Deceiving the Sky: Inside Communist China’s Drive for Global Supremacy

Deceiving the Sky: The
Chinese Communist Threat
to American Security
Bill Gertz
Westminster Institute
October 2, 2019

U.S. Policy Toward China
• Past – conciliation and business ties
• 30-Year Gamble of Engagement -- Failed
• Trump: Economic security/national security
• Focus on Pressuring China economically
• Militarily – Slight pressure, some continuity
• Intelligence – Crackdown on econ
espionage

• NSS: China challenge:
– Against American power, influence, and
interests
– Attempting to erode American security and
prosperity
– Make economies less free and less fair
– Grow military
– Control information and data to repress their
societies and expand their influence

• NDS: China
– China is a strategic competitor using predatory
economics to intimidate its neighbors while
militarizing features in the South China Sea
– China wants to shape a world consistent with
their authoritarian model —gaining veto
authority over other nations’ economic,
diplomatic, and security decisions

• NDS: China
– China is leveraging military modernization,
influence operations, and predatory economics
to coerce neighboring countries to reorder the
Indo-Pacific region to their advantage.
– All-of-nation, long-term strategy seeking Indo-
Pacific regional hegemony in the near-term and
displacement of the United States to achieve
global preeminence in the future.

VP Pence Speech
October 2018
– China using economic, diplomatic, military to
expand influence in more proactive ways
– Trump seeking new approach based on fairness,
reciprocity, respect for sovereignty
– Since1991 trade concessions under assumption
a free China was inevitable. Hope unfulfilled.
– Made in China 2025 – dominate advanced tech
– Greater repression; Expanding military

VP Pence Speech
October 2018
– Election meddling: “China wants a different
American President.”
– Propaganda and Censorship Notice: “Strike
accurately and carefully, splitting apart
different domestic groups” in US
– Senior U.S. intel official: Russian influence ops
pale in comparison to what China is doing.

Chinese Ideology
– Derived from Soviet Marxism-Leninism
– Historical China/Communist China
– Xi Jinping’s ‘China Dream’ Blends Both for
Global Supremacy
– Reality: PRC is a revolutionary communist
state engaged in ‘enemy politics’ vs. U.S.
– Extensive use of lies and deception: HK
protests

Chinese Ideology
“To sustain a communist system such as the PRC's and to
enhance internal unity under the CCP, Chinese supreme
leaders after Mao Zedong, from Deng Xiaoping and Jiang
Zemin to Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping, all diligently
campaigned to create an image of the US government as
the monstrous superpower determined to ‘contain’ China
in each and every way. Chinese supreme leaders use this
theory of a US-led capitalist conspiracy to destroy
socialist China as the most potent justification for
maintaining a draconian totalitarian social order and an
increasingly technologically sophisticated, authoritarian
and omnipotent national security state.”
--- Miles Yu, professor, U.S. Naval Academy

Xi Jinping
– Since 2012, major purge of CCP, PLA, intel
– ‘Party-ization’ of PRC Government
– Military becoming unstable
– Expansion of United Front Work
– 19th Party Congress: Assumed New Power
• Xi Jinping Thought in Constitution
• Ended term limit – Party Leader for Life

PAP police armored vehicles
dispatched from Chongqing to
Chengdu, where police surrounded
the US consulate to try and
apprehend defector Wang Lijun,
February 2012

Engagement with China
– Began with Kissinger and the ‘China Card’
– Continued under successive administrations
– Accelerated during Clinton: WTO (2001)
– Nuclear and space cooperation led to Chinese
nuclear espionage and missile improvement
– Trump initiated a major shift
– Trade war is outward sign of new new policy

A Chinese Intelligence ‘Storm’
“The Chinese intelligence storm impacting the US is
a secret assault on America that is without parallel
since that mounted by Moscow in the 1930’s and
40’s. Beijing’s ongoing intelligence campaign has
garnered no more than episodic public attention, and
then only when a spy is arrested or a high-profile
cyber-attack detected.”
--- Mark Kelton, former CIA counterintelligence
director

