U.S. Sailor Sentenced to 27 Months for Leaking Secrets to China

(ProsperNews.net) – A US sailor has been sentenced to 27 months in prison for leaking military secrets to the China government. US Navy Petty Officer Wenheng Zhao, also known as Thomas Zhao, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring with a Chinese intelligence officer and one count of receiving a bribe, according to a Department of Justice press release.

Zhao worked at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme and held a security clearance. Between August 2021 and May 2023, he received $14,866 in 14 separate payments from a Chinese intelligence officer, and in exchange, Zhao provided information on a large-scale maritime training exercise and “operational orders and electrical diagrams and blueprints for a Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar system located in Okinawa, Japan.”

Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division said Zhao broke his solemn oath to defend the United States and endangered US military personnel.

The FBI Los Angeles Field Office’s Counterintelligence and Cyber Division and Naval Criminal Investigative Service led the successful investigation with assistance from the Inland Revenue Service.

Zhao’s case is one of several involving Chinese espionage in the US military. Last August, the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division arrested sailor Jinchao Wei at a Naval Base in San Diego, California. Wei also held national security clearance and was found to have passed sensitive information about the USS Essex and its weapons, propulsion, and desalination systems.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies keeps a record of Chinese spy cases in the US since 2000 and notes that 69% of espionage cases occurred after current Chinese President Xi Jinping became the leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Of the 224 reported incidents between 2000 and 2022, 49% involved people directly involved in the Chinese military, while 41% were private citizens. In 10% of cases, a non-Chinese American was recruited by the CCP, and in most incidents, the purpose was to collect information about commercial technologies.