America is in a new Cold War with China and ports are at the center of the conflict, according to foreign policy experts.  

“China has truly a global portfolio of ports worldwide,” said Alex Wooley, communications director for a research lab at William and Mary that does in-depth research on Chinese investments.  

China is currently financing over 180 port projects around the globe at 93 unique ports that are worth about $32 billion, Wooley explained at an event at The Heritage Foundation in the District of Columbia on Thursday. Among these ports that AidData has identified, a third are in high income countries, he said, and 40% are in Europe.  

The large amount of port projects are evidence of China’s “long game” strategy, according to Wooley.   

“While the U.S. was largely paying attention to other areas of the world, China was patiently building these long-term relationships with countries to build ports,” he said. 

China is “everywhere,” Wooley said, adding that he and the researchers at AidData have discovered an interesting shift in China’s foreign investments.  

“There’s an increasing decline of Chinese aid, what would traditionally be called foreign aid, and instead, there’s a movement toward financing, typical sort of loans and commercial interest rates, to high income countries,” Wooley said. The trend reveals that China is “moving to very exotic financing instruments, in part because that evades detection, evades transparency.”  

The research institute has also found that China is working to gain a stake in “critical infrastructure assets,” such as airports and critical minerals. To this end, port assets are a â€œdouble win” for China, he said. 

“The ports are an end in itself because it sort of reaffirms China’s maritime dominance, or attempt to being dominant, and also provide for means by which they get these critical commodities and minerals, etc., to China,” Wooley explained.  

China, according to the researcher, is likely driven by a desire for profit in building the ports, but even more so, a motive for strategic geopolitical power. China could use the ports as naval facilities in the future.  

China has spent decades building its global influenced through port projects and at this point, the U.S. will have to “pick and choose” how to compete with China on this front because “it’s difficult to catch up,” he said.  

The U.S. needs to think strategically, including regarding where to establish new military bases, but most important is that the U.S. not waiver in the action it chooses to take to address the growing threat of China’s port control, Wooley says, because China is doubling down.  

Brent Sadler, a senior research fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for National Security and author of “Naval Power in Action,” said the South China Sea is the most import location for the U.S. to prioritize its maritime presence right now, followed by the eastern Mediterranean.  

“China has banked a lot of their future global vision in controlling or having access to Europe,” Sadler said. “It’s a huge economy. It’s also one in which could influence what happens in Eurasia, so they want to have that. That’s that Maritime Silk Road, … so if you can challenge that, you’re going to draw their attention, their resources, to that region,” which would be strategic for the U.S., Sadler explained.  

From an economic perspective, it is critical that shipping “remains free and open,” the Heritage researcher said, “and so I think it behooves all of us that there is stability and strong governments that don’t threaten international trade.”  

In the future, when entering into agreement with China, Sadler said the free world needs to see the country for what it is, a nation that is not interested in advancing democracy, or free markets for that matter.  

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