Federal agencies are facing scrutiny after it was revealed that more than 100 taxpayer-funded research projects involved collaboration with Chinese supercomputing centers sanctioned by the U.S. government. These high-powered machines have been tied to Beijing’s weapons development programs, raising new concerns about national security risks.
A review of public records uncovered that the Department of Defense and Department of Energy supported dozens of studies that relied on computing resources from five Chinese facilities, each previously blacklisted by the Commerce Department. These include centers in major cities such as Guangzhou, Beijing and Tianjin — all flagged for helping the Chinese Communist Party build hypersonic missiles and nuclear weapons.
Despite the sanctions, U.S.-based researchers teamed up with individuals in China to run simulations on those supercomputers. In several cases, project authors included Chinese personnel from universities directly overseen by the Central Military Commission, the top command of China’s armed forces.
Michigan Rep. John Moolenaar, chair of the House Select Committee on the CCP, said allowing access to blacklisted systems is “unacceptable” and accused federal researchers of aiding China’s military buildup.
Some of the studies involved seemingly benign subjects like space weather or materials science. However, former Air Force analyst L.J. Eads warned that such research often carries dual-use implications. Space weather data, for example, is essential for missile tracking systems and satellite defense networks.
Records show Argonne, Los Alamos and Oak Ridge national laboratories were involved in dozens of the projects. While spokesmen at each facility denied that their staff directly used the banned Chinese computers, they did not deny working with co-authors in China who did.
In one case, researchers in both countries thanked the TianHe-2 supercomputer in Guangzhou — a system tied to nuclear weapons research — for running simulations. In another, a study involving exotic materials linked to advanced energy research referenced help from a supercomputing center in Changsha that had been blacklisted since 2015.
Argonne’s team also collaborated with members of a Chinese military university sanctioned by the U.S. over two decades ago. Los Alamos acknowledged that its scientists helped interpret the results of work conducted on those platforms.
The Energy Department has not responded to questions about how such partnerships were approved despite the export controls in place.
