Al Mayadeen English

  • Ar
  • Es
  • x
Al Mayadeen English

Slogan

  • News
    • Politics
    • Economy
    • Sports
    • Arts&Culture
    • Health
    • Miscellaneous
    • Technology
    • Environment
  • Articles
    • Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Blog
    • Features
  • Videos
    • NewsFeed
    • Video Features
    • Explainers
    • TV
    • Digital Series
  • Infographs
  • In Pictures
  • • LIVE
News
  • Politics
  • Economy
  • Sports
  • Arts&Culture
  • Health
  • Miscellaneous
  • Technology
  • Environment
Articles
  • Opinion
  • Analysis
  • Blog
  • Features
Videos
  • NewsFeed
  • Video Features
  • Explainers
  • TV
  • Digital Series
Infographs
In Pictures
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Asia-Pacific
  • Europe
  • Latin America
  • MENA
  • Palestine
  • US & Canada
BREAKING
Netanyahu: If Lebanese Army takes steps to disarm Hezbollah, Israel will engage in reciprocal measures, including phased reduction of Israeli military presence in Lebanon
Al Mayadeen's correspondent: Photojournalist Houssam Al-Masri martyred, reporters Hatem Omar, Mohammad Ashraf Salameh injured in Israeli strike on Nasser Medical Complex.
Israeli media: Intense US efforts are being made to resolve differences, such as the issue of the Israeli presence on Mount Hermon and in southern Syria
Israeli media: The security agreement means amending the disengagement agreement, which will also address the Druze issue
Israeli media: Attempts to reach a security agreement between 'Israel' and Syria were among the topics discussed at the Paris meeting
Israeli media: Sheikh Muwaffaq Tarif rejected a US proposal to join the recent tripartite meeting between Tom Barrack, al-Shaibani, and Dermer
Saba News Agency: Two martyred, five injured in a preliminary toll of the Israeli aggression on the Yemeni Oil Company station on Al-Sitteen Street in Sanaa
Senior Yemeni military source to Al Mayadeen: We observed a state of confusion among the enemy's aircraft squadron after Yemeni air defenses intercepted the attack
Senior Yemeni military source to Al Mayadeen: The Yemeni air defense forces succeeded in neutralizing a squadron of enemy aircraft and prevented airstrikes on some governorates
Senior Yemeni military source to Al Mayadeen: Our air defenses and missile forces forced a formation of enemy aircraft to flee the airspace

Trump launched CIA covert operation against China: Reuters

  • By Al Mayadeen English
  • Source: Agencies
  • 14 Mar 2024 17:34
  • 4 Shares
5 Min Read

Three former officials reveal that the CIA formed a small team of spies who used fictitious online identities to build bad narratives about Xi Jinping's government.

  • x
  •  Trump launched CIA covert operation against China: Reuters
    Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka Japan in June 2019. (AP)

Former US officials with insider knowledge revealed to Reuters that former President Donald Trump allowed the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to launch a covert operation on Chinese social media to turn public sentiment against the Chinese government.

Three former officials divulged that the CIA formed a small team of spies who used fictitious online identities to build bad narratives about Xi Jinping's government while leaking damaging material to foreign media. The endeavor, which began in 2019, had not previously been publicized.

The CIA team, as detailed to Reuters, fanned charges that members of the government were sheltering ill-gotten money overseas and blasted China's Belt and Road Initiative, which provides finance for building projects in underdeveloped countries, as corrupt and inefficient.

Chasing ghosts

The activities within China were designed to instill fear among top authorities, pushing the government to devote resources to tracking incursions into Beijing's carefully regulated internet, according to two former officials. "We wanted them chasing ghosts," one of the former officials explained.

The program, its intentions, or impacts were not commented on by Chelsea Robinson, a CIA spokesperson.

Meanwhile, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson stated the CIA program demonstrates how the US government exploits "public opinion space and media platforms as weapons to spread false information and manipulate international public opinion."

Read more: CovertAction Mag: How China dismantled CIA ploys

The program was a response to China's increased technological advancements in recent years, prompting Trump to develop harsh criticism of the nation.

A current administration official could not confirm to Reuters if the program was still in effect, but intelligence historians revealed that CIA covert operations usually remain in place throughout administrations when the authority is granted by the President.

China’s Foreign Ministry reported that Beijing follows a “principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries and does not interfere in the domestic affairs of the United States.”

Other sources told Reuters that the operation allowed the CIA to not only be active in China but other nations where the US wishes to influence public opinion, like Southeast Asia, Africa, and the South Pacific.

Related News

Valery Zaluzhny: From Ukraine top general to presidential prospect

FP: Why the Global South won't pick sides in US-China rivalry

Officials with knowledge of the CIA plan reported that Matt Pottinger, a former senior National Security Council official orchestrated the authorization, which cited China's use of "malign influence", accusations of intellectual property theft, and alleged threats to US national security.

