China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is continuing with its objective of recruiting working and former Western military personnel, particularly aviation specialists, to enhance its own force and work on the weaknesses of Western agencies.
Earlier this month, the Five Eyes alliance, a grouping of intelligence agencies from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States warned their partner countries of this big threat. This warning followed a conference held in January in which over 120 officials from the US, NATO, and partner countries came together to understand ways to counter the threat posed by China.
The Sunday Guardian in 2022, in a series of articles, had revealed how the Chinese military was using companies based in multiple countries like the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Sweden and Singapore, to train pilots for the PLA.
As per the office of the Five Eyes, PLA has been actively seeking to address its military skills-gap by clandestinely recruiting Western military talents through intermediary private firms worldwide.
These firms, ostensibly disconnected from the PLA, offer substantial financial incentives to attract recruits, thereby masking their true affiliations. Despite recent measures taken by Western governments to disrupt these operations, the PLA’s recruitment tactics continue to adapt and evolve in response.
Officials aware of the matter told The Sunday Guardian that the recruitment of Western military personnel by the PLA poses a significant challenge to security interests as by accessing specialized training and knowledge from Western experts, the PLA aims to bolster its operational capabilities, particularly in critical areas such as aviation.
This practice not only undermines Western defence strategies but also jeopardises the integrity of military alliances and collaborative efforts aimed at countering global threats.
In October 2022, Daniel Edmund Duggan, a former US Marine Corps pilot who had renounced his US citizenship to become an Australian citizen, was arrested at the request of the US government and extradited on charges of arms trafficking and money laundering. The US government has accused him of training Chinese fighter pilots to land fighter jets on aircraft carriers and laundering money.
As per the Five Eyes, current and former military personnel from North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nations and other Western countries are being actively recruited by China by using private companies in South Africa and China to hire former fighter pilots from Canada, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia, the United States, and other Western nations to train PLA Air Force and Navy aviators.
To discourage such efforts, the US and its Western partners had put commercial restrictions on the Test Flying Academy of South Africa (TFASA), Beijing China Aviation Technology Co. (BCAT), Stratos, and other PLA providers who were accused of providing training to Chinese pilots by employing Western military personnel.
Sources said that the PLA recruitment attempts are not always obvious, as companies may not initially promote the PLA’s role and in many cases it has been found that the target was contacted directly by personal acquaintances from the military and through headhunting emails, or indirectly via professional networking sites and online job platforms. The resultant job offers were then sent by privately-owned companies around the globe whose ties with the PLA are hidden.
In most cases, the job location was in China, South Africa, or elsewhere, with lucrative contracts and the opportunity to fly exotic aircraft, with vague details on the ultimate customers.
Officials said that the most sought-after targets to-date have been military pilots, flight engineers, and air operations center personnel.
According to officials, such poaching exercises enable the PLA to advance its air capabilities, improve planning for future operations, and prepare better counter Western military strategies. It also increases the risk of future conflict by reducing the deterrence capabilities of these Western countries vis-à-vis China.
So far, no reports of Indian nationals being recruited for this purpose have come to light.