31 ms·

In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

336 points by bobbiechen 5y ago

sigmaprimus 5y ago
This is a troubling story in so many ways, I don't know what the answer to the problem is but feel something needs to change within the government when people are subjected to what can only be described as a witch trial bordering on McCarthyism. The fact the state and his own lawyer were pressing him to take a deal is also very troubling as it echoes the plight of many impoverished young men who lost their families, careers, reputations and futures by pleading down trumped up charges laid against them. These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative.
- qazpot 5y ago
  > These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative. As if LWM is totally unbiased and cover stories even if they do not fit their narrative.
- throwawayay02 5y ago
  > These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative. That's just ridiculous.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- ghufran_syed 5y ago
  I agree with all of your points except the last - I’m guessing you dont read “RWM”? https://www.wsj.com/articles/mit-professor-gang-chen-says-misunderstanding-lay-at-root-of-u-s-case-11643224325 https://www.wsj.com/articles/mit-professor-gang-chen-says-mi...
  - sigmaprimus 5y ago
    You are right. I apologize for injecting a subject that has no relevance to the conversation, sometimes I forget that doing so is not within HN guidelines. (And by right I obviously mean correct, although it is an interesting double entendre!)
    - jaywalk 5y ago
      The WSJ article is objectively better than the NYT article, too. It gives much more info about what he was actually accused of, and how the case fell apart. So instead of just apologizing for bringing it up, maybe you should work to recalibrate your views.
- JackFr 5y ago
  When both the state and his lawyer were pressing him to take the deal, both the state and his lawyer believed he was guilty. The charges were withdrawn, as I understand it, when the Department of Energy clarified the understanding of the grant application for the US attorney and they came to the conclusion that there was not a duty to disclose the particular affiliation. There’s no doubt that this caused professional harm to him. At the same time the US government has a reasonable interest in knowing of the foreign government affiliations of researchers it funds, and should reasonably pursue those who flout the rules. Was this prosecution flawed? It seems very much so. Was it pursued reasonably and in good faith? It’s hard to say it wasn’t, unless your outlook is to be immediately suspicious of prosecutors.
  - jhugo 5y ago
    You seem to imply that he flouted the rules, but we don't know if he has any ties to China beyond the ties that anybody born there would have.
    - JackFr 5y ago
      No I don't imply that at all. The article is clear, at least seemed to be to me, that he had affiliations with Chinese organizations, he did not disclose them, and most importantly to the charges being dropped, based on Department of Energy regulations, he was under no obligation to disclose them. The US attorney brought charges based on the idea that he was obligated to disclose them. The US attorney was wrong according to the Department of Energy, who administered the grant.
- mlindner 5y ago
  I don't get what the issue is here. He wasn't put in jail, and he was acquitted. The system worked correctly.
pmichaud 5y ago
Paywall?
- pferde 5y ago
  Just disable javascript. You don't need it to read plain text anyway.
  - contravariant 5y ago
    I still don't understand what the point of the javascript on pages like this is. It's sole purpose seems to be to lower performance and add annoying popups.
    - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
      Yes, this is exactly what JS is used for on 95% of today's web.
  - OldTimeCoffee 5y ago
    If you're on Firefox, you can also just turn on Reader view (F9) after it loads and hit refresh.
- Stevvo 5y ago
  Yes, the New York Times has been paywalled for the last 10 years. What's your point?
- motoboi 5y ago
  Http://12ft.io
  - Kim_Bruning 5y ago
    sadly "12ft has been disabled for this site"
- teh_klev 5y ago
  https://archive.is/Z2sgI https://archive.is/Z2sgI
throwawayarnty 5y ago
The worst part of these accusations is that your reputation is tarnished whether you are guilty or not. This instilled a sense of fear in every person even if they are innocent because you can still be targeted and your career ruined. If this scientist was just stating out, rather than already established, he would likely have had to quit science. There should be some penalty for false accusations that can compensate for these people.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- lordnacho 5y ago
  They are also accusations of nothing specific. "Association with China" doesn't seem like it's specific enough to warrant sanction, all it can do it make people suspicious, which it does regardless of whether you've even done anything with China. I accept the US is having a power struggle with China at the moment, but this is not the way to win it. People who aren't actually in favor of freedom will welcome this "record who associates with China" thing, but it goes against the high ideals of the US and makes it look like many unsavory countries.
  - ethanbond 5y ago
    Errr... pretty sure the allegation is more specific than you suggest. The allegation was that he was being paid by China and did not disclose this on grant applications.
    - Aperocky 5y ago
      Case was closed, allegation was rejected. Witch hunt begins when allegation holds more weight then the verdict, and when it becomes the verdict, you can say goodbye to all semblance of rule of law, which surprisingly many here will condone depending on the subject.
      - ethanbond 5y ago
hwers 5y ago
I mean what you do in these situations is just have NY times write an article like this on you that you can point to in job applications and any reputational damage is probably nullified.
- 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 5y ago
  This option is probably not open to early career scientists.
  - totalZero 5y ago
    How many early career university scientists get arrested for not disclosing their ties to China? These are high profile cases with established professors at their core.
- mcherm 5y ago
  > any reputational damage is probably nullified In this case, Professor Chen lost his research grants. He lost several grad students. He lost a year's worth of progress in his field. Do you think this NY Times article nullified those effects?
- tsol 5y ago
  I think this only works about 1 out of 1000 times. The rest are too unknown to get articles written about them
ngcc_hk 5y ago
Given the nuclear bomb in China was helped by out-going chinese. Given china is a world power which is communist and totalitarian in nature. Can China be treated by Soviet Union? Yes you can. By allowing china playing the hand I can got yours but you cannot go to my market, even if you are not that political one should be very careful. Bad to be racist. Sorry to lose the war yes war to communists and totalitarians. But with this, I still think USA will lose. The free world will lose.
- nc__nc 5y ago
  - jjgreen 5y ago
    Though you could probably pass for Prime Minister ...
    - nc__nc 5y ago
      How? Boris seems to be in full support of receiving these emigrating HKers regardless of their English proficiency.
- gambiting 5y ago
  I honestly don't understand what you're saying. >>Sorry to lose the war yes war to communists and totalitarians Like, what does that even mean?
  - ARandomerDude 5y ago
    All your Soviet Unions are belong to us.
  - 1MachineElf 5y ago
    The "_hk" at the end of their username might be a clue on their perspective.
- Majestic121 5y ago
mupuff1234 5y ago
I'd be curious to hear how many candidates for tech companies get disqualified due to failing security clearance.
batushka3 5y ago
- DocTomoe 5y ago
  Ah yes, the "Japanese-American relocation centers argument". It was a criminal state violating human rights back then, and it is a human rights violation today.
  - Lendal 5y ago
    Democracy is not a criminal state. That's nihilism. Nihilism tells us to let criminals off the hook and not hold them accountable, because of course they're part of a criminal state, "the government". But that's just as wrong as what these officials did. These people infiltrated my government, allowed their personal prejudices to affect their professional decision-making and the result was a man-made catastrophe. We can't let them off by saying "oh well it's a criminal state, this is normal behavior for them." No, it's not normal. Hold these people accountable. Fight against it.
- sdk16420 5y ago
  >Works like precaution To keep scientists of Chinese descent out of US academia, yes indeed.
  - edmcnulty101 5y ago
    I've worked in Academia. There are so many Chinese scientists. Trust me that's not a problem in the least.
    - ordu 5y ago
      So we should make it a problem?
      - edmcnulty101 5y ago
