The arrest of two Chinese-American citizens who were allegedly running a secret police station in New York City exposes China’s biggest weakness, according to one retired four-star general.
“It does reveal sort of an Achilles heel, in my view, of China, and that is how sensitive they are to adverse opinion and how quickly they respond to it,” Fox News senior strategic analyst Ret. Gen. Jack Keane said on “Mornings with Maria” Tuesday.
“Look at how elaborate this is: we’re many, many oceans away from China, but yet they’ve got an operation right in New York City to control adverse opinion against their regime,” he continued. “We’re not talking about Beijing and Shanghai. We’re talking about New York City.”
The FBI and federal prosecutors announced Monday the arrests of two New York residents who set up and ran an undisclosed Chinese government police station in Manhattan’s Chinatown neighborhood.
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Lu Jianwang and Chen Jinping – who are reportedly U.S. citizens – have each been charged with conspiring to act as agents of China’s government, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York.
“Here’s what we know happened inside the secret police station in Lower Manhattan. At the very least, the station was providing some government services, like helping Chinese citizens renew their Chinese driver’s licenses,” U.S. attorney Breon Peace said Monday. “But to do even that, the law requires that individuals like the defendants who act as agents of a foreign government give prior notice to the attorney general before setting up shop in New York City. That didn’t happen.”
More troubling, however, is evidence allegedly showing that on at least one occasion, a Chinese National Police official directed one of the defendants to help locate a pro-democracy activist of Chinese descent living in California.
“In other words,” Pearce added, “the Chinese national police appear to have been using the station to track a U.S. resident on U.S. soil.”
The fact that China reacts “so strongly” to adverse opinion, Gen. Keane argued, proves that the U.S. adversary is trying to protect its greatest vulnerability.
“The thing that they fear more than anything are their own people,” Keane said. “They fear their own people more than they fear the United States and our adversaries for sure. And this sort of reveals how much that fear really is.”
“Our government can do more in terms of our own influence operations against China to expose their repression inside of China, to expose this incident to the people in China, to expose their intimidation and aggression against Taiwan and other countries on a regular basis,” the general added.
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He further warned U.S. defense to be on alert as China conducts “the most comprehensive penetration of American society in our history,” even overshadowing the Soviet Union’s efforts during the Cold War.
“Not only is China an adversary of ours against national interests that we have in the Indo-Pacific region and other parts of the world,” Keane said, “obviously they recognize the United States as the leading adversary against them, and they want to undermine American society, break down America’s trust and faith in its government.”
Fox News’ Greg Norman and Marta Dhanis contributed to this report.