Loch Johnson, a University of Georgia political scientist who studies the use of covert messaging, revealed that the US has always used such tactics as in the Cold War and the 1950s.

Last month, the Associated Press obtained a memo detailing a years-long covert Operation Money Badger by the US Drug Enforcement Administration that sent undercover operatives into Venezuela to secretly record and build alleged drug-trafficking cases against the country's leadership; a plan the US acknowledged from the very beginning was potentially a violation of international law.

Critics fear the CIA's actions may reinforce what many nations already believe: the US is the embodiment of hypocrisy. After all, nobody meddles in foreign nations and then denounces it on their own soil quite like them.

The CIA; a covert army of mayhem across the world

Last month, Jeffrey Sachs revealed in an opinion piece for Common Dreams that the CIA has 3 major problems that disregard foreign policy and international law. According to Sachs, the CIA's aims and tactics, along with its covert methods and deceptive strategies, ensure a lack of accountability.

He calls Congress a "doormat" and notes that the agency's objectives are whatever the CIA and president determine at the time, irrespective of international and domestic law.

Sachs recalls Mike Pompeo's comments when he admitted, as CIA director, that the agency "lied, cheated, and stole."

The CIA, founded in 1947, has two main missions. One is to provide intelligence to the US government, while the other is to undermine whoever is considered an "enemy" by the current President, by a variety of techniques, including assassinations, coups, manufactured disturbances, arming of rebels, and other methods.

Sachs notes that the second objective has had a destructive impact on global stability and the rule of law in the US. He calls the CIA a covert army of the US "capable of creating mayhem across the world with no accountability whatsoever."

He recalls how former President Dwight Eisenhower orchestrated the 1961 assassination of African president Patrice Lumumba of Zaire.

No attempts to hold CIA accountable

Sachs details the many operations of the CIA in Afghanistan, Serbia, Russia, China, and Syria and how for the last 20 years, it has been "deeply involved in fomenting the growing catastrophe in Ukraine," which is not limited to the overthrowing of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014 that triggered a "decade of bloodshed" leading up to the war with Russia.

Sachs expresses that the "continuing mayhem" from CIA operations has resulted in "needless deaths, instability, and destruction" that continue to this day.

He criticizes mainstream media for not questioning or investigating such operations and demanding the release of data that allows the CIA to be held accountable.

The author calls for the urgent need to expose the truth about the "US-led mayhem" and attempt to start a new epoch in which US foreign policy is more "transparent, accountable, subject to the rule of law both domestic and international, and directed towards global peace rather than subversion of supposed enemies."

  • Donald Trump
  • China
  • Xi Jinping
  • US President Joe Biden
  • United States
  • CIA

Most Read

Tom Artiom Alexandrovich, executive director of the defense division of the Israeli National Cyber Directorate, undated (Social media)

Israeli-born US prosecutor drops Israeli officer child sex crime

  • Politics
  • 19 Aug 2025
Displaced Palestinians walk through a makeshift camp along the beach in Gaza City, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2025 (AP)

Hamas, other factions accept Egypt-Qatar ceasefire proposal: Exclusive

  • Politics
  • 18 Aug 2025
Israeli soldiers stand on the top of armoured vehicles parked on an area near the Israeli-Gaza border, as seen from southern Israel, Wednesday, Aug. 20, 2025 (AP)

Palestinian fighters target Israeli soldiers, vehicles in Gaza

  • Politics
  • 21 Aug 2025
Almost instantly after the Helsinki Accords were signed, organisations sprouted to document purported violations, whose findings were fed to overseas embassies for international amplification. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Zeinab el-Hajj)

How ‘Human Rights’ became a Western weapon

  • Opinion
  • 23 Aug 2025

Coverage

All
The Ummah's Martyrs

Read Next

All
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference at the Prime minister's office in al-Quds, Occupied Palestine, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2025 (AP)
Politics

Netanyahu deliberately derailing truce with Gaza occupation: Hamas

Irish President Michael Higgins arrives to deliver his speech during a 42nd World Food Day celebration at FAO headquarters in Rome, on Oct. 16, 2023. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Politics

Irish president renews call for UN military intervention in Gaza

US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy to Syria Tom Barrack speaks during an interview with The Associated Press at the US Embassy in Aukar, northern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, July 21, 2025 (AP)
Politics

US envoy, Netanyahu discuss restraining attacks on Lebanon, withdrawal

Smoke billows following Israeli airstrikes in multiple areas in Sanaa, Yemen, Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025 (AP)
Politics

Ansar Allah vow sustained Gaza support despite Israeli strikes

Al Mayadeen English

Al Mayadeen is an Arab Independent Media Satellite Channel.

All Rights Reserved

  • x
  • Privacy Policy
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Authors
Android
iOS