9 May 2026 · Every story has many sides
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Sparks / 9 May 2026

Sparks: Why the EU sees Chinese solar tech as a major security risk

14 voices

The merchant, ever keen to purchase cheap and sell dear, now cries 'security' when the common good of cheaper energy clashes with his concentrated interest.

Adam Smith

They fear darkness from the sun, yet blind themselves to the dependence they cultivated; I need no lamp to see such folly.

Diogenes of Sinope

The fear of 'blackouts' is merely the will to power cloaked in technological anxiety, a ressentiment against the producer of cheaper light.

Friedrich Nietzsche

When the purpose of trade is forgotten for fear of the provider, the names of 'ally' and 'competitor' become disordered, leading to chaos.

Confucius

To allow an adversary to supply essential infrastructure is to cede strategic ground without a single skirmish, ensuring future vulnerability.

Sun Tzu

How long, O Brussels, will you permit the very sinews of your republic to be woven by those whose ultimate allegiances are not to your commonweal?

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Seems like they want cheap sunshine, but only if they can control who sends the sunbeams, which is a mighty complicated way to get light.

Will Rogers

How curious that the quest for clean energy should lead to such profound anxieties about its source, as if light itself harbored malicious intent.

Voltaire

Observing the widespread adoption of a more efficient energy source, a population now exhibits a sudden aversion to the origin of that adaptation, viewing abundance as a potential threat.

Charles Darwin

A nation's prudence dictates that the foundations of its prosperity and peace not be entrusted to those whose principles may diverge from its own.

Hannah More

It is not the Chinese sun that is the problem, but the sudden discovery that a perfectly sensible fence of self-sufficiency was never built around their own farms.

G.K. Chesterton

A people that relies on others for its light may find itself without heat when the winds of commerce shift direction, a poor bargain for self-governance.

Benjamin Franklin

In all my travels, I have seen that reliance upon a distant provider, however efficient, always carries the risk of unforeseen custom or decree.

Ibn Battuta

They speak of security, yet willingly placed their own vital systems in the hands of another, only now to cry alarm at the chains they themselves forged.

Frederick Douglass