        It will never be a problem. There are so many Chinese scientists in America. Labs upon labs upon labs that don't hire non-Chinese and don't speak English.
lbs4 5y ago
This reminds me of the case of Tsien Hsue-Shen, who in the 1950s was deported from the US and subsequently more or less became the father of the Chinese space program. Iris Chang wrote a good book about it called 'Thread of the Silkworm.'
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
neither_color 5y ago
Last week, the government dismissed the case against Dr. Chen, which alleged that he had concealed seven Chinese affiliations in applications for $2.7 million in grants from the U.S. Energy Department. Prosecutors announced that they had received new information indicating that Dr. Chen had not been obliged to disclose those affiliations, undercutting the basis of the case. I feel like this part could use more details. The charges were for not disclosing his affiliations, but those affiliations existed nonetheless? Edit: I'm not implying there's anything shady he did or that he wasn't falsely accused, just trying to parse this.
- refurb 5y ago
  Agreed. It seems like the details matter here. Were the affiliations suspect but not reportable? Or were the affiliations unremarkable and not reportable but prosecutors screwed up?
  - teh_klev 5y ago
    > were the affiliations unremarkable and not reportable but prosecutors screwed up? Yes, the prosecutors royally screwed up. From the article: "Prosecutors had floated the idea of a deferred prosecution agreement, which would have allowed him to return to work and apply for government grants in the future. In return, said his lawyer, Mr. Fisher, he would have to admit to having some ties to China, none of them a violation of the law." So why would Chen have to declare them if they aren't illegal?
    - DocTomoe 5y ago
      Sounds like a prosecutor was afraid to get sued into oblivion/have his future political ambitions ruined by this affair, and strong-armed the good doctor into signing a document to avoid this going to court, where outcomes are pretty much random.
      - jhugo 5y ago
        * tried to strong-arm. He didn't accept the deal.
tsol 5y ago
>The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China. Many of the prosecutions, like the case against Dr. Chen, do not allege espionage or theft of information, but something narrower: failing to disclose Chinese affiliations in grant applications to U.S. agencies. Critics say it has instilled a pervasive atmosphere of fear among scientists of Chinese descent. While I can agree with and see the value of the overall agenda, it seems a matter of bad application. I won't pretend to be an expert on the matter who can say exactly what needs to be done, but I wonder about how necessary it really is to drag people through the mud in such cases. It certainly can have a chilling effect on scientists with affiliations to Chinese entities, many of which are plenty secular. I understand the impetus to investigate all affiliations when a foreign state is involved, but at the same time it becomes self destructive if it goes too far all too quickly. The solution, to me, seems to fall on those doing the investigating; that the investigating parties must hold to a higher and better informed standard before bringing forth charges that could hurt American scientists, and by extention, American science
- p_l 5y ago
  What if the chilling effect and cruelty is the, perhaps silent, point?
- elzbardico 5y ago
  The problem with law enforcement today is that they want their work cut out for them. Instead of doing the old school investigation stuff and THEN getting a subpoena, they instead want to have blanket access to all of our communications. Instead of proving real espionage, they want to merely assert "suspect" links and then you're the one who have to prove you're innocent. Instead of finding drug dealers and terrorists the old fashioned way, they want all of your bank transactions reported automatically for them, so they can sit on their chairs and deep learn their way into your data towards some flimsy accusation that they will use to pressure you into pledging your guilty to something. Really, it is about time we raise our voices agains that. It is about time we say enough is enough. It is about time for us to say, the State serve its Citizens, and not the other way around. Fuck this bureaucratic neo-feudalism. Let us say no for this shit! --- BASTILLE DAY Music: Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson Lyrics: Neil Peart There’s no bread let them eat cake \ There’s no end to what they’ll take \ Flaunt the fruits of noble birth \ Wash the salt into the earth \ But they’re marching to Bastille Day \ La guillotine will claim her bloody prize \ Free the dungeons of the innocent \ The king will kneel, and let his kingdom rise \ Bloodstained velvet, dirty lace \ Naked fear on every face \ See them bow their heads to die \ As we would bow as they rode by \ And we’re marching to Bastille Day \ La guillotine will claim her bloody prize \ Sing, o choirs of cacophony \ The king has kneeled, to let his kingdom rise. \ Lessons taught, but never learned \ All around us anger burns \ Guide the future by the past \ Long ago the mould was cast \ For they marched up to Bastille Day \ La guillotine – claimed her bloody prize \ Hear the echoes of the centuries \ Power isn’t all that money buys \
Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
Like McCarthyism it’s a noble cause, but I can’t help but wonder if these initiatives rather tend to be outsmarted by the real spies. People who are accidentally incriminated by clerical errors and misunderstandings are much lower hanging fruit.
- teh_klev 5y ago
  > Like McCarthyism it’s a noble cause I'm unsure if this is sarcasm or not.
  - Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
    It’s not. Why on earth would you want to have a bunch of Soviet or communist Chinese spies running around?
    - lucian1900 5y ago
      McCarthyism was about class struggle. Persecuting all communists, socialists and trade unionists made it less likely the working class would rise up against the capitalist ruling class. It worked for the Nazis, after all. You seem to have internalised this logic, since you're assuming all communists are spies for another nation.
      - FredPret 5y ago
        You, on the other hand, seem to have internalized a class-based worldview. I'm not sure that's healthy either
        lucian1900 5y ago
        Class struggle is the engine of history. Whether that fact is healthy for myself personally or not has no bearing on its truth. The company I work for keeps more of the value I create than they pay me. Whether I like it or not, I'm working class and in direct opposition to capitalists.
greesil 5y ago
These things have a way of working themselves out. "Father of Chinese Rocketry" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qian_Xuesen https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qian_Xuesen Except for the 5 years under house arrest part. Wow.
- feoren 5y ago
  Survivorship bias, perhaps? That is, all the stories you hear about like this are the kind that turn into stories you hear about -- you don't hear about anyone whose life is just quietly ruined, so it seems like they all work out fine. And of course nothing "works itself out" -- it's people who work them out. It doesn't have to be you -- it's OK to just read the article and move on with your own life -- but whenever things "just work out" it's because someone stepped in and made a positive difference.
  - greesil 5y ago
    At the macro level, if you're the policy-maker and doing the persecuting, stories like this should give you pause. Of course it's survivor bias for the individual.
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    The whole story is basically “how the USA gave China its space and ICBM program.” I assume “worked out” meant for the Chinese, because it really did.
    - kragen 5y ago
      For all of humanity. When I worked at Satellogic in Argentina, China's space program was how we got our satellites into space. If we'd been dependent on the US and Russia, we'd've been in bad shape.
tejohnso 5y ago
> “My thinking is, I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “So whatever they look at, they won’t find that I did anything wrong.” This statement seems like a completely backward mindset to have, especially after watching this classic advice piece on youtube [1]. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE
- mizzao 5y ago
  Wow, what an insightful video. In nerdy terms, the prosecution will basically p-hack your case until they get statistical significance.
  - aspenmayer 5y ago
    > the prosecution will basically p-hack your case until they get statistical significance. This is a great analogy.
- Bayart 5y ago
  What's backward isn't the statement, which is perfectly common sense, it's that judicial system.
- musesum 5y ago
