Officials worry that foreign interests might be behind purchase of nearly $1 billion-worth of land around major USAF base



An investment group has snatched up roughly 52,000 acres of land — much of dubious agricultural value — around a critical U.S. Air Force base northeast of San Francisco.

These acquisitions and the investors' obscurity have government officials worried about possible ulterior motivations as well as security risks.

Travis Air Force Base in Solano County, on the southwestern edge of the Sacramento Valley, is known as the "Gateway to the Pacific." Its host unit is the 60th Air Mobility Wing and is home to the 621st Contingency Response Wing, the 349th Air Mobility Wing, and over 50 partner organizations. The base itself has just over 7,600 active USAF personnel and 4,250 Air Force Reserve personnel.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the investment group Flannery Associates has spent around $1 billion in recent years to become the largest landowner in Solano County, acquiring some 52,000 acres across 300 parcels of land near the base, 20 of which surround Travis.

The company has admitted in court filings to paying prices of "multiples of fair market value" for the land.

Solano County Supervisor Mitch Mashburn said, "The majority of the land they're purchasing is dry farmland. ... I don't see where that land can turn a profit to make it worth almost a billion dollars in investment."

Rio Vista Mayor Ronald Kott told the Journal, "Nobody can figure out who they are. ... Whatever they're doing—this looks like a very long-term play."

A spokesman for the base indicated that USAF officials "are aware of the multiple land purchases near the base and are actively working internally and externally with other agencies."

The USAF's Foreign Investment Risk Review Office has reportedly been looking into the group's acquisitions, but has not yet been able to determine precisely who is backing Flannery Associates.

An attorney for the group, whose CEO was listed with the California Secretary of State's Office as Andrew Lerner, claimed Flannery is controlled by American citizens and that 97% of its invested capital derives from U.S. investors. The remainder is allegedly from British and Irish investors.

"Any speculation that Flannery’s purchases are motivated by the proximity to Travis Air Force Base" is unfounded, the attorney told the Journal.

The group's attorney previously told Solano County that Flannery "is owned by a group of families looking to diversify their portfolio from equities into real assets, including agricultural land in the western United States," reported the Daily Republic.

Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), on the House Armed Services Committee's readiness panel, said, "We don’t know who Flannery is, and their extensive purchases do not make sense to anybody in the area. ... The fact that they're buying land purposefully right up to the fence at Travis raises significant questions."

This is not the first land grab in recent months to inspire concern.

The Washington Examiner recently noted that China, the U.S.'s preeminent adversary on the world stage, has been buying up vast swathes of American land. Whereas in 2011, when Chinese investors owned 69,295 acres of American land, by year-end 2021, they controlled nearly 400,000 acres.

A Beijing-linked group recently attempted to buy 300 acres of land, some 20 minutes away from the Grand Forks Air Force Base. This prompted bipartisan backlash as well as vexation amongst local airmen.

CNBC reported that Maj. Jeremy Fox circulated a memo inside the Air Force, claiming the purchase would both be a security threat to the U.S. and fit a pattern of "Chinese subnational espionage campaigns using commercial economic development projects to get close to Department of Defense installations."

Fox wrote, "Some of the most sensitive elements of Grand Forks exist with the digital uplinks and downlinks inherent with unmanned air systems and their interaction with space-based assets."

According to Fox, the USAF would be more or less unable to detect surveillance on drone and satellite transmissions being waged by potential Chinese actors.

"Passive collection of those signals would be undetectable, as the requirements to do so would merely require ordinary antennas tuned to the right collecting frequencies. ... This introduces a grave vulnerability to our Department of Defense installations and is incredibly compromising to US National Security," wrote Fox.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) told the Examiner earlier this year, "Allowing Chinese companies with connections to the party-state to buy strategically important land in the United States is a national security threat. ... We need to treat the Chinese Communist Party for what it is — our greatest adversary."

Extra to land grabs, the Chinese regime has: agents conducting illegal police operations in the U.S. along with harassment and espionage campaigns; a hand in the deadly influx of fentanyl across the southern border via their informal partners in the Mexican cartels; and has flown reconnaissance flyovers through American skies.

Microsoft publicly revealed earlier this summer that the Chinese communist regime has also taken significant steps to undermine critical American infrastructure. These attacks — using malicious computer code that enables remote access to various devices — appear to be a pre-emptive attempt by the genocidal state to develop the upper hand should the two nations soon come to blows.

While attempting to corrode American capability and making clandestine incursions into the U.S., Chinese officials have also issued threats.

Concerning the land grabs in Solano County, Garamendi and fellow California Democratic Rep. Mike Thompson have pushed for a probe by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., reported the Journal.

The U.S. Agriculture Department has also pressed for answers concerning Flannery's backers.

