Good grief!  An ethnic Chinese computer scientist employed by the Los Alamos National Laboratory is suspected of having passed highly classified information on nuclear warhead technology to the Chinese government.  And (gasp) he may have been doing it for the past 10 years, working quietly for China while enjoying the benefits of US citizenship, life in sunny New Mexico and a top secret security clearance within one of the Department of Energy’s most sensitive research areas.  What a surprise!

   Unfortunately, the story of Wen Ho Lee is neither isolated nor unusual.  It is indicative of the Chinese government’s broad strategy for obtaining technology from the US and other countries to bolster its competitive position in the global marketplace -- militarily and otherwise.  The strategy consists of establishing and strengthening information networks, building cooperation with international firms to facilitate technology transfer, and using Chinese nationals to transfer and disseminate technology by studying and working overseas.

   Here’s how it works. 

  The Ministry of State Security (MSS) is the arm of the Chinese government that governs all intelligence collection activities targeted against foreign governments and corporations.  It uses a network of recruited agents and informants to collect intelligence abroad.  MSS case officers assigned to Chinese embassies and consulates or other quasi-official installations abroad (NCNA, CAAC, etc.) run the agent/informant networks with guidance from MSS headquarters in Beijing.  The agents and informants are, for the most part, ethnic Chinese residents of the target country: overseas Chinese.  People just like Mr. Wen Ho Lee.  

   China is a tightly controlled police state.  Virtually all Chinese citizens who work or study abroad, and overseas Chinese who visit their families in China, are routinely contacted and monitored by the MSS.  They are asked to keep their eyes and ears open and to report any information they may stumble across.  Those who successfully develop access to information of value become candidates for full recruitment by Chinese intelligence.  They are given guidance on intelligence requirements and collection techniques, provided with communication plans and put into direct clandestine contact with MSS case officers or principle agents within the target country.  This is SOP - standard operating procedure - for the MSS.  The screening process is thorough and effective, and there is no shortage of overseas Chinese intelligence agent candidates who retain some degree of loyalty to their motherland.  

   Furthermore, cooperation is often not a matter of choice; coercion and threats (usually against family members residing in China) are used, as well as positive incentives (money, privileges, etc.), to assure cooperation.  

   A recent incident of industrial espionage by China has a similar theme.  Huang Dao Pei, a naturalized US citizen, attempted to buy the formula for a hepatitis C diagnostic kit from a fellow scientist at Roche Diagnostics.  Roche spent millions of dollars and several years on the development of the product, and China almost obtained the formula for peanuts. We do not yet know the full extent of Huang’s betrayal to Roche and his adopted country during the years he worked at Roche, but we can estimate what the cost would have been if he had been successful in stealing the formula for the testing kit.  The only reason he was caught was because the fellow scientist turned him in.

   It’s always cheaper to steal a product than to do the research and development required to develop it. China knows this very well, and it underscores the threat China poses to the US economy through its theft of trade secrets.  This was not an isolated incident.  The threat is real and growing.  The White House estimates that $100 billion is lost to the US economy every year through similar acts of corporate espionage.  Private industry, like government, has a responsibility to take whatever security measures are necessary to guard its proprietary secrets.  When they lose, we all lose.

   An important part of the screening process for a US government security clearance is an evaluation of possible divided loyalties.  All naturalized US citizens, not just Chinese, come under intense scrutiny on the loyalty issue.  Then, if they are eventually given a clearance despite having close ties to another country, their contacts with former countrymen and relatives are supposed to be routinely monitored for as long as their security clearances remain valid.  This is particularly important when the home country involved is known to attempt to suborn its former citizens routinely. 

   Wen Ho Lee was clearly not monitored by government security officers after receiving his clearance, nor did Roche keep a close enough eye on Huang Dao Pei.  Both the government and Roche must bear the responsibility for this negligence.  They should have known better.  They should have been aware that these employees were inherently vulnerable, and that they would probably be actively targeted by China’s MSS.

   Although the loyalty issue is a sensitive one, it must be confronted directly and dispassionately, particularly when national security is at stake.  US citizens who immigrate to our shores are not second-class citizens and should in no way be treated as such.  But it must be remembered that as a group they are vulnerable to pressure from their former countries, and when that former country chooses to exploit these individuals as a matter of state policy, we have a real problem on our hands.