The Chinese Foreign Ministry reacted very strongly to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s Aug. 5 press statement presenting his five-point program called Clean Path, which would cut all Chinese communication systems in or with the U.S., and more. It can be read as a declaration of decoupling and economic warfare, leading to military confrontation, if Pompeo were allowed to carry it out.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin responded to a question on Clean Path in his Aug. 6 press briefing:
“Pompeo and his likes have time and again abused state power to bring down Chinese high-tech companies under the pretext of national security, to which China is firmly opposed. The U.S. practice has no factual basis at all and is sheer malicious slander and political manipulation in an attempt to maintain its high-tech monopoly. This is a typical hegemonic behavior that runs against market principles and international trade rules and severely threatens the security of global industrial and supply chains.
