China Escalates Its Intelligence Collection Activities Against Taiwan

Chang Kuo-wei 

April 18, 2015

China steps up spying activities against Taiwan

China appears to be stepping up spying activities against Taiwan, partly for the purpose of causing the US to have second thoughts about transferring military technology to the island, lest they be stolen and passed on to China via Chinese spies, warned Lin Chong-bin, former vice minister of national defense.

Speaking at a forum held by the Center for Asian Policy, National Tsing Hua University, on April 16, Lin pointed to the arrest last year of Chinese spy Zhen Xiaojiang, who is a former officer of China’s People’s Liberalization Army, an unprecedented phenomenon attesting to the intensified spying activities of China against Taiwan. This is also one of rare arrests of native Chinese spies by Taiwan, as opposed to most cases involving Taiwanese people recruited by China to do the job.

Lin added that some Western observers have urged Washington to be cautious in transferring military technology to Taiwan, since they may end up in the hands of China’s PLA.

Lin discussed the employment of non-conventional means by the PLA in its attacks on Taiwan. Physical attacks, said Lin, against Taiwan would lead to undesirable consequences, including heavy casualties of civilians, which would arouse widespread animosity among Taiwanese people against Communist China, and destruction of infrastructural facilities.