• partial_accumen
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    10
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    9 months ago

    Seeing some of the payouts for these bribes, it is absolutely ridiculously small. Like the one in the article:

    According to US officials, Zhao, who was stationed at a naval base north of Los Angeles, received nearly $15,000 from the Chinese intelligence officer between August 2021 and May 2023.

    I can’t imagine risking my military career and risk spending time in military prison (much less being a traitor to my country) for the cost of a used 2012 Toyota Camry with 77k miles.

    • @Serinus
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      49 months ago

      I’m just going to assume the $15,000 was all up front, and all of the spying after that was blackmail after having accepted a bribe.