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Disappearing Assets


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This is a newly published article in the NY Times, although it's not clear if the information is newly released or what. The events discussed took place between 2011 and 2015. The assets were apparently Chinese, not Americans.

 

Killing C.I.A. Informants, China Crippled U.S. Spying Operations

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The Chinese government systematically dismantled C.I.A. spying operations in the country starting in 2010, killing or imprisoning more than a dozen sources over two years and crippling intelligence gathering there for years afterward.
Current and former American officials described the intelligence breach as one of the worst in decades. It set off a scramble in Washington’s intelligence and law enforcement agencies to contain the fallout, but investigators were bitterly divided over the cause. Some were convinced that a mole within the C.I.A. had betrayed the United States. Others believed that the Chinese had hacked the covert system the C.I.A. used to communicate with its foreign sources. Years later, that debate remains unresolved.
But there was no disagreement about the damage. From the final weeks of 2010 through the end of 2012, according to former American officials, the Chinese killed at least a dozen of the C.I.A.’s sources. According to three of the officials, one was shot in front of his colleagues in the courtyard of a government building — a message to others who might have been working for the C.I.A.
Still others were put in jail. All told, the Chinese killed or imprisoned 18 to 20 of the C.I.A.’s sources in China, according to two former senior American officials, effectively unraveling a network that had taken years to build.
. . .
The previously unreported episode shows how successful the Chinese were in disrupting American spying efforts and stealing secrets years before a well-publicized breach in 2015 gave Beijing access to thousands of government personnel records, including intelligence contractors. The C.I.A. considers spying in China one of its top priorities, but the country’s extensive security apparatus makes it exceptionally hard for Western spy services to develop sources there.
. . .
The first signs of trouble emerged in 2010. At the time, the quality of the C.I.A.’s information about the inner workings of the Chinese government was the best it had been for years, the result of recruiting sources deep inside the bureaucracy in Beijing, four former officials said. Some were Chinese nationals who the C.I.A. believed had become disillusioned with the Chinese government’s corruption.
But by the end of the year, the flow of information began to dry up. By early 2011, senior agency officers realized they had a problem: Assets in China, one of their most precious resources, were disappearing.

 

 

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a response in the SCMP

 

Informants can face death penalty but ‘unimaginable without trial’

 

Hui Ching, research director at the Hong Kong Zhi Ming Institute, an independent think tank, said the report would not undermine Sino-US ties.

 

Li Wei, an anti-terrorism expert at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, a think tank affiliated with China’s foreign ministry, said the disclosure of the operation’s setback in China “to a certain extent relates to the internal political struggle in the US”.

 

. . .

 

Military expert Zhou Chenming said the reported shooting in a government courtyard, if it did happen, would be highly ­unusual. “If they have alternative ways to catch suspects, they will refrain from shooting them to death,” Zhou said.
Officers were only authorised to shoot when the suspect was targeting national leaders or deliberately damaging critical infrastructure, threatening to cause major casualties, Zhou said.

 

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. . . and the Global Times version

 

NYT’s spy in China story full of narcissism
This NYT article has been widely quoted, yet its authenticity remains unknown. If CIA spying operations in China were crippled, the US has nothing to be proud of. But the NYT report portrayed the people that spied for the US as innocents, but the Chinese national security forces as merciless. The report also claimed "China has been particularly aggressive in its espionage in recent years."
If this article is telling the truth, we would like to applaud China's anti-espionage activities. Not only was the CIA's spy network dismantled, but Washington had no idea what happened and which part of the spy network had gone wrong. It can be taken as a sweeping victory. Perhaps it means even if the CIA makes efforts to rebuild its spy network in China, it could face the same result.
As for one source being shot in a government courtyard, that is a purely fabricated story, most likely a piece of American-style imagination based on ideology.
. . .
The CIA has apparently increased its espionage activities in China, which will inevitably lead to China simultaneously strengthening its counterintelligence efforts. No matter how Americans see it, international law will affirm that China's anti-espionage activities are just and legal, while the CIA's spying is illegitimate.
When the US media is keen on hyping up "catching Chinese spies," they should forego their moral narcissism when reporting CIA espionage in China. It's absurd that under their description, the US is always the noble side whether it is catching spies or sending spies.

 

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Legendary Chinese thin skin on display. I'm not going to re-read the NYT article, but I don't recall any claim that the spies in China were innocents or that the counter-espionage was merciless. I just remember "business as usual".

 

The article heavily leaned towards a Chinese American as having sold out the assets.

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