By Kenneth J. Theisen, 7/20/07
First it was the “terrorists” among us. Now we have to watch
for Chinese spies or at least that is what the Bush regime would like us to
do. Do you have Chinese neighbors that
are acting suspiciously? Perhaps Chinese
co-workers talk among each other in Chinese.
Are you sure they are not spies busily selling out the country? Maybe you should call the FBI. Too
paranoid?
Well, this month the FBI began running advertisements in
Chinese language newspapers in San
Francisco. The
ads stated, “The FBI has many responsibilities. One of these is to protect our
domestic security and civil rights. Chinese living here have often helped the
FBI prevent subversive elements from penetrating and harming our country. We
especially welcome anyone who has information about the Chinese Ministry of
State Security to contact our office.” The
ad then gives contact information to make it easy to turn on your neighbors.
This Chinese language advertisement ran in the World Journal, Ming Pao Daily
and Sing Tao Daily from June 30 to July 8. These are the largest Chinese
language papers in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Given the history of the FBI and the federal government
towards the Chinese community in San
Francisco, this latest move by the FBI is quite
troubling. During the cold war, the
Chinese community was persecuted by the FBI.
Chinese were arrested as spies, sent to prison, and deported on dubious
evidence. Neighbors were turned against
neighbors and the Chinese community was divided along political lines.
The FBI was also used to enforce immigration laws against
the Chinese in the 1950s. At that time the FBI instituted a “confession
program” for people who had allegedly falsified their immigration records. During
this period some Chinese immigrants were “paper sons,” falsely claiming familial
ties with Chinese-American citizens in order to stay in the United States.
The confession program was created to sow a climate of fear and mistrust in the
community. It encouraged people to turn in their neighbors and even their
relatives. It divided families and resulted in many persons being deported and
many more being intimidated.
More recently we had the prosecution of Wen Ho Lee, a
Chinese American falsely accused of stealing information from the Los Alamos
National Laboratory. When first arrested
during the Clinton
administration, the FBI purported to have caught a major spy. But by the end of the case, U.S. Judge James
A. Parker offered an apology to Lee for what he called “abuse of
power” by the federal government in its prosecution of the case.
The FBI defended these ads in an official statement issued
on July 9th. According to FBI
spokesperson Special Agent Joseph M. Schadler, “The FBI is not asking members
of the Chinese community to spy on one another. The FBI intended the
Chinese-language advertisement to provide an avenue for Chinese-speaking
residents of the San Francisco Bay Area to share information related to
wrongdoing of any kind.”
Geewhiz! The FBI is
only trying to be helpful to the community.
Right! I am sorry for being so
suspicious. Now I am not sure whether I
should turn in my four-year-old son who is part Chinese. A while ago, he saw a picture of Bush in the
newspaper and he asked me whether that was the “dummy president trying to take
over the world.” Is he one of those
“subversive elements” mentioned in the ads?
Come to think of it, he was singled out on our recent vacation for
special screening by airport security.
When they moved the security wand around his little body he said, “daddy
it tickles.” So maybe he is either a terrorist or a spy.