For just a moment, I was excited, imagining integrity at Justice. For a second, I thought, “Maybe…,” and then I read on. For accepting foreign bribes from China, being involved in clandestine contact with bad actors, and denying it but accepting money for illegal access, arrests were made. It turns out none of the Bidens were arrested– only two US sailors who committed a microcosm compared to what Biden did on a grand scale.
The foreboding story hit last week. Two defendants – in unrelated incidents – responded favorably to Chinese intelligence overtures (note: all Chinese overtures are about intelligence) and took bribes for access to processes involving national security.
Of course, being a vice president also involves access to processes involving national security. China would love contact with such a person. But putting Biden aside, this story indicates a big breach. China is feeling its oats.
Beyond stiff-arming every administration member to visit in six months, from the Secretary of State and CIA Director to Biden’s illustrious Weather Czar, Mr. Kerry, China is becoming obnoxious. They think they have the golden ticket, a free ride to anywhere.
They send balloons with Mac Truck-intelligence payloads over the US to linger over highly sensitive ICBM fields and military bases. They create aviation near-misses over international waters.
They flood Tiawan’s airspace with fighters, practice quarantines, woo US allies with usurious lending, sign contracts for power projection with Western ports, set up a collection base in Cuba, and hack away.
They scare US businesses into a sharp investment downturn, seeding fear in Chinese cities. They illegally test space weapons and put up a “non-military” space station to match their non-military artificial islands with non-military runways awaiting non-military fighters.
They hatch CCP-run police stations around the US to harass their own citizens…perhaps ours. They set up a clandestine bio lab in California, recently discovered, flush with COVID-infected white mice and biohazard material – no accountability, no compunction. Biden blinks, and China shrugs.
Beyond COVID, cultivated in Wuhan, China’s fentanyl pandemic ravages US towns, killing 100,000 children last year, up 15 percent year-over-year.
China behaves like a rogue. They commit bold atrocities at home, herding minorities into concentration camps, executing political dissidents, pushing mass surveillance and abortion, boldly going where no communist – or fascist – nation has gone before, seeking dominance of the US from within.
This is where the current espionage charges come in. China’s penetration of the US military is arresting. The two cases involve the sale of sensitive processes.
The real questions: Why did this happen, what does it mean, and how do we stop it? The answers are here.
First, China is our number one counter-intelligence threat and the most aggressive. Just because Biden does not care or may be a beneficiary of China’s illegal ambitions – does not change the fact.
Second, these arrests tell us what we know. Our military is vulnerable. Three elements define the new vulnerability. Element one is obvious, but no one will say it, so I will.
These servicemembers saw a president take millions from China. Evidence indicates he sold the vice presidency to China. They watch him lie, get away with it, and say, “If he can, why not me?” That is a vulnerability.
Element two is a target on our back. China seeks world dominance and says so. They know our president, beyond being corrupt, is weak and old. They know our defense establishment reflects his weakness. Capability without the will to use it is no deterrent.
Element three makes us a target of opportunity. The clock is ticking. China needs to drain as much information – look for more spies – as they can to act kinetically while Biden remains. They know he is not likely to serve eight years, even if they help him get reelected.
Element four is internal, a failure on our part, poor counterintelligence training and readiness.
They are being sidelined in the mad dash to a “woke” military, subject to the same civil distortions, social priorities and perversions – the same navel-gazing – as the private sector.
Does this last bit matter? Yes. Wars are deterred and won by readiness – not wokeness. Marxism, race-baiting, quotas, transgenderism, recruiting drag queens, disparaging masculinity, and preoccupation with diminishing merit – are all dangerous. War is not a beauty contest; winning matters, or nothing matters. Defense is not about bowing properly but killing effectively.
So, watch your six, as fighter pilots say. We are getting weak, distracted, and socially mushy. In the military, merit will fade, and perverse policies will grow if people like the ill-suited nominee to become Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General C.Q. Brown, gets in.
Bottom line: These two cases of Chinese espionage are a red flag, a clear warning. The Chinese are serious and are coming for our military. Our job is to be ready.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.
