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MIND GAMES
How China’s shadowy ‘Brain Warfare’ unit is preparing for war with new mind-melting weapons to ‘paralyse’ enemies
Watch our exclusive interview with China expert and former Australian foreign security adviser John Lee above
CHINA is gearing up for all-out war by readying a disturbing trove of mind-melting weapons, experts have warned.
It's feared Xi Jinping's regime could use the chilling weapons to target Taiwan's forces in the event of an invasion.
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We reported last year on developments inside China's People's Liberation Army which pointed to the terrifying new tech.
Xi's forces are thought to be looking at cognitive and biological weapons - designed to make their enemies fall asleep, impair alertness and damage decision-making.
Now, China experts have spoken to The Sun about the development of the game-changing weapons - and warned of a "terrible, brave new world".
John Lee, a senior fellow at Hudson Institute and a former national security adviser in the Australian government, said the new weapons are designed to "defeat the enemy's mind".
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Because "secrecy and transparency" forms a big part of Chinese policy, it is difficult to judge where exactly the regime might be at in developing these weapons, he said.
But Lee added that there is evidence to suggest the Chinese People's Liberation Army is producing them.
And security expert Professor Anthony Glees told The Sun the threat of such formidable tech should be "taken very seriously indeed";.
He said: "Microwaves can be used to cause cognitive fog, dizziness, loss of balance, anxiety and nausea as a weapon.
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"They could be aimed at a single specific target, say Taiwan's military control HQ."
Research group first shared the alarming development of China's cognitive warfare last year.
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They suggested China is at the "forefront" of "advanced technologies" including "AI, brain-computer interfaces and novel biological weapons".
And that the regime - which has long posed a threat to smaller states like Taiwan - is looking at using them for "military strategies".
Some of the tech could even precisely target specific soldiers or leaders in enemy groups.
John told The Sun: "There is some evidence that the various Chinese entities do experiment and are developing these sorts of weapons.
"They're weapons that essentially degrade the natural capability of the minds or the cognitive processes of particular targets."
He said the PLA are interested in developing the tech to "defeat the enemy's mind, or subjugate the enemy's mind before the actual conflict or disagreement takes place".
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NO LIMITS
While certain aspects of warfare - the rise of AI and biological or cognitive weapons - are subject to limitations under international law, China does not consider itself subject to those rules.
John told The Sun that Beijing won't place any kind of limits on itself while developing these type of weapons.
John told The Sun: "The sorts of ethical constraints that many of the advanced liberal democracies, have placed on themselves, the Chinese don't hold themselves to.
"They consistently will refuse to come to any credible binding agreements on... constraints that we may mutually want to place on each other to prevent any kind of breakout into a terrible, brave new world."
Meaning its developments of cognitive, biological or even nuclear weapons - which are already kept largely secret - go unregulated.
John said: "I would even say that the Soviet Union had more mutually agreed constraints placed on them than China does now in a nuclear arena.
"And certainly [in the] biological arena. China doesn't bind itself to any restrictions.
"China continues to see itself as trying to play catch up to particularly the United States in weaponry.
"It doesn't want to put any constraints on itself for development of any kind of weaponry, based on any kind of technology."
Brain warfare weapons
THE CCP Biothreats Initiative released a trove of research into the new weapons tech last year.
It laid out which tech China was working towards and what they were capable of - in an alarming indication of the future landscape of war.
The research shows Beijing is using a combination of cutting-edge tech with biological weapons to develop its arsenal.
They said the goal for China is to "create a powerful deterrent and asymmetric advantage".
Unit 94969 and Unit 96812 - two military groups - are working on the weapons.
BRAIN-COMPUTER INTERFACES
A brain-computer interface is a system that links the brain's activity to an external device like a computer.
Brain signals can be analyzed and turned into commands - causing the person to carry out a specific action.
GENETIC DRUGS
Pharmaceuticals designed to modify the genetic and physiological makeup of adversaries.
They can then target cognitive, emotional and behavioural traits.
SOFT-KILL RADIO WAVES
These use electromagnetic energy for non-lethal attacks, such as to induce drowsiness or cause cognitive impairment.
ANTI-SLEEP GLASSES
They can bolster the usefulness of their own troops - by promoting alertness and wakefulness.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
China has long been working on its use of AI for military purposes.
Experts have previously warned The Sun about the country's use of AI to influence elections and target their enemies.
They even vowed to become the world leader in AI by 2030.
BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS
During the Cold War, China used biological warfare by weaponizing diseases like the plague, or cholera.
Concerns have long been expressed that the country continues to do so to this day.
THREAT TO TAIWAN
John told The Sun that China's increasingly aggressive drills near Taiwan are readying it for an invasion.
He said: "You often hear this comment that China is showboating.
"It's not just that. China is actively improving its readiness and its tactical capability to launch an invasion of Taiwan."
Prof Glees said these reports remind him of the Havana Syndrome phenomenon that was first raised in 2016.
Hundreds of US intelligence and military officials, along with their families, reported bizarre symptoms including hearing a loud sound, balance and cognition problems, insomnia and headaches.
Some have pointed to foreign actors - including Russia - as being behind the strange cases - using tech like microwave or ultrasound weapons.
Prof Glees told The Sun: "We've known for sure since December 2020 that the 'Havana syndrome' is real, that microwaves can be used to cause 'cognitive fog, dizziness, loss of balance, anxiety and nausea' as a weapon.
"A study the year before identified brain damage amongst those who had experienced microwave attacks.
"To use a computer virus to infect Taiwanese computers to develop a cyber version of 'Havana syndrome' which would affect large sections of a chosen group in dispersed locations, e.g. air force pilots, soldiers manning the batteries, should be relatively easy.
"Equally, infecting Taiwanese computers with sleep programmes should be simple."
He said the weapons described in last year's report, if developed, "could be aimed at a single specific target, say Taiwan's military control HQ, but not more generally".
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And, he told us "it might be possible to beam them from a warship".
Describing the tech as "China's cyber Trojan Horse", Prof Glees said it could "make an invasion of Taiwan far more straightforward than might be the case".
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