--:-- Kate Leinbaum: This is the third episode of The Missing Minister. If you haven't already listened to episodes one and two, we recommend doing that first.
--:-- Lingling Wei: One day, I got a text from our colleague Ling Ling Wei. She'd just connected with a source, and what she'd learned would redirect the course of our reporting.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: So you met with a source who knows what's going on with Chin Gang. Yes. And is there anything you can tell us about this source?
--:-- Lingling Wei: Um, let me think a little bit. So I can only say, you know, this source has knowledge about the party investigation into Chin Gang and what it had turned up.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: For months, we've been trying to figure out why Chinese officials seemed to take Qin's affair with Fu Xiaotian so seriously. Now, Ling Ling's source was offering an explanation. It was quite unbelievable.
--:-- Lingling Wei: It was unbelievable. According to the source, Qin Gang disappeared last year because the Chinese were told that the woman he had an affair with, Fu Xiaotian, was a spy.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: A spy. This was an explosive allegation.
--:-- Lingling Wei: So Ling Ling kept reporting, kept talking to people in a position to know about Qin's investigation. And she kept us in the loop along the way.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: I do trust the source. I've known him for years as well.
--:-- Lingling Wei: She reached out to sources she's cultivated in over a decade of reporting on China.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: I said, listen, I'm working on a very sensitive story. I need to know what you know about this.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Through that reporting, Ling Ling was able to confirm what her first source had said. Chinese officials were told that Fu had been a spy for Western intelligence. Specifically, they were told that Fu was a spy for the British.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: We haven't been able to confirm whether this allegation is true or false. We asked the British government if Fu was a spy for MI6, the British Foreign Intelligence Agency, and the UK Foreign Office declined to confirm or deny if she was, as is their policy.
--:-- Lingling Wei: We also asked the Chinese foreign ministry about this, and they had no comment.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Fu hasn't been seen in public in more than a year, and we haven't been able to reach her.
--:-- Lingling Wei: But according to Ling Ling's sources, it was this allegation of espionage, true or not, that sparked Qin's downfall.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: For Ling Ling, this was a huge breakthrough. But it also raised another question. Where did this allegation of espionage come from?
--:-- Lingling Wei: From The Journal, I'm Kate Leinbaum, and this is The Missing Minister, A three-part investigation into the mysterious disappearance of China's foreign minister. Episode 3, The Downfall.
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--:-- Lingling Wei: According to Ling Ling's reporting, Chinese officials were told that Fu Xiaotian had allegedly spied for the British. But her sources also told her something else, about where this allegation first came from.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Here, the Chinese have to thank their Russian friends.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Scroll back to June 25th of last year, the last day Qin was seen in public. At the time, a delegation from Moscow was in Beijing, led by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: According to Ling Ling's reporting, Chinese officials were told that during that trip... Either Rudenko himself or someone very senior in his entourage tipped off the Chinese.
--:-- Lingling Wei: They basically dropped the bombshell. Your foreign minister slept with a British spy.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: We reached out to the Russian foreign ministry about this alleged tip. They didn't respond. And the Chinese foreign ministry had no comment.
--:-- Lingling Wei: We can't confirm whether the Russians in fact tipped off the Chinese. But according to Lingling's sources, this is the story that senior Chinese officials were told by their higher-ups to explain Qin's disappearance.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: According to her sources, the Chinese viewed the tip as a gesture of friendship China and Russia have become increasingly close in recent years.
--:-- Lingling Wei: They share intelligence and their leaders Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have common interests. They both see the United States as a big threat to their national interests, and they want to get aligned to counter the United States and its allies.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And there's also a big personal component to this relationship. The two leaders really get along very well. They have developed a ritual of wishing each other happy birthday. And they have met in person more than 40 times.
--:-- Lingling Wei: The Chinese government hasn't publicly explained Fu's disappearance. And it's possible there's more to the story than what was shared with high-level Chinese officials.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: That something else was going on.
--:-- Lingling Wei: And remember, we can't confirm whether the allegation that Fu was a spy is true or false.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: One person close to Fu made the point that the same attributes that might have made her valuable to Western intelligence, her connections, her ties to the UK, also made her vulnerable to spying accusations.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Whatever the truth, according to Ling Ling sources, Qin was brought in for questioning. What did he know about Fu? And could he have been a spy himself?
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The party investigation was not for the faint-hearted, for sure.
--:-- Lingling Wei: I was told that it was a very grueling process.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What do you mean by grueling?
