According to well-informed U.S. officials with access to highly classified intelligence, China and Cuba have reportedly reached a clandestine accord. Under this agreement, China plans to establish a covert electronic surveillance center on the island, posing a bold new geopolitical challenge to the United States.
This facility, which is approximately 100 miles off the coast of Florida, would grant Chinese intelligence agencies the capability to intercept electronic communications across the southeastern region of the United States, which houses numerous military installations, as well as monitor U.S. maritime traffic.
Sources familiar with the situation reveal that China has agreed to provide financial assistance amounting to several billion dollars to financially strained Cuba in exchange for permission to construct the eavesdropping facility. While the exact terms of the agreement are yet to be finalized, the two nations have reportedly reached an agreement in principle.
“The revelation about the planned site has sparked alarm within the Biden administration because of Cuba’s proximity to the U.S. mainland,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “Washington regards Beijing as its most significant economic and military rival. A Chinese base with advanced military and intelligence capabilities in the U.S.’s backyard could be an unprecedented new threat.”
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The Biden Administration’s response gives us little comfort.
“While I cannot speak to this specific report, we are well aware of—and have spoken many times to—the People’s Republic of China’s efforts to invest in infrastructure around the world that may have military purposes, including in this hemisphere,” said John Kirby, spokesman for the National Security Council. “We monitor it closely, take steps to counter it, and remain confident that we are able to meet all our security commitments at home, in the region, and around the world.”
Does anyone expect the Biden Administration to take any meaningful “steps to counter” this move by China? This is the same administration, after all, that was far more concerned about not offending China than our national security during the spy balloon scandal in February. Three unidentified Biden administration officials revealed that the Chinese spy balloon was allowed to fly over the United States for an entire week and was able to acquire and send secret intelligence to Beijing regarding a number of military bases in “real time.”
Joe Biden’s close ties with China have been a matter of concern for years. Despite the passage of three years since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, China has yet to face any substantial accountability for its role in the crisis. Nor has it faced any accountability for the spy balloon incident, and that lack of consequence may have emboldened it to take this egregious step toward establishing a surveillance facility just a short distance from the U.S. mainland. The Biden administration is far more concerned about improving relations with China, even at the expense of U.S. national security.
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