Like autumn has arrived early at times this week. More wind and rain to come, particularly around tuesday and wednesday, it will turn cooler later in the week as well. Some showers in the forecast later today and most will ease tonight although some will return to South West England and parts of wales and some of these could well be on the heavy side. A mild night in the south but a very cool one further north, some spots in scotland out in the countryside could get down to two or three degrees. So a cool start in the northern half of the uk, one or two showers here, but a lot of dry weather and this cluster of showers will run across the midlands, east anglia and the south east before clearing away and many places will be dry into monday afternoon. Small chance of catching a shower, temperatures of 16 to 20 degrees and then we get to tuesday, a deep area of low pressure bringing some heavy rain and some unseasonably strong winds. Hello this is bbc news with the headlines. As more pupils prepare to return to the classroom englands chief medical officer says the risk to schoolchildren from coronavirus is low. Many more are likely to be harmed by not going, than harmed by going, even during this pandemic. Opposition protesters in belarus hold a big demonstration in minsk two weeks after president lukashenkos disputed election victory. President trump declares californias wildfires a major disaster releasing federal funds to victims whove lost their homes. But theres snow in south east australia the unseasonal weather triggered by antarctic air. Now on bbc news, its time for dateline london. Hello, and welcome to dateline london. This week new us sanctions on chinese telecoms giant, huawei death sentence or chance to shine . And the competence or otherwise of your ruling class the truth according to coronavirus. My guests on socially distanced screens Isobel Hilton of the website, china dialogue, ned temko of the Christian Science monitor. And here in the studio vincent ni of the bbc world service. Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win. Wisdom from chinas favourite strategy manual, the art of war. It may have been written 2,500 years ago, but chinese leaders and tech bosses may be reciting favourite sun tzu quotes at each other this weekend as the us imposes a near
blanket ban on the supply of computer chips to huawei. Ned, ill start off with you. Is this a us attempt to kill off huawei . I think even among the most hawkish voices on china in the trump administration, there is a recognition that horse has bolted, it is simply impossible to talk about destroying a company of the size and International Reach of huawei, which after all is either the second largest or largest smartphone producer in the whole world. Very much on the table is a desire to cut huawei down to size, specifically, to limit its participation, if possible to eliminate its participation, in the next generation of 56
telecommunications network, at least in western countries. There is a real concern in washington, and to a certain degree in other European Countries now, about the security implications of too great an involvement of huawei in things like 56. Although it is nominally a privately held company, it has benefited from enormous state financial support, and like any private company in an economy which is essentially controlled by the state, it is ultimately beholden to the state, to the government, and even to the Chinese Security services, so thats a real concern. The only thing i would add is that this is notjust about technology, it is not even just about trade wars it is something that has to be seen in a wider political
context because it is also about politics. We will come to that, but lets stay with huawei for a moment. Huawei has had two years under intense american pressure, has that been long enough to stockpile the chips that they need to survive . Huawei would say yes, depending on how long that would be. The Company Claims it has two years worth of chips stockpiled. Analysts would probably think that is overblown, its more like six months. I dont think that would make it any less serious even if they have there two years, because then there is the question of what happens then. Ned was describing, if you like, the first phase of us hostility to huawei, which was about trying to limit huaweis markets, so trying to exclude from 56 and so on. This is about huaweis capacity to manufacture. 90 of huaweis productions need semiconductors. When the Us Department of commerce put huaweis rivals on the list two years ago, it found itself in the same situation cut off from a supply of american chips. Four months later, the company was pretty much on its knees and xi jinping had to call donald trump and ask for a favour, which donald trump duly granted. Although huawei has not been planning for sustained hostilities, the fundamental problem remains that you cannot just switch suppliers. Huawei actually does manufacture a kind of custom made chip, but it relies on us design and licensing. It is really stymied at this
point, and so its best bet, i suppose absent an an improvement in the us china relationship, which is pretty uncertain is that the Chinese Government puts sufficient backing and sufficient initiative into developing chinas own capacity to produce these chips. So far that hasnt really worked. There are technologies that china hasnt mastered. We tend to think it is now a technological superpower, in some sectors it is. But in others, itjust isnt and its not easy. Right now, you have a situation in which no company which uses any form of Us Technology or licensing is allowed to supply huawei. In the short term, you might expect the chinese to cheat a bit. So, companies not on the entity
