Tag: china

State Department Official Fired by Rubio for Concealing Relationship with CCP Affiliate

Forget the battles you see on the news. The real war for America’s soul is being fought in the shadows, and the playbook our enemies use is shockingly simple: find the weak link. These countries don’t need to outgun us when they can simply outwit us, exploiting the moral rot that has seeped into our most trusted institutions.

This modern warfare preys on bureaucrats who have forgotten what it means to serve—those who see a government paycheck as a ticket to a life free of accountability. It targets officials who prioritize their personal dramas over their sworn duty. When loyalty becomes a suggestion instead of a requirement, the door to our nation’s secrets is kicked wide open.

From ‘The Post Millennial’:

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has fired a State Department Foreign Service officer who admitted in an undercover video from O’Keefe Media Group, that he had a romantic relationship with a woman linked to the Chinese Communist Party.

A statement from the State Department confirmed that Daniel Choi, a Foreign Service officer, was terminated following presidential approval from Donald Trump.

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China Escalates Cyberattacks That Are Increasingly Hard To Detect

AChinese hacking group is reportedly behind a significant espionage campaign targeting U.S. technology firms and legal services, highlighting a worrisome escalation in China’s cyber “Cold War” with the United States.

Since March 2025, Google’s Threat Intelligence Group and its cybersecurity subsidiary, Mandiant, have tracked suspicious activities, delivered over a backdoor malware known as “BRICKSTORM.” This sophisticated campaign is targeting a variety of sectors, including law firms, software-as-a-service providers, and other technology companies. Following extensive monitoring and analysis, Google has linked these hacking efforts to UNC5221, a long-suspected Chinese Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor, alongside other “threat clusters” associated with China.

The BRICKSTORM campaign is especially disturbing for two primary reasons. Firstly, it was crafted to ensure “long-term stealthy access” by embedding backdoors into targeted systems, enabling hackers to dodge conventional detection and response methods. The stealth campaign has proven so adept that, on average, these intruders remain undetected in targeted systems for nearly 400 days, as revealed by a Google report.

Secondly, the motivations behind these cyberattacks transcend the theft of trade secrets and national security data. Google suspects that these hackers are also probing for “zero-day vulnerabilities targeting network appliances,” as well as “establishing pivot points for broader access” to additional victims. This indicates a strategy to gather intelligence that could be pivotal to the Chinese military should tensions escalate between the U.S. and China.

Xi Jinping, the leader of Communist China, has consistently expressed his ambition for the nation to become a “cyber superpower.” With this goal in mind, the Chinese government has invested significant resources in building a formidable cyber army.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) considers cyber warfare to be a crucial aspect of both its defensive and offensive strategies, alongside traditional military forces. Cyberattacks are viewed as a cost-effective means to undermine an opponent’s will to fight by targeting its economic, political, scientific, and technological systems.

Thus, the PLA reportedly employs as many as 60,000 cyber personnel, ten times larger than the U.S. Cyber Command’s Cyber Mission Force. Additionally, a higher proportion of the PLA’s cyber force is dedicated to offensive operations compared to the United States (18.2 percent versus 2.8 percent).

Alongside China’s official cyber force, the Ministry of State Security and the Ministry of Public Security have adopted a “pseudo-private” contractor model that allows them to hire civilian hackers to conduct cyber espionage abroad while obscuring the Chinese government’s involvement.

Over time, the Communist regime has also significantly advanced its cyber operation capabilities. Today, China’s cyber operations are increasingly sophisticated, utilizing advanced tactics, techniques, and procedures to infiltrate victim networks, according to a U.S. government report.

The BRICKSTORM attack is part of a long series of high-profile cyberattacks originating from China in recent years. Between 2023 and 2024, Salt Typhoon, a Chinese hacking group linked to the Ministry of State Security accessed U.S. wireless networks operated by companies such as AT&T and Verizon, “as well as systems used for court-appointed surveillance.” This breach resulted in the compromise of telecommunication data for over a million American users, including individuals involved in both Trump’s and then-Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaigns.

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Starmer national security adviser accused of blocking spy case is senior member of shadowy lobby club China ‘uses to groom UK elite’

The senior Government adviser at the heart of the Chinese spying row was a member of a secretive network used by Beijing to cultivate Britain’s elites.

Jonathan Powell, Keir Starmer’s national security adviser, was a fellow of the 48 Group, a lobby club founded by British communists which allegedly ‘grooms’ British politicians and business leaders to fall under the sway of China’s Communist Party.