--:-- Lingling Wei: According to our sources, Qin Gang was being questioned day in and day out, having his entire life examined by the party investigators.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: He was undergoing all that interrogation in a very confined place, isolated from family and any kind of legal representation.
--:-- Lingling Wei: He had to know that his whole career, his whole life was on the line.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And according to your sources and reporting, Is there any sense that Qin Gang was a spy?
--:-- Lingling Wei: Qin Gang was certainly investigated for espionage. According to our sources, he insisted he was innocent, and he repeatedly pledged his loyalty to Xi Jinping.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But he had an affair with someone who allegedly betrayed the country. So by association, that was a very serious offense.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Did Qin have any suspicions about Fu?
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: So, according to our sources, when Chinese party investigators confronted Qin Gang with Fu Xiaotian's possible MI6 connection, Qin Gang was extremely surprised and devastated.
--:-- Lingling Wei: It. Chin suffered a mental breakdown during the investigation, according to Lingling's sources.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And at one point, he was on suicide watch at a Chinese military hospital.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Just months before he disappeared, he was still riding very high. He was considered such a rising star in Chinese political system.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And all of a sudden, he found himself being investigated for something as serious as espionage? Very hard to take.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Espionage is a serious accusation anywhere. But in today's China, it's especially damaging.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: How concerned is China about foreign espionage right now?
--:-- Lingling Wei: Incredibly concerned.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: Xi Jinping believes that the black hand of Western intelligence is trying to bring him down.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: That's Dennis Wilder. Dennis spent 36 years working for the CIA.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: I was a military analyst on China. I spent time overseas doing operational things.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What kind of operational things did you do overseas?
--:-- Dennis Wilder: What you would expect a spy to do overseas? Spotting, assessing, recruiting of what we call hard targets. The Chinese, the Russians, the North Koreans.
--:-- Lingling Wei: In recent years, the Chinese have been increasingly anxious about foreign spies. And Dennis says that anxiety comes straight from the man in charge.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Xi Jinping thinks we're out to get him personally. He thinks he has to do everything possible to protect himself.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: There's some history here. A little over a decade ago, China discovered a network of CIA spies working inside its government. Some were high-ranking Chinese officials.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What happened there?
--:-- Dennis Wilder: I'm afraid that is not a subject that I can talk about.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: OK. That remains highly classified.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Dennis wouldn't talk about it. But the Wall Street Journal has reported that as many as two dozen CIA assets in China were rounded up, imprisoned or executed.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: All of this was happening as Xi was being groomed for power. And as China's leader, he has been intensely focused on national security.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: Rooting out spies is part of that.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The job lands primarily on China's main intelligence agency, its Ministry of State Security, or MSS.
--:-- Lingling Wei: What we have seen recently is Xi Jinping promoted the head of the MSS in an unusual step to the very important polar bureau of the Chinese Communist Party.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Also, the MSS has become very open about its activities. They offer money and they give a hotline for Chinese if they suspect somebody of spying
--:-- Lingling Wei: So it a very aggressive campaign by the Chinese at this point. They're very assertive.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Frankly, in the modern era, I've never seen it like this.
--:-- Lingling Wei: This was the backdrop to Qin's disappearance. And to Fu's. It's why the spying accusation against her was so serious.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Like Qin Gang, Fu Xiaotian was also investigated. According to our sources, after the Chinese got this tip, Fu Xiaotian was already back in Beijing, so it was very easy to bring her in for questioning.
--:-- Lingling Wei: But we do not know the outcome of that investigation into her.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The party generally doesn't disclose matters as sensitive as espionage. Under Chinese law, espionage carries serious consequences.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Penalties can range from imprisonment to execution. And often the trials are held in secret.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Do we know where she is?
--:-- Lingling Wei: No idea. It's quite a mystery exactly what happened to her.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What about the baby? We do not know anything about the baby.
--:-- Lingling Wei: We asked the Chinese foreign ministry about the whereabouts of Fu and her baby. They had no comment.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Just a few years earlier, Fu had been the toast of Beijing, the center of social events like her book launch, when diplomats had taken to the stage to praise her sophistication and grace.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Elegance is not something that catches your eyes, but rather elegance is the ability not to be forgotten.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But today, Fu seems on her way to being forgotten.
--:-- Lingling Wei: In her absence, what we have are rumors, old interviews from her show, some inactive social media accounts, a garden at an English university.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: In many ways, Fu has been airbrushed away. But that would prove harder to do with Qin. Qin had been the country's foreign minister, a state counselor.
--:-- Lingling Wei: And over a year after his disappearance, there had been little indication of what his future could be.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And then this summer, the Chinese Communist Party dropped a hint.
