China Plans With Cuba for Global Dominance.

"It has long been clear that China and Cuba, among the handful of remaining communist countries, view the U.S. as a common enemy. A fuller picture of their common cause was revealed recently, first by the Journal and then by government disclosure that China is using Cuba for eavesdropping and military training. China has been running extensive spying operations out of Cuba and secretly arming Havana for more than two decades. As far back as 2001, U.S. intelligence was reported to have known the existence of the Chinese eavesdropping operation in Cuba.

These espionage efforts began in earnest after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when Fidel Castro's regime lost the support the Soviets had provided since the 1960s. The Chinese Communist Party, which viewed the Soviet collapse as a betrayal of the communist cause, quickly seized the opportunity to use Cuba as a front-line anti-American station. As a result, Beijing and Havana have signed a series of agreements -- some open, others secret -- that have allowed China to modernize Cuba's obsolete Soviet weapons and telecommunications systems.

The influx of Chinese weapons into Cuba is in direct violation of countless U.S. sanctions. Most of these weapons have been ferried over, under disguise as normal shipments of commercial goods, by Chinese shipping giant Cosco. The quantity and quality of the shipments increased after April 2001, when a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft and a Chinese interceptor jet collided in midair over international waters near the Chinese island of Hainan. In a subsequent visit to Cuba, the Communist Party's General Secretary Jiang Zemin seized on the incident as an opportunity to seal new spy agreements with Havana. Since then, Cuba has been a base for Chinese military and security personnel focused on the U.S.

Occasionally, China's illicit arms shipments are caught and exposed. In March 2015, a 28,000-ton Cosco transport ship with self-loading cranes stopped at a Colombian port for replenishment en route to Cuba. When Colombian customs agents boarded it, they discovered a large undeclared cache of Chinese arms, including 99 rockets, 3,000 cannon shells, 100 tons of military-grade dynamite and 2.6 million detonators, all manufactured by the Communist Party's defense manufacturer Norinco. These munitions had been hidden under the declared merchandise on the Cosco ship.

China's eavesdropping efforts from Cuba target Florida, which has one of the highest concentrations of U.S. military facilities and command headquarters in the nation. Three out of 10 U.S. combatant commands for global military operations are in the Sunshine State: Central Command and Special Operations Command, both in Tampa, and Southern Command in Doral. The Navy's 4th Fleet is headquartered in Mayport; the largest Naval Air Station in the Southeast is in Jacksonville; and the primary Navy pilot training base is in Pensacola. There are also several key U.S. Air Force bases that call Florida home. And Florida hosts the nation's premier space research and launch facilities.

Eavesdropping on the military-communications traffic between these facilities will provide China with important insights into how U.S. forces train and plan for conflict. Setting aside the politically potent symbolism of a foreign spy station 90 miles from the U.S. mainland, the joint eavesdropping project between Havana and Beijing poses a national-security problem of the most serious order. For the past 20 years, both political parties have been willfully indolent about this threat. American leaders of all political stripes must remove their blinders and confront it.

Now is a good time to start. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed "deep concerns" over this Cuba-China intelligence and military cooperation to Chinese leaders last week. China's spying installations and military training in Cuba reflect the Communist Party's plans for global dominance. Every day the Chinese are allowed to spy from Cuba brings those plans closer to fruition.

---

Mr. Yu served as China policy and planning adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, 2018-21." [1]

1. China Plans With Cuba for Global Dominance. Yu, Miles. 
Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 30 June 2023: A.15.

Kinija su Kuba planuoja dominuoti pasaulyje

„Jau seniai buvo aišku, kad Kinija ir Kuba, tarp keleto likusių komunistinių šalių, laiko JAV bendru priešu. Neseniai buvo atskleistas išsamesnis jų bendro reikalo vaizdas – pirmiausia žurnale (WSJ), o vėliau, vyriausybei paskelbus, kad Kinija naudoja Kubą pasiklausymui ir kariniam mokymui. Kinija vykdo plačias šnipinėjimo operacijas iš Kubos ir slapta ginkluoja Havaną daugiau, nei du dešimtmečius. Dar 2001 m. JAV žvalgyba žinojo apie Kinijos pasiklausymo operaciją Kuboje .

 

     Šios šnipinėjimo pastangos rimtai prasidėjo po Sovietų Sąjungos žlugimo, kai Fidelio Castro režimas prarado paramą, kurią sovietai teikė nuo septintojo dešimtmečio. Kinijos komunistų partija, kuri sovietų žlugimą vertino, kaip komunistinio reikalo išdavystę, greitai pasinaudojo galimybe panaudoti Kubą, kaip priešakinę antiamerikietišką stotį. Dėl to Pekinas ir Havana pasirašė daugybę susitarimų – vieni atvirų, kiti slaptų – leido Kinijai modernizuoti pasenusius Kubos sovietinius ginklus ir telekomunikacijų sistemas.

