[HN Gopher] 5 Charged with Stalking, Harassing, Spying on US Res...
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5 Charged with Stalking, Harassing, Spying on US Residents for PRC
Secret Police
Author : cwwc
Score : 315 points
Date : 2022-03-16 18:50 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.justice.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.justice.gov)
| milofeynman wrote:
| Related propublica reporting:
| https://www.propublica.org/article/operation-fox-hunt-how-ch...
| ajsharp wrote:
| These details are wild, scary, and fascinating. Fascinating from
| the perspective of how easy it is for foreign governments on the
| other side of the world to try to scare the shit out of US
| citizens by hiring some scumbag PI for probably as little as $5k.
|
| > Beginning in September 2021, Lin hired a private investigator
| (the PI) in New York to disrupt the campaign of a Brooklyn
| resident currently running for U.S. Congress (the Victim),
| including by physically attacking the Victim. The Victim was a
| student leader of the pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen
| Square in 1989, who later escaped to the United States, served in
| the U.S. military, and became a naturalized U.S. citizen. In
| September 2021, the Victim (then living in Long Island) announced
| his intention to run for a U.S. congressional seat on Long Island
| in the November 2022 general election.
|
| > In hiring the PI, Lin explained that if the Victim was selected
| during the June 2022 primary election, then he might be "elected
| to be a legislator. Right now we don't want him to be elected."
| Lin emphasized that, "Whatever price is fine. As long as you can
| do it." He also promised that "we will have a lot more-more of
| this [work] in the future...Including right now [a] New York
| State legislator." Lin explained to the PI that Lin was working
| with other unidentified individuals in the PRC to stop the Victim
| from being elected to U.S. Congress.
| mrtksn wrote:
| Back in college, I did a bit of "spying" for foreign companies.
| Nothing bad spirited, of course. They simply wanted me to
| photograph the entrance of the offices of local companies they
| partner with to see if the local company is at the address they
| claim to be.
|
| It was a good pay for a very easy job.
|
| However, considering that Kim Jong-un's brother was killed at
| the airport by making a civilian to spray neurotoxin on him
| under the pretext of a camera joke, I don't see why foreign
| entities wouldn't be able to hire unsuspecting citizens to do
| shady stuff(that can be plausibly explained as jobs).
| cwkoss wrote:
| We should all reflect on why this story is getting so little
| coverage in contrast to the 'Russian interference' narrative of
| 2017.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| That's _considerably_ more than just "harassing a US
| resident".
| nickff wrote:
| This kind of thing is why people were paying bribes to Chinese
| Paramilitary Police impersonator(s) in California:
| https://www.thedrive.com/news/29927/highway-patrol-arrests-d...
| AlexandrB wrote:
| This is such a weird ploy. Is there any link between the
| impersonator and the CCP or is it just a lone scammer
| intimidating immigrants? It's interesting too that
| "impersonating a peace officer" applies in this case.
|
| > CHP officers arrested the driver under charges of
| forging/possessing a fraudulent public seal and impersonating a
| peace officer. A police official has told KTLA 5 that the man's
| charges will be treated with the same severity as they would if
| it were American officers he had impersonated.
| sudden_dystopia wrote:
| ed25519FUUU wrote:
| orangepurple wrote:
| Chinese grad students have already copied all university
| research lab hard drive contents and sent them back to China.
| One of them admitted to my friend to doing it and being sent to
| the school by the Chinese military. Chinese grad students are a
| massive espionage risk, second only to Israeli nationals.
| sjg007 wrote:
| I'm not really sure how meaningful or effective that is as a
| strategy .. I mean it's just data. Now exfiltrating designs
| of devices might be a different thing but science is more
| about the training and becoming an expert. Learning how to do
| research is the most important part. Most experiments are
| difficult to replicate anyway.
| president wrote:
| And yet the US seemingly does nothing about it. Makes you
| think whether the US government is turning a blind eye or
| they believe there the benefits outweigh the costs.
| noobermin wrote:
| Why Israeli nationals? Israel is an allied country to the US.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| If there is one thing Israel is known for, it's their
| secret service. I'd even go and say the Mossad is miles
| ahead of the NSA... the NSA goes for the brute force
| approach: grab every piece of data they can get their hold
| on with enormous resources and attempt to make sense of the
| pile later.