list, being coerced to putting their chips huaweis way. Again, that is not a solution. Vincent, what is your take on this . We havent talked about whether theres any room for retaliation from beijing in support of what, after all, is a national champion. Chinas biggest weapon is a strong consumer market. I think china will be holding off on that because we do not know who will be in the white house next year. Isobel talked about semiconductors which is really at the core of any sophisticated technology. Indeed, much of the American Investment in china is about high technology. For example, one of the larger Semiconductor Manufacturers in the world is an american company, which gained two thirds of its revenue from chinese markets. So i think china would also benefit from the existence of American Technology companies. Coming back to the point that ned made about this being part of a wider strategic front
between the us and china as the worlds two big superpowers. We obviously now have on the table, notjust huawei and big tech, notjust cancelled trade talks, but also hong kong, south china sea, taiwan, xinjiang. How will these issues play in a us president ial election . It is a fairly long menu. Im not sure in what detail each of those issues will play. What is certain is that us china relations writ large are going to be a big deal. One reason is that President Donald Trump has made china a kind of a key issue in the sense that its a way of deflecting accusations about the us federal governments
response or lack of response to the covid pandemic on to china. That is clearly been the strategy for some months now. It is now aligned with an attempt to try and paint joe biden and the democratic party, as a whole, as somehow soft on china. In a way, you have a kind of political arms race emerging in which both major parties are going to be talking a lot tougher on china. Add to that the fact that there is genuine concern and upset among, for instance, senior democrats in congress over the crackdown in hong kong, over the treatment of the uighur muslims and the confinement camps on the mainland. Generally, there is a chill in superpower relations,
which is not helped by the fact that popular views of china and the us are at a low for many years. In part due to the background effects of the covid pandemic. Isobel, going to the actual meat of the arguments between the us and china and the strategic ways that they play out and sun tzus victorious warrior analogy, is there a side that has made sure to win before going to war or is there a risk of this calculation a risk of miscalculation in washington or beijing . Can you hear me . Im sorry, i didnt realise that was for me. There is clearly miscalculation. Trump makes a lot of noise about his china policy, particularly on things like tariffs, which are damaging and paid for by the american consumer. Even this technological war, if apple loses its china market, its a big deal for them so there are definitely
missteps and own goals. I do not see much confidence on either side, quite honestly. I dont think donald trump is famous for planning. We like to think china is famous for planning, although that might be a bit overblown. On the one hand, i think xi jinping has benefited from the mistakes of the current us administration, but at the same time he has overreached. As ned said, chinas reputation around the world is pretty low. I think in terms of how china sees the situation, leaving aside its own internal difficulties, i think that china is fairly confident that its particular combination of state power and business muscle remains strong, they have this huge internal market if the worst comes
to the worst. Xi does give the impression of steady leadership, but neither leader is gaining popularity in the world. The question of Global Leadership remains contested. After all, to be a leader, you need to have willing followers. The chinese system does not appeal to many parts of the world any more than the person of donald trump appeals to any part of the world. It is easier to fix the donald trump question than the chinese system, so i guess in the long run the United States will recover its position. But i dont see this as a win for either side right now. Vincent, how do you read the situation inside china . You spend a lot of time watching the formation of policy in china. Who are the voices, who makes the policy and such a vital relationship such
as us and china . When it comes to such a relationship, it is ultimately the politburo and xi jinping who calls the shots. There is also some really interesting debate coming out of china, it is a pity it is not often covered by english language media. There is a perception outside of china that there is only one strand of thinking in china, but actually some of them have had some very thought provoking ideas on us china relations. For example, a professor who famously criticised the president. The former academic from the Central Party . Central part square, the core of the communist party ruling in the country. These are the voices that are brewing in the country, they do exist in china. Going back to isobels point, i think this is exactly
where the problem lies. At the moment, us and china leaders are trying to undermine each other with all sorts of interesting tactics, but we do not know exactly what they want. In other words, it is about lack of leadership, it is also about a lack of vision. That brings us to our second large topic of the programme. What do you want in a leader . Americans, tanzanians, new zealanders and others will ask themselves this question in elections over the coming weeks. But weve all been forced to ponder the question in the eight months since the coronavirus pandemic tested public life across the globe. Have we changed our view of what constitutes competence and have our leaders changed accordingly . Isobel . It seems to me that what we want in a leader, based on the data now emerging from the pandemic, is that you are far better off if your leader is a woman. That is more than an impression, there was a recent