  I wonder, if ever interviewed by the Police, I could just say: "No thanks, search on YouTube for 'Don't Talk to the Police' for why. Or maybe, giving that reason why I won't talk means that I'm actually talking to the police? Somewhat a tangent: when going through due diligence for Series A, my CEO said: "Remember, they are not your friends." The thing was, though, after they invested, the VC fired him. Maybe that's the difference between prosecutors and makers.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    You don't need to explain why (and probably shouldn't). All you need to say is "I'm not interested in answering questions" (possibly suffixed with "without an attorney present", though that could escalate things), or "I don't consent to any searches", or whatever fits the circumstances of the interaction. Depending on the laws in your jurisdiction, your legal obligation may be no more than stating your name and possibly providing identification if requested. But don't be a dick: be respectful when you decline further interactions. Verbal (or other) aggression could give them a reason to try to force the issue, regardless of whether or not it's legal for them to do so.
Zak 5y ago
People wrongly charged with crimes should be able to sue for damages. That's the case in come jurisdictions, but often requires significant evidence of prosecutorial misconduct, a high bar to clear.
andi999 5y ago
"The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China." No, it is not. Why would it be a setback if somebody who is innocent has their case dismissed. I mean who writes such lines? Doesnt this line imply that this dismissal was a bad thing (since nobody endorses espionage).
- jhugo 5y ago
  One assumes that the goal of the China Initiative is to charge people who are actually guilty of espionage. Highly public failings at that goal would seem to be setbacks, right?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - bigcat123 5y ago
  - iszomer 5y ago
    Well, some publishers are careful to note the distinction between `allegations` and `accusations` while others do not. Then there's the word `indictment` which I always assumed meant something after the fact but is instead actually defined as a "formal (lega) charge of an accusation".
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- jacobolus 5y ago
  The purpose of the China Initiative was ostensibly to root out industrial espionage. Instead they ended up investigating and prosecuting a bunch of Chinese scientists for legally trying to advance their work and careers, and haven’t yet discovered much if any industrial espionage. The worst they’ve found so far, from what I can tell, is a few undisclosed grants and minor visa violations. Having incompetent, overzealous investigators and prosecutors ruin a bunch of innocent people’s lives for the sake of some questionable agenda they aren’t otherwise successfully advancing makes the whole endeavor seem like a farcical waste of public resources and undermines the reputation of the DOJ.
qwertass 5y ago
Might do good to introduce more diversity in US academia
dijonman2 5y ago
Note that the accusations of Dr Chen having ties to China are true. However, Dr Chen wasn’t legally required to disclose them: > Prosecutors announced that they had received new information indicating that Dr. Chen had not been obliged to disclose those affiliations, undercutting the basis of the case. In either case I believe ties to China are harmful, they are not a friendly country.
- jhugo 5y ago
  He was born there. So of course he has "ties". We can't really know if they are harmful or not without more information, but we do know they're the kind of ties that the government doesn't consider worthy of reporting...
- eunos 5y ago
  Wut? Chinese American scientific collaboration is one of the most the strongest on Earth. You'll have ten of thousands of folks in scientific community having ties to China.
beepbooptheory 5y ago
To at least attempt to think about this critically, and to try to ignore the amount of frankly shocking things people are saying here, can I ask, maybe from people in the field, is this level of industrial/scientific espionage even a critical factor in our current world? We live in a global world where scientists in various institutions are constantly trading papers, findings. Why are we so worried that the U.S. might be doing something so different from China, that this level espionage would even be viable? Surely, everyone is working on different things here and there, but this idea that there is such critical intellectual property the US that needs to be guarded so intensely in this like James Bond scenario, just feels a little wacky. Are you all really here in 2022, being like "we can't risk a Chinese national from even seeing our American semiconductor research, they will steal it and use it against us?" Are actual scientists concerned? Or just the state, and apparently most of the fellow commenters?
- coliveira 5y ago
  This is a paranoia induced reaction that is being fostered by the media and the war industry, who are interested in creating a new cold war scenario.
  - howmayiannoyyou 5y ago
    Incorrect. It is a MORAL issue. Technology stolen from the US companies is advancing the national security agendas of countries with no regard for human rights and the rule of law. It is immoral to turn a blind eye to this very real threat.
    - StreamBright 5y ago
      It is kind of curious fact that the US is not a member of ICC. Could you guess why?
      - howmayiannoyyou 5y ago
        There are good reasons why geopolitics cannot be held to strict interpretation of laws, not the least of which is the enforceability paradox, whereby countries more likely to break the norms are less susceptible to enforcement action. This, and attaching the name 'court' on something does not make it any less arbitrary or politically motivated
shantnutiwari 5y ago
This will just lead to a chilling effect, where scientists, esp those born outside, will be hesitant to apply for any government aid. I vaguely remember this case when it first came out. At the time, the impression I got was: Dr Chen was passing info to Chinese agents. And now the impression is: He had some affiliations with Chinese groups that were fully legal, and he was not required to disclose. Which begs the question: Why was he arrested in the first place?
- ska 5y ago
  > Why was he arrested in the first place? Sounds like a mixture of incompetence and poorly constructed incentives.
floor_ 5y ago
I'm reminded of this great story: "How I got an FBI record at age 11 from dabbling in cryptography then got into more trouble" https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/crypto.htm https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/crypto.htm
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
VictorPath 5y ago
> The son of two mathematics teachers who were sent to teach on farms during China’s Cultural Revolution, Dr. Chen grew up without any hope of becoming a scientist. His parents, the descendants of landowners, had a “bad classification” from the Chinese government, and were viewed suspiciously. His father warned him he would probably spend his life as a farmer. But then Mao Zedong died. Chen moved to the US to experience the American equivalent of this.
- HarryHirsch 5y ago
  Indeed. A former colleague married a Chinese lady whose parents had suffered badly through the Cultural Revolution. He told the story, how she went off to the US for her PhD and how her parents drove her to the airport and told her never to return to China. How things have changed within just a generation!
  - varjag 5y ago
    Can you elaborate how exactly? Was your former colleague sent to kill sparrows in rice fields too?
    - HarryHirsch 5y ago
      (It was the colleague's wife's parents.) Obviously I never got the full story, but from what I heard, the parents were academics who had their house vandalized by the Red Guards and were sent to work the countryside.
      - nextaccountic 5y ago
        Did her parents ever leave China?
        HarryHirsch 5y ago
        I don't know.
    - 5y ago
rolling_robot 5y ago
In US you end up being free, but treated like a spy by some funding agency. In Russia you end up in prison having no hope of getting back. Arrested in April 2021, 69 year old professor Golubkin is still in remand prison. https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/04/13/another-treason-case https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/04/13/another-treason-case accused for governmental treason.
selimthegrim 5y ago
There was a case at Caltech with an Israeli national and I don’t recall that receiving nearly the same level of scrutiny. Instead the supervisor who got her work stolen got disciplined for putting a cat as a coauthor on one of her papers as a joke.
hiptobecubic 5y ago
> The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China. How is this a setback? The goal is to prevent espionage, not harass and punish people for being Chinese. Honestly, what has happened to the NYT? When did they get so bad at this? They were the most well-regarded newspaper in the world and now they read like madlibs.
- notreallyserio 5y ago
  It's a setback because it's another case of overzealous prosecution that fell apart because the basis was entirely false. In the end they harmed the career of a scientist because he had some affiliation with China, which, duh, he grew up there. It calls into question the basis of the whole initiative.
