Army using Chinese company to make weapons despite security concerns

 The British Army is using Chinese-made 3D printers to build weapons despite national security concerns.

Troops have taken the Chinese technology with them into the field and used it to make “suicide drones” for attack missions.

Officers want to train “whole platoons” to use the 3D printers, which would enable them to be “armed with a virtually endless supply” of weapons.

But on Saturday, security experts said Britain might as well hand China “the keys to the back door of our security systems”, and accused ministers of using Chinese-made technology to save money despite security fears.

They said defence chiefs had “not learnt lessons” after Huawei, the Chinese tech giant, was banned from the UK’s 5G network over security concerns.

Britain’s relationship with China is already under heightened scrutiny following the collapse of a high-profile spy trial, blamed on the Government’s refusal to describe China as a threat to British national security.

It provoked a row in Westminster, with Sir Keir Starmer accused of sabotaging the prosecution to protect Britain’s ties with China.

Last week, it was reported that Britain had scaled back its scientific links with China since the spying scandal, with ministers deciding to prioritise collaboration in “uncontroversial” areas that did not entail a security risk.

But The Telegraph can disclose that British troops used portable 3D printers, manufactured by Bambu Labs, during a military exercise in Kenya earlier this year.

They used the technology to make first person view (FPV) suicide drones in the field and deploy them on attack missions.

Maj Stephen Watts, Officer Commanding F Company, 3rd Battalion, The Rifles Regiment, said the weapons “proved their worth” and added that he would like to have “tens, if not hundreds, of self-built FPVs flying, which will make the formation extremely lethal”.

Speaking to Soldier, the Army’s official magazine, he said: “Imagine if we had whole platoons trained to use these weapons on operations, armed with a virtually endless supply of them. That would increase the Army’s fighting power many times over.

“We only used our self-made platforms sparingly – but they are potent, flying at 190mph for three-and-a-half minutes, which means they can cover 15 miles and are very hard to intercept.”

The Chinese government has classified 3D printing as a “strategic industry”, meaning huge state subsidies are available for companies.

Under China’s National Intelligence Law, passed in 2017, companies can be compelled to share data with the government, including filenames, timestamps and machine logs.

Luke de Pulford, the executive director of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, said: “The difficulty is that there is not really a private company in China – certainly not when it comes to subsidised strategic industries.

“Those categories matter – they don’t pump huge amounts of money into certain industries for no reason. They do this not just to consolidate CCP [Chinese Communist Party] control at home but CCP control abroad. They are making sure they can bend other countries to their will.”

Robert Clark, a defence expert and visiting fellow at the Council on Geostrategy, said the decision to use a Chinese company for the army’s 3D printing was “outrageous” and “shameful”.

“The Ministry of Defence are just not learning their lessons on this,” he said. “We may as well be handing them the keys to the back door of our security systems.

“The big picture is that the MoD is currently facing a £2.5bn black hole for the next financial year, and they are clearly doing things now on the cheap. This is saying: ‘We don’t want to invest in British or even other Western companies which are more secure – let’s just turn to China to plug those gaps.’

“This is 100 per cent going to come back and bite the Army and the Government. It is a house of cards waiting to fall down, and when it does it is going to be severe.”

Ed Arnold, a senior research fellow for European security at the Royal United Services Institute, said the use of the Chinese technology was “very concerning”.

He added: “China, Russia and North Korea are working together in a variety of areas. One area that is consistent is technology transfer. That is a core part of what is driving them together. The Chinese extract the data and then likely hand it to the Russians.”

An industry source told The Telegraph that 3D printing was a “hot topic” in defence, particularly following the success Ukraine has had in making drones on the front lines of the war against Russia.

The source said: “So far they have mostly been used for printing drones – the parts are quick and cheap to make and you can make them anywhere. But people do not realise that every 3D printer has a tiny but powerful computer on the inside. There has not been a public discussion about security implications.”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said: “Protecting national security is the foundation of everything we do. We have strict security procedures in place to ensure all sensitive information is protected.

“There is no evidence that Bambu Labs printers store information which could be passed to Chinese authorities. 3D printers are not connected to the defence network and are not used to produce any sensitive materials.”

MoD officials said they took all allegations very seriously and explored all threats to national security.