|
| The Mossad is orders of magnitude more resource-efficient,
| they go for surgical strikes against whomever they are
| targeting. And they don't care _at all_ if their target is
| an allied state, a neutral state or an enemy state.
| encryptluks2 wrote:
| Yet they indiscriminately kill around the world and we
| support their Holy War.
| philovivero wrote:
| Sometimes I think this sounds conspiratorial, and surely isn't
| happening. Who has the time or money to pay 5 people to just go
| around harassing and stalking people for political gain only?
|
| Then I remember the story of the lady in East Germany who, after
| it fell, managed to get the Stasi records that finally proved
| that yes, they had been stalking her, harassing her, and spying
| on her.
|
| They would do things like wait until she went into a store to buy
| something, then let the air out of her bicycle tires. Just stupid
| little harassing things like that, so that if she complained
| about it to her family they'd think she was crazy.
|
| Next time you hear some nutcase on the street talking about
| things like this to whoever will listen... ponder things like
| this.
| dralley wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1HWNcLDK88&t=5614s
| Sakos wrote:
| There are a lot of cases of Chinese, Russian, Iranian, Saudi,
| etc. dissidents or critics being targeted overseas. I'm not
| sure why it's a surprise to anyone or why people think it
| doesn't happen.
| synergy20 wrote:
| To make sure the qualify of the brain-wash process for the
| whole country, which is the foundation for those countries'
| stability, dissidents must be eliminated or harassed enough
| so they shut-up, wherever they might be.
| tsol wrote:
| Agreed. It seems naive to think "of course that wouldn't
| actually happen" without any real evidence except your own
| incredulity. Why shouldn't they harass people in small ways?
| It's cheap, annoying, and minor enough that most people will
| just brush it all off as coincidences. You obtain your goal
| of punishing those who got on your wrong side, without having
| to worry about attracting too much attention.
|
| Hell it doesn't even have to be state actors, if anyone here
| pisses off someone with too much money, it wouldn't be hard
| to hire someone anonymously on craigslist to harass you.
| People have done a lot worse for a lot less money
| anonporridge wrote:
| _puts on tinfoil hat_
|
| Because the belief that this kind of gang stalking never
| happens and people who think that they are getting harassed
| like this are always crazy is a psyop designed to make sure
| the public is more susceptible to the rare, but highly
| effective practice.
| noobermin wrote:
| That reminds me of COINTELPRO, and how the FBI tried to get MLK
| to commit suicide by sending him a harassing black mailing
| letter. It's amazing how states particularly when they have
| apparatuses that can go rouge or are even actually encouraged
| by the government like the Stasi were go to ridiculous lengths
| to harass people they find politically inconvenient.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| that is true, but that was more than fifty years ago..
| staticassertion wrote:
| The problem with learning about things with a ~multi-decade
| delay (via FOIA etc) is that everything sounds so long ago,
| in a different time.
|
| But there's not a ton of reason to believe that things have
| changed so fundamentally.
| psyc wrote:
| I can think of one powerfully compelling reason: wishful
| thinking.
| spacemanmatt wrote:
| They definitely still do this.
| noobermin wrote:
| The stasi story was also ~30 years ago too. The point isn't
| a story of who's bad more than it is a story of unchecked
| political power. That was my point, not a "we do it too so
| TFA isn't bad." No, it's bad when any state does it.
|
| I think one difference is we did have the Church commission
| so at least there is some amount of accountability although
| it could have been better whilst in PRC there will be no
| such inquiry into these sorts of things.
| wand3r wrote:
| I had this same thought but then I caught myself. Human
| nature doesn't change that much. This basically happened at
| the corporate level at eBay in the last 12 months right? So
| factually if you are just saying it was a long time ago,
| then yes, that's correct. However, I think it can and does
| still happen and humans from 50 years ago aren't much
| different. In fact, some are even literally the same humans
| but just older...
| adolph wrote:
| It is such a weird story:
|
| _BOSTON - Six former employees of eBay, Inc. have been
| charged with leading a cyberstalking campaign targeting
| the editor and publisher of a newsletter that eBay
| executives viewed as critical of the company. The alleged
| harassment included sending the couple anonymous,
| threatening messages, disturbing deliveries - including a
| box of live cockroaches, a funeral wreath and a bloody
| pig mask - and conducting covert surveillance of the
| victims._
|
| https://www.justice.gov/usao-ma/pr/six-former-ebay-
| employees...
| exhilaration wrote:
| This was posted yesterday in one of the comments on HN if
| you want a better idea of what the FBI does these days:
| https://casetext.com/analysis/how-to-spot-the-informant-
| at-y...