poxwole 5y ago
Seriously this is next level paranoid. I wondering when will they have McCarthyism 2: Electric Boogaloo China Edition. I say a little before the next election
biohax2015 5y ago
Please read about the Cultural Revolution. To call this “equivalent “ is laughable.
- commandlinefan 5y ago
  > To call this “equivalent “ yet.
  - dang 5y ago
    Please don't post ideological flamewar comments to HN. It leads to repetitive, dumbed-down, nasty discussion. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691.
  - tharne 5y ago
    - Cycl0ps 5y ago
      No, we save that for the Hispanics.
      - mistrial9 5y ago
        irrational provocation, please refrain
      - daniel-cussen 5y ago
        No we don't. Your claim is racism masquerading as racism.
        dang 5y ago
        Please don't post flamewar comments to HN. It leads to repetitive, dumbed-down, nasty discussion. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691.
Communitivity 5y ago
There are two factors that come into play here in terms of regulations. The first, and biggest, is the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). ITAR is the set of United States regulations that control the manufacture, sale, and distribution of defense and space-related articles and services as defined in the United States Munitions List (USML), https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-22/chapter-I/subchapter-M/part-121 https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-22/chapter-I/subchapter-M.... The USML is large, and broad in scope. It also still needs to be interpreted. These interpretations err on the side of 'an abundance of caution', due to the fines from violating regulations and the perceived threat to national security. ITAR regulations and policies are complex enough that most defense contracting firms have people who specialize in just ITAR and help others in the company deal with it. I have worked projects with multiple countries and can tell you that it is a pain to dot all the Is and cross all the Ts, even when working with countries that are our closest allies. Things that you might not think would be covered often are, or are interpreted to be covered. Let's say you designed a new type of paper clip. This paper clip[ is so much better that when it comes to organizing files and paperwork processing productivity its use is considered to provide a 'material advantage' to military units that use it. That likely would be export controlled under ITAR. I'm not debating whether it should or not, that is how it is. The other factor is that modern conflict is multi-domain, and one of the biggest domains is economics. Corporate espionage is very real, and very state sponsored, around the world. That means that things like chip designs are very sought after. I remember going to a particular standards conference. We had a huge upsurge in one country's delegates just before the conference (roughly a 3:1 increase), and during the conference I noticed the new delegates seemed more polished and less proficient than the ones I had worked with for a while and knew. The ones I knew also seemed deferential to the new delegates. Before the conference the matter came up with my employer. I've been told such situations are the norm rather than the exception. It is because of these situations and the level of state actor activity, that the U.S. wants to know all your affiliations, even seemingly innocent ones. You sign a legal document, in effect testifying, that the associations you documented are accurate and complete to you knowledge. The penalties for not disclosing such associations are well known because they are spelled out. They are draconian because of the U.S. concern, and the causes of that concern are real. All sorts of cases can be made for that policy, and against it, but there is no away any researcher working for the government on DOD or DOD-tangential projects is ignorant of the policy. As an anecdote, I knew another American colleague. Young guy, had a girlfriend in Canada (a relationship he disclosed). They decided to get married, and did (something he did not disclose). When the CO of the group he was doing his research for found out about it my colleague's employment and clearance were terminated, and he was judged a permanent security risk, meaning he could never again work a government contract - effectively ending his career.
webmaven 5y ago
https://archive.is/Z2sgI https://archive.is/Z2sgI
mrtweetyhack 5y ago
1-6 5y ago
In security, you're always guilty until proven innocent.
javajosh 5y ago
As bad as this is, it could have been so much worse for him. The government does not usually correct itself like this, preferring instead to continue with prosecution, notch up another corrupt win, and call it a day. And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos! And Dr. Chen should get more hugs, and more support - as many as he needs to help him forget this nightmare and get back to doing what he loves.
- deleted 5y ago
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- openknot 5y ago
  >And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos! From the article: 'The 15 postdoctoral students he worked with were transferred to other research groups, taking their knowledge with them. “We are all losers, right?” Dr. Chen said. “My reputation got ruined. My students, my post-docs, they changed their career. They changed to other groups. M.I.T., the country, the U.S., we lose. I can’t calculate the loss. That loss cannot be calculated.”' It's a positive that the rule of law in the United States has been demonstrated to work in this case. But he could have easily accepted a plea deal earlier and have avoided the dismissed charges. He also lost his staff and may be stigmatized in the future for people who see that he was arrested by the FBI in his home, but don't read the full story behind the dismissal. The dismissal of charges sounds like a bare minimum for a functional society, not an extraordinary response (and it should not be the norm to double down and press on with false charges). A fair response would be for him to be compensated so he's no worse off, and at least receive an official apology from the government.
  - javajosh 5y ago
    I made my comment in light of my recent education about how the government actually functions, specifically its criminal justice system. On the spectrum of outcomes this is actually pretty good, considering the alternatives. Countless men are wrongfully convicted, spend their entire lives in prison, and are eventually exonerated. What do they get? They get released.
alexnewman 5y ago
Be cool to write a book about how the CCP/CPC realized asian americans are more and more important to the USA defense and economic structure. They then spread disinfo to the CIA about anti CPC Chinese Americans, claiming they are chinese spys. This causes the end of the university system being a relevant defense/economic buffer for the west. Kindof like a Chinese version of the men who stare at goats which was apparently based on a true story.
vishnugupta 5y ago
This is just such a sad situation. The scientist's reputation has taken a big beating and he will now be looked through the lease of these accusations for rest of his career, if not more. The last paragraph stood out for me. “My love is science. I did not want politics, right? I saw that, and I got away from it. I do my devotion to science. I help people, I support. But I learned that you can’t get away. Politics impacts everybody. So if there are things that are not right, we all need to speak out.” Lot of times most of us, including me, don't speak out against wrong policies. We all think "let's just focus on our own thing" it won't affect us. But we are all wrong, "Politics impacts everybody".
- tasha0663 5y ago
  > The scientist's reputation has taken a big beating While this really sucked, this is an exaggeration. No charges. Still has his job. He can still file for government grants. The article starts with his colleagues offering up opportunities for him and celebrating that he is back. Yeah, the feds screwed the pooch and messed things up, but I don't see where his reputation was actually harmed.
  - sangnoir 5y ago
    > While this really sucked, this is an exaggeration He lost 15 doctoral students/post docs who moved on in his absence, and I'm assuming his research group(s) imploded - do you think it's going to be easy to get those back? He has a job, but it's not at the same job he had before - for one he'll be co-authoring fewer papers. So his reputation has taken a beating in measurable ways - that's no exaggeration.
    - tasha0663 5y ago
      You've cured my ignorance. Thanks.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - ska 5y ago
FpUser 5y ago
"“We understand that our charging decisions deeply impact people’s lives,” said Rachael Rollins" Understand my a$$. They do not give a fuck about what they do to people. If they were directly responsible and punished in cases where they've improperly ruined people's lives then they might understand.