CIA Intelligence Disaster
– Beginning in 2010, China began arresting
recruited CIA assets
– Within in a few years, at least 27 CIA recruits
were caught by MSS
– All imprisoned or executed
– In one case, an agent was shot in a building
courtyard in front of a group of officials
– Cause: Either traitor(s) in agency or
communications compromise, or both

Chinese electronic surveillance

Headquarters, United Front Work Department, Beijing

Chinese propaganda insert in major U.S. newspapers

Zhao Qianli, MPS official arrested at Key West NAS, Sept. 2018

Ministry of Public Security headquarters, Beijing

Convicted Chinese spy and former DIA officer Ron Hansen

Convicted Chinese spy, former CIA officer Kevin Mallory

Former CIA officer Jerry Chun Shing Lee, plead guilty to spying for China

Ministry of State Security headquarters, Beijing

4PLA General Staff Department/Electronic Countermeasures and Radar Department

China Cyber
• Among the most significant state cyber threats
• 20-year massive global program of cyber
espionage, cyber reconnaissance
• Ministry of State Security, 2PLA, 3PLA, Unit
61398
• Espionage, economic and traditional, and network
attack and sabotage through digital sleeper agents
• U.S. reluctant to disclose extent

China Cyber
• PRC cyber ops most secret program; Beijing
denies all
• Obama admin sought talks, norms –No results
• Trump admin using tariffs, pressure, indictments
• Industry urging more muscular response

PLA hacker Unit 61398, Shanghai

Huawei Technologies CFO Meng Wanzhou

Cyber warfare
• PLA has made cyber warfare a priority
• Use civilian hackers.
• Byzantine Hades: Massive global program of
cyber espionage. Google, RSA, Lockheed
• Cyber attacks: For espionage and future sabotage
through digital sleeper agents
• U.S. reluctant to disclose extent
• Mandiant report exposed, Pentagon report

Indictment of Chinese hackers, October 2018

DF-17 Hypersonic Glide Vehicle

DF-ZF hypersonic glide vehicle from Global Times

Gongji-11 (GJ-11) stealth attack drone

WZ-8 High Altitude and High Speed Reconnaissance Drone

HSU001 unmanned underwater vehicle

Long March 11 Rocket with Dong Ning ASAT Kill Vehicle

Strategic Nuclear Forces
• China is engaged in a major, covert strategic
nuclear forces buildup. New missiles, warheads,
MIRVs, EMP weapons, Missile Defenses
• No engagement in talks on types, numbers,
controls.
• PRC nuclear forces built on stolen U.S. nuclear
secrets, later proliferated Pakistan, Iran, NK,
Libya.
• US Intel: 240 strategic warheads. Russia: 1,500
• Great Underground Wall

Section of 3,000-mile-long Underground Great Wall nuclear complex

CCP outlet Global Times 2013 depiction of SLMB nuclear strikes on Los Angeles

PLA electronic jammers, Mischief Reef

PLAN Type 056 corvettes, Mischief Reef

YJ-12B supersonic anti-ship missiile

Taiwan
• China’s main target. Unfinished communist
revolution
• U.S. (unofficial) ally. 1979 TRA: defensive arms,
protection from forcible reunification
• Arms sales declining. Obama refused new F-16
C/Ds. Trump approved 66 new F-16Vs
• Past détente facilitates China strategy
• Flashpoint in U.S.-China relations

Rioting in Xinjiang/East Turkistan. Over 1 million Ughurs in detention camps

Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un, March 2018, Beijing

North Korean KN-08 ICBM carried on Chinese launcher

New U.S. Policy Toward China
• Declare PRC/CCP ‘enemy,’ disengage
• Financial warfare as in ‘80s v. Soviets
• Aggressive information operations
• Strict reciprocity
• Increased intelligence, counterintelligence
• Reform diplomatic system

New U.S. Policy Toward China
• New democratic alliance in Asia
• Restrict Chinese activities in US
• Expand regional, global missile defenses
• Counter and engage in ‘gray zone’ war
• Create Free China parliament in exile
• Play ‘Russia card’

Deceiving the Sky: Inside Communist China’s Drive for Global Supremacy

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