Chinese wet market, like the one where COVID-19 originated. Photo credit: Flickr
By Jon Dougherty @TheNatSent
(TNS) Increasingly, diplomats, politicians, pundits, and analysts are calling for some sort of action against China to hold it ‘accountable’ for the creation and spread of Wuhan coronavirus.
The kind of action preferred this far appears to be some form of “legal” accountability. Like with lawsuits.
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Marc Thiessen of the Washington Post is the latest pundit to offer up this solution. He writes:
The costs of the pandemic keep piling up. Hundreds of millions of Americans are on lockdown, a record 16.8 million have filed unemployment claims, nearly 15,000 Americans have died so far and the death toll is growing exponentially by the day. Congress has passed three coronavirus relief bills totaling $2.3 trillion, and more might soon be in the works.
Somebody has to pay for this unprecedented damage. That somebody should be the government of China. …
It took Beijing more than two months after the first case appeared to impose that lockdown. That coverup had deadly consequences. A University of Southampton study found that if Beijing acted just three weeks sooner, the number of covid-19 cases might have been reduced by 95 percent — which would have prevented a pandemic.
And China’s lies and obstruction are ongoing. The U.S. intelligence community has reportedly concluded that Beijing is underreporting both total cases and deaths it has suffered from covid-19 — denying U.S. scientists accurate data they need to understand how the virus behaves. This is more than mere negligence; it is active disinformation and obstruction.
Thiessen goes on to note, accurately, that China’s cover-up is continuing, as noted by U.S. intelligence reports. He also mentions that there is increasing evidence that the virus might have inadvertently escaped a Chinese Level 4 bioresearch lab, the only one in the country — which is located in Wuhan city, COVID-19’s place of origin.
He continues:
China must be held to account for its lies and obstruction. U.S. health-care workers and business owners recently filed the first lawsuits against the Chinese Communist Party for its complicity in this pandemic. Congress should help them and others by lifting China’s statutorily granted sovereign immunity and allowing the individuals and businesses harmed by China’s actions to sue Beijing for damages.
There is precedent for doing so. In 2016, Congress passed the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which permitted victims and survivors to sue Saudi Arabia for complicity in the 9/11 attacks. Because of Beijing’s lies, we are now in the midst of a pandemic 9/11. The victims should have a right to sue China for these damages.
China would not be able to ignore such lawsuits. As former Justice Department official David Rivkin told me, “Once default judgments are obtained, they can be used to seize any Chinese commercial assets, including any proceeds of Chinese exports anywhere in the world.†But, Rivkin says, the benefit is not just recovery of money damages for the victims. “Litigation discovery,†he said, “is a great vehicle for fact-finding.†We have only scratched the surface of China’s complicity in this pandemic. The best way to uncover the truth might be through the U.S. legal system.Â
Others have made similar arguments. But while this might be the Kennedy School of Government’s preferred answer in a Foreign Policy 101 course, it’s lunacy.
The Chinese have been ‘taken to court’ in the past. In 2016, the five-judge Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration “issued a highly anticipated and unanimous award in Republic of Philippines v. People’s Republic of China, a case filed in 2013 by Manila concerning maritime entitlements and the status of features in the South China Sea, among other issues,” The Diplomat reported.
The case involved China’s outsized claim to virtually all of the South China Sea, where it was already busy constructing and arming manmade islands to enforce those claims.
The ruling was meaningless because while the Philippines ‘won’ the case, they — and the international court — lacked an enforcement mechanism.
China continued its island construction and to this day continues using ‘gray zone’ power to influence its neighbors and enforce its own policies in the region. What will the Philippines do — go to war against China? Because that’s all that’s left. And that’s national suicide.
So what makes western pundits and analysts think that Beijing would respond to lawsuits, even if it loses? Are these people serious when they suggest the United States seize billions of dollars’ worth of China state-owned property and assets? Do they really believe China won’t retaliate — which could lead to war?
That said, there are viable solutions, and others have suggested them, including Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.).
A Harvard-trained lawyer, former U.S. Army infantry officer, Iraq war veteran, and China hawk, believes China should “pay” for what it’s done, but not through bogus lawsuits it will simply ignore, or the taking of Chinese assets which will result in tit-for-tat retaliation against American assets and possibly even lead to war.
Cotton wants China to ‘pay’ by moving American manufacturing out of the country, especially the production of vital products like pharmaceuticals.