336 points by bobbiechen 5y ago

This is a troubling story in so many ways, I don't know what the answer to the problem is but feel something needs to change within the government when people are subjected to what can only be described as a witch trial bordering on McCarthyism. The fact the state and his own lawyer were pressing him to take a deal is also very troubling as it echoes the plight of many impoverished young men who lost their families, careers, reputations and futures by pleading down trumped up charges laid against them. These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative.

qazpot 5y ago
> These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative. As if LWM is totally unbiased and cover stories even if they do not fit their narrative.
throwawayay02 5y ago
> These are the stories the RWM doesn't cover as it does not fit their narrative. That's just ridiculous.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
ghufran_syed 5y ago
I agree with all of your points except the last - I’m guessing you dont read “RWM”? https://www.wsj.com/articles/mit-professor-gang-chen-says-misunderstanding-lay-at-root-of-u-s-case-11643224325 https://www.wsj.com/articles/mit-professor-gang-chen-says-mi...
- sigmaprimus 5y ago
  You are right. I apologize for injecting a subject that has no relevance to the conversation, sometimes I forget that doing so is not within HN guidelines. (And by right I obviously mean correct, although it is an interesting double entendre!)
  - jaywalk 5y ago
    The WSJ article is objectively better than the NYT article, too. It gives much more info about what he was actually accused of, and how the case fell apart. So instead of just apologizing for bringing it up, maybe you should work to recalibrate your views.
JackFr 5y ago
When both the state and his lawyer were pressing him to take the deal, both the state and his lawyer believed he was guilty. The charges were withdrawn, as I understand it, when the Department of Energy clarified the understanding of the grant application for the US attorney and they came to the conclusion that there was not a duty to disclose the particular affiliation. There’s no doubt that this caused professional harm to him. At the same time the US government has a reasonable interest in knowing of the foreign government affiliations of researchers it funds, and should reasonably pursue those who flout the rules. Was this prosecution flawed? It seems very much so. Was it pursued reasonably and in good faith? It’s hard to say it wasn’t, unless your outlook is to be immediately suspicious of prosecutors.
- jhugo 5y ago
  You seem to imply that he flouted the rules, but we don't know if he has any ties to China beyond the ties that anybody born there would have.
  - JackFr 5y ago
    No I don't imply that at all. The article is clear, at least seemed to be to me, that he had affiliations with Chinese organizations, he did not disclose them, and most importantly to the charges being dropped, based on Department of Energy regulations, he was under no obligation to disclose them. The US attorney brought charges based on the idea that he was obligated to disclose them. The US attorney was wrong according to the Department of Energy, who administered the grant.
mlindner 5y ago
I don't get what the issue is here. He wasn't put in jail, and he was acquitted. The system worked correctly.

pmichaud 5y ago

Paywall?

pferde 5y ago
Just disable javascript. You don't need it to read plain text anyway.
- contravariant 5y ago
  I still don't understand what the point of the javascript on pages like this is. It's sole purpose seems to be to lower performance and add annoying popups.
  - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
    Yes, this is exactly what JS is used for on 95% of today's web.
- OldTimeCoffee 5y ago
  If you're on Firefox, you can also just turn on Reader view (F9) after it loads and hit refresh.
Stevvo 5y ago
Yes, the New York Times has been paywalled for the last 10 years. What's your point?
motoboi 5y ago
Http://12ft.io
- Kim_Bruning 5y ago
  sadly "12ft has been disabled for this site"
teh_klev 5y ago
https://archive.is/Z2sgI https://archive.is/Z2sgI

throwawayarnty 5y ago

The worst part of these accusations is that your reputation is tarnished whether you are guilty or not. This instilled a sense of fear in every person even if they are innocent because you can still be targeted and your career ruined. If this scientist was just stating out, rather than already established, he would likely have had to quit science. There should be some penalty for false accusations that can compensate for these people.

deleted 5y ago
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lordnacho 5y ago
They are also accusations of nothing specific. "Association with China" doesn't seem like it's specific enough to warrant sanction, all it can do it make people suspicious, which it does regardless of whether you've even done anything with China. I accept the US is having a power struggle with China at the moment, but this is not the way to win it. People who aren't actually in favor of freedom will welcome this "record who associates with China" thing, but it goes against the high ideals of the US and makes it look like many unsavory countries.
- ethanbond 5y ago
  Errr... pretty sure the allegation is more specific than you suggest. The allegation was that he was being paid by China and did not disclose this on grant applications.
  - Aperocky 5y ago
    Case was closed, allegation was rejected. Witch hunt begins when allegation holds more weight then the verdict, and when it becomes the verdict, you can say goodbye to all semblance of rule of law, which surprisingly many here will condone depending on the subject.
    - ethanbond 5y ago

hwers 5y ago

I mean what you do in these situations is just have NY times write an article like this on you that you can point to in job applications and any reputational damage is probably nullified.

6LLvveMx2koXfwn 5y ago
This option is probably not open to early career scientists.
- totalZero 5y ago
  How many early career university scientists get arrested for not disclosing their ties to China? These are high profile cases with established professors at their core.
mcherm 5y ago
> any reputational damage is probably nullified In this case, Professor Chen lost his research grants. He lost several grad students. He lost a year's worth of progress in his field. Do you think this NY Times article nullified those effects?
tsol 5y ago
I think this only works about 1 out of 1000 times. The rest are too unknown to get articles written about them

ngcc_hk 5y ago

Given the nuclear bomb in China was helped by out-going chinese. Given china is a world power which is communist and totalitarian in nature. Can China be treated by Soviet Union? Yes you can. By allowing china playing the hand I can got yours but you cannot go to my market, even if you are not that political one should be very careful. Bad to be racist. Sorry to lose the war yes war to communists and totalitarians. But with this, I still think USA will lose. The free world will lose.

nc__nc 5y ago
- jjgreen 5y ago
  Though you could probably pass for Prime Minister ...
  - nc__nc 5y ago
    How? Boris seems to be in full support of receiving these emigrating HKers regardless of their English proficiency.
gambiting 5y ago
I honestly don't understand what you're saying. >>Sorry to lose the war yes war to communists and totalitarians Like, what does that even mean?
- ARandomerDude 5y ago
  All your Soviet Unions are belong to us.
- 1MachineElf 5y ago
  The "_hk" at the end of their username might be a clue on their perspective.
Majestic121 5y ago

mupuff1234 5y ago

I'd be curious to hear how many candidates for tech companies get disqualified due to failing security clearance.

batushka3 5y ago

DocTomoe 5y ago
Ah yes, the "Japanese-American relocation centers argument". It was a criminal state violating human rights back then, and it is a human rights violation today.
- Lendal 5y ago
  Democracy is not a criminal state. That's nihilism. Nihilism tells us to let criminals off the hook and not hold them accountable, because of course they're part of a criminal state, "the government". But that's just as wrong as what these officials did. These people infiltrated my government, allowed their personal prejudices to affect their professional decision-making and the result was a man-made catastrophe. We can't let them off by saying "oh well it's a criminal state, this is normal behavior for them." No, it's not normal. Hold these people accountable. Fight against it.
sdk16420 5y ago
>Works like precaution To keep scientists of Chinese descent out of US academia, yes indeed.
- edmcnulty101 5y ago
  I've worked in Academia. There are so many Chinese scientists. Trust me that's not a problem in the least.
  - ordu 5y ago
    So we should make it a problem?
    - edmcnulty101 5y ago
      It will never be a problem. There are so many Chinese scientists in America. Labs upon labs upon labs that don't hire non-Chinese and don't speak English.

