This whole thing with China goes well beyond trade issues. We have known (or, at least, suspected) for years that China has been making cyber-incursions into American networks and systems. Now, in an exclusive Wall Street Journal report from Cybersecurity and Intelligence reporter Dustin Volz, we learn that in December, China made a tacit admission of being behind a series of attacks on American infrastructure.

Chinese officials acknowledged in a secret December meeting that Beijing was behind a widespread series of alarming cyberattacks on U.S. infrastructure, according to people familiar with the matter, underscoring how hostilities between the two superpowers are continuing to escalate.

The Chinese delegation linked years of intrusions into computer networks at U.S. ports, water utilities, airports and other targets, to increasing U.S. policy support for Taiwan, the people, who declined to be named, said.

What's a little surprising here is that the Chinese delegation in this meeting admitted, so freely, that Chinese hackers were messing about in American cyber-systems. Then again, they were dealing with the Biden administration at that point, so they were pretty safe in presuming inaction on the part of the United States in response. But then, they already knew that President Trump was re-assuming office in January.

The first-of-its-kind signal at a Geneva summit with the outgoing Biden administration startled American officials used to hearing their Chinese counterparts blame the campaign, which security researchers have dubbed Volt Typhoon, on a criminal outfit, or accuse the U.S. of having an overactive imagination.

U.S. officials went public last year with unusually dire warnings about the uncovered Volt Typhoon effort. They publicly attributed it to Beijing trying to get a foothold in U.S. computer networks so its army could quickly detonate damaging cyberattacks during a future conflict.

The Chinese official’s remarks at the December meeting were indirect and somewhat ambiguous, but most of the American delegation in the room interpreted it as a tacit admission and a warning to the U.S. about Taiwan, a former U.S. official familiar with the meeting said.

China is growing ever more serious about Taiwan and has been for quite a while.

See Also: Mr. Wonderful: 'It’s Time to Squeeze Chinese Heads Into the Wall, Now'

US, UK File Cyberespionage Charges, Impose Sanctions on Suspected Chinese Hackers

Cyber warfare, of course, is no joke. Any major conflict between developed nations, as opposed to un-aliving marginally literate Houthis rebels, would have a cyberwar element; certainly any future conflict with China would. A major war would likely begin with a cyber attack on the target country's infrastructure; the electrical grid, water, communications, all could be brought down, making an initial military strike easier; the enemy would be confused, and couldn't easily communicate, form plans, and respond to any hostile acts.

China sure seems to be getting better at this. We'd better get better at it, too. Attack is the other side of the coin as defense, after all. Our vital systems are clearly vulnerable, and we need to fix that. What's more, China wants us to know that they are getting better at it, according to the WSJ piece linked above:

A Chinese official would likely only acknowledge the intrusions even in a private setting if instructed to do so by the top levels of Xi’s government, said Dakota Cary, a China expert at the cybersecurity firm SentinelOne. The tacit admission is significant, he said, because it may reflect a view in Beijing that the likeliest military conflict with the U.S. would be over Taiwan and that a more direct signal about the stakes of involvement needed to be sent to the Trump administration.

“China wants U.S. officials to know that, yes, they do have this capability, and they are willing to use it,” Cary said.

This was, in other words, not a leak. Someone was told to warn us that China is doing this. They are telling us that if we support Taiwan in any upcoming attempt by Communist China to retake what they deem a "rogue province," the United States had better not interfere. If they can do it for that reason, they can do it for any other reason, like, say, a trade war.

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