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“The Chinese Communist Party has threatened to cut off America’s access to vital drugs in the midst of a pandemic caused by its own failures. It’s time to pull America’s supply chains for life-saving medicine out of China and make the CCP pay for contributing to this global emergency,” Cotton said last month.
Already, American firms were moving out of China as a result of President Trump’s tariff trade policies, as we have reported. In addition, Japan announced last week it would help pay the cost of relocating Japanese companies out of China.
Getting China to ‘pay’ for the miserable way it handled the spread of this deadly virus by refusing to behave like a first-world country in a world of countries definitely should become a foreign policy priority.
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But the way to do isn’t to seize Chinese assets but rather shift American manufacturing out of China and back to our own soil. This will deprive the ChiComs of revenue while bolstering our economy and employing our workers, thereby repaying us for their viral pandemic.
We should be doing this anyway, given the Chinese regime’s constant hacking of our military and industrial secrets and their attempt to monopolize one of the world’s most profitable trade routes.
Trump started the process long before coronavirus; he should definitely finish it.
GOT SOMETHING TO SAY? COMMENT BELOW
America First — is what President Trump is all about.
I’ve hated red Chinko demonfuckers for 50 years. It’s easy.
You mean like when Democrat lawyers sued Tobacco for $250 million 20 years ago and then kept it to themselves…
but made sure the states made their citizens foot the bill with exorbitant taxes that the lawyers are still taking a cut from ?
shhhhhhh…. we don’t really want you to quit’
Yeah, let’s do that again.
You got it right: this is the sort of endless game lawyers feed on for years and endless years–and on our dime.
…the Anti – Made in USA, job killing regulations that Democrats slipped into their UnStimulus Bill.
They did it out of spite, too. Just to make Obama’s ” Those Jobs Aren’t ever Coming Back ” dream come true again.
Why would China respond to charges of reparations?
Maybe the threat of wiping out all the US (and other) debt they hold?
Lead to war? While China may have one of the largest military in the world,they have nowhere near the logistics and heavy transport, navy and air power the US and Western allies have.
They are still, by and large, a regional power.
Nuclear option? well, it would be horrible for all, MAD doctrine does not bode well for them.
At least not yet.
If we can sue China, then U.S. businesses can sue the CDC, WHO and their Governor for possible over-reaction and manipulation of data that destroyed private property, ie. business. I agree with this article 100%. Use some of the stimulus to bring back businesses is a reasonable idea. This is yet another horrible legacy of Globalism; trusting those who cannot be trusted. You cannot go into business with people who lie, cheat and steal. The most alarming part in this piece is the allusion to the genesis of this virus. Much has been speculated about a biochemical virus versus one… Read more »
Sadly the like of Tim Cook if you could pry him out of China will simply move to another slave labor schite hole country. He will continue to add to his corporate and personal billions…and we will still over pay more and more for his products. We are repeatedly told how much we are saving in labor costs..anyone think of ANYTHING that comes from China or Vietnam or Indonesia or that is hecho in Mexico or Honduras that is cheaper than it was 10 years ago…or even the same price. Anyone? Anyone?
Back in the early’80’s when companies were feverishly sending their jobs and intellectual property to China, any idiot could see that it was akin to setting up a manufacturing facility in 1930’s Germany.
Trouble with Trump is he speaks out of both sides. On the one hand he’s allegedly bringing the companies back. On the other, he’s constantly ‘hoping’ a 600 billion ‘agricultural’ deal with China will be ‘honored’. China already owns or has control of ranches, farms and real estate all over North America. We want to encourage this development? Seems more than a bit flakey.
Just put a 10% Covid tariff on all Chinese imports to the US until further notice. Companies would likely relocate much manufacturing out of China and this would encourage them. Any retaliatory tariffs from China just gets added on top of the 10%
I had a similar idea. A small on-going tariff on anything coming from China to repay us for their evil.
18 March 2020 It’s Time to Quarantine the Chinese Communist Party https://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2020/03/18/hayward-its-time-to-quarantine-the-chinese-communist-party/ quote “As nations across the world struggle to contain the Wuhan coronavirus, they should realize it is also long past time to quarantine the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The people of China must understand that their future under the Communist Party is as outcasts, lepers, pariahs – isolated and quarantined by the civilized world. If that is not the future they want, the time to rise up and overthrow the Communists is now.” – It’s not a matter of “should be done” .. it’s a matter of “will… Read more »
Bring back American manufacturing !