--:-- Lingling Wei: That's next.
--:-- Announcer: Sponsored jobs receive 45% more applications than non-sponsored jobs, according to Indeed data. Plus, with sponsored jobs, there are no monthly subscriptions or long-term contracts. You're only paying for results.
--:-- Announcer: There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash journal.
--:-- Lingling Wei: According to Ling Ling's reporting, Chinese officials were told that Fu Xiaotian had allegedly spied for the British. But her sources also told her something else, about where this allegation first came from.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Here, the Chinese have to thank their Russian friends.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Scroll back to June 25th of last year, the last day Qin was seen in public. At the time, a delegation from Moscow was in Beijing, led by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: According to Ling Ling's reporting, Chinese officials were told that during that trip... Either Rudenko himself or someone very senior in his entourage tipped off the Chinese.
--:-- Lingling Wei: They basically dropped the bombshell. Your foreign minister slept with a British spy.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: We reached out to the Russian foreign ministry about this alleged tip. They didn't respond. And the Chinese foreign ministry had no comment.
--:-- Lingling Wei: We can't confirm whether the Russians in fact tipped off the Chinese. But according to Lingling's sources, this is the story that senior Chinese officials were told by their higher-ups to explain Qin's disappearance.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: According to her sources, the Chinese viewed the tip as a gesture of friendship China and Russia have become increasingly close in recent years.
--:-- Lingling Wei: They share intelligence and their leaders Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have common interests. They both see the United States as a big threat to their national interests, and they want to get aligned to counter the United States and its allies.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And there's also a big personal component to this relationship. The two leaders really get along very well. They have developed a ritual of wishing each other happy birthday. And they have met in person more than 40 times.
--:-- Lingling Wei: The Chinese government hasn't publicly explained Fu's disappearance. And it's possible there's more to the story than what was shared with high-level Chinese officials.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: That something else was going on.
--:-- Lingling Wei: And remember, we can't confirm whether the allegation that Fu was a spy is true or false.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: One person close to Fu made the point that the same attributes that might have made her valuable to Western intelligence, her connections, her ties to the UK, also made her vulnerable to spying accusations.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Whatever the truth, according to Ling Ling sources, Qin was brought in for questioning. What did he know about Fu? And could he have been a spy himself?
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The party investigation was not for the faint-hearted, for sure.
--:-- Lingling Wei: I was told that it was a very grueling process.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What do you mean by grueling?
--:-- Lingling Wei: According to our sources, Qin Gang was being questioned day in and day out, having his entire life examined by the party investigators.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: He was undergoing all that interrogation in a very confined place, isolated from family and any kind of legal representation.
--:-- Lingling Wei: He had to know that his whole career, his whole life was on the line.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And according to your sources and reporting, Is there any sense that Qin Gang was a spy?
--:-- Lingling Wei: Qin Gang was certainly investigated for espionage. According to our sources, he insisted he was innocent, and he repeatedly pledged his loyalty to Xi Jinping.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But he had an affair with someone who allegedly betrayed the country. So by association, that was a very serious offense.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Did Qin have any suspicions about Fu?
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: So, according to our sources, when Chinese party investigators confronted Qin Gang with Fu Xiaotian's possible MI6 connection, Qin Gang was extremely surprised and devastated.
--:-- Lingling Wei: It. Chin suffered a mental breakdown during the investigation, according to Lingling's sources.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And at one point, he was on suicide watch at a Chinese military hospital.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Just months before he disappeared, he was still riding very high. He was considered such a rising star in Chinese political system.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And all of a sudden, he found himself being investigated for something as serious as espionage? Very hard to take.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Espionage is a serious accusation anywhere. But in today's China, it's especially damaging.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: How concerned is China about foreign espionage right now?
--:-- Lingling Wei: Incredibly concerned.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: Xi Jinping believes that the black hand of Western intelligence is trying to bring him down.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: That's Dennis Wilder. Dennis spent 36 years working for the CIA.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: I was a military analyst on China. I spent time overseas doing operational things.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What kind of operational things did you do overseas?
--:-- Dennis Wilder: What you would expect a spy to do overseas? Spotting, assessing, recruiting of what we call hard targets. The Chinese, the Russians, the North Koreans.
--:-- Lingling Wei: In recent years, the Chinese have been increasingly anxious about foreign spies. And Dennis says that anxiety comes straight from the man in charge.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Xi Jinping thinks we're out to get him personally. He thinks he has to do everything possible to protect himself.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: There's some history here. A little over a decade ago, China discovered a network of CIA spies working inside its government. Some were high-ranking Chinese officials.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What happened there?
