5 ms·

“The defendant faces up to six months in prison” It seems like this scientist was basically acting as a foreign spy... for which he could face a laughable 6 mo

by jtdev 6y ago

“The defendant faces up to six months in prison” It seems like this scientist was basically acting as a foreign spy... for which he could face a laughable 6 month sentence? seems far too light of a sentence to deter this behavior in the future.

autokad 6y ago
where they a spy? I was trying to glean the ramifications from their actions but couldn't tell from the article. It sounded like on face value, they accepted grants to be in china's good graces? It didnt explain what that meant I thought
- SllX 6y ago
  Looks like some form or perjury actually, but the article didn’t list the charge. Money quote: “ Meyyappan concealed this work from NASA and the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, and falsely told investigators in an Oct. 27 interview he was not a member of the Thousand Talents Program and did not hold the professorship in China, prosecutors said.” NASA is a government agency, and the United States has a legitimate interest in ferreting out applicants who may be compromised by a foreign adversary. So from this description he essentially lied to law enforcement or some equivalent and/or checked the box on some form the affirmed whatever they wanted him to affirm under penalty of perjury with all the typical legalese attached to that box. The Thousand Talents program essentially a foreign espionage operation, or at best, a theft operation, so that caught up to him.
  - HarryHirsch 6y ago
    Thousand Talents is a recruitment program for scientific talent, not for intelligence assets. We know this because if this guy was working for Chinese intelligence agency the government would have charged him with more than having a professorship in China.
    - SllX 6y ago
      Prosecutors charge what they can prove. It may have only been perjury, mind I still haven’t seen a list of charges at the time of this writing.
    - ChuckMcM 6y ago
      I suppose they can be both. I have a ResearchGate account and they reached out to me to suggest Chinese scientists that were looking for co-authors on papers and collaboration on research. If I were an academic and/or worked at an institution that evaluated me by papers published for "impact" it would be a credible enticement. It has always been the case that working across borders was considered a good way to establish non-diplomatic ties between countries. That said, if you work for the government you have rules about disclosing such work and it seems that he may have perjured himself on some of his disclosure forms. That is always a bad choice. If true, that he felt compelled to lie about his association would indicate that he also felt if he didn't lie the US Government would ask him to stop working with these folks. That combination of things sounds like a very common rationalization that people have used forever that goes something like "I know that 'technically' this is against the rules, but what I'm doing doesn't violate the spirit of the rule and it is giving me a large benefit. Since I have decided it wouldn't be a violation, lying about it is harmless and saves a lot of paperwork explaining to people who don't understand what we're doing on why it only seems like it would violate the rule but doesn't really." It may be survivor bias but it seems that every time someone has used this sort of logic to explain to me why they were not following some "bureaucratic rule" I knew that once it came out that they were not following the rule, they would face worse consequences.
  - N1H1L 6y ago
    > The Thousand Talents program essentially a foreign espionage operation citations please
    - SllX 6y ago
      Sure! In fairness espionage may be too harsh a charge, but theft under the circumstances isn’t a much better one. https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2019-11-18%20PSI%20Staff%20Report%20-%20China's%20Talent%20Recruitment%20Plans%20Updated.pdf https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2019-11-18%20PSI%...
      - N1H1L 6y ago
        So if foreign talent recruitment is espionage bordering on theft then choking up the immigration pathway for trained scientists to become residents is arson too.
        SllX 6y ago
        The problem isn’t the talent recruitment. The problem is the Civil-Military Fusion inside what is a Communist Dictatorship where the State is treated as society writ large rather than a participant in society and the CCP puts itself above the State. What they are recruiting into is that and the PLA has been building up their capabilities out of what they can get their hands on Stateside via programs like this.
        powerapple 6y ago
        Isn't everyone in this world is trying to threat US in one way or the other? Poor guy. I don't know whats the insecurity of Americans about. The other day, I was reading the comment on Capitol Hill, someone commented oh it is so bad, imagine Iran or Russian see this event and plan to do the same.. What's wrong with you guys? It is unlikely US will lose power soon. But it is also unlikely US will hold power forever and ever. US has the biggest army, military expenditure larger than other major countries combined. It is okay to be conservative, but it is wrong to be paranoid. I really worry that US will start a nuclear war, when it assumes its 'enemy' has a gun. This is a stupid age of time when we have auto pilot, mRNA vaccine and this.
daun 6y ago
The DOJ statement says it's up to five years, the article may be wrong: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/senior-nasa-scientist-pleads-guilty-making-false-statements-related-chinese-thousand https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/senior-nasa-scientist-p...