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| Sure FBI/CIA/NSA did nasty things in tbhe
| 40's/50s/60s/70s/80s/80s, but now it's totally different!
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| I got the same speech when suggesting some of the
| "dangerous white supremacist (who were never arrested nor
| identified)" at the Canadian truck rallies might have
| been feds in disguised.
|
| How weird.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| and the 90s (Contras)
|
| and 00s/10s
| (https://www.theguardian.com/law/2022/mar/14/cia-black-
| site-d...)
|
| But they SURELY have changed in 2020s!
| evan_ wrote:
| That means the people in charge now were trained by the
| people doing that stuff 50 years ago
| jonesnc wrote:
| If they were able to do it without any repercussions or
| consequences, why would they ever stop doing it?
| freeflight wrote:
| _> Anonymous discovered that HBGary was conspiring with a
| law /lobbying firm known as Hunton and Williams to launch a
| highly sophisticated campaign to subvert and sabotage the
| enemies of their clients. In some cases these plans
| involved illegal actions. The targets were journalists,
| labor unions, and political opponents._
|
| _> One client was Bank of America, who hired Hunton and
| Williams to launch a campaign against Wikileaks. At some
| point the list of targets was expanded to various other
| supporters of Wikileaks such as journalist Glenn Greenwald.
| The other client so far revealed was the Chamber of
| Commerce, which wished to target labor unions and a
| shockingly long list of their supporters._
|
| _> The main tool of attack would be the use of the
| Palantir technology to analyze the network of support for
| the targets._
|
| Source: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2011/02/13/943139/
| -HBGary:-...
|
| The House Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats
| and Capabilities never properly followed up on that
| incident. In 2011 it asked the DoD and NSA to provide any
| contracts with HBGary, Palantir and Berico, but as far as I
| can tell that never ended up happening, the whole thing was
| just buried over time and forgotten.
| skrtskrt wrote:
| I'm sure they've cleaned up their act by now!
|
| Surely they aren't during stuff like that, and "thwarting"
| "terrorist plots" where the "conspirators" are FBI assets
| themselves
| bpiche wrote:
| what are you referring to? the Boston bombing?
| evan_ wrote:
| https://theintercept.com/2017/09/03/the-fbi-pressured-a-
| lone...
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/15/magazine/fbi-
| internationa...
|
| impossible to know how many such stories there are
| freeflight wrote:
| FBI COINTELPRO [0] and CIA Operation CHAOS [1] did way more
| than just sending some harassing mail to MLK [2]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS
|
| [2] https://openyls.law.yale.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.1305
| 1/7...
| cwkoss wrote:
| Seems very odd that people are downvoting the comment I'm
| replying to:
|
| downvoters - why are you downvoting this? Do you think it's
| false? Or just don't like hearing about it?
| colpabar wrote:
| It's important to remember that this was in the past. The
| FBI, as well as every other three-letter-agency, are the
| good guys now, and they are totally ashamed of doing those
| things. They're _definitely_ not doing _anything_ like that
| anymore!
| bleuchase wrote:
| Like the old saying goes, a leopard _can_ change its
| spots.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| My favorite is the time the FBI sent a bunch of fake
| correspondence making it seem like a bunch of prominent civil
| rights leaders were cheating on their spouses and was very
| confused when nothing came of it because said spouses already
| assumed they were and didn't care.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| My fav story along those lines is the KGB trying to
| blackmail Sukarno with videotape of dalliances with
| prostitutes. He asked for copies to show his friends.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Also reminiscent of the batshit-bonkers story of eBay's
| corporate jihad against a mom-and-pop business:
|
| https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/06/ebay-execs-sent-...
|
| https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/07/lawsuit-ebay-tri...
| calibas wrote:
| > Who has the time or money to pay 5 people to just go around
| harassing and stalking people for political gain only?
|
| Political gain often means more wealth and power for those
| involved, and I think we all know the great lengths people will
| go to for both of those things. Not defending China, but
| harassing and stalking is fairly tame compared to things like
| assassinating journalists and starting wars.
