Evidence has emerged that the Bush administration may be protecting mainland Chinese intelligence operations on U.s. territory. According to recent revelations, a Chinese national who seized control of the China Spring group last year is a penetration agent of the People's Republic of China Ministry of State Security. China Spring had been the most important U.S.-based Chinese student organization opposed to the Deng Xiaoping regime. Its policy changed dramatically after Feng Shengping-the alleged P.R.C. operative-took charge. Feng works out of the Washington office of former State Department intelligence chief and CIA deputy director Ray Cline. Cline is a decades-long trusted operative for George Bush. This has led some to conclude that the P.R.C. intelligence coup involving Feng was approved by the White House.
Accusations against Feng center around a series of Minis- try of State Security internal documents which had reportedly been leaked to, or stolen by, opponents of the Beijing regime and smuggled out of the mainland. The documents, and sup- porting evidence, have been making the rounds of the Chi- nese student movement over recent weeks.
One document, dated April 1989 and entitled "Summary of Progress," deals with P.R.C. intelligence operations in the United States directed against Chinese student organizations. The document details Feng Shengping's role in "infiltrating" China Spring. It notes that a state-by-state takeover of the U.S. organization, made possible by Feng and what the min- istry refers to as his "task force," was then in progress. It reports that actual opponents of the Deng regime within the organization were being isolated. Other documents report on Feng and his associates' role in regularly funneling informa- tion to their superiors relating to Chinese student movement leaders in the United States.
China Spring was formed in 1982 by Dr. Wang Bing- zhang, as the first U.S.-based student organization opposed to the Beijing regime. Its organizing among the Chinese student community in the U.S. proved to be quite successful. In the spring of 1987, Deng Xiaoping himself denounced Dr. Wang in his speech before a plenary session of the 12th Chinese Communist Party Central Committee. In that speech, Deng accused Wang of trying to "lead China on the road to capitalism."
Beijing-and possibly its allies in Washington-was worried. Meanwhile, students in China itself were also be- coming increasingly radicalized. China Spring literature smuggled onto the mainland became instrumental in that growing radicalization, as Chinese authorities have since stated.
Feng launches a preemptive coup However, on Jan. 8, 1989, Feng and 15 of his supporters
ran a coup within the executive committee of China Spring, and expelled Wang and all of the organization's founders. Feng, who had been an obscure member based at Princeton University, promptly moved to Washington, D.C. to work out of Cline's two-room office on K Street. Feng's first action as head of China Spring was to initiate civil action against Wang for allegedly pilfering funds. Wang was forced to establish a new organization, the Chinese Democratic Party, in greatly reduced circumstances-and as the revolutionary events in Tiananmen Square approached. On June 30, 1989, the mayor of Beijing, Chen Xitong, delivered a speech justi- fying the Tiananmen Square massacre, in which he specifi- cally denounced Dr. Wang and his Chinese Democratic Party for "inciting students" and having had "a direct hand in the turmoil."
Shortly after taking over China Spring, Feng and his associates began modifying their opposition to the P.R.C. regime to that of mild criticism. At the same time, Ray Cline formed a new publication, China and Pacific Rim Letter, and placed Feng on its editorial board. There, Feng joined a number of active and retired U.S. intelligence agents.
Cline's "investment" in Feng proved to be handy. Imme- diately following the June 1989 massacre in Beijing, Cline dragged Feng from one Washington press conference to an- other, in order to "explain" what had happened, and also to "explain" the behavior of President George Bush, whose cowardly betrayal of the massacred Chinese students was then provoking international outrage.
Cline then worked with Feng to form a new organization known as the China Solidarity Committee. The stated pur- pose of this new organization was to serve as a liaison be- tween the Chinese student movement and the U.S. intelli- gence community. While it is unclear whom Feng is meeting with, Cline's close associates with Asian intelligence back- grounds include former CIA director William Colby and for- mer Pentagon intelligence chief Gen. Richard Stilwell.
Given such connections, it is not surprising what the line adopted by China Spring spokesmen has become. The Beijing students "went too far" and "should have negotiat- ed," they say. This is the White House line. It was also shortly after the Tiananmen Square massacre that Feng began denouncing Lyndon LaRouche and EIR for "extremism" and for being "crooks." This is also a White House line. Cline, for his part, has taken to denouncing LaRouche before Chinese students as the "devil."