study in more than 170 countries which measured pandemic performance in terms of death rate and so on. The countries led by women came out way in the front the leaders were responsive and willing to take risks, they locked down earlier and listened to the science more intelligently. They suffered fewer deaths by a factor of six in some cases, they came out earlier and stronger. Well, draw your own conclusions. The majority of countries led by men, the worst ones appeared to be brazil, the us and the uk. Again, judged on the data. What do they have in common . Well, all of these three are insurgent governments leaders who came in promising to smash the system which they claimed was not working. So they are not collaborative, they are using untested theories, and they have a very low willingness to use
the machinery of government intelligently. And you know, the machinery of government, we can complain about bureaucracy, but when the Civil Service works, it is there to stop politicians making complete idiots of themselves by pointing out their bright ideas were tried 20 years ago and it didnt work then and wont work now. Thats a very important safety net when you have an untested set of politicians. So its all a bit of a disaster. And the second factor, i would say, is that in an insurgent government, in such a government ideology tends to matter more than competence. So you tend to have loyal ministers, chosen for loyalty and not necessarily for their past performance. And when they make mistakes, as we have discovered in this country, theyre not sacked because loyalty matters more than anything. And thats a set of characteristics, honestly, you do not want in a leader. Ned . Your views on all of that . I want to build on something that isobel said. That is that it is a crucial question because we are in a period where, pre covid, there was this tide of populism, populist leaders, one strand of which was the notion that experts dont matter, the Civil Service is part of some nefarious deep state. And it drew on a kind of sense of alienation from existing institutions, distrust of government, anger. And covid has been a wake up call. And isobel is completely right. Most of the successful cases of mere competence are governments run by women, but they share other things. They have followed the science, the facts, they have communicated well, theyve told the truth to their own people. And as a result, by and large, they have brought people along with them. And thats what governments, in theory, in this pre populist age, werejudged on. And whats going to be fascinating now is whether this renewed sense that government actually matters, and that when youre faced with a crisis, particularly a crisis like covid, which cant be tweeted away, which doesnt listen to rhetoric, doesnt follow a particular ideology what you need a government to do is do itsjob. People like Jacinda Ardern in new zealand, angela merkel, with a scientific background herself in germany. And ill take one non woman example. And there arent many. After a disastrous start, the state governor of new york, in the United States,
andrew cuomo, who, by and large followed the ardern and merkel playbook which was follow the science, communicated clearly and as a result, got his own constituents and citizens to follow him. And i suppose one other women to add to the list there are a number is tsai ing wen of taiwan. Taiwan having a very notably low death rate. Vincent, i want to ask if there is a third group . We have talked about the successful a nd u nsuccessful, but is there a third group that started slow but have actually risen to the challenge . I mean, some might say that might include xi jinping of china, for example. Well, obviously, china was initially criticised for the initial handling of the coronavirus. And then china dealt with it quite well. This week, there was in image circulating on the internet in wuhan, where the virus was first reported, where thousands of people were having a pool party. This shows that china is handling quite well. There is also damage done to chinas image globally because china was the first victim of the virus, then chinese diplomats started engaging in conspiracy theories with american diplomats, and then you see this tit for tat. You know, this is time of great health and political crisis. It needs collaboration, it needs two superpowers to come together to talk about the solution, rather than engaging in this sort of tit for tat conspiracy theories. Youre not about national leadership, but Global Leadership . The absence thereof . Exactly. Given the two economies, military sizes, etc they should naturally take a Global Leadership approach when it comes to global goods, a Global Health crisis for example. And you talk about taiwan, tsai ing wen was credited for handling this crisis quite well. But a lot of credit to her deputy, a us trained
epidemiologist. We are talking about the competency of leadership, we are also talk about the competency of state institutions. On top of that, i would also say there is a trust in state institutions which it is very important. These days in asia, a lot of people are still questioning why there is still such political debate in the west when it comes to wearing face masks or not. Good question. Hasnt everyone agreed to wear a face mask now . Governments, at least. I would like to give the last few minutes of the programme to talk about a story we havent had a chance to cover yet. Ned, what has caught your eye in the past week . One thing that i think would be getting a lot more play, and credit to the bbc, the bbc is it giving some play, is the plight of alexei
