the Chinese were increasing information barriers and trying to keep U.S. reporters out of Wuhan. The few who slipped in were put in hotel rooms and told not to leave. Others were later expelled. Pottinger concluded the Chinese were more aggressive with expulsions than the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War. All signs were pointing to an effort to hide something. Even before the virus crisis, O’Brien and Pottinger believed China represented the greatest and most fundamental existential national security threat to the United States. “They would love world domination,” O’Brien said during
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