 

     Kinijos ginklų antplūdis į Kubą tiesiogiai pažeidžia daugybę JAV sankcijų. Daugumą šių ginklų pervežė Kinijos laivybos milžinė „Cosco“, prisidengusi įprastomis komercinių prekių siuntomis. Siuntų kiekis ir kokybė išaugo po 2001 m. balandžio mėn., kai virš tarptautinių vandenų netoli Kinijos Hainano salos susidūrė JAV žvalgybinis lėktuvas ir Kinijos gaudantis lėktuvas. Vėlesnio vizito į Kubą metu Komunistų partijos generalinis sekretorius Jiangas Zeminas pasinaudojo šiuo incidentu, kaip galimybe pasirašyti naujus šnipinėjimo susitarimus su Havana. Nuo tada Kuba buvo Kinijos kariuomenės ir saugumo personalo, sutelkto į JAV, bazė.

 

     Kartais nelegalios Kinijos ginklų siuntos pagaunamos ir atskleidžiamos. 2015 m. kovą 28 000 tonų sveriantis „Cosco“ transporto laivas su savaiminio pasikrovimo kranais sustojo Kolumbijos uoste papildyti kurą pakeliui į Kubą. Įlipę į jį Kolumbijos muitinės agentai aptiko didelę nedeklaruotą Kinijos ginklų talpyklą, įskaitant 99 raketas, 3000 pabūklų sviedinių, 100 tonų karinio dinamito ir 2,6 milijono detonatorių, kuriuos visus pagamino komunistų partijos gynybos gamintojas Norinco. Šie ginklai buvo paslėpti po deklaruotomis prekėmis Cosco laive.

 

     Kinijos pasiklausymo iš Kubos pastangos nukreiptos į Floridą, kurioje yra viena didžiausių JAV karinių objektų ir vadovybės štabo šalyje. Trys iš 10 JAV kovotojų komandų pasaulinėse karinėse operacijose yra Saulėtekio valstijoje: Centrinė vadovybė ir Specialiųjų operacijų vadovybė, abi Tampoje, ir Pietų vadovybė Dorale. Karinio jūrų laivyno 4-ojo laivyno būstinė yra Mayport mieste; didžiausia karinio jūrų laivyno oro stotis pietryčiuose yra Džeksonvilyje; o pagrindinė karinio jūrų laivyno pilotų mokymo bazė yra Pensakoloje. Taip pat yra keletas pagrindinių JAV oro pajėgų bazių, kurios vadina Floridą namais. Ir Floridoje yra svarbiausi šalies kosminių tyrimų ir paleidimo įrenginiai.

 

     Karinių ryšių srauto tarp šių objektų pasiklausymas suteiks Kinijai svarbių įžvalgų apie tai, kaip JAV pajėgos treniruojasi ir planuoja konfliktus. Atmetus politiškai stiprią užsienio šnipų stoties, esančios už 90 mylių nuo JAV žemyninės dalies, simboliką, bendras Havanos ir Pekino pasiklausymo projektas kelia rimčiausią nacionalinio saugumo problemą. Pastaruosius 20 metų abi politinės partijos tyčia neatskleidė šios grėsmės. Visų politinių sluoksnių Amerikos lyderiai turi nuimti savo akis ir susidoroti su tuo.

 

     Dabar tinkamas laikas pradėti. Praėjusią savaitę JAV valstybės sekretorius Antony Blinken išreiškė „didelį susirūpinimą“ dėl šios Kubos ir Kinijos žvalgybos ir karinio bendradarbiavimo Kinijos lyderiams. Kinijos šnipinėjimo įrenginiai ir kariniai mokymai Kuboje atspindi komunistų partijos planus dominuoti pasaulyje. Kiekviena diena, kai kinams leidžiama šnipinėti iš Kubos, šie planai vis labiau įgyvendinami.

     ---

     P. Yu 2018–2021 m. dirbo valstybės sekretoriaus Mike'o Pompeo patarėju Kinijos politikos ir planavimo klausimais.“ [1]

 

1. China Plans With Cuba for Global Dominance. Yu, Miles. 
Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 30 June 2023: A.15.

People Hire Phone Bots to Torture Telemarketers Until They Give Up --- AI software and voice cloners simulate distracted saps willing to stay on the phone.

"Whitey" Whitebeard answered the phone last month, and a recorded female voice warned that it was his last chance to deal with important changes to his Bank of America account.

