U.S. Pulls More Casualties Out of Guangzhou and Beijing as Sonic Attacks Persist

At least three have been sent back to the U.S., believed to be the first affected in Beijing
By Te-Ping Chen

The U.S. embassy in Beijing. The three Americans sent home for medical reasons are thought to be the first in the Chinese capital to have been affected by so-called "health" attacks. 

BEIJING—The U.S. has evacuated at least three Americans from Beijing after they reported unusual health symptoms, in the latest evacuations since unexplained "health" incidents first affected U.S. diplomatic personnel stationed in Cuba in 2016.
In a U.S. Embassy meeting on Tuesday, staff were told that the latest people evacuated, as with previous cases, were sent for further medical evaluation to the University of Pennsylvania, a person familiar with the matter said.
The U.S. Embassy in Beijing didn’t immediately comment. 

At the embassy meeting, the affected individuals weren’t identified by name, and it wasn’t made clear whether they were diplomatic personnel or family members.
The latest cases are believed to be the first from Beijing. 

At least a dozen Americans have now been evacuated from China, the only other country besides Cuba where the unexplained health incidents are known to have struck U.S. government personnel.
Symptoms include headaches, sleep impairment and various cognitive issues; the State Department has said the cause is unclear and has described the incidents as “health attacks.”
To date, the State Department has reported one case of a U.S. government employee previously based in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou who was confirmed to have suffered symptoms consistent with those of U.S. workers stationed in Havana.
The employee was evacuated earlier this spring, and more than half a dozen other evacuations of Americans connected to the Guangzhou consulate have followed for reasons that include unrelated medical issues discovered in the course of medical screenings, the person familiar with the situation said.
More than 280 U.S. diplomatic staff and family members have now undergone medical screenings in China, the person said.

China's Sonic War

U.S. Consulate under Chinese sonic attacks: More U.S. casualties have been evacuated from Guangzhou
BY C. DANIELLE BIZIER 

More U.S. citizens have been evacuated from a U.S. consulate in Guangzhou, China, after suffering what appears to be the same strange, sound-related illness that afflicted consulate workers in Cuba. The New York Times reported that consulate worker Mark Lenzi and his wife heard strange noises over the course of several months before falling ill with what they described as neurological symptoms. 

On Wednesday night they were flown to the U.S. with their children, including a three-year-old son who was also affected.
Speaking to The Washington Post that same day, Lenzi described the sound as being like “marbles bouncing and hitting a floor then rolling on an incline with a static sound.” 

The Lenzis reached out to their neighbors to see if the sound was coming from their home but the neighbor denied it. 

Several months after the sounds began, the Lenzis began to develop migraine like headaches and suffer from sleep deprivation. 

Medical professionals at the consulate prescribed sleeping pills to help with the insomnia.
In May, Lenzi found out that the same neighbor had been evacuated after exhibiting the same symptoms. 

He was checked and diagnosed with a “mild traumatic brain injury,” the State Department said in a statement. 

That statement also said the government did not know of any other cases — which according to Lenzi, was a lie. 

He told The Washington Post that he he’d filed several reports with both the consulate and the State Department.
Lenzi also contends that his security clearance was frozen after he attempted to bring attention to the issue, effectively barring him from work at the consulate, and that he is now calling for the resignation of the U.S. ambassador to China, who is based in Beijing.
The New York Times is also reporting that a State Department medical team flew to Guangzhou and is performing tests on other employees and their family members — some 170 workers in total at the site, plus their family members.
If this case sound eerily familiar, it should. 

In 2016, 24 people — all embassy workers and their families there – suffered the same symptoms at the U.S. embassy in Havana, Cuba. 

Those symptoms included dizziness, headaches, tinnitus, fatigue, cognitive issues, visual problems, ear complaints and hearing loss, and difficulty sleeping, the State Department said at the time. 

Tests concluded that they had suffered injuries consistent with concussion or minor brain injury.
In the wake of the initial illnesses, speculation on the cause included the possibility of targeted sonic attacks that might cause such disruption. 

The U.S., blaming Havana, expelled Cuban dignitaries following the incident. 

Additional theories include bacterial poisoning, neurotoxins, and surveillance devices that emit disabling sounds.
On Tuesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the launch of The Health Incidents Response Task Force, which had been created to respond to the unexplained ailments, including testing workers and families at the Guangzhou consulate. 

The task force’s role includes “identification and treatment of affected personnel and family members, investigation and risk mitigation, messaging, and diplomatic outreach.”
On May 24, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang said in a regular press briefing that China had investigated the initial May 16 case, but had not found a reason for the illness. 

The Russians have a history of using toxins against the foreign diplomatic corps, but the Chinese have stayed primarily in the lanes of active and aggressive surveillance. 

Some attachés tell stories of playing along with the status quo by asking aloud in their homes for help finding missing items such as car keys and glasses. 

They would leave the home after the request for a few moments and return to find the items placed conspicuously on their kitchen table. 

