Tag Archives: defense policy

Export Controls Regarding the PRC

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It has come to light that we really don’t have any serious export controls covering technology-related exports to the People’s Republic of China.

Of the US’s total $125 billion in exports to China in 2020, officials required a license for less than half a percent, Commerce Department data shows. Of that fraction, the agency approved 94%, or 2,652, applications for technology exports to China. The figures omit applications “returned without action,” meaning their outcomes were uncertain.
The result: the US continues to send to China an array of semiconductors, aerospace components, artificial-intelligence technology, and other items that could be used to advance Beijing’s military interests.

Why is this being allowed to occur?

Some warn tighter restrictions on US tech sales to China will backfire because allies such as Germany, Japan, and South Korea will step in to fill the void. For export restrictions to be effective, “we need our allies to have the same controls,” said Kevin Wolf, a senior Commerce official during the Obama administration, while testifying on Capitol Hill last year. “It is that simple and logical.”

That would be silly if it weren’t, at bottom, rankly defeatist. We shouldn’t be waiting around on putting curbs on technology transfers to an enemy nation. Instead of looking for consensus first, we need to act, to lead, to let the consensus build as we go, and to give our allies something to follow and a consensus to join. After all, if we don’t care enough to do, there’s no reason anyone else should care enough to do.

Beside that, if we stop exporting our technology to the PRC and our putative allies step in to fill the gap, at least we’ll be stopping our own transfers, and our allies’ technologies, for the most part, aren’t as good as ours. The PRC would be getting second best, continuing to trail us, and that would be to the good for our security.

This Says It All

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The Republic of China’s Mainland Affairs Council has issued a statement in response to a People’s Republic of China policy statement that did not include phrasing that ruled out the dispatch of Chinese troops and civilian administrators to Taiwan as had prior editions. In their own statement, the RoC, among other things,

declar[ed] that “the Republic of China is a sovereign country,” referring to the government in Taipei by its formal name.
“The CCP regime has never ruled Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen, and Matsu for a single day,” the statement read….

Hear, hear.

Bragging about Getting al-Zawahiri

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It’s good that we got him. It’s unclear that we can do this sort of thing routinely. General Frank McKenzie, Central Command commander during President Joe Biden’s (D) panicky running away from Afghanistan, had this:

Let’s remember, this is one strike in a year[.]

Indeed. Successfully burning al-Zawahiri in his city apartment makes us one-for-two in over-the-horizon drone strikes into Afghanistan. The other was in the immediate aftermath of that cut-and-run, when we successfully burned a civilian and a bunch of kids with a drone strike on a car.

However, with an n of 2, we can’t tell whether the first, failed, strike is illustrative of the true trend, or the second, successful, strike is illustrative of the true trend—or even whether the true trend is closer to that mediocre 50-ish per cent success rate.

Nor is two strikes a year apart a very useful pace.

Who Checks the Checkers?

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Senator Rob Portman (R, OH), in his capacity as Ranking Member of the Senate’s Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, released a report detailing a decade-long effort by the People’s Republic of China to infiltrate the Federal Reserve system. The report concluded, in part, that

the Fed failed to mount an adequate response. The report’s findings show “a sustained effort by China, over more than a decade, to gain influence over the Federal Reserve and a failure by the Federal Reserve to combat this threat effectively.”

Of course, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell demurred from that report.

“Because we understand that some actors aim to exploit any vulnerabilities, our processes, controls, and technology are robust and updated regularly. We respectfully reject any suggestions to the contrary,” he wrote in a letter to Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, the committee’s top Republican.
Mr Powell detailed the central bank’s information security and background screening protocols, including reviews of foreign travel and personal contacts for staff who have access to restricted information. “We take seriously any violations of these robust information security policies[.]”

Of course. However, any procedure, no matter how robust or frequently updated, is only as good as the people executing the procedure. I have to ask: who does that vetting for the Fed? Who follows up on those travel reviews and contacts? What’s the Fed’s IG role in these procedures? How closely is the DoJ’s FBI involved?

That last, given the FBI’s demonstrated bias and too-often outright dishonesty, is especially important.

Our Secure Southern Border

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Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas insists that our southern border is secure. President Joe Biden (D) echoes him with his own silence on Mayorkas’ claim. Here’s some of what Texas’ police and National Guard are intercepting at that border under Governor Greg Abbott’s (R) Operation Lone Star, which has the Texas National Guard also working the border, according to Texas Department of Public Safety Sgt Marc Couch:

  • more than 225,000 migrant apprehensions
  • more than 13,000 criminal arrests,
  • more than 3,500 weapons seized
  • 289 million deadly fentanyl doses

That’s since Operation Lone Star began. Just since last October, there also have been 500,000+ known “gotaways,” illegal aliens who were spotted crossing our border illegally but who evaded capture.

This is what Biden and his DHS Secretary, neither of whom are willing actually to visit our southern border, are letting through with their version of “secure.” Since that’s what they’re calling it, I have to conclude they’re deliberately letting this sewage in.

Imagine the intercepts and the increased safety of our nation if the Federal government were really interested in security.