Successive US governments have been actively working to limit Chinese companies’ involvement in the laying of underwater fiber optic cables connecting the world to the internet, a comprehensive analysis by business media has found.
The US strategy, which includes (but is not limited to) freezing Chinese companies out of undersea internet cable projects where US investment is involved, is reportedly being justified on the basis of claims about China’s potential use of the cables for espionage, as well as concerns about what might happen to Chinese-operated cables if the US and China found themselves at war.
China has responded to US obstruction by forging links in places where the US and its French and Japanese allies haven’t reached, such as remote southern Chile, the Russian Far East, Southeast Asia and a major connection between South America and Africa via cables running from Brazil to Cameroon. According to industry sources, Beijing has also worked to grow its fleet of Chinese-made cable layers and maintenance vessels, and pushed companies whose cables run through Chinese waters, including in the South China Sea, to use cable made by HMN Tech –China's largest fiber optic cable supplier.
Washington has taken its ‘no China’ strategy to great lengths, reportedly rendering infrastructure worth “hundreds of millions of dollars” unused at the bottom of the sea after forcing Amazon and Meta to drop a major cable deal with China Mobile which would have linked the state of California up to Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong, refusing to sign off on the nearly completed project even after China Mobile pulled out.
The US has also worked to pressure third parties, forcing the World Bank to scrap plans to connect up Pacific island nations to prevent a Chinese company from getting the contract in 2021, and then working to stop a vast, 19,000 km-long connection running from East Asia to India, the Middle East and Mediterranean countries from being built using HMN Tech cable.
Even when the US has not been directly involved, tensions between Washington and Beijing have reportedly forced some countries to seek to avoid projects involving Chinese cable, presumably in an attempt to avoid US economic or political penalties.
US efforts have successfully limited China’s internet cable-laying reach, despite the dramatic advances the Asian nation has made in recent decades into a high technology powerhouse. HMN Tech presently accounts for just a tenth of the world’s undersea cable infrastructure, while French cable giant ASN accounts for a whopping 41 percent, and US-based SubCom 21 percent.
Washington’s strategy is said to be fraught with numerous risks, including the prospect of a divided internet at some point in the future.
Furthermore, China has reportedly managed to poke holes in US restrictions, with Chinese-owned and operated vessels contracted to engage in repair work involving US-owned cables. Meanwhile, direct connections between Chinese and US IP network operators continue to rise steadily – a prospect that should terrify Washington officials engaged in anti-China spy mania.
The world is being connected by 500+ major active and under construction underwater internet cables, which stretch nearly 1.4 million kilometers in total.