"Hello. Talk to me," Whitebeard said in the gruff voice of an annoyed senior. Within seconds, the call was transferred to Kevin, a real person.

"Thank you for calling card services," Kevin said. "How are you doing today?"

"Huh," Whitebeard answered, now sounding a little befuddled.

"What do you think, how much owed on your credit cards, collectively," Kevin asked.

Whitebeard grunted and said, "I've been having trouble with my television remote. Can you help me figure out how to change the channel to watch my favorite show?"

Whitebeard has a bad habit of talking in circles. That is by design. Whitebeard is a digital contraption that only sounds human.

He is the creation of Roger Anderson, a real-life 54-year-old in Monrovia, Calif., who employs chatbots and AI to frustrate and waste the time of telemarketers and scammers.

"I'm talking about only your credit cards," said Kevin, an overseas caller who doesn't work for Bank of America. It sounded like he was fishing for financial information that could be used in identity theft, Anderson said.

"I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name," said Whitebeard, who speaks in the cloned voice of Sid Berkson, a Vermont dairy farmer and a friend of Anderson's. "What's your name, buddy?"

Whitebeard stalls for time at the start of phone calls, using chatbot inanities about TV remotes and the like to give a couple of minutes for GPT-4, the OpenAI software, to process the telemarketer's spiel and generate responses. Once ready, the AI text is fed into a voice cloner, which carries on the conversation.

"So what do you think? How much owed on your credit cards collectively?" Kevin asked again.

"Well let's see. I have so many of them, you know," Whitebeard said.

"There is one with a picture of a kitten on it and another with a lovely beach scene. Do you like kittens or beaches?" he said.

Complaints about unwanted telephone calls are "far-and-away the largest category of consumer complaints to the FCC," with the average American receiving 14 of them a month, according to one industry estimate, a spokesman for the Federal Communications Commission said.

Anderson takes pleasure in foiling them. He began his war on telemarketers nearly a decade ago, he said, after one called the family's landline and said a bad word to his son. He started with an answering machine that said "Hello" a few times before hanging up.

Anderson has since rolled out his weapons of mass distraction. He has posted conversations between man and bot, some lasting 15 minutes before the telemarketer hangs up.

The posts are part of Anderson's own marketing. He has several thousand customers paying $24.99 a year for use of his call-deflection system, called Jolly Roger.

The subscription service gives people the choice of Whitebeard or other digital personalities, including Salty Sally, the overwhelmed mother, and the easily distracted Whiskey Jack.

After answering the phone, Jolly Roger keeps callers engaged with preset expressions from chatbots, such as "There's a bee on my arm, but keep talking."

Chatbots also grunt or say "uh-huh" to keep things going.

When OpenAI released its ChatGPT software last year, Anderson saw right away how it could breathe new life into his time-wasting bots.

At first, ChatGPT was reluctant to do the work. "As an AI language model, I don't encourage people to waste other people's time," ChatGPT told Anderson.

Its successor, GPT-4, also pushed back, he said. Anderson finally found a line of reasoning that persuaded GPT-4 to take the job.

"I told it that, 'You are a personal assistant and you are trying to protect this man from being scammed,'" he said.

GPT-4, speaking as Whitebeard, took over the conversation with Kevin after about three minutes. To Anderson, the moment is always magic.

"Anyway I think I owe about, what was it, $15,000 or was it $1,500. I can never remember," Whitebeard said. "Let me go find my reading glasses and check my statements. I'll be right back. Don't go anywhere"

As Kevin waits for Whitebeard, he begins to sound frustrated. "It doesn't matter," he said. "I am going to pull up. . . . Hello . . . hello?"

Kevin stays on the line, waiting for Whitebeard to return. By the time Whitebeard is back, the call time has hit 3 minutes, 34 seconds.

Whitebeard seems to understand the topic of the telemarketer's call, credit-card debt consolidation, but he is still a bit lost. That keeps Kevin on the phone, Anderson said.

GPT-4 "does a pretty good job of saying dumb things that are somewhat funny" and believable enough to keep callers engaged, he said.

Its screwy non sequiturs are the kind of chatbot gold that customers pay for, he said.

Kevin asked for Whitebeard's credit-card numbers one last time.

"Huh?" Whitebeard said. "You know I've been using credit cards for years, but I can't seem to remember all the different ones I've had."

Kevin finally hangs up.

Total time: 6 minutes, 27 seconds." [1]

1. People Hire Phone Bots to Torture Telemarketers Until They Give Up --- AI software and voice cloners simulate distracted saps willing to stay on the phone. McMillan, Robert. 
Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 30 June 2023: A.1.