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The US National Security Adviser Talks With a Top Chinese Military Official in Beijing

Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission, right, shakes hands with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan before a meeting at the Bayi building in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, Pool)
Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission, right, shakes hands with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan before a meeting at the Bayi building in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, Pool)
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The US National Security Adviser Talks With a Top Chinese Military Official in Beijing

Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission, right, shakes hands with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan before a meeting at the Bayi building in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, Pool)
Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission, right, shakes hands with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan before a meeting at the Bayi building in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, Pool)

United States National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan met Thursday with a top Chinese military official as the two countries strengthen communication in an effort to prevent differences over the South China Sea and Taiwan from spiraling into conflict.
The meeting came one day after the White House said that both countries would plan for a phone call between Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden in the coming weeks.
Sullivan was wrapping up a three-day trip to China, his first as national security adviser and one aimed at stabilizing bilateral relations to avoid conflict. His main talks were held over the past day and a half with Wang Yi, the foreign minister and the ruling Communist Party’s top foreign policy official, The Associated Press said.
The meeting Thursday was with Gen. Zhang Youxia, one of two vice chairs of the Central Military Commission, an organization that Xi personally heads. It was a rare meeting with a US official that came at a time when both sides are eager to keep relations on an even keel ahead of a change in the US presidency in January.
“Your request to meet with me shows the value you attach to military security and the relationship between our militaries,” Zhang told Sullivan in opening remarks.
A White House statement after the talks said the two had “recognized the progress in sustained, regular military-military communications over the past ten months” and noted the agreement announced Wednesday to hold a telephone call between commanders at the theater-level in the near future.
China suspended communication between the two militaries and in a few other fields after a senior US lawmaker, then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, visited Taiwan in August 2022. Talks were only gradually resumed more than a year later, after Xi and Biden met outside San Francisco in November.
A theater-level call would be between Adm. Samuel Paparo, who heads the US Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii, and his Chinese counterpart, said Danny Russel, a vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute in New York.
“This theater command-level dialogue is critical for crisis prevention but something the Chinese military has been resisting,” Russel said.
A White House statement after talks with Wang concluded Wednesday said both sides would keep lines of communication open, including planning for a “leader-level call” in the coming weeks. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said Wang and Sullivan discussed “a new round of interactions between the two countries’ heads of state to take place in the near future.”
There was no indication whether the two leaders might meet in person before Biden leaves the Oval Office.

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CIA Official: Suspects in Foiled Plot to Attack Taylor Swift Shows Aimed to Kill 'Tens Of Thousands'

Security officers stand outside Wembley Stadium ahead of a Taylor Swift concert, following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna because of a planned attack, in London, Britain, August 15, 2024. REUTERS/Toby Melville
Security officers stand outside Wembley Stadium ahead of a Taylor Swift concert, following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna because of a planned attack, in London, Britain, August 15, 2024. REUTERS/Toby Melville
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CIA Official: Suspects in Foiled Plot to Attack Taylor Swift Shows Aimed to Kill 'Tens Of Thousands'

Security officers stand outside Wembley Stadium ahead of a Taylor Swift concert, following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna because of a planned attack, in London, Britain, August 15, 2024. REUTERS/Toby Melville
Security officers stand outside Wembley Stadium ahead of a Taylor Swift concert, following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna because of a planned attack, in London, Britain, August 15, 2024. REUTERS/Toby Melville

The suspects in the foiled plot to attack Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna earlier this month sought to kill “tens of thousands” of fans before the CIA discovered intelligence that disrupted the planning and led to arrests, the agency's deputy director said.
The CIA notified Austrian authorities of the scheme, which allegedly included links to the ISIS group. The intelligence and subsequent arrests ultimately led to the cancellation of three sold-out Eras Tour shows, devastating fans who had traveled across the globe to see Swift in concert.
CIA Deputy Director David Cohen addressed the failed plot during the annual Intelligence and National Security Summit, held this week in Maryland, The Associated Press said.
“They were plotting to kill a huge number — tens of thousands of people at this concert, including I am sure many Americans — and were quite advanced in this," Cohen said Wednesday. “The Austrians were able to make those arrests because the agency and our partners in the intelligence community provided them information about what this ISIS-connected group was planning to do.”
Austrian officials said the main suspect, a 19-year-old Austrian man, was inspired by the ISIS group. He allegedly planned to attack outside the stadium, where upwards of 30,000 fans were expected to gather, with knives or homemade explosives. Another 65,000 fans were likely to be inside the venue. Investigators discovered chemical substances and technical devices during a raid of the suspect's home.
The 19-year-old’s lawyer has said the allegations were “overacting at its best,” and contended Austrian authorities were “presenting this exaggeratedly” in order to get new surveillance powers.
Swift broke her silence about the cancellations last week after her London shows had concluded.
“Having our Vienna shows canceled was devastating,” she wrote in a statement posted to Instagram. “The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows.”
She thanked authorities — “thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives,” she wrote — and said she waited to speak until the European leg of her Eras Tour concluded to prioritize safety.
“Let me be very clear: I am not going to speak about something publicly if I think doing so might provoke those who would want to harm the fans who come to my shows,” she wrote.
Concert organizer Barracuda Music said it canceled the three-night Vienna run that would have begun Aug. 8 because the arrests made in connection to the conspiracy were too close to showtime.
The main suspect and a 17-year-old were taken into custody on Aug. 6, the day before the cancellations were announced. A third suspect, 18, was arrested Aug. 8.
The shows in London, the next stop after Vienna, came on the heels of a stabbing at a Swift-themed dance class that left three little girls dead in the UK In a statement issued after the Southport attack, Swift said she was “just completely in shock” and “at a complete loss for how to ever convey my sympathies to these families.” News outlets reported that Swift met with some of the survivors backstage in London.
The Vienna plot also drew comparisons to a 2017 attack by a suicide bomber at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England, that killed 22 people. The bomb detonated at the end of Grande’s concert as thousands of young fans were leaving, becoming the deadliest extremist attack in the United Kingdom in recent years.
Cohen on Wednesday praised the CIA's work in preventing the planned violence, saying that other counterterrorism “successes” in foiling plots typically go unheralded.
“I can tell you within my agency, and I'm sure in others, there were people who thought that was a really good day for Langley,” he said, referring to the CIA headquarters. “And not just the Swifties in my workforce.”
The record-smashing tour is on hiatus until the fall.