CIA Targets Chinese Military Officials in Online Recruitment Bid

The US spy agency on Thursday released a video in Mandarin that portrays a fictional mid-level military officer who decided to contact the CIA after seeing qualified officers removed — and replaced with inexperienced leaders more interested in lining their pockets than defending their country. The video follows Xi’s dramatic escalation of a sweeping shakeup of China’s military in a campaign that suggests that political loyalty — not just corruption — is increasingly under scrutiny. “Any man qualified to lead us is deemed a threat and unceremoniously removed,” the fictional Chinese military officer says in the CIA video, before sending files from his laptop at night from a parked car after sneaking out of a military facility.