Helen Raleigh Beijing’s Spy Games We need to defend America from Chinese spies with diligence and accountability, while avoiding witch hunts.
https://www.city-journal.org/article/beijings-spy-games
A former high-level New York State employee has been charged with acting as an undisclosed agent for Communist China. This incident, along with other similar ones, presents a significant challenge to the United States: How do we effectively address the national security threat from spies within our borders without descending into destructive witch hunts?
Linda Sun, who held several prominent positions in New York State government, including serving as deputy chief diversity officer under former governor Andrew Cuomo and deputy chief of staff under Governor Kathy Hochul, was arrested along with her husband Chris Hu early this week. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York has charged Sun, who never registered as a foreign agent, with “violating and conspiring to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act” and having been involved in numerous political activities to advance the interests of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party, including “blocking representatives of the Taiwanese government from having access to high-level New York State officers.” The couple allegedly collected considerable financial benefits for Sun’s actions, and their families in China received special treatment from the government.
This case is the latest of several incidents involving high-level Democratic politicians and alleged Chinese spies. Former California senator Dianne Feinstein, who served as the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had a Chinese spy on her staff for an astonishing 20 years. In 2020, Americans learned that Fang Fang, a suspected Chinese spy, had been building relationships with up-and-coming local politicians in the Bay Area and across the country, including California representative Eric Swalwell, a member of the House Intelligence Committee.
These cases are only the tip of the iceberg. In the ongoing and escalating strategic competition between China and the United States, Beijing will undoubtedly recruit and deploy more spies. Notably, Beijing sees spies as more than just tools to collect critical information. The United Front Work Department (UFWD), a secretive Chinese government agency, is a crucial player in this competition. Its primary function is to conduct overseas influence campaigns by cultivating prominent people in the West and, through them, to influence policies and public opinion and silence or discredit critics.
The UFWD frequently employs a carrot-and-stick approach to recruit the Chinese diaspora to its causes. It dangles the carrot of bribes and special favors for those who cooperate, while brandishing the stick of potential harm to their families in China if they refuse. Beijing views each exposure of a Chinese spy in the U.S. as a double win, as the resulting news sows distrust between the Chinese diaspora community and the rest of society, which makes it easier for Beijing to recruit individuals for espionage activities.
Given Beijing’s motivations and tactics, the U.S. must take a balanced approach, protecting our national security against future Chinese spy incidents without unfairly targeting Chinese Americans as a whole. It is crucial that anyone with access to sensitive information or holding positions of political influence, regardless of ethnicity, undergo enhanced background checks and security screenings (along with their staffs). Those who have overseas relations or have made extensive trips to America’s adversaries in the past deserve additional scrutiny.
Every spy incident at a political office or agency should invite enhanced oversight or scrutiny, at a minimum. There must be accountability at the top; otherwise, we send the message to our adversaries that we don’t take espionage seriously.
The Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 is also badly in need of an update. The current penalty for willful violations of FARA—imprisonment for not more than five years, a fine of up to $250,000, or both—is insufficient. This is especially true when considering the gravity of the crime and the substantial financial benefits that foreign adversaries are willing to bestow on spies. In the case of Sun, she allegedly received “substantial” economic benefits from Beijing, which allowed her to own several multimillion-dollar mansions and luxury cars, including a 2024 Ferrari. Congress should increase the severity of penalties for FARA violations to deter future espionage activities.
But the U.S. must avoid taking its search for spies too far. We should not look at all Chinese Americans suspiciously or doubt their loyalty without any credible evidence. Otherwise, we may end up harming our national security rather than protecting it.
The story of Qian Xuesen (1911–2009) is instructive. Qian came to study in the U.S. in 1935, earning a master’s degree in mechanical engineering at MIT and then pursuing a Ph.D. at Cal Tech. There, Qian became a protégé of the renowned mathematician, leading aerospace engineer, and physicist Theodore von Karman. During World War II, Qian joined the J. Robert Oppenheimer-led Manhattan Project. His exceptional talent helped the U.S. build the world’s first atomic bomb and, ultimately, win the Second World War.
After the war, Qian didn’t want to go back to China. He applied for U.S. citizenship and was offered a prestigious position at Cal Tech. But the Red Scare, fueled by Senator Joseph McCarthy’s crusade against Communism, led to Qian losing his security clearance and being denied U.S. citizenship—despite the absence of evidence he had ever been a Communist or Communist sympathizer. The constant surveillance and distrust drove Qian to seek a way out. Eventually, the U.S. government deported him to China in 1955 in exchange for U.S. pilots whom China had captured during the Korean War. Upon his return to China, Qian led the nation’s successful tests of the atomic bomb and the hydrogen bomb in the 1960s. His pivotal role in developing China’s military ballistic missile and space programs further solidified his legacy as the “Father of Rocketry” in China. Former U.S. Secretary of the Navy Dan Kimbal called Qian’s deportation “the stupidest thing this country ever did.”
The lesson from Qian’s story is that the competition between China and the U.S. is essentially a contest for hearts and minds. We must address Chinese spy cases and protect America’s national security with the highest level of vigilance. But we must also remember that it is never in America’s interests to alienate a group of people based on their country of origin or ethnicity. If we again allow fear to drive away some of the most brilliant minds into the arms of the Chinese Community Party, America’s grave loss will be a titanic win for the CCP.
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