lbs4 5y ago

This reminds me of the case of Tsien Hsue-Shen, who in the 1950s was deported from the US and subsequently more or less became the father of the Chinese space program. Iris Chang wrote a good book about it called 'Thread of the Silkworm.'

deleted 5y ago
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neither_color 5y ago

Last week, the government dismissed the case against Dr. Chen, which alleged that he had concealed seven Chinese affiliations in applications for $2.7 million in grants from the U.S. Energy Department. Prosecutors announced that they had received new information indicating that Dr. Chen had not been obliged to disclose those affiliations, undercutting the basis of the case. I feel like this part could use more details. The charges were for not disclosing his affiliations, but those affiliations existed nonetheless? Edit: I'm not implying there's anything shady he did or that he wasn't falsely accused, just trying to parse this.

refurb 5y ago
Agreed. It seems like the details matter here. Were the affiliations suspect but not reportable? Or were the affiliations unremarkable and not reportable but prosecutors screwed up?
- teh_klev 5y ago
  > were the affiliations unremarkable and not reportable but prosecutors screwed up? Yes, the prosecutors royally screwed up. From the article: "Prosecutors had floated the idea of a deferred prosecution agreement, which would have allowed him to return to work and apply for government grants in the future. In return, said his lawyer, Mr. Fisher, he would have to admit to having some ties to China, none of them a violation of the law." So why would Chen have to declare them if they aren't illegal?
  - DocTomoe 5y ago
    Sounds like a prosecutor was afraid to get sued into oblivion/have his future political ambitions ruined by this affair, and strong-armed the good doctor into signing a document to avoid this going to court, where outcomes are pretty much random.
    - jhugo 5y ago
      * tried to strong-arm. He didn't accept the deal.

tsol 5y ago

>The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China. Many of the prosecutions, like the case against Dr. Chen, do not allege espionage or theft of information, but something narrower: failing to disclose Chinese affiliations in grant applications to U.S. agencies. Critics say it has instilled a pervasive atmosphere of fear among scientists of Chinese descent. While I can agree with and see the value of the overall agenda, it seems a matter of bad application. I won't pretend to be an expert on the matter who can say exactly what needs to be done, but I wonder about how necessary it really is to drag people through the mud in such cases. It certainly can have a chilling effect on scientists with affiliations to Chinese entities, many of which are plenty secular. I understand the impetus to investigate all affiliations when a foreign state is involved, but at the same time it becomes self destructive if it goes too far all too quickly. The solution, to me, seems to fall on those doing the investigating; that the investigating parties must hold to a higher and better informed standard before bringing forth charges that could hurt American scientists, and by extention, American science

p_l 5y ago
What if the chilling effect and cruelty is the, perhaps silent, point?
elzbardico 5y ago
The problem with law enforcement today is that they want their work cut out for them. Instead of doing the old school investigation stuff and THEN getting a subpoena, they instead want to have blanket access to all of our communications. Instead of proving real espionage, they want to merely assert "suspect" links and then you're the one who have to prove you're innocent. Instead of finding drug dealers and terrorists the old fashioned way, they want all of your bank transactions reported automatically for them, so they can sit on their chairs and deep learn their way into your data towards some flimsy accusation that they will use to pressure you into pledging your guilty to something. Really, it is about time we raise our voices agains that. It is about time we say enough is enough. It is about time for us to say, the State serve its Citizens, and not the other way around. Fuck this bureaucratic neo-feudalism. Let us say no for this shit! --- BASTILLE DAY Music: Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson Lyrics: Neil Peart There’s no bread let them eat cake \ There’s no end to what they’ll take \ Flaunt the fruits of noble birth \ Wash the salt into the earth \ But they’re marching to Bastille Day \ La guillotine will claim her bloody prize \ Free the dungeons of the innocent \ The king will kneel, and let his kingdom rise \ Bloodstained velvet, dirty lace \ Naked fear on every face \ See them bow their heads to die \ As we would bow as they rode by \ And we’re marching to Bastille Day \ La guillotine will claim her bloody prize \ Sing, o choirs of cacophony \ The king has kneeled, to let his kingdom rise. \ Lessons taught, but never learned \ All around us anger burns \ Guide the future by the past \ Long ago the mould was cast \ For they marched up to Bastille Day \ La guillotine – claimed her bloody prize \ Hear the echoes of the centuries \ Power isn’t all that money buys \

Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago

Like McCarthyism it’s a noble cause, but I can’t help but wonder if these initiatives rather tend to be outsmarted by the real spies. People who are accidentally incriminated by clerical errors and misunderstandings are much lower hanging fruit.

teh_klev 5y ago
> Like McCarthyism it’s a noble cause I'm unsure if this is sarcasm or not.
- Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
  It’s not. Why on earth would you want to have a bunch of Soviet or communist Chinese spies running around?
  - lucian1900 5y ago
    McCarthyism was about class struggle. Persecuting all communists, socialists and trade unionists made it less likely the working class would rise up against the capitalist ruling class. It worked for the Nazis, after all. You seem to have internalised this logic, since you're assuming all communists are spies for another nation.
    - FredPret 5y ago
      You, on the other hand, seem to have internalized a class-based worldview. I'm not sure that's healthy either
      - lucian1900 5y ago
        Class struggle is the engine of history. Whether that fact is healthy for myself personally or not has no bearing on its truth. The company I work for keeps more of the value I create than they pay me. Whether I like it or not, I'm working class and in direct opposition to capitalists.

greesil 5y ago

These things have a way of working themselves out. "Father of Chinese Rocketry" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qian_Xuesen https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qian_Xuesen Except for the 5 years under house arrest part. Wow.

feoren 5y ago
Survivorship bias, perhaps? That is, all the stories you hear about like this are the kind that turn into stories you hear about -- you don't hear about anyone whose life is just quietly ruined, so it seems like they all work out fine. And of course nothing "works itself out" -- it's people who work them out. It doesn't have to be you -- it's OK to just read the article and move on with your own life -- but whenever things "just work out" it's because someone stepped in and made a positive difference.
- greesil 5y ago
  At the macro level, if you're the policy-maker and doing the persecuting, stories like this should give you pause. Of course it's survivor bias for the individual.
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  The whole story is basically “how the USA gave China its space and ICBM program.” I assume “worked out” meant for the Chinese, because it really did.
  - kragen 5y ago
    For all of humanity. When I worked at Satellogic in Argentina, China's space program was how we got our satellites into space. If we'd been dependent on the US and Russia, we'd've been in bad shape.

tejohnso 5y ago

> “My thinking is, I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “So whatever they look at, they won’t find that I did anything wrong.” This statement seems like a completely backward mindset to have, especially after watching this classic advice piece on youtube [1]. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE

mizzao 5y ago
Wow, what an insightful video. In nerdy terms, the prosecution will basically p-hack your case until they get statistical significance.
- aspenmayer 5y ago
  > the prosecution will basically p-hack your case until they get statistical significance. This is a great analogy.
Bayart 5y ago
What's backward isn't the statement, which is perfectly common sense, it's that judicial system.
musesum 5y ago
I wonder, if ever interviewed by the Police, I could just say: "No thanks, search on YouTube for 'Don't Talk to the Police' for why. Or maybe, giving that reason why I won't talk means that I'm actually talking to the police? Somewhat a tangent: when going through due diligence for Series A, my CEO said: "Remember, they are not your friends." The thing was, though, after they invested, the VC fired him. Maybe that's the difference between prosecutors and makers.
- kelnos 5y ago
  You don't need to explain why (and probably shouldn't). All you need to say is "I'm not interested in answering questions" (possibly suffixed with "without an attorney present", though that could escalate things), or "I don't consent to any searches", or whatever fits the circumstances of the interaction. Depending on the laws in your jurisdiction, your legal obligation may be no more than stating your name and possibly providing identification if requested. But don't be a dick: be respectful when you decline further interactions. Verbal (or other) aggression could give them a reason to try to force the issue, regardless of whether or not it's legal for them to do so.

