A former US Air Power fighter pilot with greater than twenty years of expertise with nuclear supply methods and plane, together with superior F-35 stealth jets, has been arrested and charged with conspiring to assist the Chinese language navy.
Gerald Eddie Brown Jr., 65, was arrested in Jeffersonville, Indiana, on Wednesday and charged with violating the Arms Export Management Act by offering coaching to pilots in China’s Individuals’s Liberation Military Air Power (PLAAF), in accordance with an announcement from the US Lawyer’s Workplace for the District of Columbia.
“Offering US navy coaching to our adversaries represents a big menace to nationwide safety,” Lee Russ, government director of the Air Power Workplace of Particular Investigations Workplace of Particular Venture, mentioned within the assertion.
Earlier than his retirement on the rank of main in 1996, Brown served 24 years within the US Air Power.
“Throughout his navy profession, Brown commanded delicate models with duty for nuclear weapons supply methods, led fight missions, and served as a fighter pilot teacher and simulator teacher on quite a lot of fighter and assault plane,” the assertion mentioned.
He additionally flew a spread of jets, from the Vietnam-era F-4 Phantom to extra fashionable F-15s and F-16s, in accordance with the assertion.
After retirement, Brown flew business cargo plane earlier than becoming a member of two US protection contractors to work as an teacher in flight simulators coaching US pilots to fly the US F-35 stealth fighter and A-10 assault jet, the assertion mentioned.
The Lockheed Martin F-35 is without doubt one of the US’s most-advanced plane. About 600 of the fifth-generation jets had been in service as of the start of the yr throughout the US Air Power, Navy and Marine Corps, with greater than 1,600 on order, in accordance with FlightGlobal’s World Air Forces 2026.
Nineteen allied and associate nations are additionally a part of the F-35 program, in accordance with Lockheed Martin.
It’s anticipated to be a workhorse within the US and allied fleets for many years to return.
Brown allegedly spent greater than two years in China coaching PLA pilots, touring there in December 2023 and staying till earlier this month, the US Lawyer’s assertion mentioned.
“Brown answered questions for 3 hours concerning the U.S. Air Power on his first day within the PRC after which, on his second day, ready and offered a quick about himself for the PLAAF,” the assertion mentioned. The remainder of the time he skilled Chinese language pilots, it mentioned.
“Brown’s alleged betrayal uncovered delicate navy ways, threatening the safety of our nation, our armed forces, and our allies,” mentioned FBI New York Assistant Director in Cost James Barnacle.
Aviation analyst Peter Layton of the Griffith Asia Institute, a former Royal Australian Air Power officer, informed CNN that China may have realized a spread of issues from Brown.
“If I used to be China, I might even be most all for ‘nuclear weapons supply methods’ and the ways deliberate to ship nuclear weapons,” Layton mentioned.
China may have additionally tried to study what ways F-35 pilots use to keep away from detection in each offensive strike and air protection roles.
And Layton mentioned US allies and companions are prone to be asking laborious questions of the Pentagon.
“If I used to be an allied nation flying the F-35 I might be very strongly requesting what the US finds has been handed onto the Chinese language. And what modifications to ways and procedures the US now suggests must be made,” Layton mentioned.
However Layton mentioned it’s attainable as a simulator teacher, Brown could have simply been coaching US pilots in primary flying, reminiscent of take-offs, landings and flying on devices.
“So presumably no ways,” he mentioned.
Carl Schuster, former director of operations on the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Middle, mentioned even gaining information of these primary strategies may very well be helpful to China.
Schuster informed CNN that “the teacher pilot’s instincts in coaching and simulated fight flights inform us a lot about his previous coaching…and what ways the teacher’s air drive of origin could make use of in an intercept or ‘canine struggle’ as soon as engaged.”
“The teacher insights add context to the remotely collected technical intelligence-based info and open-source supplies. You possibly can construct a really thorough and full image by fusing all that collectively,” he added.
The US legal professional’s assertion mentioned Brown was desperate to be coaching fighter pilots in China.
“Within the resumé he ready for his utility, Brown wrote his ‘goal’ as ‘Teacher Fighter Pilot,’” it mentioned, including that later Brown informed a co-conspirator upon his arrival in China: “Now…. I’ve the prospect to fly and instruct fighter pilots once more!”
Requested concerning the case at a briefing on Thursday, Mao Ning, a spokesperson for China’s International Ministry, declined to remark.
“I’m not conversant in the state of affairs you talked about,” Mao mentioned.
Brown allegedly made contact with China by way of a co-conspirator who was involved with Stephen Su Bin, a Chinese language nationwide who in 2016 pleaded responsible to conspiring to provide delicate US navy and export information to China and was sentenced to just about 4 years in a US jail.
CNN anchor Jim Scuitto wrote about Su’s case in his 2019 ebook, “The Shadow Warfare: Inside Russia and China’s Secret Operations to Defeat America,” saying Su and his companions stole tens of 1000’s of pc information associated to the F-22 and F-35 fighters.
Brown is just not the primary American flier to be charged with serving to practice Chinese language pilots, nor the primary to be linked to Su.
Former US Marine Corps pilot Daniel Duggan was charged in 2017 of violating the Arms Export Management Act, particularly for allegedly serving to Chinese language pilots study plane service operations.
Duggan, a naturalized Australian citizen, was arrested in New South Wales in 2022, and is pending extradition to the US.
He has denied the costs, claiming that US officers knew about his actions and that he was solely coaching civilian pilots as China’s aviation sector boomed.
US authorities discovered correspondence with Duggan on digital gadgets seized from Su Bin, Duggan’s lawyer Bernard Collaery mentioned in a submission to Australian Lawyer Common Mark Dreyfus, in accordance with a 2024 Reuters report.
Messages retrieved from Su Bin’s digital gadgets present he paid for Duggan’s journey from Australia to Beijing in Could 2012, in accordance with extradition paperwork lodged by america with the Australian court docket, in accordance with Reuters. Collaery mentioned Duggan was unaware of Su Bin’s hacking operations and knew him on the time as an employment dealer for a Chinese language state aviation firm.