The Chinese have never been shy about making sure American diplomats knew they were under constant monitoring — though before now, the most aggressive tales involved State Department officials returning home to find someone had defected in their toilet and left it without flushing.
The potential sonic attacks we are now beginning to see are more reminiscent of Cold War era Soviet tactics — but perhaps par for the course of the ever-growing tensions.

Chinese sonic attacks: More US diplomats fall ill in China

Consular employees sent home from Guangzhou for medical checks as Mike Pompeo sets up new investigation

By Lily Kuo and agencies

The US employees were working at a consulate in Guangzhou, China, when they reported symptoms previous linked to sonic attacks.

More US citizens have been evacuated from China, reviving concerns that American government personnel and their families may be the target of “sonic attacks” by China.
US state department officials said on Wednesday it had sent “a number of individuals” from its consulate in Guangzhou back to the US for “further evaluation and a comprehensive assessment of their symptoms”. 

Last month, a consulate worker in Guangzhou was found to have suffered a traumatic brain injury after reporting “abnormal sensations of sound and pressure” from late 2017 through to April 2018.
The department sent a team to Guangzhou in late May to examine other US staff and their families, and investigate possible links between their symptoms and those of US diplomats in Cuba last year, an incident that prompted Washington to pull its staff from the country and expel Cuban diplomats from the US.
The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, on Tuesday announced the formation of a task force to investigate unexplained health incidents among US government personnel and their families overseas.
The latest evacuation suggests what was previously described as an isolated case may turn into a wider diplomatic crisis, at a time when US-China ties are already at a low.
China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, described the incident in May involving the US consulate worker as an “individual case”, and one Beijing hoped would not be “magnified, complicated or even politicised”.
When the US issued a health alert in May to US citizens in China to report any “unusual acute auditory or sensory phenomena”, it said it was not aware of other similar cases within or outside of the US diplomatic community in China.
That has been disputed by Mark Lenzi, a security engineering officer at the consulate in Guangzhou, who, according to the New York Times, was among the personnel evacuated on Wednesday.
Lenzi, who lived in the same complex as the consulate worker who suffered brain trauma, said he had been hearing sounds like “marbles bouncing and hitting a floor” since April last year. 

That was followed by excruciating headaches and sleeplessness, symptoms his family also experienced. 

When he brought his concerns to his superiors, he was prescribed painkillers.
Lenzi sent an email to staff of the consulate criticising the fact that the first employee was evacuated in April, but US citizens weren’t alerted until a month later. 

The health alert suggested it was a single case. 

“They knew full well it wasn’t,” he told the paper.
The US embassy in Beijing did not respond to requests for comment on Lenzi’s allegations, but sent the government’s statement from Wednesday.
“The state department has been and will continue to be diligent and transparent in its response to our employees’ concerns,” departmental spokesperson Heather Nauert said.

Death by China: American Consulate Workers as Animal Test Subjects

With Sonic Weapon Attacks on U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou, China Demonstrates Experimental Program

By Joshua Philipp

U.S. CONSULATE GENERAL IN GUANGZHOU

An employee at the U.S. Embassy in Guangzhou, China, suffered traumatic brain injury after hearing a vague and abnormal sound, as revealed in a May 23 health alert released by the embassy. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was quick to draw similarities between the incident and a 2016 incident in Havana, Cuba, in which U.S. Embassy personnel were sickened from a sonic attack.
Pompeo told the House Foreign Affairs Committee, “The medical indications are very similar, and entirely consistent with, the medical indications that were taking place to Americans working in Cuba.”
He said the United States has sent medical teams and is “working to figure out what took place, both in Havana and now in China as well.”
The incident elicited all forms of reactions from news outlets.
Yet the common narrative now floating around is an attempt to write the attack off as being not a sonic attack, but instead a slip-up with electronic monitoring technology, framing the U.S. government response as a hasty conclusion and overreaction.
What this prevailing narrative fails to note, however, is the long history of such weapons in the Chinese military arsenal. 
Sonic and ultrasonic weapons (USW) fall under the broader category of directed energy weapons (DEW), which also include a range of weapons on the electromagnetic spectrum.
These can be used for many purposes, including destroying electronic equipment, making a targeted person feel ill, or even damaging a targeted person’s internal organs.
“Like gun, missile, and bomb technologies, DEW can be utilized against people, material, and infrastructure,” said Robert J. Bunker, adjunct research professor at the Strategic Studies Institute at U.S. Army War College, in an email.
“As late as the early 1990s, information concerning non-lethal weapons (NLW) and their human bio-effects—at least the advanced DEW forms of them—was discussed primarily within the classified world,” he said.
There are various weapons within this category on the electromagnetic radiation spectrum, which includes visible light, and on the sonic spectrum, which includes audible sound.
“When directed against humans, different bio-effects will result,” Bunker said.
“As an example, high-powered microwaves (HPM) targeted at humans can raise their brain temperatures, resulting in seizures and damage, while infrasound can create vibrations in the human body, causing disorientation and incapacitation or potentially even causing organ failure.”
A 2005 secret report from the National Ground Intelligence Center, declassified in 2011, describes experiments the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was conducting with high-powered microwaves and electromagnetic frequency radiation weapons on animal test subjects.
According to the report, the CCP scientists made it clear in a series of seminars that “the real purpose was to investigate potential human effects of exposure to these specific radiations.”
It states the CCP scientists were using the technologies to cause eye injury, brain injury, and organ injury. 
Many details on the tests are redacted in the report, but it notes there was a “high mortality” rate among the animal test subjects, and the analysis states that due to gradual effects of such weapons, the CCP scientists were developing the technologies “for torturing prisoners.”
It also notes that the Chinese scientists had connections to the CCP’s military, the People’s Liberation Army. 
It states they were affiliated with the Institute of Radiation Medicine of the Academy of Military Medical Scientists.
It states the CCP conducted similar studies in 2001 under its Academy of Military Medical Sciences and its National University of Defense Technology.