Sources have pointed the finger at Mr Powell for the Government’s failure to state that China represented a threat to national security – an omission which the Director of Public Prosecutions has said led to last month’s collapse of the trial of Chris Cash and Christopher Berry on charges of passing secrets to China between 2021 and 2023. Both men were formally declared not guilty and deny any wrongdoing.

The Tories have accused ministers of causing the collapse of a major spying trial because they feared that calling China a national security threat might jeopardise trade relations. 

The Government has denied interfering with the case.

The 48 Group, which is one of the most prominent pro-China lobbying organisations in Britain, says its aim is to improve trade relations between the two nations – but has been accused of furthering the Beijing regime’s wider causes in Britain, as this newspaper first reported in 2020.

Its patrons have included Labour grandee Peter Mandelson, who was recently sacked as Britain’s Ambassador to the US over his links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. 

Both Tony Blair and former Tory Chancellor George Osborne have attended events hosted by the 48 Group in London.

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Spies were ‘gagged’ from objecting to new Chinese mega embassy plans

British spies were ‘gagged’ from raising objections to a new Chinese embassy in east London, documents suggest.

The revelations about the proposed embassy – dubbed a ‘spy campus’ – are likely to increase concerns about the development on the site of the Royal Mint buildings near the Tower of London.

A final decision on whether to approve the plan, revived by No 10 despite being blocked by the previous government after warnings from MI5 and Scotland Yard in 2022, has been deferred while the row about the collapsed Chinese spy trial continues.

Now unearthed documents show inspectors were denied access to key secret documents by Labour when approving the ‘mega embassy’ which will be ‘crawling with spies’.

The documents include a critical assessment from security services – the contents of which have been redacted. 

Ministers refused to allow a private inquiry, which would have allowed secret evidence to be considered.

Critics have accused ministers of trying to ram the application through and shut down any dissent or security concerns which might jeopardise it.

Officials in the Communities Department, which is handling the planning case, are preparing to announce the October 21 deadline will be pushed back. 

The department declined to comment.

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Anduril Founder Urges Rapid Reindustrialization As U.S. Defense Supply Chain Remains Alarmingly Reliant On China

China’s latest decision to expand rare earth export controls, adding holmium, erbium, thulium, europium, and ytterbium to the restricted list just days ago, serves as yet another wake-up call for the Trump administration and Washignton as a whole. The U.S. remains dangerously dependent on China, the world’s largest producer of rare earths, for these critical minerals that are essential inputs into the manufacturing of drones, humanoid robots, EVs, and advanced weaponry. 

Anduril Industries founder Palmer Luckey sat down with Bloomberg on Friday to discuss how America’s defense supply chains are dangerously reliant on China. He said the U.S. must urgently “reindustrialize” and rebuild its capacity to produce rare earths, semiconductors, and advanced computing hardware domestically if it wants to survive the 2030s. 

“I mean, the reality is that our interests are relatively divergent at this point,” Luckey said, referencing President Trump’s late tariff threats (read here) against Being. “We need to make our own chips, our own computers, our own products downstream. China has a lot of leverage right now, and that makes it very hard to negotiate. They do have a lot of leverage right now, and so it’s very hard to make deals with them. I think it’s actually healthy for the US-China relationship for it not to be so dependent on China right now.”

Luckey noted that Anduril, one of the fastest-growing defense technology startups in the U.S, has been heavily sanctioned by China, forcing it to eliminate all supply chain exposure in China. 

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Inside the Hunter Biden-linked proposal to sell off land around the US Embassy in Romania

Future first son Hunter Biden was tied up in an eyebrow-raising proposal to sell off land around the US embassy in Bucharest, Romania to a group that included a Chinese company — as part of an effort to help a local real estate tycoon beat corruption charges.

The scandal-scarred former first son — whose ties to Romania date back to when his father, Joe Biden, was vice-president — became involved in the proposal after he agreed in 2015 to help the developer, Gabriel Popoviciu, fight criminal charges, according to a forthcoming book by New York Times reporter Ken Vogel.

The would-be land deal, which came about shortly after Biden left office as vice president in January 2017, was floated in an apparent attempt to convince Romanian prosecutors to drop the real estate fraud case against Popoviciu.

The proposed deal centered on Popoviciu potentially handing over a portion of his land holdings around the US embassy to CEFC China Energy — a Beijing-linked firm that paid Hunter and his uncle James Biden millions in 2017 and 2018.

