Charles W. Beardall, the Pentagon’s deputy inspector general, told the national security subcommittee of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that the scheme was discovered over a two-year period by agents of the Defense Criminal Investigative Service and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Investigators detected a "cover agent" from China who sought to buy up to 70 Blackhawk engines and several F-16 engines along with air-to-air and air-to-ground missiles.
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“The subject was induced to travel to the United States for undercover agents who showed him an F-16 engine,” Beardall said. “He wired $140,000 to an undercover bank account, and was arrested.”
The agent was convicted of export violations, bribery and for being a covert Chinese agent. He was sentenced to six years in prison in July 2006.
China operates 20 S-70C transport helicopters, as it calls the UH-60 Blackhawks, acquired during a military sales program in the 1980s. The sales were stopped after Congress imposed an arms embargo after the 1989 Tiananmen massacre.
China has lobbied the United States to lift the ban on Blackhawk parts but has continued covertly to obtain parts.
China’s interest in F-16 engines is related to its development of indigenous fighters.