Psychotronic Weapons
On the sonic level, humans can generally hear anything from 20Hz to 20,000Hz.
Above this range is ultrasound, and below this range is infrasound.
On the electromagnetic spectrum, meanwhile, humans can generally see only an extremely narrow range of light known as ROYGBIV (referring to the color spectrum), between infrared and ultraviolet.
Beyond ultraviolet are x-rays and then gamma rays.
Below infrared are microwaves and then radio waves, followed by “very low frequencies,” then “extremely low frequencies.”
Technologies using these spectrums are not limited to China; and other countries, including the United States, have developed weapons within these categories.
According to Bunker, “a number of these weapons technologies may have originated with Soviet-era programs, but have since proliferated to (or were appropriated by) other national defense programs.”
Documents recently released by the Washington State Fusion Center, obtained through a FOIA request by MuckRock, detail the uses of electromagnetic frequency weapons, the technologies to carry out such attacks, and their impacts on the human body and human consciousness.
Among the stated effects, according to the documents, are “forced memory blanking and induced erroneous actions,” various forms of “intense pain” on different parts of the human body, “wildly racing heart without cause,” “induced changes to hearing,” “controlled dreams,” and many others.


A chart details various effects of electromagnetic frequency attacks on the human body. (Washington State Fusion Center)

Another document shows how such attacks can be carried out by mobile phone networks, vehicles, helicopters, and emitters.
It also lists the resonance frequencies of various parts of the human brain, and states the technologies can be used for “sound which bypasses the ears,” “images in the brain bypassing the eyes,” “imposed subconscious thoughts,” and other purposes.
A chart details different emitters that can launch electromagnetic frequency attacks. (Washington State Fusion Center)

A third document details the bio-electromagnetic field of the human body and the different frequencies of human brain waves.A chart from the Washington State Fusion Center details the frequencies of the human brain, and the human body’s electromagnetic field. (Washington State Fusion Center)

According to Bunker, weapons such as these are becoming a greater focus in military development around the world.
“Twenty-first century warfare is gradually shifting from conventional gun, missile, and bomb technologies which are mechanically derived into exotic and advanced DEW technologies that literally ‘weaponize bands of the electromagnetic spectrum’ and then direct them at opposing forces,” he said.
“China is well aware of the military value of DEW—as well as artificial intelligence (AI), armed robots/drones, facial recognition, anti-satellite, and swarming technologies—and is actively experimenting with them in field tests and, even now apparently, in clandestine operations,” he said.

Future Wars
The declassified military report notes that some of the technologies are related to the CCP’s Assassin’s Mace (“Sha Shou Jian,” or “Trump Card”) program, which uses a blend of asymmetrical and unconventional weapons designed to launch surprise attacks and rapidly win a war.
An Assassin’s Mace attack from the CCP would likely take the form of rapid attacks on GPS satellites to disable key military equipment, the use of EMP from a nuclear blast to destroy electronics in wide areas, rapid strikes on airstrips to disable military planes, and various other forms of attack.
The report states the CCP’s Assassin’s Mace weapons “will permit China’s low-technology forces to prevail over U.S. high-technology forces in a localized conflict, according to these political pronouncements.”
It notes the CCP has experimented with “EMP warheads” and the use of nuclear weapons for high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) attacks to destroy electronic infrastructure.
Both the CCP and the United States have also developed technologies using microwave and EMP weapons to destroy technology in targeted locations.
According to an article published by Popular Science in January 2017, the CCP’s Northwest Institute of Nuclear Technology has been working on such technologies for over six years.
In the United States, Boeing and the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) Directed Energy Directorate, have developed similar weapons that can destroy electronic targets with enough precision to target individual buildings.
According to Bunker, the recent attack on a U.S. government employee in China should be viewed in the context of similar attacks on U.S. diplomatic personnel in Havana, Cuba. 
The sonic technology used in both incidents “shines the spotlight on potential Chinese security services involvement in these incidents, given their ‘medically similar’ bio-effects.”
In the context of trade and defense tensions between the United States and China, the CCP may be sporadically engaging U.S. military and governmental personnel ‘covertly on the margins’ as a component of an active engagement program following the tenets of ‘Unrestricted Warfare’-type thinking.

