Under extreme pressure from the US, China has not slowed nor faltered in its development of 5G wireless technology, and this makes some US elites uneasy. 

Less than a week after China issued 5G licenses for the full commercial deployment of 5G networks, Chairman Carolyn Bartholomew of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, affiliated to the US Congress, couldn't help but accuse China of posing a threat. 

She claimed Wednesday that if China gets participating countries of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to accept Chinese technical standards, this "will create long-term reliance on Chinese intellectual property and technology, while disadvantaging US and other foreign companies."

Bartholomew said that the "BRI can create new barriers to US exports and investment." This is absurd. It is not the BRI or China but the US that sets barriers. Countries along the BRI have the right to independently choose Chinese technology to build 5G networks, which meets their national interests. It is a natural choice determined by market economy rules, which the US advocates. 

Huawei has won 46 5G commercial contracts in 30 countries all over the world as of June 6. Nokia - which is also not a US company - has gotten 42 contracts, the second most. The reason those countries picked Huawei is because Chinese technology is reliable and affordable. The most important reason is that Huawei has many proprietary and irreplaceable technologies.

According to an April report from patent data firm IPlytics, Huawei is the top 5G standard essential patents (SEPs) owner as to the number of patent families. The Chinese company has 1,554 SEPs, followed by Nokia, which has 1,427. Qualcomm is the largest US company holding 5G SEPs, with a number almost half that of Huawei. Four Chinese companies (Huawei, ZTE, China Academy of Telecommunications Technology and Oppo) own about 36 percent of world's total 5G SEPs.

Such being the case, if BRI countries relying on China's world-leading 5G technology are subject to risks, will it be better to create reliance on backward US technology?

We can understand that the US is accustomed to being the world's No.1 and it is hard to accept the reality that others have caught up with it. 

Regrettably, the US not only cracks down on Chinese high-tech companies but also forbids other countries from using Chinese technology to help them. 

In addition to employing state power to target a private Chinese company on trumped-up charges, the US wants to unite allies for a boycott. Washington is acting like a rogue.

The paranoid US smears China for raising "serious concerns about both information security and the expansion of the surveillance state" in countries alongside the BRI, as Bartholomew noted. The US is gauging others by its own narrow-minded thinking. 

China upholds mutually beneficial cooperation along the BRI. Under this framework, China is willing to use its advanced 5G technology to help other countries develop their wireless networks, fulfilling its promise to promote common prosperity of the world. 

If the US is not capable of setting global standards for 5G technology and not willing to help other countries build next-generation networks, the best choice for Washington is to take a step back and take care of its own business. 

The US should stop throwing its weight around.