Sullivan Urges Trump Team to Focus on China Cyber Threats

(Bloomberg) -- National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said China would face severe consequences if it launches a cyberattack that causes physical destruction in the US, and deterring such a move should be a priority for the incoming Trump administration. 

Sullivan said the US has evidence that China is prepositioning for just such an attack at some point in the future, underscoring past concerns from US officials. He spoke in an interview at the Bloomberg News bureau in Washington on Monday.

“We’ve sent a clear message to China’s leaders that if they did that — if they actually took a physically destructive cyber attack in the United States — that there would be severe consequences,” Sullivan said. “We’re going to have to continue to deter China from doing that because we have seen them setting up or positioning to be able to do that in the future. That’s something the new team will have to continue to work on internally.”

Sullivan’s warning follows a series of high-profile attacks by Chinese hackers against US agencies and companies, including a breach reported in recent weeks into the computers of senior US Treasury Department leaders. Before that, US officials had blamed a series of other espionage campaigns on China, including one targeting US telecommunications companies.

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He said the recent hacks are “dramatic in their scope and scale and we take them deadly seriously.”

Sullivan, who will step down when Biden leaves office on January 20, argued that his team has left President-elect Donald Trump in a better position to confront China in the four years since taking over from him. He cited moves made to protect technology and support alliances while avoiding conflict.

At the same time, he made clear that the work was nowhere near complete. Another priority, Sullivan said, is a concern around supplies of critical minerals that go into electric-vehicle batteries and semiconductors. He said the US and Europe should work together on a critical minerals marketplace so China can’t choke off supplies.

“That’s something that I have made the case to the incoming administration to really work on,” Sullivan said. “We took some modest steps in that direction, but I think we have a long way to go to be secure in our supply chains on critical minerals.”

Sullivan said that after Vice President Kamala Harris’s election loss, Biden had directed his team to work closely with Trump’s incoming staff. He and his successor, Representative Mike Waltz of Florida, speak regularly.

“I’m going to root for their success because their success is our success,” Sullivan said.

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