2y ago

Chinese Nationals Posing as Tourists Have Accessed US Military Bases and Other Sensitive Sites: Report

www.military.com

Plenty of other sources including Forbes and USA Today.

It's worth noting that China's National Intelligence Law requires that all organizations and citizens support, assist, and cooperate with national intelligence efforts. In other words, every Chinese tourist is expected to act as a spy.

18 comments

Actually entering a military facility which is not open to the public and taking pictures is definitely against the law, and should be handled as such.
Being in a legally publicly accessible place, and taking pictures from that place, is not, and should not be illegal. If they don't want pictures taken from that space, the space would need to be redesignated as a priavte part of the facility, without public access, or have barriers erected to block line of sight (or both).
Side note: Forbes is a crap non-journalistic site now, avoid using it as a reference.
- Side note: Forbes is a crap non-journalistic site now, avoid using it as a reference.
  LOL. No.
  
  Yeah, it used to be a real source for solid business journalism. It's really not anymore.
  It's been majority owned by a Hong Kong investment group since 2014, and some billionaire is now under contract to acquire an 82% stake.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbes
- The article says they just hang nearby and take photos, which is kinda hard to prevent. Or just speed onto the base, which normally ends pretty badly for them.
- I have been on several as a tourist. We turned the wrong way and ended up on base visiting a museum and lighthouse in Pensacola FL. Our cruise ship docked at a base in Key West FL. They told us not to take pictures as they bussed us across. A highway goes through the national laboratory in Los Alamos NM. Again, the guards tell you to drive straight through without taking pictures.
  But how would they know? What could you actually see that doesn’t show up on Google maps? And what if you drive a car with cameras like Tesla?
  Edit: Not Chinese, and have never taken pictures in these cases. I learned a long time ago that there are amazing pictures of everywhere on Google. The only ones that matter have my family in them.
  
  Not Chinese
  That's what they'd want you to say.
  
  I've worked on the base in Pensacola with the museum. Those places are specifically open to the public. Further on past the lighthouse and museum is another checkpoint preventing the public from entering the rest of the base.
- It's right in the article. They're either taking pictures from outside, or going in and saying they got lost.
In other words, every Chinese tourist is expected to act as a spy.
Mask off with the fifth column accusations.
- "Fifth column" refers to citizens or residents of the targeted country who betray it to an invader. Your concern would be well-placed if this were about Americans of Chinese ethnicity. But it isn't; it's about citizens of China "visiting" the US and probing security of US military facilities.
  Again: This is about citizens of China, not Americans of Chinese ethnicity. And it is not just about any citizens of China visiting the US, but specifically those who attempt to get into US military installations.
  Citizens of China are expected to obey the Chinese law requiring them to assist the China regime's spy agencies. If they don't, they and their families can be imprisoned, tortured, or murdered. None of that is true of Americans of Chinese ethnicity, nor do these articles suggest that it would be.
  So I think your concern is misplaced here.
  The US has made that mistake in the past; most famously in WWII with regards to Americans of Japanese ethnicity. That was bad; that was racist; that was unjust.
  However, that is not going on here.
  
  First you treat all foreigners of a specific nationality as a spy, then you treat everyone of a specific nationality as a spy, and then you round them up. The progression is quite simple, so let's not start with step one. Military bases should just fix their security and end it at that.

18 comments