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Documents

October 10, 1963

John McCone (Director of Central Intelligence Agency) to Mexico City, 'Chinese in Mexico of Operational Interest'

The CIA director reports that the Agency is in control of Liang Sicheng’s brother in the US and is using him to arrange a meeting between the two men in Mexico City, in which Liang Sicheng's defection would be raised as a real possibility.

October 12, 1963

John McCone (Director of Central Intelligence Agency) to Mexico City, 'Cable: Background on CCP Member Born 1901'

A cable sent from CIA headquarters to an agency officer in Mexico City concerning Liang Sicheng and whether or not he could be persuaded to defect to the United States. Though Liang's name was not disclosed during the declassification process, the identifying details match Liang's biography.

November 1963

Chinese Communist Industrial Trade Fair Scheduled to Be Held in Mexico City December 1963

An "information report" from a CIA officer in Mexico City concerning the possible opening of an Chinese Communist industrial trade fair.

December 2, 1980

Politburo Resolution No. 31-NQ/TW on the Protecting Political Security and Maintaining Law and Order in Our Society in the New Situation

In response to this perceived growing threat against the regime, on 2 December 1980 the Vietnamese Communist Party Politburo issued Resolution 31-NQ/TW on maintaining internal political security and law and order in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, with a specific focus on increasing the power and the responsibilities of Vietnam’s Public Security and Police forces, which were subordinate to the Ministry of Interior. 

December 15, 1980

Speech Given by Comrade Le Duc Tho to the Leaders of Public Security’s Departments, Bureaus, and City and Provincial Offices during the Conference to Discuss the Three Specialized Drafts and to Implement Politburo Resolution 31 [Excerpts]

A speech given by Party Politburo Member Le Duc Tho during a three-day conference of the Ministry’s top Public Security officers along with the Directors of Public Security of all of the nation’s provinces and major cities, where the attendees received instructions on three new Ministry of Interior Party resolutions - one on “the struggle against Chinese spies”, one on “the struggle against American spies”, and one on  “the struggle against the enemy’s ideological attacks.” At the time of the speech, Le Duc Tho was viewed as Vietnam’s second most powerful leader, second only to Party General Secretary Le Duan. 

Le Duc Tho commented that while recruiting Americans would be easy, requiring only “money, women, and drinking and carousing”, recruiting Chinese would require a careful process of political education of the target

December 15, 1980

Resolution on the Status and Mission of Combatting Enemy’s Ideological Sabotage Efforts During This New Period

This resolution on combatting “ideological sabotage” lumps Chinese ideological propaganda, Western propaganda operations, international human rights and humanitarian relief activities, and religious radio broadcasts and religious missionary activities all together with the spreading influence of Western culture and music in Vietnam as part of a vast, insidious effort by Vietnam’s enemies designed to corrupt Vietnam’s society and to weaken its “revolutionary” spirit in order to cause the overthrow or collapse of the Vietnamese Communist Party and government. 

The over-the-top rhetoric used in this resolution illustrates the widespread paranoia that infected the upper ranks of Vietnam’s Party and security apparatus during this period of the Cold War.  It was not until six years later, in December 1986, that the pressures of growing internal dissension (even within the Party), the country’s desperate economic situation, and reductions in Soviet military and economic to Vietnam resulted in the decision by the Communist Party’s 6th Party Congress to shift to a policy of reforms, called “Renovation” [Đổi Mới] reforms and to new Vietnamese efforts to normalize relations with China and the United States.

December 15, 1980

Resolution on Policy Guidelines and Missions for the Struggle against American Spies in the New Situation

A resolution on combatting “American spies." The document calls for Public Security to re-interview all confirmed or suspected “CIA” agents being held in re-education camps and to conduct careful reviews of the enormous volume of documents captured by Communist forces when they took over South Vietnam in 1975 in order to identify and arrest any “stay-behind” agents of the Americans as well as former “CIA” agents who had still managed to evade detection and arrest.

December 15, 1980

Resolution on Policy Guidelines and Missions for the Struggle against Chinese Spies in the New Situation

A resolution on combatting “Chinese spies” in Vietnam. The resolution directs Vietnam's Public Security to establish a special interrogation center to which all known and suspected “Chinese spies” who had been arrested would be sent for detailed interrogation by trained professionals. The interrogations would help Vietnam to identify existing Chinese espionage operations and to obtain information on the Chinese intelligence organizations, their plans, and their targets. 

1988

Nguyễn Thủ Thanh, 'A Study of the Use of a Number of Psychological Characteristics of Ethnic Chinese in the Interrogation of Accused and Suspected Chinese Spies'

In 1988 a classified Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security’s in-house professional journal published this article offering ideas on how to utilize the “psychological characteristics” of the ethnic Chinese in the interrogation of suspected “Chinese spies”.  At the time the article was published, the once-close alliance between the Vietnamese and Chinese Communist Parties, which Mao Zedong described in 1967 as being “as close as between lips and teeth”, had deteriorated into a vicious military and political conflict between the two former allies.  Chinese efforts to collect intelligence on and to foment internal opposition against the leadership of the Vietnamese Communist Party were of special concern to Vietnam’s security service, and ethnic Chinese residents of Vietnam naturally became a primary focus of Vietnam’s counter-espionage efforts.

November 1987

Opinions from a Member of an Intelligence Service of the PR China Operating in the GDR under Journalistic Cover

A report on information obtained from a member of the Chinese intelligence service; this report discusses their opinions on East German-Soviet relations, relations between China and East Germany and China and the Soviet Union, and economic relations between East Germany and China.

Pagination