US Aligning With Europe Over China, Favors De-Risking Over Decoupling, Says Top Biden Administration Official

President Joe Biden's administration is working to "de-risk," not "decouple," from Xi Jinping's China, the U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said.

What Happened: Sullivan, during a speech at the Brookings Institution in Washington, indicated that the U.S. is aligning more closely with the European Union on China, making the case that the administration's industrial strategy is crucial to competing with its geopolitical rival.

"We converged with key European leaders in saying we are for de-risking, not for decoupling."

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"De-risking fundamentally means having resilient, effective supply chains and ensuring we cannot be subject to the coercion of any other country," Sullivan said, reported Bloomberg.

Sullivan said the U.S. wants to ensure that its economy will always have access to necessary resources, regardless of events such as a global pandemic or a war. He added that export controls are particularly targeted at the technology that could potentially shift the military balance against the U.S. rather than completely cutting off trade, he said.

"These are tailored measures."

"They are not, as Beijing says, a technology blockade. They are not targeting emerging economies."

Why It Matters: Just a few weeks ago, the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, ahead of her China trip, expressed the same ideas in a policy speech in Brussels. Ursula went to Beijing with French President Emmanuel Macron to directly convey Europe's message to Chinese President Xi. In her speech, she also emphasized the “de-risking” approach, which involves reducing Europe’s dependence on China for important minerals and limiting trade in sensitive technologies such as artificial intelligence, microchips, and quantum computing.

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