Zak 5y ago

People wrongly charged with crimes should be able to sue for damages. That's the case in come jurisdictions, but often requires significant evidence of prosecutorial misconduct, a high bar to clear.

andi999 5y ago

"The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China." No, it is not. Why would it be a setback if somebody who is innocent has their case dismissed. I mean who writes such lines? Doesnt this line imply that this dismissal was a bad thing (since nobody endorses espionage).

jhugo 5y ago
One assumes that the goal of the China Initiative is to charge people who are actually guilty of espionage. Highly public failings at that goal would seem to be setbacks, right?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- bigcat123 5y ago
- iszomer 5y ago
  Well, some publishers are careful to note the distinction between `allegations` and `accusations` while others do not. Then there's the word `indictment` which I always assumed meant something after the fact but is instead actually defined as a "formal (lega) charge of an accusation".
deleted 5y ago
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jacobolus 5y ago
The purpose of the China Initiative was ostensibly to root out industrial espionage. Instead they ended up investigating and prosecuting a bunch of Chinese scientists for legally trying to advance their work and careers, and haven’t yet discovered much if any industrial espionage. The worst they’ve found so far, from what I can tell, is a few undisclosed grants and minor visa violations. Having incompetent, overzealous investigators and prosecutors ruin a bunch of innocent people’s lives for the sake of some questionable agenda they aren’t otherwise successfully advancing makes the whole endeavor seem like a farcical waste of public resources and undermines the reputation of the DOJ.

qwertass 5y ago

Might do good to introduce more diversity in US academia

dijonman2 5y ago

Note that the accusations of Dr Chen having ties to China are true. However, Dr Chen wasn’t legally required to disclose them: > Prosecutors announced that they had received new information indicating that Dr. Chen had not been obliged to disclose those affiliations, undercutting the basis of the case. In either case I believe ties to China are harmful, they are not a friendly country.

jhugo 5y ago
He was born there. So of course he has "ties". We can't really know if they are harmful or not without more information, but we do know they're the kind of ties that the government doesn't consider worthy of reporting...
eunos 5y ago
Wut? Chinese American scientific collaboration is one of the most the strongest on Earth. You'll have ten of thousands of folks in scientific community having ties to China.

beepbooptheory 5y ago

To at least attempt to think about this critically, and to try to ignore the amount of frankly shocking things people are saying here, can I ask, maybe from people in the field, is this level of industrial/scientific espionage even a critical factor in our current world? We live in a global world where scientists in various institutions are constantly trading papers, findings. Why are we so worried that the U.S. might be doing something so different from China, that this level espionage would even be viable? Surely, everyone is working on different things here and there, but this idea that there is such critical intellectual property the US that needs to be guarded so intensely in this like James Bond scenario, just feels a little wacky. Are you all really here in 2022, being like "we can't risk a Chinese national from even seeing our American semiconductor research, they will steal it and use it against us?" Are actual scientists concerned? Or just the state, and apparently most of the fellow commenters?

coliveira 5y ago
This is a paranoia induced reaction that is being fostered by the media and the war industry, who are interested in creating a new cold war scenario.
- howmayiannoyyou 5y ago
  Incorrect. It is a MORAL issue. Technology stolen from the US companies is advancing the national security agendas of countries with no regard for human rights and the rule of law. It is immoral to turn a blind eye to this very real threat.
  - StreamBright 5y ago
    It is kind of curious fact that the US is not a member of ICC. Could you guess why?
    - howmayiannoyyou 5y ago
      There are good reasons why geopolitics cannot be held to strict interpretation of laws, not the least of which is the enforceability paradox, whereby countries more likely to break the norms are less susceptible to enforcement action. This, and attaching the name 'court' on something does not make it any less arbitrary or politically motivated

shantnutiwari 5y ago

This will just lead to a chilling effect, where scientists, esp those born outside, will be hesitant to apply for any government aid. I vaguely remember this case when it first came out. At the time, the impression I got was: Dr Chen was passing info to Chinese agents. And now the impression is: He had some affiliations with Chinese groups that were fully legal, and he was not required to disclose. Which begs the question: Why was he arrested in the first place?

ska 5y ago
> Why was he arrested in the first place? Sounds like a mixture of incompetence and poorly constructed incentives.

floor_ 5y ago

I'm reminded of this great story: "How I got an FBI record at age 11 from dabbling in cryptography then got into more trouble" https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/crypto.htm https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/crypto.htm

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

VictorPath 5y ago

> The son of two mathematics teachers who were sent to teach on farms during China’s Cultural Revolution, Dr. Chen grew up without any hope of becoming a scientist. His parents, the descendants of landowners, had a “bad classification” from the Chinese government, and were viewed suspiciously. His father warned him he would probably spend his life as a farmer. But then Mao Zedong died. Chen moved to the US to experience the American equivalent of this.

HarryHirsch 5y ago
Indeed. A former colleague married a Chinese lady whose parents had suffered badly through the Cultural Revolution. He told the story, how she went off to the US for her PhD and how her parents drove her to the airport and told her never to return to China. How things have changed within just a generation!
- varjag 5y ago
  Can you elaborate how exactly? Was your former colleague sent to kill sparrows in rice fields too?
  - HarryHirsch 5y ago
    (It was the colleague's wife's parents.) Obviously I never got the full story, but from what I heard, the parents were academics who had their house vandalized by the Red Guards and were sent to work the countryside.
    - nextaccountic 5y ago
      Did her parents ever leave China?
      - HarryHirsch 5y ago
        I don't know.
  - 5y ago

rolling_robot 5y ago

In US you end up being free, but treated like a spy by some funding agency. In Russia you end up in prison having no hope of getting back. Arrested in April 2021, 69 year old professor Golubkin is still in remand prison. https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/04/13/another-treason-case https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/04/13/another-treason-case accused for governmental treason.

selimthegrim 5y ago

There was a case at Caltech with an Israeli national and I don’t recall that receiving nearly the same level of scrutiny. Instead the supervisor who got her work stolen got disciplined for putting a cat as a coauthor on one of her papers as a joke.

hiptobecubic 5y ago

> The dismissal is a setback to the China Initiative, an effort started in 2018 to crack down on economic and scientific espionage by China. How is this a setback? The goal is to prevent espionage, not harass and punish people for being Chinese. Honestly, what has happened to the NYT? When did they get so bad at this? They were the most well-regarded newspaper in the world and now they read like madlibs.

