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According to a new report from the US think tank Center for Strategic &, International Studies ( CSIS), China is most likely spied on the United States from Cuba. In its analysis of four locations in Cuba that China is most likely using for spying against the US, CSIS used satellite images and people knowledge in its record. This news follows previous week’s developmentsthat four Russian boats, including a radioactive underwater and a ship, docked in Cuba.
The Biden administration first denied involvement in Cuban spy last year when a Wall Street Journal article from June 2023 by John Kirby, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, called the link “untrue.” However, a source close to the Biden administration finally claimed that China” conducted an update of its brains collection features in Cuba in 2019″ and that” their is well-documented in the brains record.” The Biden administration expressed concerns about the area having Chinese spy procedures, according to a report from Reuters time later.
According to the most recent CSIS review, China has a history of engaging in like spying because during the Cold War, the USSR spied on the US at the Lourdes Signals Intelligence Complex in Cuba. Four sites in Cuba have been identified by CSIS as being those where China is most likely to use SIGINT ( signals intelligence ) to gather intelligence about the United States.
The first is Bejucal, which according to the document is Cuba’s largest SIGINT page. It is on hilly ground overlooking Havanna, and held the USSR’s nuclear arms during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. According to the review, there has been fear” for years” that Bejucal is a page of Chinese espionage, based on both unidentified government records, Congressional evidence, and Spanish and English advertising. Senator Marco Rubio was even mentioned by name on the website in the report’s claim that he had demanded that Cuba “kick ] out this Chinese listening station in Bejucal” in 2016. Additionally, satellite imagery indicates that Bejucal underwent “major updates over the past ten years,” including” the construction of a mysterious new radome that may contain an ELINT or radar system.”
The second site is El Salao, located in southeastern Cuba. This website coincides with rumors that China has a “large antenna field” in the province of Santiago de Cuba dating back to 1999. Given its close proximity to Guantanamo Bay, the CSIS report further asserts that this location would be extremely strategic for China. El Salao, located just east of Santiago de Cuba, was able to have a SIGINT facility, despite CSIS’s inability to find one there. A circularly disposed antenna array ( CDAA ), a spying device used by the US and USSR to spy on one another during the Cold War, was constructed in El Salao in 2021. China has been building more and more CDAAs, especially in the South China Sea, despite CSIS’ claim that both the US and Russia have turned away from this technology.
The third site is Wayjay, approximately 10 kilometers north of Bejucal. The number of antennas at this location has increased from one in 2002 to twelve, as well as” significant operations and support facilities, and even a small solar farm.” The variety of antennas present is a clear indicator that Wajay is in charge of a reasonably complex SIGINT mission set, according to the report.
The fourth site is Calabazar, located near Wayjay and housing “over a dozen” dish antennas.
The CCP and Cuba have unwaveringly refute claims that China is eavesdropping on the US from Cuban soil. China cooperates with Cuba without bringing any third parties into the picture. We would not tolerate any blatant denigration or disparage, according to Mao Ning, a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry. Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for China’s embassy in Washington, claimed that the allegations were “hyped up” and “nothing but slander”. According to a Global Times editorial, the accusations are” a clear case of concocting charges without substantial evidence,” and that” [t]he WSJ, CSIS, and the forces behind were not seeking objectivity and fairness, but for concocting a “dirty bomb” of public opinion to align with Washington to suppress China and Cuba. The report was riddled with” storys about Chinese military bases that no one has seen,” according to Vice Foreign Minister of Cuba Carlos Fernandez de Cossio.
The CCP and Cuba continue to deny allegations that China spied on US citizens in Cuba, but the Biden administration at least made that claim public in 2023, with Senator Marco Rubio raising concerns years earlier. It remains to be seen how China will use its intelligence assets in Cuba to foment US hostility as China continues to escalate its rhetoric and grey-zone warfare against Taiwan.