China’s encroachment into Latin America

The Beijing regime seeks to undercut traditional American influence in the hemisphere
By James A. Lyons and Richard D. Fisher Jr.

Linas Garsys

China’s June 14 poaching of Panama, helping it to switch diplomatic relations from Taiwan to China, belies a growing campaign by Beijing to seek greater economic and strategic influence in Latin America at the expense of the United States.
For too long the policy mandarins at the State Department have avoided ascribing hostile intent to China’s growing economic and political clout in Latin America. 

In the main, China places a priority on strengthening Latin America’s anti-democrats and is using its growing economic power in the region to expand its strategic options.
In poaching Panama, Beijing made two power plays. 

First Beijing increased the diplomatic isolation of democratic Taiwan, which it ultimately seeks to destroy to help displace American power in Asia. 

Also, having long dominated the Panama Canal via commercial control and after establishing diplomatic relations, Beijing urged Panama to join its vast $1 trillion “One Belt, One Road” infrastructure initiative from China to Europe, which would give this program a global projection.
Long-standing management of the Panama Canal by Chinese companies, and Chinese corporate purchase of one Panamanian port, is now complimented by Chinese commercial investment in 10 more Latin American waterborne or landbridge “canal” projects. 

While some of these projects may be too grandiose to succeed, what matters is that China is seeking to achieve a position of economic and then political primacy in Latin America. 

It should be a matter of deep concern that China could deny the U.S. Navy access to the Panama Canal, and then also deny access to the future canals being built by Chinese companies.
China’s anti-democratic bent in Latin America is further proven by its decisive economic support for Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro regime. 

Hundreds of Chinese-made Norinco VN-4 armored cars protect Mr. Maduro’s police thugs killing Venezuelans protesting his socialist basket-case policies. 

China has also become the strongest ally of Cuba’s Castro family dictatorship and a growing source for its economic support.
China has sought to translate its economic-political clout into strategic gains. 

Late in the past decade, China began courting Argentina’s military, and by early 2015 was on the verge of offering the regime of Christina Fernandez the start of a rearmament program that could have enabled a second war with Britain over the Falkland Islands. 

By early 2015, China was offering Argentina modern, fourth-generation Chengdu J-10B combat aircraft, modern frigates and co-production of wheeled armored vehicles.
Since early in this decade, China has been marketing deadly short-range ballistic missiles to Latin America. 

Just last April, China marketed one of its most modern unmanned combat aerial vehicles, the Chengdu Wing Loong-2, at an airshow in Mexico City.
While the Argentine arms deals cooled off after the October 2015 election of President Mauricio Macri, China maintains control of a space tracking and control base in Argentina’s Neuquen Province. 

This deep Southern Hemisphere facility will allow China’s People’s Liberation Army to better control future military-space assets it requires to attack U.S. space systems, which could happen in the opening phase of a Chinese attack against Taiwan.
This drives home the point, America cannot ignore China’s aggression against its democratic allies and friends, including Taiwan. 

Washington can and should play a more active role in lauding Taiwan’s democratic example and encouraging Latin states to sustain a vibrant relationship with Taipei, even if it is “unofficial,” as does the United States.

Washington must also make clear to its Latin friends that allowing China to threaten freedom in Taiwan, and to sustain cruel dictatorships in Venezuela and Cuba, ultimately also threatens their freedom. 

The Trump administration should consider translating the Pentagon’s annual report on China’s military growth into many languages, including Spanish, to enable a wider public understanding of China’s threats to freedom.
Like previous administrations, the Trump administration is seeking to gain China’s decisive support in containing North Korea’s now-imminent nuclear missile threats. 

But for 25 years, Trump’s predecessors watched as China refused to reverse deep support for North Korea, even its missile programs, as it worked increasingly to undermine U.S. security interests on the Taiwan Strait, East China Sea and South China Sea.
Washington has little choice but to push back harder against Chinese belligerence in Asia if it wants to maintain its alliances and influence. 

In this hemisphere, the U.S. will have to formulate a new hard line against China’s strategic ambitions. 

This must be done now before China acquires its planned global military projection forces of aircraft carrier battle groups and large heavy-lift transport aircraft, which it could use to intimidate and to suppress Latin America’s still-fragile democracies.

Axis of Evil: Russia and China Are Bulking Up in the U.S.’s Backyard

Putin and Xi are working to win over small, poor countries with promises of aid, military support, and investment, even as Trump scales back.
By Ezra Fieser

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu (center) inspects a Cuban tank division during a 2015 visit to Havana. 

As supplies of crude from its old ally Venezuela dwindled last year, Cuba began turning out the lights in government offices and shuttering oil refineries. 

Then, Havana turned to an old friend for help: Russia. 

In early May the Kremlin sent a tanker full of fuel across the Atlantic as part of a deal to keep the communist island running for three months. 

It was the first such shipment Cuba had received in years from its former benefactor, but it wasn’t the only sign Russia has returned to a region it had all but abandoned after the Cold War. 

Moscow is building a satellite-tracking station in Managua and considering reopening Soviet-era military bases in the region, as well as expanding economic ties and doling out aid in countries across Central America and the Caribbean. 

