A contentious foreign policy decision is coming to a head in London, with major implications for US national security. The British government is expected to announce next Tuesday a decision on the Chinese government’s plans to construct a new super embassy complex on the site of the former Royal Mint. And in recent months, Keir Starmer’s Labour government announced its determination to complete the hand-off of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, a China-friendly government located 1,250 miles away.
The Donald Trump administration needs to do all it can to ensure these major errors, which would pose major espionage risks for one of Washington’s closest allies, do not become reality.
The so-called embassy, which would be China’s largest in Europe, “sits astride a treasure trove of key information infrastructure: fiber optics cables servicing London financial firms and a telephone exchange serving the city.”
Unredacted plans leaked this week detail 208 secret rooms in the planned complex, including one directly beneath potentially sensitive communications cables. At ground level, one embassy wall would be just a single yard from these crucial lines.
China’s obvious interest in tapping these cables is further belied by plans for large-scale air-extraction systems in the adjacent secret room, likely to help cool computer equipment used to spy on financial flows.
For months, China has been pressuring London to approve the plans, holding up permits for the United Kingdom to upgrade its embassy in Beijing and even turning off the water taps on the British diplomats stationed there.
President Donald Trump warned the UK last spring that approving the new Chinese embassy would endanger US-UK intelligence sharing. In June, a senior US official stated, “The United States is deeply concerned about providing China with potential access to the sensitive communications of one of our closest allies.”
Such push-back undoubtedly led to the UK’s decision to delay approval; now, however, no further delays seem to be forthcoming. But despite the immense risk, the UK prime minister is expected to capitulate to the Chinese government’s demands.
Starmer is currently planning the first visit to China by a UK prime minister since 2018 and is actively seeking UK business executives to join the delegation. Rejecting China’s building application would surely result in the trip’s cancellation, which would deal a significant blow to Starmer’s economic and diplomatic agenda.
Yet if there is one leader who holds more sway in London than Xi Jinping, it is Trump.
The Anglo-American financial system is deeply interconnected. Allowing China a viewing platform to understand these vital flows is an unacceptable risk that the White House should be hammering home to Downing Street every day until a decision is announced.
Xi has no qualms about muscling Starmer into approving this espionage hub; Trump should likewise use US muscle to stop the madness.
In a similar unforced error, the Starmer government remains intent on handing over the Chagos Islands to China-friendly Mauritius. Not only is this plan foolish from a security perspective, but the Chagossians themselves oppose the handover.
Yet the Labour government in London remains intent on seeing the agreement through, despite facing a series of humiliating defeats in the House of Lords over amendments questioning the deal’s cost, legality, and prudence.
The Trump administration, for its part, should reverse previous American support for an agreement that fundamentally undermines US national interests.
Mauritian control of the Chagos may threaten America’s ability to fully utilize the British base at Diego Garcia, which is particularly important for nuclear-equipped Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines in the future. Furthermore, China will search for ways to build its own presence in the archipelago, and its ravenous fishing fleet could one day rampage in Chagos waters.
Prior to Monday’s House of Lords vote, a group of senior UK military leaders wrote that handing over the Chagos Islands is “possibly the most serious military-strategic error since the Suez Crisis.”
They are correct, with profound consequences for American security as well.
The British government is set to push through two strategic blunders that benefit China and undermine US-UK relations.
Rather than sit idly by the White House, Congress should launch a strong, concerted effort to squash the Starmer government’s self-defeating decisions, hand a defeat to Beijing, and strengthen the future security of the United States. Time is of the essence.