This battle cry comes up every so often, then fades away.
This latest episode will be no different.
A widget made in Ching-Chong
$20
A widget made in U.S.A.
$40
Sorry to be pessimistic.
I give President Trump an A for effort, though.
Simple. Add tariffs sufficient to make Sino-crap cost 20% more than any similar American made product. Use the tariffs to create a fund to help American manufacturers rebuild our industry they have stolen. Treat this as though we were at war, for in reality that is now the situation. The Chi-com is using bio-warfare because they know they would be decimated in a real shooting war. We should take them down now, fast and hard. They cannot match our Pacific Fleet, they have no long range transport capability. We have stealth aircraft that can achieve air superiority and area denial… Read more »
rEALLY VERY SIMPLE. Cut off all energy and food shipments to the Red Chinese. Allow no commerce to leave that enslaved nation. Wait six months and let the turmoil begin there.
he got for asking his dad to look the other way at Chinese Dumping at every major port in America for 8 years ?
oh, he’s probably in SanFran Cesspool awaiting another shipment of fenced goods.
…or asking the Chinese to make a hit on his stripper gf.
THIS DOCUMENTARY reveals, (for the 1st time), HOW “SARS” / “Coronavirus” / Covid-19 were developed, as well as WHERE, & WHEN, & WHY…Watch it by scrolling towards the bottom, until you see a man’s image, AND the “DOCU” image:
https://hnewswire.com/this-should-trouble-us-deeply-chilling-documentary-maps-out-likely-origin-of-covid-19-the-who-is-evil/
This is what i have been advocating for quite a while.
[…] Calls to ‘hold China legally liable’ for coronavirus are moronic: Here’s what REALLY needs to … […]
I say … we must detach for China entirely. They need us more than we need them. Let them drown in their bat soup.
All western interests must get OUT OF CHINA!
We must boycott those who do not.
While we were ‘sleeping’ the globalists have taken over the bulk of our country, all fair and square, through our capitalist system. What’s gone is gone. Bring back Made in the U.S.A. depends on fresh new domestic start-ups that are PRIVATELY held. Go PUBLIC and the globalists will swallow you up.
We have to move fast. President Trump will be out of office in 4 short years. He will do all he can to make it attractive to start small and mid-size companies.
I TOTALLY AGREE WITH SENATOR COTTON, AND HAVE BEEN WRITING COMMENTS AT VARIOUS WEBSITES FOR MONTHS NOW STATING AS MUCH… AND THAT TRUMP HAS BELIEVED THIS FOR A COUPLE OF DECADES NOW. I ALSO THINK IT WOULD BE WISE TO STOP THE INFILTRATION OF SOMEWHERE BETWEEN 100,000 AND 200,000 CHINESE STUDENTS ADMITTED AND ALLOWED TO ATTEND OUR COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES. ALL THIS DOES IS FEED THE CHINESE SYSTEM OF TAKING OVER THE WORLD… AND AT OUR EXPENSE. THIS IS AS IDIOTIC AS AMERICAN FIRMS ALLOWING THE CHINESE TO STEAL OUR PROPERTY RIGHTS WHEN WE SET UP OUR COMPANIES IN CHINA.… Read more »
They should lose hold on our treasuries also. If we no longer owe on that debt we will be in a greater position.
Reactivate older, decommissioned U.S. subs and their deck guns. Start surreptitiously ‘picking off’ China’s “fishing boats” one by one.
By the time the CCP can react to their diminishing food/intelligence supply, they’ll have a rioting, hungry populace.
BDS China. No tarriffs, instead prohibit Chinese made products and any products made in China by US corporations. If you make it in China, then it stays in China.
Any US biz that continues to do biz with communists…remove their corporate charter and hold the officers of the biz liable in civil court.
Why bother “suing” the Chinese? With the courts of law in shambles, it would take several years just to sue, plus another few years of trial. We should just simply freeze their assets here (trillions of USDs) as they own so much of our industrial infrastructure, technology, politicians, and our educational system. Freeze and nationalize, cut diplomatic relations, and let them go back to the old times in the 60s when they were dying of hunger. The Chinese are not, and have never been our friends.