Vladimir Putin has even offered to restore the Capitol building in Havana, which bears a striking resemblance to the one in Washington.
“This could purely be a way of the Russians telling the gringos, ‘Be careful, we can come back to your backyard,’ ” says Jorge Piñon, director of the Latin America and Caribbean Energy Program at the University of Texas at Austin, who estimates Russia’s fuel shipments to Cuba are worth more than $100 million. 

“Or it’s a long-term strategic commitment, and this is the first building block of a considerable investment in the region.”
China also has been building up its presence in the Caribbean Basin. 

Chinese companies and the government have poured $6 billion into the area since 2012, according to a tally of large investments by the American Enterprise Institute. 

Beijing’s interest isn’t just economic: It wants to persuade the Dominican Republic and 10 other countries in the region to sever their diplomatic ties with Taiwan as it seeks to curtail its rival’s role on the international stage. 

The People’s Republic of China considers Taiwan part of its territory under its One China policy. 

For years, Beijing and Taiwan competed for diplomatic allegiances promising low-cost loans and outright aid. 

But in 2007, when Costa Rica switched from Taiwan to Beijing, the two governments entered a détente. 

That may have changed with the election of Taiwan’s pro-independence leader Tsai Ing-wen, whom Donald Trump telephoned after the November election. 

After the phone call, Beijing convinced the tiny African island nation São Tomé and Príncipe to cut ties with Taiwan. 

Tsai quickly arranged a trip to Central America in January, visiting three countries to shore up relations.
A top diplomat from one Caribbean country, who spoke on condition of anonymity, expects several countries to switch allegiances over the next year or two, as more Chinese money flows in: “You’ll see these countries leave Taiwan in bunches.”
Even before Trump signaled the U.S. would scale back its global role under his “America First” policy, China and Russia were using their size and resources to win over small, mostly poor countries with promises of aid, military support, and investments in everything from cricket stadiums to a proposed canal stretching across Nicaragua. 

“Both Russia and China recognize the region’s geopolitical importance due to its proximity to the U.S.,” says Evan Ellis, professor of Latin American Studies at the U.S. Army War College’s Strategic Studies Institute in Carlisle, Pa. 

“The difference is that while China wants to build an economic presence to position itself softly, the Russians are the opposite; they want to use their presence to provoke.”
In a bygone era, such incursions might have drawn a quick, even hostile, U.S. response. 

Yet since the end of the Cold War, Washington has largely turned its focus away from hemispheric affairs, creating an opening for China and Russia, says Richard Feinberg, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington. 

“If you take China, for example, they see a disorganized, inward-looking United States and they see themselves as, comparatively speaking, well-organized and able to establish a long-term vision for the region through gradually building influence,” he says. 

“And I can easily see how enticing it is for Putin to establish Russia as a regional power. He’d welcome the opportunity to do more in the Caribbean.”
Nikolay Smirnov, Russia’s Guyana-based ambassador to the southern Caribbean, balks at the notion that Russia is trying to provoke the U.S. 

Instead, he emphasizes the potential for greater cooperation between Russia and countries in the region on issues like climate change, trade, and fighting drug trafficking. 

“In the foreign policy of modern Russia, there exist opportunities for all countries, small or large, to participate in economic as well as political partnerships,” says Smirnov. 

“Our position is not to intrude into anyone else’s relations or to compete with others’ interests.”
The U.S. remains the dominant economic force in Central America and the Caribbean, with about $80 billion in two-way trade last year, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures. 

It is also the region’s single-largest source of foreign direct investment, which totaled $18 billion in 2015, according to the U.N.’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. 

However, Trump’s proposed budget envisions a near 40 percent reduction in aid to Central American countries, according to an analysis by the Washington Office on Latin America, an advocacy organization.
Russia, meanwhile, has been doling out aid to small Caribbean islands and forgiven $32 billion in Cuban debt. 

Chinese capital has flowed into hotel projects in Barbados and power plants in Haiti. 

In Jamaica, where a $730 million toll road nicknamed the “Beijing Highway” opened last year, Chinese-financed infrastructure projects are seen as key to pulling the country out of a decade-long economic slump, says Anelia Nelson, an officer at Jamaica Promotions Corp., a quasi-­government agency.
In April, U.S. Navy Admiral Kurt Tidd, head of Southern Command, told Congress that he was concerned about China’s exercise of soft power in the region as well as the growing involvement of Russia’s military. 

“Even seemingly benign activities can be used to build malign influence,” he said.
Take Nicaragua, whose President Daniel Ortega refers to Putin as his “hermano.” 

Since the two countries agreed to expand military ties two years ago, Russia has docked its warships in Nicaraguan ports and supplied the Central American country with tanks, aircraft, and weapons. 

It’s now putting the finishing touches on a station to track GPS satellites. 

Its location, near the U.S. embassy, has raised suspicions that it might also be used to spy on the U.S. and its partners.
Despite Trump’s seemingly cozy relationship with Putin, the new administration is pushing back. 