--:-- Dennis Wilder: I'm afraid that is not a subject that I can talk about.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: OK. That remains highly classified.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Dennis wouldn't talk about it. But the Wall Street Journal has reported that as many as two dozen CIA assets in China were rounded up, imprisoned or executed.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: All of this was happening as Xi was being groomed for power. And as China's leader, he has been intensely focused on national security.
--:-- Dennis Wilder: Rooting out spies is part of that.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The job lands primarily on China's main intelligence agency, its Ministry of State Security, or MSS.
--:-- Lingling Wei: What we have seen recently is Xi Jinping promoted the head of the MSS in an unusual step to the very important polar bureau of the Chinese Communist Party.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Also, the MSS has become very open about its activities. They offer money and they give a hotline for Chinese if they suspect somebody of spying
--:-- Lingling Wei: So it a very aggressive campaign by the Chinese at this point. They're very assertive.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Frankly, in the modern era, I've never seen it like this.
--:-- Lingling Wei: This was the backdrop to Qin's disappearance. And to Fu's. It's why the spying accusation against her was so serious.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Like Qin Gang, Fu Xiaotian was also investigated. According to our sources, after the Chinese got this tip, Fu Xiaotian was already back in Beijing, so it was very easy to bring her in for questioning.
--:-- Lingling Wei: But we do not know the outcome of that investigation into her.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The party generally doesn't disclose matters as sensitive as espionage. Under Chinese law, espionage carries serious consequences.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Penalties can range from imprisonment to execution. And often the trials are held in secret.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Do we know where she is?
--:-- Lingling Wei: No idea. It's quite a mystery exactly what happened to her.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What about the baby? We do not know anything about the baby.
--:-- Lingling Wei: We asked the Chinese foreign ministry about the whereabouts of Fu and her baby. They had no comment.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Just a few years earlier, Fu had been the toast of Beijing, the center of social events like her book launch, when diplomats had taken to the stage to praise her sophistication and grace.
--:-- Lingling Wei: Elegance is not something that catches your eyes, but rather elegance is the ability not to be forgotten.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But today, Fu seems on her way to being forgotten.
--:-- Lingling Wei: In her absence, what we have are rumors, old interviews from her show, some inactive social media accounts, a garden at an English university.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: In many ways, Fu has been airbrushed away. But that would prove harder to do with Qin. Qin had been the country's foreign minister, a state counselor.
--:-- Lingling Wei: And over a year after his disappearance, there had been little indication of what his future could be.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And then this summer, the Chinese Communist Party dropped a hint.
--:-- Lingling Wei: That's next.
--:-- Announcer: Sponsored jobs receive 45% more applications than non-sponsored jobs, according to Indeed data. Plus, with sponsored jobs, there are no monthly subscriptions or long-term contracts. You're only paying for results.
--:-- Announcer: There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash journal.
--:-- Chris Johnson: According to our sources, Chinese officials were told that Qin disappeared due to an explosive allegation.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: That's Chris Johnson, another former CIA official. Chris has been analyzing and observing China for years.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Like us, he was captivated by the mystery of Qinggang's disappearance.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And this summer, he thought there might be an opportunity to learn something about Qin's status.
--:-- Chris Johnson: There was something called the Third Plenum of the 20th Central Committee. These are these plenary sessions.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The Third Plenum.
--:-- Chris Johnson: It's a high-profile Communist Party meeting, the kind of event that in past years, Qin would have been part of.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Hundreds of party officials converge on Beijing, dressed in black suits and military uniforms.
--:-- Chris Johnson: They gather at the Great Hall of the People in a room draped in revolutionary red.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The official goal of the meeting is to discuss economic matters.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And it was largely focused on economic matters.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But if there's any personnel housekeeping that needs to be done, then oftentimes they will do that as well, because the party constitution actually requires them to do it that way if they're adding or removing members of the Central Committee.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And as I like to say, the Chinese Communist Party doesn't have a lot of rules, but the few that they have, they actually do follow.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: These personnel changes were what China watchers like Chris and reporters like Ling Ling were looking out for.
--:-- Chris Johnson: At the end of the plenum, the party releases a written recap of the meeting, a communique.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And when it came out, Ling Ling scrolled straight down to the personnel section for news.
--:-- Chris Johnson: One key change involves our man, Qin Gang.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: What happened?
