Ray [REDACTED]

Former US Army Sergeant Joseph Schmidt pleaded guilty in June 2025 to charges of sharing classified information with the Chinese government. Schmidt served in the Army as a human intelligence collector from 2015 until January 2020, including with the 109th Military Intelligence Battalion at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington. He was trained in Mandarin at the Defense Language Institute and had a deep interest in Chinese culture. Six days after leaving active duty, Schmidt took a four-day trip to China, and then traveled to Turkey the following month, where he emailed the Chinese consulate offering them classified information before returning home again. In March 2020 he flew to Hong Kong and remained in China until October 2023. According to the FBI affidavit, Schmidt visited the headquarters of the Ministry of State Security in Beijing, offering them classified information along with his Army ID card and a PKI token which allowed access to the Army’s Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRnet). Schmidt left behind a wealth of digital evidence of his actions, including a Google search history for terms such as “can you be extradited for treason”, “soldier defect”, and “chinese.consulate number doesn’t go through”. The FBI’s affidavit includes screenshots of his Google Maps application which were recovered from his iCloud account and showed a driving route from Beijing International Airport to MSS headquarters. Another Google Maps screenshot showed his phone in close proximity to MSS headquarters on March 10th, 2020. He also saved a 23-page document to his iCloud account titled “High Level Secrets” and a four-page document titled “Important Information to Share with Chinese Government.” Investigators from the FBI and Army quickly built a case against him but had no opportunity to arrest him so long as he remained in China. FBI agents arrested Schmidt when he landed at San Francisco International Airport in October 2023. He initially pleaded not guilty but later changed his plea. In October 2025 he was sentenced to four years in prison. #usarmy #china #hongkong #beijing #army #soldier