The report, made available to The New York Times, asserts that two nonmilitary Chinese companies pose high risk because of links to the Chinese Government, the People’s Liberation Army and other Chinese entities accused in the past of ties to Syria and Iran.

A Chinese company, BHA Aero Composites Company, is partly owned by American company Boeing which has been cited for lapses in licenses for exports.

In general there has been a particular emphasis on selling to China. The United States is expected to show a trade deficit with China of nearly $300 billion in 2007.

At the same time, at least since the 1990s, Democratic and Republican Congressional leaders have called on the Bush administratio.

William A Reinsch, heading National Foreign Trade Council, said the administration over all had tightened controls on China and called the lifting of license requirements on only five firms “a spoonful of sugar to make the medicine go down.”

A House Republican staff member had a similar view. “We were told by Commerce that they were going to make some very safe choices,” he said, speaking anonymously because of the delicacy of the subject.

The Commerce Department said out of $55 billion in American exports to China in 2006, only $308 million were items requiring licenses to make sure the Chinese military could not use them. The five companies named as “validated” accounted for $54 million of those goods.