CHIN BELIEVED PLANTED IN U.S. AS SPY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000605070034-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 20, 2013
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: December 6, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

,.,.,,, Declassified and Approved For Release 2013/02/20 :CIA-RDP90-009658000605070034-0
r.~ ~~?'.:'ED ~ WASHINGTON POST
Chin Believed Planted in U.S. as Spy
/~,( By Ruth Marcus and Joe Pichirallo
7 Wastungton F'os[ Snf( Writers--
Investigators believe that retired
CIA analyst Larry Wu-Tai Chin was
given intelligence training by the
Communist Chinese in the early
1940s, before he started working
for the U.S. government, and was
planted as a spy at the start of his
more than 40 years of U.S. govern-
ment service, according to officials
familiar with the case. ,
The officials said Chin, who
started working for the U.S. Army
Liaison Office in China in 1943 and
joined the CIA in 1952, had access
to nearly all U.S. intelligence anal-
ysis concerning Asia while at the
CIA.
Asa "document control officer,"
Chin, 63, was responsible for rout-
ing "finished" intelligence reports
through the CIA and to officials in
the White House and other depart-
ments, the sources said.
Chin, who held high-level "code-
. word" clearance, is believed to have
given the Chinese much of the in-
formation to which he had access,
including reports during the. war ire
Vietnam, they said. Chin is believed
to have received more than $1 mil-
- lion from the Chinese in return for
the information, one source said.
"It's astounding," said one gov-
ernment official familiar with the
investigation. "He survived all the
security checks and survived all the
re-examinations."
Chin, who worked primarily as an
analyst and translator for the CIA's
Foreign Broadcast Information Ser-
vice, "was more than a guy ... lis-
tening to People's Republic of China
broadcasts and translating the Peo-
ple's Daily," said one source famil-
iar with the investigation.
U.S. intelligence officials are still
assessing the damage that Chin
-might have caused but believe it
represented a serious security
breach, sources familiar with the
investigation said.
I "He wasn't a Walker and he
couldn't do that kind of damage,"
one official said, referring to Soviet
spy John Anthony Walker Jr., who
,~~ pleaded guilty in October to mas-
terminding an espionage ring that
operated since 1968.
However, the source said, Chin
provided "enough information to
cause the Chinese to decorate this
man." According to an FBI affidavit,
Chinese intelligence officials dec-
orated Chin with the title of "deputy
bureau chief' for his work.
Some current and former intel-
ligence officials played down Chin's
role and said they were not aware
he had access to extremely sensi-
tive documents.
An FB[ agent Certified at a hear-
ing for Chin last week that his de-
liveries to the Chinese were so vo-
luminous that it took two trans-
lators two months to translate each
shipment. The agent, Mark R. John-
son, also testified that Chin was
feted as the guest of honor at a
1982 banquet in Peking attended by
the head of China's intelligence ser-
vice and its retired chief.
Johnson said Chin had clearance
to see information "top secret and
above."
Sources said Chin received .the
~ C[A's career intelligence medal for
superior service when he retired in
1981. Chin, who continued to work
for the CIA as a consultant until his
arrest Nov, 22, was asked five
months ago to return to the agency
full time, his lawyer said at a court
hearing last week.
A source familiar with the inves-
tigation said that was an apparent
blunder on the part of CIA officials
who asked Chin to resume full-time
work rather than a ruse to aid the
FBI's investigation,. which began in
December 1983. It has not been
disclosed what triggered the probe.
Much of the government's case
against Chin comes from Chin him-
self, who admitted spying for the
Chinese in an interview with FBI
agents before his arrest,.according
to an FBI. affidavit and court testi-
mony.
Investigators believe Chin, who
v
was born in Peking and became a
naturalized U.S. citizen, was given
intelligence training while he was a
college student in China during the
early 1940s, the sources said.
During that period the Commu-
nists were engaged in a bitter
struggle with the Nationalist Chin-
ese Kuomintang for control of the
government. The Communist Chin-
ese government was formed in
1949.
While the FB[ has suggested in
an affidavit that Chin was recruited
as a spy before he joined the CIA in
1952, it has not been disclosed be-
forE: that Chin was allegedly
groomed to become an intelligence
agent a decade before that.
The affidavit states that Chin,
while serving with the Army Liai-
son Office from 1943-44, met a
"Dr. Wang" who "indoctrinated Chin .
on the aims of the Chinese Commu-
nist Party." In 1948, while Chin was
working as an interpreter at the
American Consulate in Shanghai,
Dr. Wang introduced him to a "Mr.
Wang of the Shanghai Police" who
"encouraged Chin to serve the in-
terests of Communist China."
The first indication that Chin ac-
tively engaged in espionage was in
1952, when, according to the affi-
davit, he was paid $2,000 by the
Chinese for information about the
location of Chinese prisoners of war
in Korea and the type of intelli-
gence information that American
and Korean intelligence services
were seeking from the POWs.
StafjwriterMichae! Weisskopj
contributed to this report.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2013/02/20 :CIA-RDP90-009658000605070034-0