China’s Strategic Threat

The Chinese leadership has labeled the last two decades a “period of strategic opportunity” for the country. President Xi Jinping has, on numerous occasions, said that China must learn lessons from the collapse of Soviet Union to be a global power and that all options are on the table. In recent years, the CCP has dramatically increased its military spending, aggressive international behavior, and even shown its willing to export Chinese students to form the point of the spear, plunged in the heart of the west. The COVID-19 virus is renewing interest into China’s long-overlooked methods and goals. In the United States China is at its lowest level of popularity since the Tiananmen massacre in 1989.

Ninety percent of Americans in a recent PEW Research Center survey believe China is a threat, with well over 55% viewing it as a “major threat.” The danger is not new. In August 2018 Dr. Francis Collins, Director of NIH, wrote a letter to 10,000 research institutions in the US pointing out that “threats to the integrity of US biomedical research exist. NIH is aware that some foreign entities have mounted systematic programs to influence NIH researchers and peer reviewers and to take advantage of the long tradition of trust, fairness and excellence of NIH-supported research activities.” The FBI also is aware and responding, in part, by visiting colleges campus administrators to explain the reality of the threat it faces from its Chinese students and to request their assistance. Yet, somehow, over the last few decades the US Government continues to allot more visas to Chinese students than to any other nationality; and most of those are granted to STEM majors.

What is the problem and how can the US identify the underlying causes of the threat to US national security and to the American economy? This is the question that Washington should be addressing in 2020.

Although China conducts a highly-sophisticated, cyber warfare program, Chinese intelligence still operates using a shotgun approach on American college campuses. The concept is that the more “nodes,” in this case Chinese students, spread across America the better the odds of Beijing receiving actionable intelligence. Each Chinese student is a potential “access agent,” or covert influencer. As a Chinese intelligence official told me long ago, one grain of sand is not an irritant and it doesn’t form a beachhead, but a million grains of sand, that is something to stand on. Although most Chinese students entering the US are here for legitimate educational purposes, they still form a beachhead of 800,000 F, M, and J visa-holding individuals obliged to their homeland.

In any given year, an average of a half million Chinese are studying on American campuses and working in American research labs. In FY 2019 alone Chinese nationals were granted 117,000 F visas. The next largest allotment went to India with only 46,000. China also receives the 2^nd highest total of green cards behind only Mexico. The reality is China has weaponized immigration to infuse spies into the United States.

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Most Chinese students come to the US with no plans to work for Chinese intelligence, but all are well aware of what their government expects from them. They must receive permission from the government to be allowed to leave China. Then they are briefed before departing and upon their return. Many are concerned about the fate of their families back home if they don’t cooperate when approached by Chinese intelligence agents. Using students as a “fifth column” compresses the amount of time China needs to acquire new technologies. Dr Collins wrote that “This kind of inappropriate influence is not limited to biomedical research; it has been a significant issue for defense and energy research for some time.”

Many Chinese nationals work on post-grad science and technology research projects in the private sector while in the US. Today more than 80% of all Department of Justice cases of economic espionage involve China. They are connected to 60% of all trade secret thefts for the last decade. Yet few Chinese entities, outside of Huawei, are even on the trade blacklist. The cases that do make the news, like the recent arrest of a Harvard University Chemistry and Chemical Biology Department head, are only the tip of the spearhead. Increased cyber exploitation, expanded Internet access, global travel and advanced payment technologies add to the difficulty of identifying and catching those who would do harm to the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic put the world on “pause” for the moment. It may the West’s last opportunity to address the Chinese student threat.

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government. Each Friday, she presents key updates on China.

Illustration: Pixabay

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.