by jtdev 6y ago

autokad 6y ago

where they a spy? I was trying to glean the ramifications from their actions but couldn't tell from the article. It sounded like on face value, they accepted grants to be in china's good graces? It didnt explain what that meant I thought

SllX 6y ago
Looks like some form or perjury actually, but the article didn’t list the charge. Money quote: “ Meyyappan concealed this work from NASA and the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, and falsely told investigators in an Oct. 27 interview he was not a member of the Thousand Talents Program and did not hold the professorship in China, prosecutors said.” NASA is a government agency, and the United States has a legitimate interest in ferreting out applicants who may be compromised by a foreign adversary. So from this description he essentially lied to law enforcement or some equivalent and/or checked the box on some form the affirmed whatever they wanted him to affirm under penalty of perjury with all the typical legalese attached to that box. The Thousand Talents program essentially a foreign espionage operation, or at best, a theft operation, so that caught up to him.
- HarryHirsch 6y ago
  Thousand Talents is a recruitment program for scientific talent, not for intelligence assets. We know this because if this guy was working for Chinese intelligence agency the government would have charged him with more than having a professorship in China.
  - SllX 6y ago
    Prosecutors charge what they can prove. It may have only been perjury, mind I still haven’t seen a list of charges at the time of this writing.
  - ChuckMcM 6y ago
    I suppose they can be both. I have a ResearchGate account and they reached out to me to suggest Chinese scientists that were looking for co-authors on papers and collaboration on research. If I were an academic and/or worked at an institution that evaluated me by papers published for "impact" it would be a credible enticement. It has always been the case that working across borders was considered a good way to establish non-diplomatic ties between countries. That said, if you work for the government you have rules about disclosing such work and it seems that he may have perjured himself on some of his disclosure forms. That is always a bad choice. If true, that he felt compelled to lie about his association would indicate that he also felt if he didn't lie the US Government would ask him to stop working with these folks. That combination of things sounds like a very common rationalization that people have used forever that goes something like "I know that 'technically' this is against the rules, but what I'm doing doesn't violate the spirit of the rule and it is giving me a large benefit. Since I have decided it wouldn't be a violation, lying about it is harmless and saves a lot of paperwork explaining to people who don't understand what we're doing on why it only seems like it would violate the rule but doesn't really." It may be survivor bias but it seems that every time someone has used this sort of logic to explain to me why they were not following some "bureaucratic rule" I knew that once it came out that they were not following the rule, they would face worse consequences.
- N1H1L 6y ago
  > The Thousand Talents program essentially a foreign espionage operation citations please
  - SllX 6y ago
    Sure! In fairness espionage may be too harsh a charge, but theft under the circumstances isn’t a much better one. https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2019-11-18%20PSI%20Staff%20Report%20-%20China's%20Talent%20Recruitment%20Plans%20Updated.pdf https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2019-11-18%20PSI%...
    - N1H1L 6y ago
      So if foreign talent recruitment is espionage bordering on theft then choking up the immigration pathway for trained scientists to become residents is arson too.
      - SllX 6y ago
        The problem isn’t the talent recruitment. The problem is the Civil-Military Fusion inside what is a Communist Dictatorship where the State is treated as society writ large rather than a participant in society and the CCP puts itself above the State. What they are recruiting into is that and the PLA has been building up their capabilities out of what they can get their hands on Stateside via programs like this.
        powerapple 6y ago
        Isn't everyone in this world is trying to threat US in one way or the other? Poor guy. I don't know whats the insecurity of Americans about. The other day, I was reading the comment on Capitol Hill, someone commented oh it is so bad, imagine Iran or Russian see this event and plan to do the same.. What's wrong with you guys? It is unlikely US will lose power soon. But it is also unlikely US will hold power forever and ever. US has the biggest army, military expenditure larger than other major countries combined. It is okay to be conservative, but it is wrong to be paranoid. I really worry that US will start a nuclear war, when it assumes its 'enemy' has a gun. This is a stupid age of time when we have auto pilot, mRNA vaccine and this.

daun 6y ago

The DOJ statement says it's up to five years, the article may be wrong: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/senior-nasa-scientist-pleads-guilty-making-false-statements-related-chinese-thousand https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/senior-nasa-scientist-p...