US law enforcement officials on Monday arrested three people on charges of spying for China to obtain top secret information on US arms sales to Taiwan over a period of more than two years.
In a 35-page indictment brought in a federal court in Virginia, the FBI shed light on what appears to be previously unknown military cooperation arrangements between Washington and Taipei meant to help Taiwan deal with an attack by China. The information allegedly involved two secret arms sales programs.
Arrested were Kuo Tai-shen (
The indictment said that starting in January 2006, Bergersen provided Kuo with information about US arms and military services sales, which were transmitted to an unnamed Chinese military official in Beijing through Kang, who operated, in spy parlance, as a "cut out" or intermediary.
The indictment focuses on two sets of secret information.
One is a command and information technology program called "Po Sheng," or "Broad Victory" that Taiwan initiated in 2003, which included the purchase of "a substantial amount of the technology" from the US government.
The program involves so-called C4ISR technology, which stands for command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, all considered crucial to winning any military confrontation.
"One crucial security cooperation goal for national purchasing C4ISR technology," the indictment said, "is compatibility with United States military systems. Accordingly, DSCA has stated its intention to release systems that promote communications between friendly forces and the United States forces."
The indictment quotes the US Pacific Command's director of command and control (C4) systems as saying the information "could be used to damage the United States' national defense."
The other is a previously unknown five-year program of planned military sales to Taiwan, apparently updated by both sides each year.
Every year, the DSCA prepares a top secret report for the US Congress on its projected five-year sales plan for Taiwan as part of its so-called "Javits Report," named after the late US senator Jacob Javits.
The report lists the "quantity, dollar value and name of weapons systems planned for sale to Taiwan over the next five years," according to the indictment filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia on Monday.
Bergersen allegedly showed last year's Javits Taiwan section to Kuo for money.
On July 14 last year, Kuo flew to Washington to visit Bergersen for the Taiwan information he wanted. Four days later, Bergersen told Kuo over the telephone "that he had obtained everything the United States had delivered to Taiwan from 1980 to the present, as well as the projected sales for the next five years," the FBI said.
After their meeting, the two had dinner, after which Kuo "spent approximately one hour recording notes" on what Bergersen supplied.
The notes were seen by the FBI and described as "a near verbatim copy of portions of the Taiwan sections of the Javits Report."
On a ride to Dulles International Airport outside Washington later, Kuo placed a "half-inch folded stack of cash" into Bergersen's front shirt pocket.
"The outer bill was a US$100 note," the indictment said.
The next day, Kuo sent an e-mail message on his laptop to the Chinese military official referred to as "PRC Official A" to say: "Just got back from DC and have good talk with G ... [who] gave me two paper is very very sensitive. One is about T's future Sale and he couldn't give it to me but let me hand write down most of information. Another is the complete update of PS program, govt everything in there about the program."
"PS" is believed to refer to Po Sheng. "T" refers to Taiwan.
The FBI says the PRC official is based in Guangzhou and Hong Kong.
It quotes Kuo as saying that the official sees Kuo on all his trips to Beijing because "the Central Committee has assigned him to take care of me."
Kuo was identified as the owner of a New Orleans furniture business.
At one point, he allegedly also tried to establish two companies to obtain subcontracts for items sold for Po Sheng.
During a dinner at a Washington area restaurant, Kuo and Bergersen discussed communication security.
"Bergersen revealed information about United States and Taiwan communications security, requested that Kuo share the information with Taiwanese officials, and asked Guo to arrange a meeting with Taiwan Ministry of Defense officials," the FBI said.
It was not clear whether any such meeting took place, or what the purpose of such a meeting might have been.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday it had set up a task force to assess security leaks.
"The defense ministry considers the espionage case recently cracked in the United States of great importance," the ministry said in a statement.
"The defense ministry has organized a contingency group to assess, and control damage, if any, that may arise from the case," it said, without elaborating.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY AFP
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
RSS