navalny, the russian opposition leader, who apparently was poisoned and has now been evacuated to germany for medical care. More broadly, russian politics, which in this age of covid has gotten much less attention than it might ordinarily do. Particularly the move earlier this year by vladimir putin, the president , whom navalny has consistently criticised, to amend the constitution and in effect end term limits and give him a pathway to become president for life. Thanks for bringing that one to our attention. Isobel, what about you . Well, i have to say, i was momentarily cheered by the news this week of the arrest of steve bannon on fraud and Money Laundering charges. Only perhaps balanced
by the fact that that the woman who supports the conspiracy theories of qanon was succeeded in getting a nomination for a congressional seat. So you have got this extraordinary persistence of very, very wild conspiracy theories, which pretty much, you know, steve bannon was instrumental in laying the ground for all of that in his earlier career. And i think its absolutely characteristic that in at the end he would be brought down, if proved to be his downfall, through rather cheap fraud perpetrated on a rather gullible public. Allegations, charges at the moment, rather than a conviction. And we should also say in the case of the navalny, sudden sickness, that is suspected poisoning, not yet confirmed by medical staff. Vincent, what about you . Is there been a story that has jumped out for you . I have been paying a lot of attention to belarus. President lukashenko has vowed to crush these protests in the next few days. This is quite unfortunate if it happens. Today, we have been talking a lot about sun tzu and his wisdom, talking about the art of winning a war, but he also has something to say about the art of leadership. He said that a good leader leads by example, not by force. In this day and age, its very easy for authoritarian leaders to threaten their population with using state forces. But then we have also seen in the past these tactics often backfire. So words of wisdom found in china notjust applies to china, but also to europe. And that lu kashenko point, though. Congratulations on his victory from beijing and from moscow. Yep. Whatever sun tzu thought 2,500 years ago, the fact that the domination of force in your country can secure you all kinds of victories. Yeah, absolutely. This speaks to the world were living in today. We have a rise in authoritarian leadership which has loosely formed a camp in supporting each other when it comes to crises. But we have also seen, at the same time, the west is trying to form alliances with themselves to counter countries like china or russia. And at the moment, there is no Global Leadership. And what we have seen is camps and alliances with each other. And a quick word on that, belarus. Going back to the russian story that ned was talking about. Isobel, a word on that situation and what the outside world does about russia . How many seconds do i have to solve the russia problem . Any sign of any kind of organisational coherence from europe and north
america on the issue . Ithink, actually, the eu is becoming increasingly coherent in its approach both to russia and china. And as the us electoral season gets under way, i think increasingly the steady ship in global diplomacy is going to be europe. And ned, a line from you to close . I just think this underlines the importance of the november president ial election, because among the many things on the ballot is the contrast between trumps kind of go it alone foreign policy, if you can call it that, and a more traditional approach which joe biden and the democrats when it is likely to begin with a reinvigoration of old alliances. We have to leave it there. Ned, isobel and vincent, thank you all three so much. And thats it for dateline london for this week back next week, same
place, same time. Goodbye. Hello. There are still a fair few days of august remaining but as far as the weather is concerned, its going to feel like autumn has arrived early at times this week. More wind and rain to come, particularly around tuesday and wednesday, it will turn cooler later in the week as well. Some showers in the forecast later today and most will ease tonight although some will return to South West England and parts of wales and some of these could well be on the heavy side. A mild night in the south but a very cool one further north, some spots in scotland out in the countryside could get down
to two or three degrees. So a cool start in the northern half of the uk, one or two showers here, but a lot of dry weather and this cluster of showers will run across the midlands, east anglia and the south east before clearing away and many places will be dry into monday afternoon. Small chance of catching a shower, temperatures of 16 to 20 degrees and then we get to tuesday, a deep area of low pressure bringing some heavy rain and some unseasonably strong winds. This is bbc news the headlines at 5pm as more pupils prepare to return to the classroom, englands chief medical officer says the risk to schoolchildren from coronavirus is low. Many more are likely to be harmed by not going than harmed by going, even during this pandemic. Chanting opposition protesters in belarus hold a big demonstration in minsk two weeks after president lukashenkos disputed election victory. 00 00 00,000 4294966103 13 29,430 assay. Gs. ess fag. r §sarg s. S. Gfir ~ ~ ~ ~ ~