The Journal indicated that local and federal officials' inability to learn the identities of those in the Flannery group is in part due to the fact that Delaware-registered LLCs, such as Flannery Associates, do not have to publicly disclose the identity of their owners.

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Europeans unwilling to back US in war with China: Poll



The U.S. fought valiantly to liberate Europe from totalitarian powers in the 20th century and footed the bill for its latest fight with Russia.

Now, confronted with the threat of an increasingly aggressive and genocidal threat in the east, it appears America may not be able to rely on its continental beneficiaries to return the favor.

The European Council on Foreign Relations just published the results of an extensive poll of over 6,000 people across 11 European Union member nations — Austria, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and Sweden — "to understand how European citizens see their place in the world today."

In the event of a war between the U.S. and China — as might result from a Chinese invasion of the island nation of Taiwan — only a quarter of European respondents, on average, "would like their country, or Europe, to take America’s side."

62% of Europeans surveyed would like to remain neutral, notwithstanding their nations' ongoing infiltration by Chinese communist spies, subversion by illegal Chinese police operations, and economic coercion by Beijing.

The survey also found:

  • On average, 3.3% of European citizens regard China as an ally "that shares our interests and values";
  • 43% recognize China as a "necessary partner ... with which we must strategically cooperate";
  • 7% of both French and German respondents suggested Europe or their countries should support China against the U.S in a war, whereas only 4.7% of Europeans, on average, would want to side with the genocidal communists;
  • Bulgarians, the most anti-American of the bunch, were the most likely to regard China as a "necessary partner" (58%) and tied for most likely to regard China as an ally (8%);
  • Swedes were the most hawkish on China, with 26% calling it an adversary "with which we are in conflict" and 24% calling it a rival "with which we need to compete"; and
  • 35% of Swedes and 31% of Poles would want to support the U.S. in a war with China over Taiwan.

Jana Puglierin and Pawel Zerka, senior policy fellows at the ECFR, indicated the notion of neutrality was naïve, writing, "While remaining neutral in the case of great power confrontation is an appealing idea, a US-China confrontation would have a massive impact on Europe’s trade and economy at a minimum and European countries would certainly not be neutral bystanders. In addition, the US would likely demand loyalty from Europeans, reminding them of America’s pivotal role in ensuring a strong Western response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine."

There appear to be two dominant schools of thought in Europe: de-risking and deference. While both entail some form of continued appeasement of Beijing, the latter appears to involve more mental gymnastics on the part of leaders who routinely pay lip service to the importance of democracy and human rights.

The ECFR indicated that European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and French President Emmanuel Macron exemplify the two varieties of collaborators.

Von der Leyen acknowledged in a March speech that China is ramping up its military posture, its policies of disinformation, and economic and trade coercion, stressing, "These escalatory actions point to a China that is becoming more repressive at home and more assertive abroad."

While recognizing the destabilization and repression China threatens, von der Leyen went on to say, "I believe it is neither viable – nor in Europe's interest – to decouple from China. Our relations are not black or white – and our response cannot be either. This is why we need to focus on de-risk – not de-couple."

De-risking, according to von der Leyen, will require addressing "distortions created by China's state capitalist system," reassessing the terms of the Comprehensive Agreement on Investment, altogether reducing dependence on China, and limiting economic and national security exposure "in the context of China's explicit fusion of its military and commercial sectors."

Macron, alternatively, makes von der Leyen out to be a hawk with his deferential stance to Beijing.

The ECFR suggested that Macron is willing to prioritize close economic relations, even if that compromises allied nations.

"Macron spoke of reviving the strategic and global partnership with China and deliberately avoided critical remarks on the subject of Taiwan. Like Scholz before him, Macron was accompanied by a business delegation, which concluded numerous agreements in China," reported the ECFR. "Macron’s message to Xi was clear: Paris wants close economic relations with Beijing, even if China does not oppose Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and continues to maintain close relations with the Kremlin."

The New York Times reported that during his China trip in April, Macron reiterated his opposition to the economic decoupling from China favored by the U.S. and his preference for a world where American dominance was minimized or zapped altogether.

According to the ECFR's findings, "European citizens are more on Team Macron than Team von der Leyen. They do not see China as a power that challenges and wants to undermine Europe, and they do not buy into the 'democracy versus autocracy' framework promoted by the Biden administration."

Among the 11 nations where citizens were polled, it appears Germany, Sweden, France, and Denmark are outliers in terms of their citizenry recognizing China as a "rival" or an "adversary."

The rest reckon China to be an "ally" or a "partner."

The Euro-Sino love-in could be disrupted, however, if Beijing officially begins arming Russia.

"On average, 41 per cent would be ready to sanction Beijing in that event, even if that meant seriously damaging Western economies. A minority of 33 per cent, on average, would oppose this," reported the ECFR.

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