The Central Intelligence Agency has announced the creation of a China-centered unit to cope with the rising threat posed by the communist regime.
The newly-announced China Mission Center will “address the global challenge posed by the People’s Republic of China that cuts across all of the agency’s mission areas,” the U.S. intelligence agency said in a statement.
Beijing is the “most important geopolitical threat we face in the 21st century,” CIA Chief William Burns said while stressing the need for the new mission center.
Politico reported the creation of CIA’s China-focused unit:
The Central Intelligence Agency announced the formation of a new China Mission Center on Thursday, underscoring the Biden administration’s focus on Beijing as a top foreign policy priority and a formidable global competitor to the United States.
In a statement that referred to the Chinese government as a “key rival,” the CIA said the mission center was the result of a series of strategic reviews launched by Director William Burns in the spring that concentrated on “China, technology, people, and partnerships,” among other areas.
The mission center is intended to “address the global challenge posed by the People’s Republic of China that cuts across all of the Agency’s mission areas,” the CIA said, with Burns adding that it “will further strengthen our collective work on the most important geopolitical threat we face in the 21st century, an increasingly adversarial Chinese government.” (…)Deputy CIA Director David Cohen “will oversee the implementation” of the changes to the agency’s organizational structure that resulted from Burns’ reviews, the CIA said.
Former directors of the CIA praised Burns and the agency for creating the center to combat the threats to American power posed by China.
“If there is any country that deserves its own mission center, it is China, which has global ambitions and presents the greatest challenge to U.S. interests and to international order,” former CIA Director John Brennan told POLITICO.
The news comes as China increases military hostilities against its Asian neighbors. In recent days, more than a hundred Chinese warplanes, including fighter jets and nuclear-capable bombers, have violated Taiwanese air space. “The number of Chinese military planes flown through a corner of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone surged to 125 in the first days of October,” USA Today reported on Saturday. Beijing has repeated its threats to annex the independent island nation, which it regards as a breakaway province.
China’s People Liberation Army (PLA) is again amassing troops along its southwestern border with India. “India’s army chief has said China is sending troops to their disputed border in “considerable numbers,” prompting a matching deployment by New Delhi in a development he called a “concern”, the broadcaster France24 reported earlier this week.
This week, Indian media outlets reported renewed clashes between the PLA and Indian army. China disputes its 2,100-mile-long border with India.
The reorganization has been announced as the CIA’s overseas intelligence-gathering operations come under increasing pressure from China, Iran, and other rogues states. According to recent news reports, the agency admitted losing dozens of informants based in hostile countries.
“In recent years, adversarial intelligence services in countries such as Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan have been hunting down the C.I.A.’s sources and in some cases turning them into double agents,” the New York Times reported on Tuesday citing secret CIA cables.
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