Tag: China

The Chinese continue to put military pressure on the ROK:

South Korea scrambled Air Force jets Wednesday to counter a Chinese military plane flying in the country’s air defense domain without notice, defense authorities in Seoul said.

It entered the Korea air defense identification zone (KADIZ) at around 7:37 a.m. and moved over southern and eastern waters for about four hours, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).

“(We) took normal tactical measures,” such as sending a warning message and dispatching Air Force jets to track and monitor it, the JCS added.

More than 10 aircraft, including F-15K fighter jets, were mobilized, a source said later.

It marked the second flight of a Chinese aircraft, believed to be for military reconnaissance, in the KADIZ in a month.

There were similar incidents in January, February and April as well.

South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense summoned the defense attache at the Chinese Embassy in Seoul to deliver a protest message.

Choi Hyong-chan, director general of the ministry’s international affairs, emphasized that the government takes the repeated entry of Chinese warplanes into the KADIZ “very seriously,” the ministry said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but if the ROK government took the KADIZ violations seriously why don’t they respond by flying through the Chinese ADIZ?

President Trump’s canceling Secretary Pompeo’s trip to Pyongyang is certainly a surprise since is comes only 24 hours after announcing a new envoy for North Korea and affirming the diplomatic mission. This reflects poor coordination on the administration’s North Korea policy.

— Bruce Klingner (@BruceKlingner) August 24, 2018

Trump's incompetence is just mind-blowing. Anyone could have told you that the Chinese would hit back across issue-linkages if we targeted its export trade. Presumably they'll be tougher on the South China Sea too. Was there any US counter-planning for this near-certainty on /1 https://t.co/YXZSYaF1pI

— Robert E Kelly (@Robert_E_Kelly) August 24, 2018

This is just another indication that President Trump is not about to sign up for a “pretend denuclearization” deal with the North Koreans like Seoul, Beijing, and Moscow want him to do:

South Korea on Saturday called the U.S. decision to call off a trip to North Korea by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo unfortunate and said that continued diplomacy was most crucial in resolving the nuclear standoff with Pyongyang.

The statement by the Foreign Ministry in Seoul came hours after President Donald Trump directed Pompeo to delay his trip because of what he saw as a lack of progress on nuclear disarmament talks with the North. Trump also said the nuclear negotiations with North Korea have been hampered by the lack of support from China, the North’s only major ally that’s engaged in an intensifying trade dispute with the United States.

While describing the delayed trip as a setback, the ministry said it would be most important for the allies to pursue “substantial progress” on denuclearization. South Korea expects China to continue serving a “constructive role” in international efforts to solve the nuclear crisis and noted that Beijing continues to express commitment to fully implement sanctions against the North, the ministry said.

“While we consider the delay of the visit to North Korea as unfortunate, we believe it’s most important for the North Korea-U.S. dialogue including Secretary Pompeo’s visits to North Korea to contribute to substantial progress in complete denuclearization and the establishment of a permanent peace regime in the Korean Peninsula.”  [Associated Press]

You can read more at the link, but what is going on is that I think President Trump is sending a message to not only North Korea, but to Beijing and Seoul as well.  China is not strictly enforcing sanctions on North Korea and even the South Koreans have not been effectively enforcing sanctions either.  This is going to come down to who is going to blink first because the North Koreans will not commit to real denuclearization unless sanctions are fully enforced on them.  As long as other countries like China continue to not strictly enforce sanctions the Kim regime will feel no expediency to denuclearize at the pace the Trump administration wants.

The US Treasury Department is continuing to go after companies that violate sanctions against North Korea:

The United States imposed sanctions on a Russian port service agency and Chinese firms for aiding North Korean ships and selling alcohol and tobacco to Pyongyang in breach of U.S. sanctions.

The U.S. Treasury said in a statement on Wednesday that China-based Dalian Sun Moon Star International Logistics Trading Co. Ltd and its Singapore-based affiliate SINSMS Pte. Ltd had netted more than $1 billion a year by exporting alcohol and cigarette products to North Korea.

The department also sanctioned Russian-based Profinet Pte Ltd and its director general, Vasili Aleksandrovich Kolchanov, for providing port services on at least six occasions to North Korean-flagged ships.

Kolchanov was personally involved in North Korea-related deals and interacted directly with North Korean representatives in Russia, the department said.

“The tactics that these entities based in China, Singapore, and Russia are using to attempt to evade sanctions are prohibited under U.S. law, and all facets of the shipping industry have a responsibility to abide by them or expose themselves to serious risks,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in the statement.  [Reuters]

You can read more at the link.

It appears that China has a new weapon that instead of running people over with tanks, they can now suppress protests by covertly setting people on fire:

China has developed a new portable laser weapon that can zap a target from nearly a kilometre away, according to researchers involved in the project.

