Former Ambassador Sam Brownback: The World Needs a New Cold War Against the CCP

Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback speaks at the Department of State in Washington on June 21, 2019. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

The world needs a new cold war against communist China, according to former Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback.

“One of the things that’s taking place now is we’re getting in a cold war stance against China,” Brownback told EpochTV’s “Crossroads” program. “We need to confront them as aggressively as we confronted the Soviet Union for those decades, facing-off in that Cold War.”

“We’re in the same position now. Only I think China’s a tougher opponent than what the Soviet Union was,” Brownback added.

Brownback said he loves China and the Chinese people, and he has an adopted daughter from China. But he criticized the Chinese regime’s oppression of human rights in Hong Kong, and of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang.

The Trump administration said the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had detained over a million Uyghurs in Xinjiang and declared it had committed “genocide” and “crimes against humanity” against Uyghurs and other minorities. The Biden administration has maintained this stance.

It’s also reported that the CCP has used prisoners of conscience, especially Falun Gong practitioners, as living sources for forced organ transplants, which Brownback called “almost unbelievable.”

The Biden administration announced on Dec. 6 a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics over human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

Brownback said the diplomatic boycott does not go far enough.

“I don’t think it’s far enough. But I think it’s a great step. I’m glad they’re doing it,” he said.

“It is a huge, huge success to go from a Republican to a Democrat administration and maintain a policy continuity on this big of an issue,” Brownback continued. “So then it means Republicans said this; the Democrats agreed with this. And now you’ve got a united country standing against the Chinese communists. And that’s a very big thing. I would love to see that the Biden administration be more robust about it.”

However, the Biden administration has repeatedly called the Chinese regime a competitor instead of an adversary.

“I don’t know if [the Biden administration] would call it a cold war like I’ve called it,” Brownback said, “but I think we’ve just got to continue to build that and then build the cohesiveness of us as the United States and the free world, to stand against the Chinese. That’s now the ticket we’ve got to do. We’ve got to get the Europeans, the other freedom-loving nations. And then finally, we got to fight for Africa, in the developing world. That’s where the Chinese have gone in to get resources and to buy off people and to get influence.”

Tibetans, Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Hongkongers, Southern Mongolians, Taiwanese, and Chinese democracy activists join together to call on governments to stand against the Chinese Communist Party’s suppression of freedom, democracy, and human rights, in front of the United Nations headquarters in New York City on Oct. 1, 2020. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

Brownback explained that he takes such a strong stance because he saw the evils of communism.

“It’s the same fight. We just got a tougher opponent,” Brownback said. “It offends me, and I’m in a position to be able to say something about it.”

“And it’s not about the Chinese people, as I said earlier, mentioned that one of my children is Chinese, and I love her dearly. I love the Chinese people. They’re wonderful people. But this government, this atheistic, communist, totalitarian regime, headed by a dictator in the image of Mao—Xi Jinping—is wrong for their country now. It’s wrong. Period. And certainly wrong for the world.”

In July 2020, Brownback, along with Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), and Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), were sanctioned by the Beijing regime in retaliation for the United States punishing Chinese officials, including Chen Quanguo, the head of Xinjiang, for their human rights violations in the region.

“It’s a badge of honor to me,” Brownback said, referring to Beijing’s sanction. “We cannot as a free world stand around and let the Chinese communists do what they’re doing. It’s past time.”

“This is the time to stand up against China. So I’m honored to have been in this fray, and I’m going to keep in this fray.”