China Attacks!

by Charles

Agence France Presse reports on a little espionage, most likely by the Chinese military:

A systematic effort by hackers to penetrate US government and industry computer networks stems most likely from the Chinese military, the head of a leading security institute said. The attacks have been traced to the Chinese province of Guangdong, and the techniques used make it appear unlikely to come from any other source than the military, said Alan Paller, the director of the SANS Institute, an education and research organization focusing on cybersecurity.

"These attacks come from someone with intense discipline. No other organization could do this if they were not a military organization," Paller said in a conference call to announced a new cybersecurity education program.

Of course, there might be a few folks in the U.S. government who are hacking into Chinese computers. Speaking of attacks, Dongzhou Village is where China massacred.  In a public protest of property confiscations, the police responded forcefully:

Residents of Shanwei City's Dongzhou Town in Guangdong Province, China, report that on December 6, authorities sent armed policemen to suppress their appeals. By the 8th, 33 residents had been killed and several dozen missing. The unprovoked slaughter of unarmed civilians reminds observers of the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) 1989 massacre of students in Tiananmen Square. The villagers' appeal was for proper compensation that had not been forthcoming after corrupt officials had expropriated farmers' land for a power plant.

A villager, contacted on December 8, described the situation: "Yesterday, we were busy dealing with the problems caused by the incident. We counted the number of dead and injured and sent six corpses to Dongzhou Hospital. A severely injured villager died and there are still 30 to 40 people unaccounted for. No one knows whether they are dead or hiding. We heard that there are still corpses in the mountains yet we are forbidden to enter the area. The town's main representatives are in danger. As of now, the authorities do not simply arrest and then sentence people, but shoot them at will. A villager was shot dead in public yesterday afternoon.

One villager reported that 33 residents had been shot dead and more than 20 were still missing, most of whom were in their twenties. One of the missing was a young man who worked in another province, but had returned to Dongzhou Town to get married. When he went to the power plant to see what had happened on December 6, he was shot dead at the scene.

A little trouble in big China, and indicative of the problems of the "unaccountable top-down power structure" as Robert Mayer calls it.  Another example from the International Herald Tribune:

The government tried for days to keep secret the threat posed to the nearly four million people of this city by a chemical explosion and benzene leak that has made the water supply unusable, Chinese news accounts revealed Friday.

The reports, including some from the official Xinhua news agency, suggested that officials here and in Jilin Province, where the disaster occurred 380 kilometers, or 235 miles, up the Songhua River, lied or told only part of the story until they had no choice but to admit the truth.

There may also be other reasons for citizens' discontent, as this post by James Hamilton shows.  Chinese GDP statistics don't add up.

One additional note.  The Epoch Times (which has a separate China section) is not just on the sidelines.  Their editors have produced the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party, which is dead-set against the current ruling class.  In either case, as I continue to read the news on China, the phrase "they may be trading partners, but they're not our friends" keeps bubbling to the surface.  It makes me more agreeable with Anton Traversa, who makes the case that we're better off strengthening our ties with India.  All the more so, given our current trade imbalance.

Comments

[derrida derider]

But your (no, I'm not American) current account deficit that means that you have to stay friends whether you like it or not. If they start selling all those Treasury bonds you sold them ....

You're in the position of Don Corleone's barber after he'd received a favour from him.

On the spying, in the modern world even friends spy on each other. I'd be quite surprised, f'rinstance, if your spooks weren't trying to read UK, French, etc government traffic.

[angela]

It's true that Chinese economic figures are a sham. But reading through the links in the Dr. hamilton's post it seems agreed that growth is greater than stated (remember the pressure to reduce it?) and that various methods including tax cuts are being used to stimulate investment. The basic guess is investment is overstated, but those numbers are unbelievable.

This doesn't mean China doesn't have a large number of discontents or economic tensions.

[Jon H]

And it's Cuba that gets the Right wing's panties in a bunch.

[Jon H]

China can use virtually unlimited brutality against the poor, so long as they keep enough of the well-off sufficiently happy.

I guess cars, plasma screens, bootleg DVDs, and gadgets are the masses' new opiates.

[Frank]

Why isn't anyone talking about the good news in Guangdong?

[liberal japonicus]

"These attacks come from someone with intense discipline. No other organization could do this if they were not a military organization,"

Though I'm not completely doubting that the Chinese military is interested in this, this guy doesn't have a clue about real-life computer users.

From the WaPo (emph mine)
Pentagon figures show that more attempts to scan Defense Department systems come from China, which has 119 million Internet users, than from any other country. VanPutte said this does not mean that China is where all the probes start, only that it is "the last hop" before they reach their targets.

He noted that China is a convenient "steppingstone" for hackers because of the large number of computers there that can be compromised. Also, tracing hackers who use Chinese networks is complicated by the lack of cyber investigation agreements between China and the United States, another task force official said.

That Chinese hackers have been at it since 2001 is something also to be taken into account.

In addition, attempting to somehow dry up the number of Chinese hackers would make things like this less likely.