The spending bill the president signed in early May bans some U.S. funding to countries, including Nicaragua, that recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the self-proclaimed independent states that fought alongside Russia against neighboring Georgia in 2008. 

Separately, Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is a co-sponsor of a bill called the Nicaraguan Investment Conditionality Act that requires countries seeking loans from international financial institutions first hold free and fair elections and promote democracy.

Chinese Fifth Column: Wolves In Tech Robes

Huawei Is Focus of Widening U.S. Investigation
By Paul Mozur

A Huawei booth at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, in February. The widening inquiry in the United States puts Huawei in an awkward position at a moment when sanctions have taken on new import. 

HONG KONG — As one of the world’s biggest sellers of smartphones and the back-end equipment that makes cellular networks run, Huawei Technologies has become one of the major symbols of China’s global technology ambitions.
But as it continues its rise, its business with some countries has fallen under growing scrutiny from investigators in the United States.
American officials are widening their investigation into whether Huawei broke American trade controls on Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, according to an administrative subpoena sent to Huawei and reviewed by The New York Times. 

The previously unreported subpoena was issued in December by the United States Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, which oversees compliance with a number of American sanctions programs.
The Treasury’s inquiry follows a subpoena sent to Huawei this summer from the United States Department of Commerce, which carries out sanctions and also oversees exports of technology that can have military as well as civilian uses.

As an administrative subpoena, the Treasury document does not indicate that the Chinese company is part of a criminal investigation.
Still, the widening inquiry puts Huawei in an awkward position at a moment when sanctions have taken on new import. 

The Trump administration has been working to push China to cut back its trade, and in turn economic support, for North Korea, amid rising tensions over the North’s nuclear and missile programs. 

The growing investigation also comes after Huawei’s smaller domestic rival, ZTE, in March pleaded guilty to breaking sanctions and was fined $1.19 billion.
It is not clear why the Treasury Department became involved with the Huawei investigation. 

But its subpoena suggests Huawei might violate American embargoes that broadly restrict the export of American goods to countries like Iran and Syria.
“The most likely thing happening here is that Commerce figured out there was more to this than dual-use commodities, and they decided to notify Treasury,” said Matthew Brazil, a former United States commercial officer in Beijing and founder of the Silicon Valley security firm Madeira Consulting.

By its own admission, Huawei has struggled with corporate governance.

In a rare 2015 media appearance, Ren Zhengfei, Huawei’s founder, said that 4,000 to 5,000 employees had admitted to various improprieties as part of a “confess for leniency” program the company set up in 2014.
“The biggest enemy we’ve run into isn’t other people,” he said at the time. 

“It’s ourselves.”
A Treasury spokeswoman declined to comment on whether it was conducting an investigation. 

A Commerce Department spokesman also declined to comment.
Huawei plays an important strategic role for China. 

The company is often a part of Chinese overseas trade delegations and investment deals in emerging markets like South America and Africa. 

As a major spender on research and development, it is also a crucial part of Chinese industrial policies aimed at building up domestic technological capabilities.
It has also turned itself into an increasingly recognized smartphone brand. 

In the fourth quarter of 2016, Huawei was the third-largest smartphone maker in the world, with a global market share of about 10 percent.
The subpoena, which was sent to Huawei’s Texas offices in the Dallas suburb of Plano, called for the company to describe technology and services provided to Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria over the past five years. 

It also called for the identity of individuals who played a part in those transactions. 

North Korea, which was named in the Commerce Department subpoena issued last year, was not named in the Treasury Department subpoena.
The scrutiny of Huawei shows the increased importance both the United States and China are putting on the technology industry. 

Earlier this year a Pentagon report distributed at the top levels of the Trump administration indicated Chinese flows of investment into American start-ups were a new cause for concern.
The American authorities have jurisdiction over the trade of companies like Huawei and ZTE when those companies sell equipment made by or featuring components from American companies. 

If Huawei is deemed to have violated American laws, it could have its access to American electronic components cut off. 

Given the company’s size — it is one of the two largest cellular phone equipment makers in the world — that could have an effect on the expansion of mobile networks around the globe.
When the Department of Commerce first announced its investigation into ZTE, it released a document in which ZTE executives mapped out a plan for how to get around American export controls. 

The document said the strategy came from a company that ZTE labeled with the code name F7, which The New York Times reported closely resembled Huawei.
Earlier this month 10 members of Congress sent a letter to the Commerce Department demanding that F7 be publicly identified and fully investigated.
“We strongly support holding F7 accountable should the government conclude that unlawful behavior occurred,” read a part of the letter.

Rogue Companies

U.S. Fines ZTE of China $1.19 Billion for Breaching Sanctions

By PAUL MOZUR and CECILIA KANG

Visitors used ZTE devices during the Mobile World Congress 2017 on Feb. 27 in Barcelona. The company’s settlement with the United States is the latest in a series of skirmishes between the United States and China over technology policy. 

HONG KONG — As one of China’s few truly international technology companies, ZTE is often held up by Beijing as part of a new generation of firms that is able to compete beyond Chinese borders.
On Tuesday, the United States government made an example of ZTE in a different way.
As part of a settlement for breaking sanctions and selling electronics to Iran and North Korea, ZTE agreed to plead guilty and pay $1.19 billion in fines, the United States Department of Commerce said in an announcement. 