The ZKZM-500 laser assault rifle is classified as being “non-lethal” but produces an energy beam that cannot be seen by the naked eye but can pass through windows and cause the “instant carbonisation” of human skin and tissues.

Ten years ago its capabilities would have been the preserve of sci-fi films, but one laser weapons scientist said the new device is able to “burn through clothes in a split second … If the fabric is flammable, the whole person will be set on fire”.

“The pain will be beyond endurance,” according to the researcher who had took part in the development and field testing of a prototype at the Xian Institute of Optics and Precision Mechanics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shaanxi province.

The 15mm calibre weapon weighs three kilos (6.6lb), about the same as an AK-47, and has a range of 800 metres, or half a mile, and could be mounted on cars, boats and planes.  [South China Morning Post]

You can read more at the link, but considering all the past failures with laser weapons I recommend patience before getting to worried about Chinese soldiers zapping US soldiers into ash.

Via a reader tip comes news that Senator Diane Feinstein had a driver that worked for her for nearly 20 years that was a Chinese spy:

A staffer in U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s San Francisco office was fired a few years back after being linked to Chinese spying in the Bay Area.

According to a Politico Magazine story on Silicon Valley espionage, the Feinstein staffer was suspected of providing political intelligence — but nothing classified — to his handlers, with one former intelligence official telling author Zach Dorfman that the suspected informant was “run” by officials based at the local Chinese Consulate.

A local source who knew about the incident confirmed to us that the FBI showed up at Feinstein’s office in Washington, D.C., about five years ago to alert the then-chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee that her driver was being investigated for possible Chinese spying.

“Dianne was mortified,” said our source, who spoke to us only on condition he not be named.

Besides driving her around when she was in California, the staffer also served as gofer in her San Francisco office and as a liaison to the Asian American community, even attending Chinese Consulate functions for the senator.  [SF Chronicle]

You can read more at the link, but the US media has definitely done a good job keeping this quiet.  However, it has now come out and of course President Trump has jumped on this news since Senator Feinstein is a leading Democrat involved in investigating Trump over Russian spying.

I think it is pretty clear that the Chinese government is using the North Korea issue to put pressure on the ROK to remove the THAAD battery:

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi asked South Korea on Friday to resolve the issue of an advanced U.S. missile defense system deployed on the peninsula.

Wang made the request in bilateral talks with his South Korean counterpart, Kang Kyung-wha, in Singapore on the margins of annual ASEAN-hosted sessions, according to a South Korean government official.

He cited the need for a “compete resolution” to the matter, a repeat of Beijing’s demand, which comes amid a peace mood in Korea.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

I wonder if major corporations in the US even consider the espionage risk of hiring Chinese nationals for sensitive positions?: 

A Chinese-American engineer faces charges of stealing valuable technology from General Electric, sneaking it out hidden in a picture of the sunset to take to China, the US Justice Department said. Xiaoqing Zheng, 56, a US citizen also believed to have Chinese nationality, was due to appear before a judge in Albany, New York on Thursday, a day after his arrest, according to federal prosecutors. Following a four-year investigation, the FBI arrested Xiaoqing Zheng after searching his home and finding, among other things, a handbook detailing “resources” Beijing would grant to individuals providing certain technologies. Zheng’s arrest comes as President Donald Trump intensifies the trade war with Beijing, largely over complaints the country steals US technology or obliges American companies to share know-how in exchange for doing business in China.  [AFP]

You can read more at the link.

I wonder how long before the Chinese reverse engineer the S-400?  Even more worrisome is if this system or a Chinese knockoff ends up in North Korea in the future:

Russia’s TASS news agency and a Hong Kong daily report that China could test fire a new Russian missile defense system in the coming days.

The South China Morning Post said Saturday that China could put the defense system, which is capable of downing U.S. F-35 stealth fighters, through its paces within a few days.

The report says the Chinese army has already been trained in the use of the S-400 Triumph in Russia.

The S-400 Triumph, which was delivered just last week, is a surface-to-air missile system designed to complement China’s home-grown defense capabilities.

With a range of 24-hundred kilometers, the S-400 can engage up to 36 targets simultaneously with as many as 72 missiles at altitudes of between five meters and 30 kilometers.

The South China Morning Post said the U.S. has had F-35s at its own and allies’ military bases in the Asia-Pacific region since October and this deployment pushed China into bringing its first stealth fighter, the J-20, into service ahead of schedule in February.

Some pundits say the S-400 deployed on the Shandong Peninsula, which is near Korea, will pose a major threat to the combat power of South Korea and U.S. Forces Korea.   [KBS World Radio]