Folks… this means a potentially hostile submarine surfaced within striking range of one of our carriers and we had no clue it was there.:
From UPI:- Senior NATO officials said that since the Chinese vessel surfaced in the middle of the recent military exercise, U.S. Navy officials have been shocked by the advanced technology used by their Chinese counterparts, The Daily Mail said Saturday.
One official said that based on the ease at which the submarine avoided 12 U.S. warships to surface near a 1,000-foot carrier, Navy officials are reconsidering the potential dangers posed by Chinese subs.
Appears we are once again reaping some of the bountiful harvest of the Clinton administration (bold highlights added by me):
From Seth Cropsey, Safeguarding Defense Technology, Enabling Commerce, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research – In 1994, China sold Pakistan parts of a missile with a payload of at least 1,100 pounds and minimum range of 185 miles, in violation of the Missile Technology Control Regime, an accord that Beijing promised to honor. The Clinton administration offered to forgive China if it would admit its violation; Beijing admitted nothing. When the PRC sold Iran C801/802 Silkworm antiship missiles—which could endanger U.S. Navy operations in the Persian Gulf—the Clinton State Department simply issued a démarche (a mild diplomatic protest called a “demarshmallow” in diplomatic circles), even though American machine tools and specialty furnaces sold to China had contributed to improving the capabilities of the Silkworm missiles that China sold Iran.
The United States was also slow to act when specialty steels that could only be used to make SCUD missiles went from China to North Korea and Syria. Titanium-stabilized duplex stainless steel has virtually no commercial applications; it can be, and is, used in the production of SCUD missiles and in the storage of their highly caustic propellants. Despite evidence that a third country was selling this highly specialized steel to China, it took the Clinton administration two years to place it on the list of materials whose export is proscribed by the Missile Technology Control Regime. In this as in the other issues raised by China’s stealthy effort to increase its military’s technological sophistication, the Clinton administration steadfastly refused to apply sanctions, to use its leverage to withhold other goods Beijing wanted, or to discourage China’s problematic behavior in any meaningful way.
Gee.. I wonder why….
With the outpouring of formerly restricted technology to China—and by extension, to its rogue-state clientele—development times for military hardware have been dramatically compressed. In December 1999, the Washington Times carried reports that a Chinese submarine, the Type 094, would be operational around 2005. The sub will carry the Julang-2 (“Great Wave”) missile, an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching a target 7,400 miles away, which will permit Chinese submarines to threaten cities throughout the United States. Pentagon officials said that the Julang-2 would be armed with Chinese copies of the smallsize, large-power W-88 warhead—whose design had been stolen from the United States, as Bill Richardson, the Clinton administration’s Secretary of Energy, admitted in March 1999.
China’s enhanced ability to project nuclear force is noteworthy not merely for its threat to America but also because much of the Clinton administration’s decontrol of defense exports took place after 1995, when the administration first admitted that China may have stolen our W-88 warhead design. For example, the export to China of computers that could be used to test the performance of nuclear warheads continued even after the administration knew what had likely happened to the W-88 design. Similarly, the machine tools for the quiet submarine propellers were delivered in China after the administration realized the extent of Beijing’s success in appropriating our advanced nuclear weapons technology.
hmmm… a submarine sneaks up on one of our carriers… we delivered machine tools to China to make quieter subs… wonder if there could be any correlation…
This could only be worse if somehow the Chinese had access to the highest levels of the administration to influence technology release decisions. Oh wait… they did…
NY Times February 16, 1998.. William Safire: In rare agreement, the counterintelligence arm of the F.B.I. and counterspies in the C.I.A. approved this statement to be issued by the Senate next week:
”There are indications that Chinese efforts in connection with the 1996 elections were undertaken or orchestrated, at least in part, by People’s Republic of China intelligence agencies.”
That agonizingly worked-over judgment by America’s intelligence establishment is a stunner. China’s spy network succeeded in penetrating the Clinton White House.
We are not dealing here merely with lobbying conducted covertly, unlawful though such secret activity is. As the language in the report the Senate worked out with the C.I.A., F.B.I. and N.S.A. makes clear: ”the PRC engaged in much more than simply ‘lobbying.’ ”
We are confronted by evidence of espionage. It was conducted by operatives assigned by Chinese intelligence to collect U.S. trade-policy and other official secrets, as well as by agents of influence directed by Beijing to buy changes in U.S. foreign policy.
”A variety of PRC entities were acting to influence U.S. elections,” the unclassified Senate report states. A top-secret appendix containing evidence to back up these conclusions is to be locked away in inaccessible archives for decades.
More (lots more) on John Huang (the subject of the Safire essay) from the NY Times here.
And yet, the Clinton-China connection continues to this day:
From the NY Daily News - The big bucks Hillary Clinton raised from Chinatown donors holding seemingly modest-paying jobs caused a political stir last month – and recent calls from the Justice Department.
Donor Hsiao Yen Wang said a Justice Department investigator asked her last week if she was coerced into giving money to the campaign and whether she knew of anybody else who may have been forced to contribute.
Wang said she gave willingly, but the campaign returned her $1,000 check out of an “abundance of caution.”
Yeah… no chance that money was being laundered in Chinatown before finding its way to Clinton (no pun intended).
From the LA Times and RedState - “A warrant was issued this morning for Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu, who failed to appear for a bail hearing on a 15-year-old grand theft charge.”
Hsu, a fugitive from justice since 1992, was jailed Friday after a judge ordered him to post $2 million bail. Hsu, turned himself in after first news accounts, then his lawyer, identified the Democratic fundraiser as a fugitive.
Back in 1992, before becoming one of the Democrats’ go to bag men, Hsu disappeared after pleading no contest and agreeing to serve up to three years in prison for defrauding investors in a Ponzi scheme.
This is all sounding strangely familiar. We have seen unusual Clinton campaign contribution scandals before. The 1996 scandal saw 120 people connected to the Clinton fundraising efforts either flee the country to avoid questioning or plead the Fifth Amendment.
Clinton campaigns need to be scrutinized closely. The 1996 Clinton campaign wasn’t and we had a situation which may have compromised American national security – the Chinese tried to influence our election.
Hillary now says she is going to give some of Hsu’s tainted money to charity. But why only two percent?
And the beat goes on…
Makes me wish the only problem with another Clinton presidency would be higher taxes and socialized everything; unfortunately, that may be the least of our worries when our nation’s security is jeopardized by politicians willing to sell our knowledge and technology to the highest bidder.