| dirtyid wrote:
| >political gain only
|
| Political dissidents flee to US (west in general), west (US in
| particular) will magnify and weaponize dissident for
| international discourse power when convenient. Countries being
| targeted spend resource to deter this behaviour. Interesting
| case of different systems abusing each other's asymmetries -
| large diasporas in west = lots of asylum for dissidents but
| also many recruitable foreign assets.
|
| And sometimes diaspora drama is innate, deep cultural beef
| between nationalist and dissident Chinese that IMO will only
| get more acrimonious with time. Older gen of dissidents who
| fled PRC when times were bad are dying but their kids and
| younger generation of dissidents from HK/XJ/TW will clash hard
| with younger gen of PRC nationalist economic migrants and 1st
| gen kids of mainlanders who inherited beef against dissidents.
| It will be shitshow, with lots being exploited by domestic
| propaganda and foreign espionage.
| [deleted]
| daenz wrote:
| Reminds me of Gang stalking[0]. It always seems to happen to
| people who present themselves as generally not very mentally
| healthy, but sometimes you have to wonder. If you were the very
| unlucky target of some deniable, organized harassment effort,
| it would certainly take its toll on your mental health.
|
| 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_stalking
| brailsafe wrote:
| relevant Onion https://youtu.be/FzoXQKumgCw
| vmception wrote:
| tangentially relevant Onion
| https://www.theonion.com/police-flip-through-unsolved-
| crimes...
| brailsafe wrote:
| Tangentially related indeed, though all the really funny
| writers must have gone to Clickhole when that launched
| kingcharles wrote:
| Damn. I was in jail with a lot of very mentally sick
| people, and this hits too close to home!
| kingcharles wrote:
| Don't whatever you do go here:
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Gangstalking/
| stefan_ wrote:
| The Stasi term for this was Zersetzung:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zersetzung
| wswope wrote:
| You may want to dig into gangstalking as a cultural
| phenomenon before you legitimize it with that equivalency.
|
| This is not cherry-picked; I just went to the subreddit and
| found a relatively recent post: https://old.reddit.com/r/Ga
| ngstalking/comments/tf2xd0/they_a....
|
| (Spoilers: the number of people in amphetamine psychosis is
| several orders of magnitude larger than the number of
| victims of targeted government harassment.)
| sneak wrote:
| Worth noting that if you actually ARE being tailed by an
| organized and well-resourced group, they will frequently use
| a team of people to do so, time and circumstances permitting.
| anonporridge wrote:
| This is probably why it's very hard to help someone who is
| under legitimately delusional feelings of gang stalking,
| because those who legitimately are and those who are
| delusional are likely to look the same to outsiders, and
| will always be considered delusional.
|
| If a person is suffering from strong enough paranoia to
| classify themselves as a "targeted individual", then
| they've probably walked through the scenario that they
| might be crazy but also realized that if their paranoia is
| accurate, then they would also have appeared to be crazy.
|
| It's a vicious cycle.
| vmception wrote:
| Same with Ernest Hemingway, remembered for his paranoia later
| in life, specifically about the US government watching him.
| Going to doctors for this, to no avail.
|
| Turns out the FBI was following him, as detailed in recently
| classified documents (2010s).
|
| My synopsis is that they enabled his predisposition for
| depression and paranoia. But the initial observation of being
| watched by the government was not inaccurate.
| davidb_ wrote:
| Any chance you have a source for the bicycle tire story? I'm
| keen to read more about it (and similar stories).
| alisonatwork wrote:
| There are several stories like this at the Stasi Museum[0].
| Highly recommend checking it out if you are ever in Berlin.
| The Jugend Widerstands (Youth Resistance) Museum[1] has some
| interesting stories about life in the DDR too.
|
| [0] https://stasimuseum.de/
|
| [1] https://widerstandsmuseum.de/
| IncRnd wrote:
| The East German Police after WWII had a policy of Zersetzung,
| their type of petty, persistant psychological harassment that
| disrupted people's lives.
|
| I'm curious, did they stop teaching in school that Zersetzung
| happened in East Germany in the context of WWII? I was taught
| in High School about that.
| davidb_ wrote:
| I was educated in the US and took AP US History in high
| school. I don't recall a specific reference to Zersetzung
| within that curriculum, but the idea that life in East
| Germany was difficult due to Stasi oppression was covered.