The penalty is the largest criminal fine in a United States sanctions case.
The action is the latest in a series of skirmishes between the United States and China over technology policy. 

It also offered a chance for President Trump’s young administration to make a statement about the seriousness of United States sanctions. 

In addition to ZTE, the Commerce Department is also investigating the company’s larger Chinese rival, Huawei, for violating United States sanctions.
“We are putting the world on notice: The games are over,” said Commerce Secretary Wilbur L. Ross. 

“Those who flout our economic sanctions and export control laws will not go unpunished — they will suffer the harshest of consequences.”
ZTE was found to have breached United States sanctions against Iran by selling American-made goods to the country last March. 

At the time, the Commerce Department said it would force American companies to obtain a special license to sell to ZTE, which makes smartphones and telecommunications infrastructure equipment. The restrictions would have had the potential to cripple ZTE’s supply chain.
The ban, however, was never put in place, and instead the Chinese company was given a series of reprieves.
Still, ZTE, which is China’s second-largest maker of telecom equipment, has not fared well over the past year. 

Its revenue from the expansion of China’s 4G cellular networks has slowed and its smartphone business has faced major competition from new Chinese handset makers, as well as Huawei.
On Tuesday, the Commerce Department said that along with selling prohibited American electronics to build Iran’s telecom networks, ZTE also made 283 shipments of microprocessors, servers and routers to North Korea, violating American embargoes in that country as well.
“ZTE engaged in an elaborate scheme to acquire U.S.-origin items, send the items to Iran and mask its involvement in those exports,” said the acting assistant attorney general, Mary B. McCord. 

“The plea agreement alleges that the highest levels of management within the company approved the scheme.”
She added that ZTE repeatedly lied to and misled federal investigators, its own lawyers and internal investigators.
In a statement, ZTE said that it had strengthened its compliance policies and undergone a shake-up of top leaders; the company named a new chief executive last April.
“ZTE acknowledges the mistakes it made, takes responsibility for them and remains committed to positive change in the company,” said Zhao Xianming, chairman and chief executive of ZTE.
Although China and the United States have occasionally traded barbs over technology policy and cyberattacks, the actions against ZTE by the United States government have not had a major impact on the relationship of the two countries, though Beijing could respond harshly to the new fine.
It is unclear whether the Commerce Department has completed its investigations into Chinese telecom equipment makers.
In a rare step accompanying the announcement last March, the Commerce Department provided two internal ZTE documents.
One, from 2011 and signed by several senior ZTE executives, detailed how the company had “ongoing projects in all five major embargoed countries — Iran, Sudan, North Korea, Syria and Cuba.” 

Another document laid out in a complex flow chart a method for circumventing United States export controls.
Citing an unnamed company as a model for circumventing United States sanctions, that second document seemed to implicate ZTE’s more politically important rival, Huawei.
The New York Times reported last year that the United States government was also investigating whether Huawei broke export controls. 

The Commerce Department subpoenaed Huawei, demanding it turn over all information regarding the export or re-export of American technology to Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan and Syria.
Huawei has said it is committed to complying with laws and regulations where it operates.
Huawei and ZTE are private companies, but they have deep ties to the Chinese government, in part because they supply much of the equipment that makes the country’s telecom backbone function.

Axis of Evil

Michael Flynn, a Top Trump Adviser, Ties China and North Korea to Jihadists
By EDWARD WONG

Retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, the choice of President-elect Donald J. Trump for national security adviser, speaking at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July.

What if someone were to tell you that China and North Korea are allied with militant Islamists bent on imposing their religious ideology worldwide?
You might not agree. 

After all, China and North Korea are officially secular Communist states, and China has blamed religious extremists for violence in Muslim areas of its Xinjiang region.
But such an alliance is the framework through which retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, the pick of President Donald J. Trump for national security adviser, views the two East Asian countries. 

To the list of pro-jihadist anti-Western conspirators, General Flynn adds Russia, Cuba and Venezuela, among others. (Never mind that he has recently had close financial and lobbying relationships with conservative Russian and Turkish interests.)
By appointing General Flynn, Mr. Trump has signaled that he intends to prioritize policy on the Middle East and jihadist groups, though the Obama administration seems to have stressed to Mr. Trump the urgency of dealing with North Korea’s nuclear program. 

General Flynn is an outspoken critic of political Islam and has advocated a global campaign led by the United States against “radical Islam.” 

He once posted on Twitter that “Fear of Muslims is RATIONAL.”
General Flynn is about to take on what many consider the most important foreign policy job in the United States government. 

He is expected to coordinate policy-making agencies, manage competing voices and act as Mr. Trump’s main adviser, and perhaps arbiter, on foreign policy.
General Flynn’s peers in the Army have praised him for his work gathering intelligence in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

But senior officials have criticized him for being a poor manager as director of the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency. 

