Chen Pokong: The CCP's Strategies for Infiltrating Overseas Democracy Movements

Political commentator Chen Pokong gave a speech on the CCP’s strategies for infiltrating overseas democracy movements. (Lin Dan/Dajiyuan)

October 19, 2024 – The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) infiltrates the United States, overseas Chinese communities, and overseas democracy movements through two major mechanisms: united front work and espionage. Often, these two approaches are intertwined, working simultaneously. In other words, the CCP’s United Front Work Department and Ministry of State Security collaborate, making it difficult to distinguish between the two.

First mechanism: United front work. Mao Zedong long declared that the Party’s three main strategies are: the united front, armed struggle, and Party-building. The united front was listed first, showing its importance. The united front refers to rallying various groups under the CCP’s influence. Domestically, the CCP organizes eight "democratic parties," and they can do the same abroad, establishing as many as eight or more "democratic parties" overseas.

The idea of cultivating internal forces within the enemy, known internationally as the fifth column, is referred to by the CCP as opening a "third front." During the Chinese Civil War in the last century, the CCP used this tactic to defeat the Nationalist army and overthrow the Kuomintang government, tasting victory. Today, the CCP applies the same methods in its confrontation with the U.S., hoping to use the strategies it employed to topple the Nationalist government to undermine the U.S.’s global leadership and achieve similar success.

Second mechanism: Espionage. This involves infiltration, creating internal conflicts, and dividing and disintegrating groups. The CCP uses mass infiltration tactics to flood democracy movements, marginalizing true believers and seizing leadership positions. They occupy organizations, co-opt new members through deceptive means, and use inducements, honey traps, recruitment, and defection tactics to entrench their control.

Infiltration. The CCP places operatives for long-term infiltration, only acting at critical moments. During the latter stages of the Chinese Civil War, many Nationalist military leaders who "defected" had been secretly planted by the CCP. In every Chinese democracy movement—from the 1979 Democracy Wall, the 1986 student protests, to the 1989 national movement—the CCP had already embedded agents who would remain dormant for extended periods. Some of these infiltrators still exist among exiled dissidents and continue to infiltrate the overseas democracy movement.

Infiltration through sheer numbers. With China’s large population, many Chinese go abroad, and the CCP uses mass infiltration tactics, sending waves of agents into overseas democracy movements. On one hand, democracy movements need people to grow their ranks; on the other, these movements operate publicly and lack secret structures. They also don’t have the resources or technology to detect infiltration. As a result, they are highly vulnerable to the CCP’s mass infiltration efforts.

Creating and exploiting divisions. After infiltrating overseas democracy movements, CCP agents often sow discord. It is common to see democracy organizations split into factions, even multiple factions, with the same name. These groups refuse to recognize one another, engage in internal conflicts, and smear each other online, wasting resources and, in some cases, losing external support altogether. This results in prolonged internal strife, leaving the movement stagnant or completely ineffective.

The CCP uses mass infiltration to flood democracy movements and then introduces internal struggles in the style of the Communist Party, sidelining true activists and taking control of leadership. The aim is to occupy the movement’s base. As the CCP says internally, "If they are going to run a democracy movement, we’d rather run it ourselves." In other words, while true democracy activists work for a genuine cause, the CCP creates a fake democracy movement, making it hard to tell what’s real. The map of overseas democracy movements over the years reflects this strategy. The flood of communist informants and spies that came to light in East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall provides a vivid historical example of the CCP’s mass infiltration strategy.

This pattern of flooding democracy movements with agents, creating divisions, and undermining their effectiveness has become a signature tactic of the CCP's efforts to infiltrate and control opposition movements overseas.

CCP agents set up numerous organizations and branches overseas, spreading across major cities worldwide like democracy workstations. However, these are not genuine democracy movements. People in China, unaware of this, often fall into these traps as they seek to find and join such organizations after arriving abroad. As a result, some Chinese dissidents, who were under CCP surveillance in China, find themselves still under CCP control after reaching overseas, even though they may not realize it. Their thoughts and plans are quickly known to the Ministry of State Security.

Inducements are a common tactic of the CCP. With its one-party dictatorship, the CCP controls the country’s lifeblood and finances, using these resources to conduct united front and espionage work. Buying people with money is a common method. Some overseas individuals serve as CCP informants due to financial incentives. Some dissidents who originally had strong democratic beliefs and had made historical contributions have, due to financial difficulties, been targeted by the CCP. While they may not act as informants, they receive CCP "friendly reminders," which lead them to tone down their speech and writings—criticizing lower-ranking CCP officials while avoiding the top leadership. It is rumored that some aging democracy activists have quietly begun accepting "pensions" from the CCP. Consequently, they become hesitant to criticize, playing both sides and adopting a more neutral stance. Publicly, they wear the halo of democracy activists, but privately, they secretly cooperate with the CCP.

Honey traps. If financial inducements fail, the CCP resorts to honey traps—or both tactics simultaneously. There have been painful examples of this.

Turncoats. Just as in every historical movement or revolution, some individuals in the Chinese democracy movement have wavered. Given the difficulties of the democracy movement and the slim hope of victory, some weak-willed or ideologically fragile individuals have succumbed to temptation and defected. They’ve traded their principles for material benefits or other rewards and have even begun working for the CCP. The CCP is particularly adept at exploiting human weaknesses, using exiles' emotional ties to family or homesickness as leverage. Through various channels, they lure democracy activists back to China to visit family. In the mildest cases, they are co-opted; in more extreme cases, they are turned into informants. For the CCP, recruiting turncoats is a low-cost but highly effective strategy.

There are many such examples. Among those who have infiltrated the overseas Chinese democracy movement are professional CCP spies, informants (commonly known as "spies"), and agents. It is worth noting that professional CCP spies or informants are relatively easy for U.S. law enforcement agencies to identify and prosecute. However, others are neither professional spies nor informants but engage in activities that benefit the CCP. For a long time, the U.S. found it difficult to prosecute such individuals. However, there is now an increasingly common term: CCP agent, or agent of Communist China. People whose actions fit this definition can now be prosecuted by U.S. law enforcement agencies. For example, Linda Sun, who entangled herself with two governors, was arrested and charged under this definition, serving as a warning to overseas Chinese who work for the CCP.

(This article is based on Chen Pokong’s speech at the "How Should the Overseas Democracy Movement Respond to CCP Infiltration" seminar held in New York on October 13, 2024.)

Editor: Jin Yue