| I don't recall specific examples like the story I asked
| about though (besides my own extracurricular references
| from movies/books).
| IncRnd wrote:
| Thanks for the complete answer! It doesn't actually
| answer what I wanted to know, but it does answer exactly
| what I asked.
| philovivero wrote:
| Did a quick search and didn't find it. All I remember is it
| was written up in a rather major publication some years ago
| talking about the fall of Stasi.
|
| While trying to find my source, I did find out Putin was in
| East Germany when the wall fell, and was working for KGB.
| Along with Stasi, Putin burned so much evidence of their
| wrongdoing, it broke the furnace.
|
| So I guess Putin was a questionable fellow even back in the
| 1980's and 1990's!
| bsdz wrote:
| Anyone else curious about the ages of the defendants? 59, 73 and
| 62 years old respectively. Is it harder for the PRC to recruit
| younger "spies" or are older ones just more reliable?
| spacemanmatt wrote:
| Younger spies are more careful?
| bsdz wrote:
| ah! indeed that's another possibility, they simply don't get
| caught (at least this time)
| spacemanmatt wrote:
| I am totally shooting from the hip on all this, but I do
| wonder if/when there is a trade-off point between the
| expertise and energy youth can put into the trade versus
| the benefits and efficiencies of experience.
| dirtyid wrote:
| Yes, I noticed that too. Seems like they're tapping older
| people with connections and resources. I imagine there's going
| to be more younger gen assets to tap in future, a lot more
| nationalist PRC diaspora in west now vs older gen who fled
| PRC/China when it was a shitshow.
| bsdz wrote:
| I've been surprised how nationalist some older Chinese expats
| are. In particular, I found some older HKers were very pro
| PRC. This was all before the Umbrella Movement. I put it down
| to becoming more conservative as you age (anecdotal
| evidence).
| dirtyid wrote:
| My feeling is older Chinese diaspora comes in roughly two
| flavours, dissidents who still see PRC as politically
| repressive shithole (fair) or economic migrants who left
| broke China but are now proud of rich China. I think folks
| intuitively group Chinese diaspora together with ex Soviet
| State diaspora, people who fled failing communism states
| that remain stagnant. But modern China is more "new
| country" than "old country". Combine with influence of pro
| PRC media ecosystem = resurging nationalism.
| alliao wrote:
| very light slap on the wrist after murder of Jim Li
|
| https://queenseagle.com/all/2022/3/16/queens-atty-stabbed-to...
| andrewzah wrote:
| Did you misread the article? Says it happened two days ago
| (3/14/2022) and a murder charge is pending.
| opisthenar84 wrote:
| I imagine we have spies in the PRC as well... only they wouldn't
| be doing mundane things such as going around stalking and
| harassing people.
| qwertyuiop_ wrote:
| No other country has managed to accomplish what CCP has in its
| coordinated campaign across the globe.
|
| Covert:
|
| Inflitrate US Congress for potential blackmail -
| https://www.axios.com/china-spy-california-politicians-9d2df...
|
| Infitration of US Higher Ed & Supression -
| https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/16/how-china...
|
| Siphon off entire US Government personnel information, Probably
| to match it against Grindr, Tiktok and other social networks -
| https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/de/security/news/cyber-atta...
|
| Inflitrated Australian Government -
| https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/28/world/australia/china-spy...
|
| Infiltration of UK Higher Ed -
| https://felixonline.co.uk/issue/1773/news/chinese-infiltrati...
|
| Overt:
|
| US Newspapers - https://zeenews.india.com/world/china-daily-paid-
| us-newspape...
|
| Tiktok: https://www.reuters.com/technology/rubio-wants-biden-
| block-t...
|
| Zoom (potential massive spying operation) -
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/12/18/zoom-he...
|
| And many more.
| pessimizer wrote:
| Infiltration is barely an accomplishment. What material things
| has China done to any other country outside of the ones it has
| border disputes with, ever?
|
| The US has obviously accomplished much more, toppling the
| governments of dozens of countries, and always credibly
| threatening and working towards doing it to two or three.
|
| The "Overt" campaign you cite against "US Newspapers" consists
| of buying $19 million of advertorials. That's a billionaire's
| bar tab.
| ccn0p wrote:
| don't forget the overt "influence the influencer" investments
| into organizations like the NBA, Disney, etc.