--:-- Chris Johnson: So the communique that was issued by state media stated that, quote, Comrade Qin Gang's resignation request was accepted, and Comrade Qin Gang was removed from his position as a member of the Central Committee.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: In the months after his disappearance Chin had been stripped of most of his official titles He was no longer foreign minister and no longer state counselor But there was one title he held on to He was still a member of the Communist Party's Central Committee.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Now, the party was announcing he'd been stripped of that final title, too.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Chin's high-flying political career was officially over.
--:-- Chris Johnson: But crucially... Chin Gang was listed as comrade. Comrade Chin Gang, which tells us that he's still a party member.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And so he would not still be a party member if they had intention to prosecute him.
--:-- Chris Johnson: So we had a sense then that he was going to be at least spared that, number one.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And then number two, it was equally clear they weren't going to say another thing about his case.
--:-- Chris Johnson: It's sort of like, Comrade Chinggong has left, and we're moving on.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: But Chin still hasn't been seen. And the party hasn't explained his absence.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Chris says that's unusual. Almost always, there's an instinct inside the system to want to show the system is not rotten.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: There are a few bad apples. And when we find these bad apples, we throw the book at them and they go away.
--:-- Chris Johnson: So in other words, his having disappeared for months and months and months with no explanation as to what happened to him, that leaves a sort of running sore, if you want to call it that, that the regime in normal times would explain in some way or the other.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And it's absolutely clear they don't intend to explain this.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And if it was just an extramarital affair, they would.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The fact that they're not doing that explains to us that whatever has happened is of great sensitivity to them.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And highly embarrassing.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Qin's rise to the top of Chinese politics had ended in a spectacular fall.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And that failure didn't just reflect on Qin.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Xi Jinping trusted Qin Gang so much. Remember, Qin Gang was picked by the top leader himself, right?
--:-- Chris Johnson: Before all this went down.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: So it would be egg on the face of Xi Jinping.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Exactly.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: He decides who gets promoted and who gets demoted. He controls the security, very powerful security apparatus.
--:-- Chris Johnson: He decides how to run the world's second largest economy.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: So he's the one man, right, who makes all those important decisions.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Xi trusted Qin.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Xi made Qin China's ambassador to the U.S. He made Qin foreign minister and state counselor.
--:-- Chris Johnson: In the end, those decisions backfired.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And when they did, Qin, one of the party's rising stars, disappeared.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Just like so many others in Xi's China.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: This practice of secret detention, investigation, torture, execution is a kind of practice that's been in existence for many decades.
--:-- Chris Johnson: But under Xi Jinping, we have heard more prominent figures disappearing.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Under Xi, the net of disappearances has widened.
--:-- Chris Johnson: It's not just the usual suspects who disappear, the journalists, activists, corrupt politicians.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: It's business people, bankers, government advisors, high-level military officials.
--:-- Chris Johnson: And in some cases, it's Xi's supporters, like Chin.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: People had thought that, you know, as long as you're close to Xi Jinping, you're safe.
--:-- Chris Johnson: You know, no matter how many bad things you do, you're safe. You're going to be safe.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: And obviously, Qinggang's downfall showed that the fact that I promoted you is not a guarantee for your political safety down the road.
--:-- Chris Johnson: Ling Ling doesn't write off the possibility that Chin could reemerge one day, that he won't stay missing.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Maybe he'll be granted a low-level government job.
--:-- Chris Johnson: There could even be a pension, government health care.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: It would be a small life, nothing like the one he had before when he was an actor on the world stage.
--:-- Chris Johnson: But whether that happens, whether Chin ever gets to exist again, whether Fu and her baby ever reappear.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: It'll likely be at the discretion of one man, Xi Jinping.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: The Missing Minister is part of the journal, which is a co-production of Spotify and The Wall Street Journal.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: I'm your host, Kate Leinbaugh.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: This series was produced by Annie Minoff and Alan Rodriguez Espinosa.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: It was reported by Maria Byrne and Lingling Wei.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: It was edited by Maria Byrne.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Additional reporting in this episode from Max Colchester, Anne Simmons, and Warren Strobel.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Mary Mathis is our fact checker.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Sound design and mixing by Griffin Tanner.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Music direction by Nathan Singapak.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Music in this episode by Nathan Singapok, Peter Leonard, Griffin Tanner, and Blue Dot Sessions.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Our theme music is by So Wiley and Remix by Nathan Singapok.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Special thanks to Katherine Brewer, Elena Cherney, Laura Morris, Alana Patterson, Sarah Platt, Heather Rogers, Aruna Vishwanatha, and to the entire Journal team.
--:-- Kate Leinbaum: Thanks for listening. Thank you.
