By 1news.co.nz
China, which is increasingly flexing its muscles around the world, is one of the biggest threats to Britain and its allies, and a āmiscalculation” by Beijing could lead to war, the head of the UK’s foreign intelligence agency said on Wednesday (NZ time).
MI6 chief Richard Moore said that China, Russia, Iran and international terrorism make up the ābig fourā security issues facing Britain’s spies in an unstable world where both countries and illicit organisations are racing to exploit fast-changing information technology.
In his first public speech since becoming head of the Secret Intelligence Service, also known as MI6, in October 2020, Moore said China is the intelligence agency’s āsingle greatest priorityā as the Beijing leadership increasingly backs ābold and decisive actionā to further its interests.
Calling China āan authoritarian state with different values than ours,ā he said Beijing conducts ālarge-scale espionage operationsā against the UK and its allies, tries to ādistort public discourse and political decision-makingā and exports technology that enables a āweb of authoritarian controlā around the world.
āBeijingās growing military strength and the (Chinese Communist) partyās desire to resolve the Taiwan issue, by force if necessary, also pose a serious challenge to global stability and peace,” Moore said.
The self-ruled island of Taiwan split from mainland China in 1949, and Beijing still claims it as part of its territory.
āBeijing believes its own propaganda about Western frailties and under-estimates Washingtonās resolve,” Moore added.
“The risk of Chinese miscalculation through overconfidence is real.ā
Moore said the UK also continues āto face an acute threat from Russia”. He said Moscow has sponsored killing attempts, such as the poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal in England in 2018, mounts cyberattacks and interferes in other countriesā democratic processes.
āWe and our allies and partners must stand up to and deter Russian activity which contravenes the international rules-based system,ā the MI6 chief said.
āNo country in Europe or beyond should be seduced into thinking that unbalanced concessions to Russia bring better behaviour,” he said, noting Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine and its recent buildup of troops near the border with Ukraine.
His comments are the latest warnings from senior British and NATO officials aimed at deterring Moscow from further incursions in Ukraine.
Moore said Iran also poses a major threat, and uses the political and militant group Hezbollah ā āa state within a stateā ā to fuel political turmoil in neighbouring countries.
Turning to non-state threats, he said the fall of Afghanistanās internationally backed government and the return to power of the Taliban were a āmorale boostā to militants.
āI won’t soft soap it: The threat we face will likely grow now we have left Afghanistan,” Moore said ā though he claimed it would be āoverblownā to call the surprise speed of the Taliban’s takeover a Western intelligence failure.
He argued that Britainās spies must give up some of their deep-rooted secrecy and seek help from technology firms to win a cybersecurity arms race that is giving hostile countries and groups ever more capacity.
Moore, speaking at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, said the disruptive potential of artificial intelligence and other rapidly developing technologies means the spy agency has to ābecome more open to stay secretā in a world of destabilizing technological change.
āOur adversaries are pouring money and ambition into mastering artificial intelligence, quantum computing and synthetic biology, because they know that mastering these technologies will give them leverage,ā Moore said.
He used China as an example of a country that harvests data on a vast scale to gain information and power.
To keep up, he said British spies āare now pursuing partnerships with the tech community to help develop world-class technologies to solve our biggest mission problems”.
āUnlike Q in the Bond movies, we cannot do it all in-house,ā Moore added, referring to the fictional MI6 gadget-maker in the 007 thrillers.
Moore said working with the private sector is a āsea changeā for an organization enmeshed in secrecy.
Until 1992, Britainās government refused to confirm the existence of MI6. The organisation has gradually become more open in recent years, even allowing publication of an authorised history — though it only goes up to 1949.
MI6 began publicly naming its chief, who uses the code name C, in the 1990s, and Moore is the first head of the service with a Twitter account