Dear College Student,

Welcome back to school! Great to hear you are interested in China! It’s the right subject if you care about the future of the United States and the free world. But you should know that when you study China, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) studies you back — hard.

For instance, if you travel to China, all devices you bring will be hacked; any email or other accounts you access from those devices will be exploited; and you yourself will be monitored and assessed by Chinese intelligence professionals. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: CCP Intelligence Official Buys Building Steps From White House)

Your professors might not have mentioned this.

“Academics who study China,” the economist Carsten Holz wrote in a still-accurate 2007 article, “habitually please” the CCP “through the research questions we ask or don’t ask, through the facts we report or ignore, through our use of language, and through what and how we teach.” Almost two decades ago, Holz identified China scholars’ acceptance of surveillance and internalization of propaganda in exchange for access: “We benefit from our connections in China to obtain information and insights, and we protect these connections” by not offending the CCP. It’s like studying the Mafia, he concluded — and few dare make that comparison out loud.

The exceptions prove the rule, as the party has punished the rare scholars of forbidden topics by denying them visas –........

© The Daily Caller