"Spying"-Chinese Style

The Clinton Administration "buzzword" for their across-the-board policy with the PRC was "Constructive Engagement", which in the case of the Clinton Administrations PRC Lab-to-Lab program was essentially a euphemism for "Spring", But a principal conclusion of the Redacted Report is that it was the PRC's Academy of Engineering Physics[CAEP]-the PRC equivalent of the US DOE and the Russian MINATOM-that took advantage of the Clinton Administration's "Constructive Engagement" program to "spy"on us.

The Cox report describes in several places the PRC-style of "spying." but Phillip B. Moore. the FBI's chief analyst for Chinese intelligence for more than 20 years probably describes it more succinctly;

China's approach is to create situations in which it is possible for individuals to make their intelligence contributions. The Chinese seek to develo0 significant relationships with as many people as possible, in particular those of ethnic Chinese ancestry, whose thinking and value systems China's intelligence officers understand best. This they do on a very large scale. and are quite content to let their efforts directed toward a given individual continue for many years.

Normally, the natural"consumers"of intelligence-scientists, engineers, st6uderts, etc.-are the ones who actually collect the date, not professional Chinese intelligence officers. The physical transfer of information typically takes place in China, and as a byproduct of a legitimate trip there by someone from the United States. The usual collection mechanism is simple elicitation. The visitor may be asked to give a talk to his colleagues in China, who then pepper him with questions that might induce at least a small security breach on his part.

So the Clinton Administration set out in 1993 to "constructively engage"the PRC weapons scientists through a US-PRC version of "lab-to-lab"programs, using US scientists who were in many cases of 'Ethnic Chinese ancestry'. But here is the way the Redacted Report "defines"PRC "Espionage".

Espionage played a central part in the PRC's acquisition of classified US thermonuclear warhead design secrets. In several cases, the PRC identified lab employees, invited them to the PRC, and approached  them for help, sometimes playing upon ethnic ties to recruit individuals.... PRC scientists have used their extensive laboratory-to-laboratory interactions with the United States to gain information from US scientists on common problems, solutions to nuclear weapons physics, and solutions to engineering problems... The China Academy of Engineering Physics has pursued a very close relationship with US national weapons laboratories, sending scientists as well as well as senior management to Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore. Members of the CAEP senior management have made at least two trips during the mid-to-late 1990s to US national weapons laboratories to acquire information and collect intelligence.... Specific examples of the loss of classified US information in this manner are detailed in the select Committee's classified Final Report. The Clinton Administration has determined that these examples cannot be publicly discussed.

If what the Clinton Administration did was not "Spying," then what the PRC did--in learning as much about our nuclear weapons as they could, taking advantage of the Clinton Administration's Openness and Engagement polices-was not "Spying"either. Apparently, the Cox Committee feels that the PRC got more out or the Clinton Administration than the Clinton Administration got out of the Engagement and )openness with the PRC. There is no way to tell, because the Clinton Administration will not allow the public to know what evidence it has for what the PRC obtained.

The NSC Staffer designated by the President's National Security Advisor to be "point man" on the developing PRC "spying" scandal, argued then and now, as does DOE Secretary Richardson, that the PRC "forum" has been, and should be permitted to remain, a key element of the Clinton Administration's "Engagement" policy with the PRC. Secretary Richardson extensively lobbied Congress, made numerous TV appearances, concentrating on the necessity of continuing to allow "scientific exchange" between the PRC and US nuclear weapons labs, with the result that the Administration marshaled enough votes in the House to defeat an amendment to the FY 2000 NDAA offered by Rep. Jim Ryun (R-KA) which would have prohibited such interchange programs with the PRC.