Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed D.W. Wilber, acounter-terrorism expert and former intelligence officer of the CIA and DOD to the show to discuss his latest piece at Townhall.com and the immediate threat of China.
Leahy: We have a very special guest who’s going to talk about the China threat. His name is DW Wilber. He brings over 30 years of experience in security and counterterrorism. He’s a former intelligence officer serving with the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Defense in Eastern and Western Europe. His expertise took them to Iraq from 2004 to 2007 where he served as an advisor for counterterrorism and counter-IED operations to the Commanding General of the U.S. Army Multinational Corps. Wow! That’s a background. D.W. Wilbur, welcome to The Tennessee Star Report.
Wilber: Well thank you for having me.
Leahy: So you had a piece that caught our attention at Townhall. You were advancing a theme that we’ve talked about many a time here on the program and that is the threat from China. The headline of your article is The China Threat is Real and Upon Us. Tell us about that.
Wilber: Well, I mean the Chinese threats been there for many years now and for decades in fact. But it has really ramped up into high gear. As you know, if technology has improved and made it easier for them to achieve some of the goals that they have. Our open society obviously has made their job easier. When they had the great opening to China that occurred under Richard Nixon, you know that opened the door for a lot more contact between the Chinese and the opportunity for them to interact with counterparts in the U.S. and the academic community and also in the defense industry.
And the Chinese have been taking advantage of that for literally for decades. But as I said, the advancement in technology and everything has made their job even easier for them to do and it’s opened up a lot of opportunities. and they’re certainly not bypassing anything. They’re taking advantage of everything they can.
Leahy: You write the following in your outstanding commentary at Townhall. China’s intelligence service has infiltrated every corner of American life. politics, academia, and the news media. They are very active on college campuses and not only involved in academic pursuits but also involved in stirring up descent and recruiting impressionable young minds. a little daunting there, isn’t it?
Wilber: Yeah, you know we’re up against a very difficult and very challenging adversary. There’s no doubt about it. And as I said, they’re taking advantage of everything that they can. Certainly, college campuses are a ripe area for them to seek out opportunities. You have impressionable young people who are attending colleges and they are there with open minds and they’re trying to develop their thought processes and how they feel about the world and politics and their own country. And certainly the Chinese are using that environment to try to create things that are favorable to them.
Leahy: Now you also write, I’m going to add one comment after this to get your reaction to this. It’s fascinating also. politically. We already know how communist China has made an effort to recruit American politicians starting at the local level and supporting candidates who appear to exhibit promise and the potential for higher office. And those who also exhibit a vulnerability in character defects that can be exploited later. Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein and Congressman Eric Swalwell are just two of the most recent examples.
Who knows how many more have yet to come to light. Now a couple of questions on this. the first is, give us the details of how Eric Swalwell was compromised by this young attractive, I guess you would just call her a Chinese spy it seems to me. Fang Fang was her nickname, I guess. And then secondly, what do you make of the following: Nancy Pelosi names the compromised Eric Swalwell to be the manager of the impeachment trial of what will then be former President Donald Trump in the Senate?
Wilber: (Chuckles) Well I’ll answer the first of the second part of your question first. Who can figure out what Nancy Pelosi does and why? She’s a, well I can’t use the term that I like to use on the radio.
Leahy: (Chuckles) We get the idea. Everybody in the audience can think of the word. Okay, go on.
Wilber: She’s crazy like a bat let’s put it that way. But as far as the techniques of the tactics that the Chinese use is a time-honored tradition. you know intelligence Services had used it against us for you know forever. I mean, the Russians have successfully used sex as a recruitment tool. I only know what I have, you know, I have heard and gleaned for the media in other sources. But that sounds you know exactly what was used against Swalwell as sex as a lure.
And you know developing a relationship. That’s something that’s common. the Russians used successfully against us in the past the Chinese certainly have and it will continue because you know how the old saying, I guess in the advertising market sex sells. I’ve met the Russians and the Chinese that they’ve used it against married men for one thing. They try to get married men in compromising situations
Leahy: Blackmail, basically.
Wilber: Basically it’s blackmail. and then use that hold that over their head to get them to cooperate with them and provide them with you no information or access. As I’ve said, the Chinese have infiltrated literally every aspect of our society. And you know getting into an area or even local politics is certainly not beyond them because we view all politics is local and certainly they do the same. They will set their eyes or whatever on you know, someone who seems to have the potential for higher office. Maybe someone who’s somewhat charismatic. I fail to see that in Swalwell.
Leahy: Not exactly oozing charisma, that guy. (Chuckles)
Wilber: Yeah, but for some reason, they saw something in him whether it was his political connections that he had or something but there’s something that they saw.
Leahy: I think it was his ambition and the possibility that he could you know move up. That’s what I think that’s what it was.
Wilber: Well in California, obviously, you know Democrats hold political power so they would certainly be a Target.
Leahy: You also wrote the following. I want to read two paragraphs to you and then get your reaction. ‘When considering the threat China communist China poses to our nation all one has to do is look on the streets of America in recent years. Much of the civil strife and unrest that have been and continue to experience has the fingerprints of communist China all over it.
Antifa, BLM, and any other leftist organizations are most certainly quietly influenced if not outright infiltrated and getting their marching orders from communist China. China’s participation may be hidden using third parties. Some very high-profile, maybe even well-known former political figures. But China’s hand is there nonetheless and China will continue their efforts to destroy our country from within based on the success they’ve experienced thus far.’
Wilber: Absolutely. And as I mentioned about college campuses being ripe for the picking as far as recruitment goes and as far as indoctrination, if you will
Leahy: And the Houston Embassy, the Consulate in Houston was engaged in some social media activity I guess to promote unrest and that’s why they were shut down. Is that right?
Wilber: I mean again like I said, they look for impressionable young minds that they can cultivate and give their views to and young people in college are certainly open to looking at what might be an alternative to what they’re familiar with.
Listen to the full interview here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Xi Jinping” by Narendra Modi. CC BY 2.0.