Under one apparent deal structure, CEFC would own as much as 47.5% of the joint venture, according to Vogel’s tome “Devil’s Advocates: The Hidden Story of Rudy Giuliani, Hunter Biden, and the Washington Insiders on the Payrolls of Corrupt Foreign Interests.”

In an effort to sway prosecutors, it was suggested that the Romanian government could go on to collect revenue from the arrangement.

Hunter, now 55, acknowledged being involved in the potential deal in multiple ways — including as Popoviciu’s attorney and as part of the “purchasing group.”

The deal ended up folding in 2017 as Hunter and his partners battled it out.

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Ukrainian Intelligence Says China Helping Russia Target Western-Funded Facilities In Ukraine

Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Agency official Oleh Alexandrov has told the state news agency Ukrinform that China has been directly assisting Russia with intelligence for use on the battlefield in Ukraine.

Specifically he said China is providing foreign intelligence to target those sites in Ukraine which benefit from foreign investment, meaning Western-backed and funded facilities, likely such as weapons production sites.

“There is evidence of a high level of cooperation between Russia and China in conducting satellite reconnaissance of the territory of Ukraine in order to identify and further explore strategic objects for targeting,” said Alexandrov. “As we have seen in recent months, these sites may belong to foreign investors.”

The Kremlin on Monday responded by rejecting the allegation, saying that it possesses all capabilities to not have to rely on any outside country or ally.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov when specifically asked about the new allegation from Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Agency said as follows:

“We have our own capabilities, including space capabilities, to accomplish all the tasks the special military operation poses,” he told reporters.

But the last year of the war has seen Moscow deepen its cooperation both with the Chinese and North Korean militaries.

The presence of North Korean troops within Russian forces is well-known, but Kiev has more recently alleged Chinese troops are fighting alongside Moscow forces as well.

There’s also reported to be training programs between Russian and Chinese militaries. For example, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Directorate has told local media, the Kyiv Post, that “The Kremlin has decided to allow Chinese military personnel to study and adopt the combat experience Russia has gained in its war against Ukraine.”

Also, Iran has factored into the equation given it has established a drone production facility within southern Russia.

Beijing has additionally in the past issued statements calling out NATO for its constant expansion, and activity which has even been lately introduced in the Pacific region, and growing ties to Japan.

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Trump Administration’s Multi-Front Counter-China Campaign

Since returning to office in 2025, Republicans have prioritized countering the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) through legislative, economic, military, and law enforcement initiatives. A key step in these efforts came in February 2025, when Senator Rick Scott introduced the Protect America’s Innovation and Economic Security from CCP Act to reinstate and codify President Trump’s CCP Initiative within the Department of Justice’s National Security Division.

The bill targets CCP-linked trade secret theft, economic espionage, and cyberattacks while strengthening enforcement of foreign investment regulations and improving coordination between the DOJ, FBI, and other federal agencies. It also ensures independent, well-funded operations dedicated to addressing CCP-related threats to U.S. technology, infrastructure, and supply chains.

Senator Scott called the CCP one of the greatest threats to America’s national security, criticizing President Biden for ending Trump’s original China Initiative, which had uncovered dozens of espionage cases. He said the revived program would help President Trump confront Beijing’s economic and technological aggression and “Make America Safe Again.”

Representative Lance Gooden, co-sponsoring the bill in the House, added that China has long stolen from U.S. businesses, infiltrated institutions, and undermined the economy, stressing that the legislation sends a clear message that the United States will no longer tolerate the CCP’s sabotage of American interests.

President Trump has taken a series of trade and economic actions to counter the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and protect U.S. national security. He imposed a range of tariffs from 10 to 125 percent on all Chinese imports, citing Beijing’s unfair trade practices and the CCP’s failure to curb the flow of fentanyl precursor chemicals to criminal cartels. To further combat the opioid epidemic, President Trump signed an executive order eliminating duty-free treatment for low-value imports from China, closing the de minimis loophole that had been the lifeblood of Chinese e-commerce companies.

In parallel, the administration expanded U.S. export controls to restrict CCP-backed subsidiaries, applying sanctions to any entity at least 50 percent owned by companies already on the Commerce Department’s Entity List.

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Deterring The Next Quasi-World War: China–Russia–North Korea Versus US

Russian planes recently flew into Polish and Romanian airspace to test NATO’s resolve while the world veers toward a conflict in Asia—one that could be far worse than the situation in Ukraine—where true deterrence and resolve remain largely absent.

Let’s backtrack a little.

