Reports have emerged that former U.S. President Donald Trump approved covert Internet intelligence operations against China by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during his tenure in 2019.
According to Reuters on the 14th (local time), citing former officials well-versed in the CIA’s covert operations, Trump authorized a covert operation to create anti-government sentiment through social media in China in his third year in office 2019.
The former officials said that the CIA teamed up with a small number of people to create fake Internet accounts and spread negative stories about Xi Jinping’s government. The team was known to have primarily disseminated information that some members of the Chinese Communist Party were hiding money they had illegally obtained overseas and that China’s ambitious global infrastructure construction project, the “Belt and Road Initiative (BRI),” was corrupt and a waste of money.
The former officials claimed that the CIA initiated this operation in response to China’s aggressive efforts to expand worldwide influence over the past decade. They said that Matthew Pottinger, who served as deputy national security advisor in the Trump administration, lntial approval for this operation.
The former officials refused to disclose the details of the operation to defame the Chinese government but claimed that the harmful content spread by the CIA was at least based on facts.
Reuters reported that a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry criticized the U.S. government for using “public forums and media platforms as weapons to spread false information and manipulate international public opinion.”
Reuters stated that it has not been confirmed whether the CIA’s covert operation continued under the Biden administration. However, historians in the field of information pointed out that the CIA activities approved by the U.S. president tend to remain intact in subsequent administrations.
Kate Waters, spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council (NSC), the CIA, and former President Trump all refused to respond to requests for verification.
Unlike previous administrations, Trump consistently fought against China during his tenure. He has publicly stated that he will be much more demanding on China if he wins the presidential election in November.
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