Posted on 11/28/2003 9:10:22 PM PST by DeaconBenjamin
Chinese researcher, who pleads guilty to selling military-formatted chips to a defence firm in China, says she never intended to betray the US
WASHINGTON - Gao Zhan, the former American University researcher who pleaded guilty to selling sensitive technology to China, said she never intended to help the Chinese government that once imprisoned her.
Gao, who was freed from a Chinese prison two years ago following US diplomatic protests against her detention, defended her human rights work.
She also sought to contain the public backlash from her guilty plea on Wednesday to one count of unlawful export of computer microprocessors with potential military uses in a federal court in Alexandria, Virginia.
'I am not an agent nor a double agent for any government,' she said in an interview.
'I'm just purely a scholar, a sociologist trying to bring my dreams to reality. It's that simple.'
Gao, in the interview and an earlier statement, said she conducted business with Chinese business entities and research institutes, 'not the Chinese government per se'.
She said she wanted to raise funds to finance a women's research institute and radio talk show in China.
The 43-year-old US permanent resident, who lives in suburban Herndon, Virginia, does freelance work for Voice of America's Radio Free Asia.
She faces a court sentence of up to 13 years in prison for selling 80 military-formatted microprocessors to a Chinese government-authorised defence company for more than US$539,000 (S$931,000).
The court released her on a US$50,000 bond pending sentencing on March 5.
She said she opposed the Chinese communist regime 'from Day One' and 'never intended to betray the United States, especially the Bush administration, who rescued me and saved my family'.
She pleaded guilty, she said, to accept responsibility for her actions 'as a God-fearing Christian' and to spare her husband and her three young sons from the strain and cost of a long trial.
Speaking from her home, Gao made a plea for public sympathy, calling her family's plight a 'tragedy'.
She thanked President George W. Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell and the American people 'for caring about me and my family...I beg them, don't rush to any judgment'.
Her statements marked the latest twist in a murky three-year tale of intrigue and espionage charges surrounding the diminutive sociologist, whose academic record consists largely of studies of women's and familial issues in China and Taiwan.
The Beijing authorities arrested her on Feb 11, 2001 as she, her husband and son were about to return to the US after a visit.
Her husband and son were each held separately for 26 days before they were released. She was jailed for 166 days, prompting Mr Bush and Mr Powell to intervene.
She was returned to the US one day after a Chinese court convicted her of spying for Taiwan and sentenced her to 10 years in prison.
At the time, her human rights attorneys said the Chinese authorities objected to her having 'officially restricted' materials.
Gao said speculation that her detention was part of a Chinese government ruse was 'total nonsense'.
As human rights groups and researchers distanced themselves from Gao's troubles, US defence experts said the technology she sold was unlikely to yield significant advances to Chinese researchers.
She admitted shipping 80 military Intel 486 DX2 microprocessors to the Nanjing Research Institute of Electronics Technology, also known as the Nanjing SunSea Industry, which court documents say is a premier Chinese radar designer.
Federal law restricts the export without a licence of such computer technology, which is specially 'hardened' for use at super-low and high temperatures or shielded from radiation.
Such 'dual-use' components could be used in civilian and military applications such as aircraft or guided missiles and bombs.
US businesses argue, however, that since the end of the Cold War, such export limits are curbing American marketing opportunities because similar technologies are available from foreign competitors.
This doesn't pass the smell test.
I don't know if that is what she sold them, but it sounds like something the Chicoms would be looking for.
Could have fooled me. Is she trying to tell us that it's all culturally relative and truth and honor and loyalty to the U.S. are "Western" concepts. Give us a break. If we were to say that this is BS designed for a guilty liberal white press that will believe anything would we be "insensitive?"
But the article talks about chips, not whole computers, and 486s at that. And I agree with Norman (N. Vasion) who said, "Whazzup widdat??"
Sure, the giant feature sizes on 486 chips compared to those of Pentia et al will make them more immune to things like alpha particles, but true radiation hardening involves radically different device technology. Now, maybe these 486s were Silicon on Sapphire or some other such Mil-wonk technology, but the article doesn't say that.
Now, in fairness to the author of the article, we might suppose they meant rad-hard design when they said "military formatted chips," but having been in the IC industry since 1969 I've never heard the term.
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