REPORT: Top American Universities Training Chinese Military Specialists

A new report from the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party has unearthed shocking new details about Beijing’s abuse of American universities to steal U.S. innovation and trade secrets and use them to strengthen China’s military.

The 39-page report, titled “From Ph.D. to PLA: How Visa Policies Enable PRC Defense Entities to Tap U.S. Higher Education,” shows that top U.S. research universities have for years admitted Chinese nationals with direct or indirect ties to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and China’s defense industrial base. Many of these students are being trained in advanced fields like nuclear engineering, computer science, and aerospace, often funded by American taxpayers.

The report concludes that “over 400 Chinese nationals—enough to crew two Arleigh Burke-class U.S. Navy destroyers—are conducting sensitive research at just one U.S. university, all at the expense of hardworking American taxpayers.”

According to the Committee, the problem stems directly from President Joe Biden’s failure to enforce Proclamation 10043, which was signed by President Donald Trump in May 2020. That order suspended visas for Chinese nationals involved in research linked to Beijing’s “military-civil fusion strategy,” citing the CCP’s “wide-ranging and heavily resourced campaign to acquire sensitive United States technologies and intellectual property, in part to bolster the modernization and capability of its military, the People’s Liberation Army.”

The Committee found that although the order remains in effect, the Biden administration did not enforce it, allowing thousands of Chinese graduate students with ties to Chinese military and defense universities to enter the country and conduct federally funded research.

The Trump order specifically targeted individuals affiliated with China’s “Seven Sons of National Defense,” elite universities whose primary mission is to advance military research and development. These include institutions such as Beihang University and the Beijing Institute of Technology—both on the U.S. Commerce Department’s Entity List for aiding the Chinese military.

Harbin Engineering University, another of the “Seven Sons,” began as the PLA Military Engineering Institute and today conducts research on nuclear propulsion, underwater robotics, and advanced maritime technology. The Select Committee discovered that each of the six American universities it investigated—the University of Maryland, Purdue University, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Carnegie Mellon University, Stanford University, and the University of Southern California—currently enrolls students who previously attended this Chinese defense institution.

This pattern extends beyond the six schools examined. One striking example involves Professor Zhang Qiang of Tsinghua University, who recently developed a new polymer electrolyte that could dramatically improve solid-state battery performance. According to Chinese media, his team’s innovation will give the PLA a critical advantage in developing light unmanned submarines—long before the technology ever benefits Chinese consumers through more efficient electric vehicles.

Zhang’s research builds directly on expertise he gained while studying at Case Western Reserve University, a leading American institution known for cutting-edge work in chemical energy storage and electrochemical systems. There, he learned from top U.S. researchers, including fellows of the Electrochemical Society whose work focuses on batteries, fuel cells, and advanced materials.

Retired Professor Gianmarco Agnelli, a former diplomat who served in China in the late 1980s, said the case illustrates how the CCP has viewed American openness not as goodwill but as opportunity. “The CCP never honored this gesture,” Agnelli said. “Instead, they saw it as a one-way highway for the export of the latest U.S. technological thought and cutting-edge innovation for the PLA.” He added that Beijing now reaps the fruits of those relationships “nearly every day.”

“The CCP exploits all kinds of opportunities that give the army an edge,” said retired Lt. Col. Quán Changpu, who defected in the early 1990s to the West. “In their view, principles don’t exist; only profit and progress in preparation for war against their enemy – namely you, America – matter,” added a former PLA officer who was involved in war planning against the United States and its allies.

Even more troubling, the Committee’s report reveals that U.S. taxpayers are subsidizing the education of these students. One university disclosed that of 1,139 Chinese graduate staff appointments, 515 were paid through sponsored programs, and 402 of those were funded directly by federal grants or contracts.

The Committee further found that 205 Chinese nationals were working in engineering and another 107 in nuclear energy, aeronautics, and computing. “In effect, American taxpayers are footing the bill to provide STEM education, hands-on lab access, and cutting-edge research opportunities to Chinese nationals—who in many cases are directly linked to Chinese military institutions,” the report reads.

At another university, Chinese nationals made up over 20 percent of all Ph.D. students but contributed only “0.2% of [the] Ph.D. degree program’s net tuition revenue.” Rather than “subsidizing American talent,” the Committee wrote, these universities are “displacing it—while simultaneously advancing the ambitions of a foreign government openly hostile to U.S. interests.”

The report also documents extensive collaboration between American and Chinese universities, even those known to be aligned with Beijing’s defense establishment. The University of Maryland admitted to at least 89 cases of faculty collaboration with Chinese schools, along with 15 exchange agreements and three research agreements. Purdue University hosted 16 visiting scholars from Chinese universities and had six of its professors on sabbatical in China.

Several of these visiting scholars were affiliated with Chinese institutions co-administered by the State Administration for Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense—the CCP agency that manages weapons research and dual-use technologies. Purdue has since introduced new restrictions, including prohibitions on foreign adversary funding and clear guidelines to protect research security, which the Committee commended as “a model for other universities to follow.”

The most alarming case involved the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, which until recently operated a joint engineering institute with Zhejiang University—an institution that “holds classified PRC research credentials, operates several defense laboratories, and has conducted cybersecurity research funded by the Ministry of State Security.”

The Select Committee noted that these joint institutes, which pair prestigious U.S. universities with Chinese counterparts “under the guise of academic cooperation,” in practice serve as “sophisticated conduits for transferring critical U.S. technologies and expertise to the PRC.” In response to the Committee’s investigation, Illinois announced this summer that it would terminate its partnership with Zhejiang University and end more than 20 similar programs with Chinese schools by early 2026.

The report places significant blame on the State Department, which is responsible for vetting foreign students through the visa system. University officials told the Committee they rely on State Department determinations to assess security risks, effectively outsourcing national security screening to a bureaucracy that has failed to act. “Without enhanced visa screening, institutional transparency, and technology protection measures,” the Committee warned, “the United States risks training the next generation of engineers, scientists, and weapons designers—not for America’s benefit, but for the advancement of the People’s Liberation Army.”

The findings make clear that China’s “Military-Civil Fusion” strategy deliberately erases the boundary between civilian and military research. “The CCP does not treat overseas study as an apolitical or purely academic exercise,” the Committee wrote. “International education is viewed as a key vector for accessing cutting-edge science, engineering, and defense-related knowledge.”

Through lax visa enforcement, taxpayer-funded research grants, and unmonitored university partnerships, the Biden administration allowed the Chinese Communist Party to embed itself in the heart of America’s research system. It is, in effect, using American openness against America itself. As the Committee concluded, “Without decisive action, the PRC will continue to convert U.S.-funded research into military capabilities that threaten American service members, our foreign allies, and our democratic values.”

Beijing’s so-called “students” are not merely learning from America—they are preparing to use that knowledge to defeat it.

Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.