After being forced from the job in 2014, he began denouncing the Obama administration in public, saying the White House refused to acknowledge important intelligence on growing jihadist threats and their ideological foundations.
He then wrote a book, with a co-author, on his military career and the need to intensify the campaign against Islamic extremists. 

The book, “The Field of Fight: How We Can Win the Global War Against Radical Islam and Its Allies,” published in July, is one of the few places where General Flynn has discussed his views on China and North Korea. 

The mentions are infrequent, but they give some clue as to how he views the Asian nations.
Here are the most relevant passages. 

In the introduction, General Flynn says one of his goals in writing the book is: “to show you the war being waged against us. 

This administration has forbidden us to describe our enemies properly and clearly: They are Radical Islamists. 

They are not alone, and are allied with countries and groups who, though not religious fanatics, share their hatred of the West, particularly the United States and Israel. 

Those allies include North Korea, Russia, China, Cuba, and Venezuela.”
He tries to further explain that alliance through a vague mention of a common ideology:
“There are many similarities between these dangerous and vicious radicals and the totalitarian movements of the last century. 

No surprise that we are facing an alliance between Radical Islamists and regimes in Havana, Pyongyang, Moscow, and Beijing. 

Both believe that history, and/or Allah, blesses their efforts, and so both want to ensure that this glorious story is carefully told.”
Early in his career, General Flynn served with the 25th Infantry Division in the Asia-Pacific region. He writes: “This opened up my eyes to the type of enemies we saw across a wide swath of the Asia-Pacific rim. 

There were many, and still are.”
General Flynn also gives a bit more detail on how he sees this global alliance:
“The war is on. 

We face a working coalition that extends from North Korea and China to Russia, Iran, Syria, Cuba, Bolivia, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. 

We are under attack, not only from nation-states directly, but also from Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, ISIS, and countless other terrorist groups. (I will discuss later on, the close working relationships between terror groups and organized criminal organizations.) 

Suffice to say, the same sort of cooperation binds together jihadis, Communists, and garden-variety tyrants.
“This alliance surprises a lot of people. 

On the surface, it seems incoherent. 

How, they ask, can a Communist regime like North Korea embrace a radical Islamist regime like Iran?”
General Flynn goes on to discuss reports that North Korea has cooperated with Iran and Syria on nuclear programs and trade. 

He asserts that Iran is the “linchpin” of the global anti-Western network. 

He writes: “The mullahs have already established strategic alliances in our own hemisphere with Cuba and Venezuela, and are working closely with Russia and China; a victory over the ‘Great Satan’ in Iraq will compel the smaller Middle Eastern countries to come to terms with Tehran, and make the region much more inhospitable to us and our friends and allies.”
Finally, General Flynn writes that if the United States loses the global war, one result will be living under “the grim censorship we see in groups such as the Islamic State, Al Qaeda, and the Taliban or from nations like Iran, North Korea, and Cuba.”

John Delury, a scholar of Chinese history and the Koreas at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea, shared these thoughts after reading General Flynn’s book:
“General Flynn seems to be all about one thing — fighting ‘radical Islam’ — and that means Asia goes on the back burner. 

Obama was trying to ‘pivot’ from costly wars in the Middle East to economic opportunity in Asia, a strategy that was still in-progress and that Hillary Clinton would have stuck with. 

But Flynn has no concept of the importance of Asia. 

For him, America needs to become single-minded in the top priority — destroying radical Islam, at home and abroad.
“Flynn’s obsession with eliminating radical Islam is likely to color his view of everything else — including key strategic questions facing East Asia like the rise of China, resurgence of Japan and nuclear breakout of North Korea. 

Running the National Security Council is all about juggling priorities, keeping your eye on the ball while maintaining strategic balance. Flynn doesn’t come across as much of a juggler. 

For him, there is only one ball out there.
“If Flynn is able to press his global war on radical Islam, America’s rivals in Asia will seize the opportunity to further their interests. 

China can speed up its march to displace the U.S. as the architect of Asian security. 

North Korea can finish its drive to joining the nuclear club. 

Life will also change for America’s Asian allies, who will no longer be able to count on U.S. commitment to their development and defense. 

And America’s role as a promoter of human rights and liberal values — a contested and problematic mission, albeit a noble one — could become a thing of the past.
“Here’s an example of how Flynn’s global war on radical Islam could have unanticipated side effects on Asian security. 

In his book, Flynn links North Korea to his ‘enemy number one,’ the Islamists, by citing Pyongyang’s military and economic ties to Syria and Iran. 

Well, what if the North Koreans promised an envoy from Trump — who said he’s willing to talk to Kim Jong-un — that they would cut their links to radical Islam and even give the Americans some intel based on their years of cooperation? 

Nonproliferation guarantees, which the North Koreans put out as bait throughout the Obama years, to no effect, could serve as a starting point for resumed U.S.-D.P.R.K. negotiation under a Flynn foreign policy. 

The old dictum stands — my enemy’s enemy is my friend. 

Flynn is crystal clear who the enemy is, radical Islam. 

Anyone who shows eagerness to fight the Islamists buys a seat at Flynn’s national security table.”