The Captain's Chair - Fall 1997

A big disappointment to me in recent weeks has been the lack of media scrutiny of what I consider one of the most dire threats to U. S. national security in memory.  Red china's attempt to buy influence with U. s. policymakers through illegal contributions is shocking to those of us who believe the Chinese communists have designs on our freedom.   However, the mainstream press seems to have assigned the fundraising scandal "back burner" status following a brief splash in the national news last spring.

The Thompson Committee didn't do much better.  Rather than focusing on chinese influence-buying in U. S. elections, the Senate committee conducting hearings into 1996 election campaign finance allowed itself to get bogged down in partisan politics and to become de-railed by a myriad of less critical, even insignificant, side issues.

If you're among those who don't believe the Communists in Beijing have designs on our freedom, then you may have been bedazzled by Chinese President Jiang Zemin's recent well-covered visit to our shores.  I was not.  My early assessment of his visit is that he got just about everything he wanted, while we got some pretty vague promises.

Even as Chinese President Jiang Zemin was being wined and dined by the Clinton White House and the CEO's of American big business, his communists government's influence was growing by leaps and bounds throughout the Western hemisphere and moving across the oceans to seaports around the world.

I consider the leasing of the Long Beach Naval Shipyard to Red Chinese-controlled China Ocean Shipping Company (COSCO) an act amounting to treason.  This control of a major U. S. port would give the People's Republic of China (PRC) the ability to conduct intelligence operations and import whatever weapons they choose into the United States.   Fortunately, serious questions were raised about the COSCO lease following the almost-too-late exposure of the communist-controlled company's smuggling of automatic weapons into the U. S.  The full story of the role the Clinton White House had in arranging for the COSCO lease and the impact of Red chinese "influence buying" had on allowing the PRC to control the port of Long Beach remains to be told.  We can only hope and pray that the congressman who have seen the serious national security threat posed by the COSCO deal are prepared to see the matter through to its logical conclusion of denying the lease to COSCO.

The next target of the PRC was (and is) Panama.  The company closely tied to the PRC that dominates Hong Kong's ports, Hutchison Port Holding, Ltd., has negotiated a 25-year lease to operate two ports that anchor the Panama Canal, Balboa on the Pacific and Cristobal on the Atlantic.  Serious questions have been raised in the United States and in Panama itself about what kind of behind-the-scenes wheeling and dealing took place that placed Hutcison at the top of a long list of international companies, including American shippers, bidding on the lease to operate the two strategic Panamanian ports.

In spite of the posturing of the chinese leader on his recent visit to the U. S., I have to wonder about the real intentions of the PRC toward the U. S.  That the Red Chinese consider us a major threat is certainly no secret.  Nicholas Eftimiades, a former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst, says Beijing's espionage in the U. S. includes the assignment of 1,500 Chinese diplomats, 15,000 Chinese students, and 10,000 Chinese tourists.  Buying access to a President, according to Eftimiades, is just "...the way they operate in Asian countries.  They do it by bribing government officials...to change policy."

Our own leaders seem to believe that the road to detente is paved with the enhancement of the economic and technological capabilities of the enemy.  The unprecedented export of military technology to Red China with U. S. government approval includes the Air force's F-16 fighter jets, technology for building long-range cruise missiles, cray supercomputers for weapons development, even technology to build its own Global Positioning System (GPS), which will enable the PRC to target cruise missiles and other advance weapons to just about any spot they choose around the world, including U. S. cities.  By granting renewed Most Favored Nation (MFN) status to the PRC earlier this year, the Clinton administration virtually guaranteed the continued economic expansion that is vital to Bejing's pursuit of dominance in Asia.  According to the Center for Security Policy, the hugh trade surplus made possible by renewed MFN status is being used by Red China "to mount a strategic threat to the United States and its vital interests in Asia, the Middle East and beyond."  An april 1997 Pentagon analysis assessed Beijing's present massive military build-up this way:  "As an emerging great power, China will probably build its military power to the point where it can engage and defeat any potential enemy within the region with its conventional forces - and can deter any global strategic threat."

Of major concern to U. S. policymakers, of course, has been Beijing's proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and other deadly ordinance to Third World nations such as Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan.  Agreements reached in the U. S.-China summit included the lifting of a 12-year embargo on U. S. sales of nuclear power equipment to China, a deal which will greatly enrich several U. S. firms.  In exchange, China promised to stop nuclear cooperation with and missile sales to Iran.

That the wandering attention of the American people has focused on
U. S.-China relations in recent days gives me hope.  In the Process, the public's attention has also been drawn to Tiananmen Square, Tibet, and religious persecution throughout China.  And, there is reason to hope that Americans will not forget Beijing's attempts to buy influence with U. S. policymakers.  Those of us who hesitate to take President Jiang Zemin's word at face value will watch and wait to see what actions are taken to validate the promises.

Send mail to rdt2@americandefinst.org with questions or comments.

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