notreallyserio 5y ago
It's a setback because it's another case of overzealous prosecution that fell apart because the basis was entirely false. In the end they harmed the career of a scientist because he had some affiliation with China, which, duh, he grew up there. It calls into question the basis of the whole initiative.

poxwole 5y ago

Seriously this is next level paranoid. I wondering when will they have McCarthyism 2: Electric Boogaloo China Edition. I say a little before the next election

biohax2015 5y ago

Please read about the Cultural Revolution. To call this “equivalent “ is laughable.

commandlinefan 5y ago
> To call this “equivalent “ yet.
- dang 5y ago
  Please don't post ideological flamewar comments to HN. It leads to repetitive, dumbed-down, nasty discussion. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691.
- tharne 5y ago
  - Cycl0ps 5y ago
    No, we save that for the Hispanics.
    - mistrial9 5y ago
      irrational provocation, please refrain
    - daniel-cussen 5y ago
      No we don't. Your claim is racism masquerading as racism.
      - dang 5y ago
        Please don't post flamewar comments to HN. It leads to repetitive, dumbed-down, nasty discussion. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30114691.

Communitivity 5y ago

There are two factors that come into play here in terms of regulations. The first, and biggest, is the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). ITAR is the set of United States regulations that control the manufacture, sale, and distribution of defense and space-related articles and services as defined in the United States Munitions List (USML), https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-22/chapter-I/subchapter-M/part-121 https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-22/chapter-I/subchapter-M.... The USML is large, and broad in scope. It also still needs to be interpreted. These interpretations err on the side of 'an abundance of caution', due to the fines from violating regulations and the perceived threat to national security. ITAR regulations and policies are complex enough that most defense contracting firms have people who specialize in just ITAR and help others in the company deal with it. I have worked projects with multiple countries and can tell you that it is a pain to dot all the Is and cross all the Ts, even when working with countries that are our closest allies. Things that you might not think would be covered often are, or are interpreted to be covered. Let's say you designed a new type of paper clip. This paper clip[ is so much better that when it comes to organizing files and paperwork processing productivity its use is considered to provide a 'material advantage' to military units that use it. That likely would be export controlled under ITAR. I'm not debating whether it should or not, that is how it is. The other factor is that modern conflict is multi-domain, and one of the biggest domains is economics. Corporate espionage is very real, and very state sponsored, around the world. That means that things like chip designs are very sought after. I remember going to a particular standards conference. We had a huge upsurge in one country's delegates just before the conference (roughly a 3:1 increase), and during the conference I noticed the new delegates seemed more polished and less proficient than the ones I had worked with for a while and knew. The ones I knew also seemed deferential to the new delegates. Before the conference the matter came up with my employer. I've been told such situations are the norm rather than the exception. It is because of these situations and the level of state actor activity, that the U.S. wants to know all your affiliations, even seemingly innocent ones. You sign a legal document, in effect testifying, that the associations you documented are accurate and complete to you knowledge. The penalties for not disclosing such associations are well known because they are spelled out. They are draconian because of the U.S. concern, and the causes of that concern are real. All sorts of cases can be made for that policy, and against it, but there is no away any researcher working for the government on DOD or DOD-tangential projects is ignorant of the policy. As an anecdote, I knew another American colleague. Young guy, had a girlfriend in Canada (a relationship he disclosed). They decided to get married, and did (something he did not disclose). When the CO of the group he was doing his research for found out about it my colleague's employment and clearance were terminated, and he was judged a permanent security risk, meaning he could never again work a government contract - effectively ending his career.

webmaven 5y ago

https://archive.is/Z2sgI https://archive.is/Z2sgI

mrtweetyhack 5y ago

1-6 5y ago

In security, you're always guilty until proven innocent.

javajosh 5y ago

As bad as this is, it could have been so much worse for him. The government does not usually correct itself like this, preferring instead to continue with prosecution, notch up another corrupt win, and call it a day. And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos! And Dr. Chen should get more hugs, and more support - as many as he needs to help him forget this nightmare and get back to doing what he loves.

deleted 5y ago
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openknot 5y ago
>And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos! From the article: 'The 15 postdoctoral students he worked with were transferred to other research groups, taking their knowledge with them. “We are all losers, right?” Dr. Chen said. “My reputation got ruined. My students, my post-docs, they changed their career. They changed to other groups. M.I.T., the country, the U.S., we lose. I can’t calculate the loss. That loss cannot be calculated.”' It's a positive that the rule of law in the United States has been demonstrated to work in this case. But he could have easily accepted a plea deal earlier and have avoided the dismissed charges. He also lost his staff and may be stigmatized in the future for people who see that he was arrested by the FBI in his home, but don't read the full story behind the dismissal. The dismissal of charges sounds like a bare minimum for a functional society, not an extraordinary response (and it should not be the norm to double down and press on with false charges). A fair response would be for him to be compensated so he's no worse off, and at least receive an official apology from the government.
- javajosh 5y ago
  I made my comment in light of my recent education about how the government actually functions, specifically its criminal justice system. On the spectrum of outcomes this is actually pretty good, considering the alternatives. Countless men are wrongfully convicted, spend their entire lives in prison, and are eventually exonerated. What do they get? They get released.

alexnewman 5y ago

Be cool to write a book about how the CCP/CPC realized asian americans are more and more important to the USA defense and economic structure. They then spread disinfo to the CIA about anti CPC Chinese Americans, claiming they are chinese spys. This causes the end of the university system being a relevant defense/economic buffer for the west. Kindof like a Chinese version of the men who stare at goats which was apparently based on a true story.

vishnugupta 5y ago

This is just such a sad situation. The scientist's reputation has taken a big beating and he will now be looked through the lease of these accusations for rest of his career, if not more. The last paragraph stood out for me. “My love is science. I did not want politics, right? I saw that, and I got away from it. I do my devotion to science. I help people, I support. But I learned that you can’t get away. Politics impacts everybody. So if there are things that are not right, we all need to speak out.” Lot of times most of us, including me, don't speak out against wrong policies. We all think "let's just focus on our own thing" it won't affect us. But we are all wrong, "Politics impacts everybody".

tasha0663 5y ago
> The scientist's reputation has taken a big beating While this really sucked, this is an exaggeration. No charges. Still has his job. He can still file for government grants. The article starts with his colleagues offering up opportunities for him and celebrating that he is back. Yeah, the feds screwed the pooch and messed things up, but I don't see where his reputation was actually harmed.
- sangnoir 5y ago
  > While this really sucked, this is an exaggeration He lost 15 doctoral students/post docs who moved on in his absence, and I'm assuming his research group(s) imploded - do you think it's going to be easy to get those back? He has a job, but it's not at the same job he had before - for one he'll be co-authoring fewer papers. So his reputation has taken a beating in measurable ways - that's no exaggeration.
  - tasha0663 5y ago
    You've cured my ignorance. Thanks.
- deleted 5y ago
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- ska 5y ago

FpUser 5y ago

"“We understand that our charging decisions deeply impact people’s lives,” said Rachael Rollins" Understand my a$$. They do not give a fuck about what they do to people. If they were directly responsible and punished in cases where they've improperly ruined people's lives then they might understand.