| radicaldreamer wrote:
| The US was doing the same thing for years, cultivating CCP
| agents from early in their careers and even paying the bribes
| they needed to rise in the hierarchy. This was supposedly
| caught when the CIA's information sharing network got busted in
| China and dozens of agents were killed.[1]
|
| [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/20/world/asia/china-cia-
| spie...
| robotnikman wrote:
| I wonder if this means the tables have turned since then...
| pphysch wrote:
| > No other country has managed to accomplish what CCP has in
| its coordinated campaign across the globe.
|
| CCP might be good at this, but this is just laughably wrong.
| They certainly haven't overthrown anywhere close to as many
| governments as Washington has since WW2.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| They haven't been a superpower for nearly as long as the US
| has been, and it didn't overlap with the zenith of
| "overthrowing governments as the means to foreign policy".
| Moreover, it's easy to criticize Cold War eta interventions
| when the stakes were very high, but there's much less
| justification for "peacetime repression". Further still,
| "overthrowing governments" isn't the only way to measure
| meddling and repression.
| salt-thrower wrote:
| > Moreover, it's easy to criticize Cold War eta
| interventions when the stakes were very high
|
| Were they, though? Which nation was primarily responsible
| for escalation of tensions during that time? And for whom
| were the stakes high enough to justify overthrowing
| democratic governments in favor of brutal dictators?
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| I'm not defending any particular action, I'm cautioning
| against context-less comparisons. But to answer your
| other questions, the stakes were _very_ high for the
| whole world (global thermonuclear war, communism, etc)
| and the USSR was primarily responsible for escalating
| though no doubt the west was not uniformly virtuous.
|
| If your goal is to compare the West or the US in
| particular with its dictatorial rivals, it's probably not
| very enlightening to account only for Western errors. You
| need to account for the errors and contributions of both
| sides. Unfortunately, this seems like hidden knowledge
| because virtually this debate is nearly always framed in
| the "only enumerate Western errors" fashion.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > the west was not uniformly virtuous.
|
| So not absolutely perfect angels at all times? Harsh
| criticism.
|
| The US started the thermonuclear arms race, and escalated
| it until it consumed a large part of the economy, based
| on literal calculated lies about the "missile gap."
|
| > If your goal is to compare the West or the US in
| particular with its dictatorial rivals
|
| The goal should be to point out its dictatorial
| tendencies, and its preference for predictable
| dictatorial regimes all over the world that it is willing
| to spend huge amounts of resources to install and
| preserve, bathing countries around the world in blood.
|
| China is not doing that, Russia is not doing that, Iran
| is not doing that, North Korea is not doing that.
| creato wrote:
| It's pretty easy to look at North Korea, Cambodia, or
| Eastern Europe during the Cold War and say "hmm, it's
| worth going to extreme lengths to prevent this from
| happening elsewhere". That may have been misguided in
| many instances, but the basic motivation is sound.
| Characterizing the situation as "overthrowing democratic
| governments in favor of brutal dictators" is a vast
| oversimplification if not outright wrong at least in many
| cases.
| quantum_solanum wrote:
| The US killed millions of people in North Korea, and was
| also largely responsible for the Khmer Rouge taking power
| in Cambodia in the first place.
| pphysch wrote:
| > It's pretty easy to look at North Korea, Cambodia, or
| Eastern Europe during the Cold War and say "hmm, it's
| worth going to extreme lengths to prevent this from
| happening elsewhere". That may have been misguided in
| many instances, but the basic motivation is sound.
|
| Careful, this is literally Moscow's reason for its
| invasion of Ukraine -- to prevent the rise of a hostile
| fascist entity in its frontyard.
| solveit wrote:
| A bad actor claiming reasonable motivation does not make
| the motivation unreasonable... Obviously you have to also
| be sincere (debatable in Russia's case) and correct
| (Russian claims are simply wrong).
| pessimizer wrote:
| Russian claims of an interest in controlling the
| government of Ukraine are at least as legitimate as US
| claims of an interest in controlling Korea, or
| Afghanistan.
| solveit wrote:
| And is the Ukrainean state actually fascist? How about
| Korea? In the absence of UN intervention, would there
| have arisen an authoritarian state that was a menace to
| not only its own citizens but every neighbouring country?
|
| Clearly Ukraine is not fascist and Korea would have been.
| There is a difference.