Why isn't anyone talking about the good news in Guangdong?

Since most of the hackers are based in Guangdong, these sorts of attacks are actually part of the price of freedom.

[Jackmormon]

There aren't any easy options for dealing with China. As far as I can tell, China is in the process of a very slow, tightly controlled economic revolution. The rural population is moving into urban areas at historic rates. Public Chinese rhetoric has become more forthrightly nationalistic--and with many of my Chinese students writing very serious, careful essays about how China needs to redress human rights abuses in order to take its rightful place among the grand powers, I'm inclined to take the murmurs of increased nationalism for real. And of course China is also beginning to realize the economic power that has been for so long implicit in its size, education standards, and comparatively cheap labor.

The US needs to be careful here. Stability and careful, gradual democraticization in China serve our interests, as cold-hearted as that sounds. The break-up of the USSR does not seem to me to be a model for a post-communist China (for the US, China, or the world).

Sure, if I were in charge of a gigantic manufacturing company, I'd prefer to hire in India than in China. But that choice really has more to do with China's recent history and uncertain future than it has anything to do with Anton Traversa's nostaglia for the British Empire.

[ckrisz]

EPOCH TIMES is a Falun Gong front organization, and pretty much lacks all credibility. They're sort of like Moonies, but actually really oppressed as opposed to just imagining they're oppressed. Unfortunately this fact does not change the fact that they are nuts.

[ckrisz]

EPOCH TIMES is a Falun Gong front organization, and pretty much lacks all credibility. They're sort of like Moonies, but actually really oppressed as opposed to just imagining they're oppressed. Unfortunately this does not change the fact that they are nuts.

[liberal japonicus]

Interesting. Falun Gong, after appearing in Japan quite a bit, has dropped off the map, which I presume is because if the right in Japan used Falun Gong as an example of Chinese repression, it would let the Chinese government use anti japanese sentiment against them. The wikipedia page as well as the associated discussion page is quite interesting.

[Barry]

Charles, I don't mean to be critical, but I really hope that you don't mind if I file this story with the ones about the aluminum tubes, biological-warfare drones, and mobile bio-weapons labs.

[Charles Bird]

I don't mean to be critical, but I really hope that you don't mind if I file this story with the ones about the aluminum tubes, biological-warfare drones, and mobile bio-weapons labs.

Why, Barry?

ckrisz, why would you equate Falun Gong with Moonies?

[Slartibartfast]

Ack!

Ack ACK?

Ack. Ack ACK ack ack!

[liberal japonicus]

In response to the avalanche of lurkers who demanded a HoCB thread on this, they can find it here

[Jackmormon]

You're joking, right?

[liberal japonicus]

I'm sorry, I don't feel it appropriate to comment on an ongoing thread...

btw, you know it's Friday here \(^o^)/

[Jackmormon]

Ah, the first heady days of having one's own blog.

[Anton Traversa]

Liberal Japonicus-

A few things. Firstly, I don't think nationalism as a force in Chinese politics is anything new. The theoretical rejection of nationalism in favor of nationalism envisioned by Marx & co. was used as a ruse to whip up more of the same - especially in China. Nationalism has a long and uninterrupted tradition in China. The only difference, I think, is now China's nationalism is being more effectively wielded - and its backed up by SU-27s and billions in US Bonds. Much scarier than you customary 5yr plan.

I don't think that you take into account the instability in a country like China. Certainly a stable China is in our best interests (I'm not necessarily looking to foment revolution), but not as a belligerent tyrant. Anyone who believes that China should be 'contained' is looking for a self-fulfilling prophecy. On the other hand, pretending China is bound to suddenly liberalize is naive. If anything, the CCP has enforced its monopoly on power more rigorously in recent years. China may be liberalizing economically, but the 'commanding heights' are still centrally planned and the political process more firmly non-democratic. It's been a long evolution from communism to fascism for China, and it remains to be seen if she can be a benign fascist polity. The historical precedent, however, is not encouraging.

One last thing, what's this about my 'nostalgia' for the British Empire? How did you get that? Is it because I think the fact that there's a thriving democracy in India, that can be directly traced to British rule, is a good thing? I don't care how it happened, just that it's happening and working. Just is the case that the Anglo model has a better record than most, but it doesn't mean I'm an apologist for imperialism.

best wishes/happy holidays everyone.

[Anton Traversa]

heh, sorry that was for Jackmormon. Sorry libjaponicus.

[godoggo]

I rather like the Epoch Times. I had checked out the website after noticing the English paper edition available at my local Borders and the Chinese edition (with much more empasis on China news) at the HK supermarket. Just thought I'd let you know that an acquaintance from Taiwan (a 40ish man with both Taiwanese and American law degrees, and certainly no Communist apologist) tells me it's sponsored by Falun Gong.

[godoggo]

Oh, someone else mentioned that. Anyway, I think it's a pretty useful, stridently anti-communist paper. Nothing strikes me as especially wacky. I'll check out the Wiki article.