On Sept. 3, Beijing staged a military extravaganza to parade a full suite of fearsome weapons. Many journalists were awed, and some defeatist experts advocated Chamberlainian appeasement. Others, mostly China observers, tried decoding the seating plan of senior Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials atop Tiananmen Square for clues about the power struggles in Zhongnanhai.

However, what is often overlooked in the discussion about the event is that it represents the financing and support mechanisms behind a new type of quasi-world war. The ongoing Russia–Ukraine war is one example, and the potential invasion of Taiwan by the Chinese regime is another. Let’s explore this further.

The Xinhua images of the Sept. 3 event, featuring Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un consorting in solidarity, should be interpreted as a calculated response to the new tripartite model the West has devised for militarily supporting Ukraine. That model conveys that Kyiv identifies its military hardware needs, European allies provide the financing, and the United States produces and delivers the hardware.

The Beijing event showcased a parallel model: Moscow requests war materiel, including troops, China and North Korea supply them in exchange for cheap Russian energy, with India and a few other countries dipping in. Thus, even though the war’s actual fighting is confined within Ukraine and Russia, its financing involves a much wider array of adversarial states. The coalitional symmetry in this financing mechanism can prolong the bloody conflict indefinitely, which Russia and Ukraine, if left to their own devices, cannot achieve.

A way to stop the war is to break that symmetry, which seems to be the goal of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “secondary tariffs.” On Aug. 6, he doubled the headline tariff on India to 50 percent for buying cheap Russian oil. It is showing results. India reportedly bought much less Russian oil in August. Notably, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who attended the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting in Tianjin from Aug. 31 to Sept. 1, quietly skipped the Sept. 3 military parade.

Now, Trump is pressuring Europe to immediately end its remaining reliance on Russian energy and join him in a similar effort against Beijing, and has called for imposing up to 100 percent additional tariffs on China for buying Russian crude oil. The EU leadership is not yet entirely on board, but has proposed to advance its target of ending all energy imports from Russia from 2027 to 2026 or even sooner.

But whatever happens to the war in Ukraine, the world would not be okay even when Putin agrees to call it quits, because Xi has all the intentions to do a sequel. Xi’s primary interest in supporting Russia lies in an expected reciprocation from Moscow if China invades Taiwan. What would a China–Taiwan war look like?

The Russia–Ukraine war is already a quasi-world war. Despite the combat space being narrowly confined, it nevertheless involves the participation of approximately 50 countries on four continents in various capacities.

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China is starting to talk about AI superintelligence, and some in the U.S. are taking notice

Early last week in the Chinese tech hub of Hangzhou, a slick, larger-than-life video screen beamed out four words that would drive tech giant Alibaba’s stock to historic levels and signal a shift in China’s approach to artificial intelligence: “Roadmap to Artificial Superintelligence.”

During his 23-minute keynote address at the flagship Alibaba Cloud conference, Alibaba CEO Eddie Wu charted out a future featuring artificial general intelligence (AGI) and artificial superintelligence (ASI). These terms point to a theorized era in which AI becomes roughly as smart as humans (AGI) and then much, much smarter (ASI).

While these terms have been tossed around Silicon Valley for years, Wu’s presentation was notable: Alibaba is now the first established Chinese tech giant to explicitly invoke AGI and ASI.

“Achieving AGI — an intelligent system with general human-level cognition — now appears inevitable. Yet AGI is not the end of AI’s development, but its beginning,” Wu said. “It will march toward ASI — intelligence beyond the human, capable of self-iteration and continuous evolution.”

“ASI will drive exponential technological leaps, carrying us into an unprecedented age of intelligence,” Wu said, highlighting ASI’s ability to help cure diseases, discover cleaner sources of energy and even unlock interstellar travel.

The U.S. and China are the world’s leading AI powers, each with immense computing capabilities and top-tier researchers developing cutting-edge systems. Yet observers have framed the countries as having different approaches to AI, with perceptions that China focuses more on real-world AI applications.

For example, commentators recently argued that Beijing is currently “winning the race for AI robots” against the U.S., as China is home to much of the world’s most advanced robotics supply chains and a growing network of robotics, or embodied AI, labs.

“There’s been some commentary in Western media recently about how the U.S. is missing the point by pushing for AGI, while China is focusing solely on applications,” said Helen Toner, interim executive director of Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. “This is wrong.”

“Some Chinese researchers and some parts of the Chinese government have been interested in AGI and superintelligence for a long time,” Toner said, though she noted this view was primarily held by smaller startups like DeepSeek.

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