Number of the day

~35% 

That’s now TSMC’s projected annual revenue growth, revised upward from the Taiwanese chipmaker’s earlier 30% estimate amid robust AI demand.

Ambass-olutely not

The UK’s Keir Starmer won power last year with a to-do list longer than Harry Styles’s One Direction-era hair, but reviving the British economy was right there up the top.

So when he met China’s Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 last year, sure, Starmer raised Hong Kong’s detained pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai, but he swiftly also dispatched his own Chancellor of the Exchequer to Beijing with verbiage around his government’s “commitment to explore deeper economic co-operation.”

But then the diplomats got in the way.

Okay record scratch. Not exactly, but embassies are involved. 

It all started with the 1648 Peace of Westphalia Beijing’s long-planned “mega embassy” on the site of the old Royal Mint, near the Tower of London. It’s a sprawling complex that’d be 10x China’s current embassy and the biggest embassy anywhere in Europe, hence the apparent requirement for every British headline to add ‘mega’.

But the project has sat in limbo since 2022, when local officials blocked planning permission over security and community concerns. Those concerns you ask? 

• The building drawings showed several areas “redacted for security reasons”, implying some kind of intelligence asset or activity

• The complex itself is located right above sensitive fibre-optic cables near London’s financial district (pssst, espionage)

• Neighbours voiced unhappiness about all the inevitable traffic and protests, and

• The broader public voiced unease at British heritage being handed over to China.

Side bar, but it’s odd China redacted its building plans. Every country that can spy, does spy. And ordinarily you just make up a cover-story for whichever part of the embassy you plan to jam full of spies and listening gear: oh, that vast, windowless, heavily fortified floor up there? Haha nothing to worry about, just the sauna!

Anyway, the local council then blocked China’s embassy plans again in 2024.

So the decision has now climbed all the way up to the (new) housing secretary, who’s attempting to stick to a 21 October deadline. And he’s in a real bind:

• China is peeved given it paid a cool £255m for the property back in 2018, and has been burning more cash every year it’s been stuck in development purgatory. Beijing is now arguing the UK is breaching its obligations under the Vienna Convention (which regulates how countries treat diplomats/embassies).

• And the US is losing patience, too: successive White Houses have warned the UK about this embassy, partly on intelligence-sharing concerns: the ‘five eyes’ (🇦🇺🇨🇦🇳🇿🇬🇧🇺🇸) arrangement is only as strong as its weakest link, and a vast London compound hoovering up every byte of data might weaken the UK link. But the US also realistically wants allies onboard in countering an increasingly assertive China.

Anyway, take your pick, Keir: keep the US happy, or keep China happy, though your economic recovery realistically involves figuring out how to keep them both happy.

And while he works on that, it’s all metastasizing into a political problem for Starmer on two fronts. First, tabloids report that China has periodically halted the water supply for British diplomats over in Beijing! That, together with China slow-walking its approval for the UK’s own embassy upgrade in Beijing, looks like a classic reciprocal pressure tactic.

But second, UK prosecutors also just abruptly dropped an explosive case against two British men both called Christopher (Christopher²) accused of spying for China, with Starmer facing claims the case collapsed after his government avoided labelling China an “enemy” in testimony.

The two tales combined are feeding into opposition claims that he’s ✌️weak on China✌️.

He’s sent his foreign office chief (Olly Robbins) to Beijing in an upcoming visit billed as routine, but the timing could not be worse. 

Anyway, that’s how the most boring diplomatic work — embassy construction paperwork — has turned into the latest proxy front for East-West relations.

Intrigue’s Take

The UK is hardly the first country to feel caught between an accelerating US-China race. Honestly, most of the world falls into that category right now.

But this one is particularly interesting for three reasons. First is the fact the UK is such a close US ally and yet in such a tough spot economically. An ally might ordinarily ease up on those Liberation Day tariffs to afford the Brits a bit more breathing room on China.

Second, it’s about an embassy — ie, we’re not just competing on the substance anymore, but also the process. It’s a reminder how all-encompassing this kind of race can be.

And third, if (as it says) China just wants this big embassy to help with “promoting understanding and the friendship between the two peoples”, it must be aware by now that this whole sorry saga is now having the exact opposite effect. But rather than course-correct, China is doubling down, and that leaves us wondering why. Sure, there’s the intel gathering and dissident monitoring. But at this stage, there’s also just testing UK resolve and Western unity.

Sound even smarter:

• There are breaking reports that China-based hackers had access to (low-medium) classified UK computer systems for over a decade.

• Earlier this year, London retook control of British Steel from its China-based owners, rushing the approval through Parliament before the owners could switch off the blast furnaces and effectively end British primary steel construction.

Meanwhile, elsewhere…

Extra Intrigue

In other worlds…

• Tech: Waymo is planning to launch its famous self-driving taxis in London next year.

• Tech (again): X has announced it’s trialling additional profile information (including a user’s country) to help folks verify account authenticity.

• Science: Check out the top 20 photos from this year’s Nikon Small World photomicrography competition.

Record of the day

As people whose job is literally “internet”, we see our fair share of wild tales.

But we were still surprised when TikTok star and cyclist Aurélien Fontenoy broke the record for fastest bike ride to the top of the Eiffel Tower. To be clear: it’s 686 steps, so he had to bunny-hop the whole way, and he did so in just 12 minutes and 30 seconds.

We haven’t seen such an arduous ascent since a non-nepo-baby career diplomat made ambassador.

Today’s poll

Yesterday’s poll: Do you think outlets should be able to report on national security leaks?

⛔ No way, leaks could harm national security (20%)
🖋️ Yep, the press must be free (79%)
✍️ Other (write in!) (1%)

Your two cents:

• 🖋️ J.P.S: “It's the government's responsibility to prevent national security leaks, and the media's job to report when the government is doing it badly.”

• ⛔ T.S: “Loose lips sink ships.”

• 🖋️ A.D: “In its own backwards way, leaks make the system safer and more secure.”

• ✍️ R.I: “Reporting on classified material related to an upcoming attack or on undercover agents can cause harm. But avoiding reporting on classified material at all can also enable fraud.”