AUKUS alliance ‘unnerved’ China’s President Xi Jinping: Condoleezza Rice

The establishment of a new military alliance would have rightly ‘unnerved’ China’s President Xi Jinping, a former US secretary of state says.

The establishment of AUKUS would have unnerved President Xi Jinping, a former US secretary of state said.

A former US secretary of state has taken aim at China’s “outsized” ambitions in a discussion about the importance the AUKUS alliance will have on stability in the Indo-Pacific.

In conversation with Australia’s longest-serving foreign minister Alexander Downer, former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice said it was only natural that the UK, the US and Australia came together to counter China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific.

“I love the idea of the Quad, I think that the Chinese don’t particularly: they were actually unnerved by the notion of Australia, India, Japan and the United States,” she said at the Policy Exchange forum.

Condoleezza Rice said President Xi Jinping’s ambitions could be a thorn in the leaders’ sides.

“I think they will be equally unnerved by Australia, Great Britain and the United States because you bring real weight, militarily, technologically in terms of intelligence and the UK is really quite a powerhouse in those areas, whether it’s military, technology or intelligence.

“I think it has the potential to really shape the Indo-Pacific, along with Japan and Korea and India, in ways that make it difficult for China to reach some of its ambitions

“I’m hoping that it really doesn’t just find footing but that it reaches its full potential, which I think is significant.”

Mr Downer said his vision was for the AUKUS alliance to put China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific region in check.

“I think AUKUS will contribute to a better power balance in the Indo-Pacific. And I think if you have a better power balance in the Indo-Pacific, it’s not to contain China but it’s to constrain China. You will have a more peaceful region,” he told the forum.

Mr Downer added that China had done itself no favours on the world stage in acting against the interests of the Chinese people.

China’s President Xi Jinping had torn up the script on how leaders should act, Ms Rice said. Picture: Nicolas Asfouri / Pool / AFP

“I think they have run one of the worst foreign policies I’ve ever seen by any foreign country in the last three or four years by alienating what you might broadly describe as the West … and leading them to rally to balance China’s power,” he said.

“It’s not really in the interests of the Chinese people for the government to have led the rest of the world to rally against them.”

Mr Rice agreed, noting that Xi Jinping’s “outsized ambitions” has led to questionable policies.

“Sometimes authoritarians make really bad policy,” she said. “And when there's only one person in Xi Jinping who really matters, they have a single point of failure, and they make big mistakes”.

On Taiwan, Ms Rice predicted Beijing would mirror Vladimir Putin’s strategy in Eastern Ukraine by using paramilitary forces and acts of sabotage to destabilise the nation.

“There was a fistfight in the Taiwanese parliament a few weeks ago and I wondered to myself did that really happen between the people of Taiwan or was that something that was provoked from the outside?’’ she said.