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| It is in fact so wrong, I can't help but feel this is a bit?
| Like, I don't understand how you could keep this all
| consistent in your head. Without even going into history of
| the 20th century or even any facts whatsoever: why would, for
| example, the U.S. _not_ do corollary acts of espionage and
| infiltration? Because of ethical principles? Or is the idea
| here that western nations are not as good at this as others?
| kingcharles wrote:
| Read the news for any length of time and it is clear the US and
| Israelis are top of the game in this.
|
| Just the sheer level of intel coming out of Russia over the
| last decade would lead anyone to believe that half of the
| Kremlin is on America's payroll.
| ericmcer wrote:
| I dunno if the USA is doing similar things but it does feel
| like we are getting picked apart internally and externally.
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| Well from a birds eye view of history, the USA, in
| particular, most definitely deserves to be meddled with in
| the same way it has for 100 years. But they are also doing a
| good job themselves in ungracefully losing its empire.
| ffwszgf wrote:
| A certain Middle Eastern nation has infiltrated the US
| government far more successfully than China could ever dream
| of, and they barely hide it.
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| Could you clarify which nation you're thinking of, here?
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| Not gp but they are most certainly talking about Saudi
| Arabia.
| InitialLastName wrote:
| Somehow, throughout the recent invasion of Ukraine by Russia,
| the US was able to predict and pre-announce, step by step, the
| Russian army's plans, moves and goals, at an absurd level of
| granularity and accuracy.
|
| You only see the news cover the people who get caught.
| redisman wrote:
| Why do you think the Five Eyes or Russia for example hasn't
| accomplished a similar level of goals?
| insaneworld wrote:
| CCP is the biggest threat to democracies around the world.
| Russia's stupid mistake now slowed down the confrontation.
| ldoughty wrote:
| > You can start thinking now, aside from violence, what other
| plans are there? Huh? But in the end, violence would be fine too.
| Huh? Beat him [chuckles], beat him until he cannot run for
| election. Heh, that's the-the last resort. You-you think about
| it. Car accident, [he] will be completely wrecked [chuckles],
| right? Don't know, eh, whatever ways from all different angles.
| Or, on the day of the election, he cannot make it there himself,
| right?
|
| Wow... If this person is indeed directed by the PRC, that's
| basically state-sponsored killing/maiming...
|
| I'm sure other countries (including the USA) do it.. but it's
| wrong on so many levels....
| mjcohen wrote:
| Only 5?
| vjust wrote:
| While there is some potential for over-reach, and a kind of
| stereotyping of Chinese academics, this is not without basis. A
| lot of them have abused their welcome, and done actions against
| USA - all while funded by US taxpayer. The Chinese govt has many
| people in its pay, some willing, likely most unwilling and
| coerced. But a spying operation is an offense.
| pipework wrote:
| It's been 9 years since Aaron Swartz passed.
| fractalfinity wrote:
| euroderf wrote:
| Book'em Danno.
| kwatsonafter wrote:
| aussiegreenie wrote:
| Australia a country with a smaller population than Texas has
| about 50,000 Chinese "spies". They are not James Bond-type spies
| but informants on other Chinese in Australia. In East Germany,
| one in five people were informants for the Communists. Canada
| would have a similar number as well.
| freeflight wrote:
| Good thing then how the US has over 300 million voluntary
| "counter spies" [0]
|
| [0] https://www.dhs.gov/see-something-say-something
| jfoster wrote:
| Do you have a source for that? Sounds too high to be plausible.
| With a population of around 25 million, that would mean that 1
| out of every 500 people would be an informant.
| pphysch wrote:
| I'll reckon their criteria for "spy" is something like
| "disagrees with me politically".
| mullen wrote:
| The Chinese "Spies" are not what you think of as Spies. They
| are Chinese foreign college students in Australia who report
| back to China if any of their classmates do something that
| the Chinese government would not approve of. They also steal
| information when they can and just basically tow the party
| line while overseas. They all do it because the government is
| paying for their education and they are proven loyal to CCCP
| (That's why the government pays for their education
| overseas).
| alliao wrote:
| local Chinese media in NZ is 100% pro CCP, serious downer as
| I'm an Asian and people automatically assume I side with CCP
| ideologies. Didn't Australia passed some law on Espionage and
| Foreign Interference? From what I can tell it greatly subsided
| public activities over there, we need something like that in NZ
| to be honest...
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