Tse Chi Lop: The CCP’s Shadow Commander in the Global Drug War — Part II

Second in a series of six articles on the CCP's Reverse Opium War.

In 2011, when notorious drug trafficker Tse Chi Lop quietly returned to China and Hong Kong, Xi Jinping was Vice President of China, poised to become General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Tse’s homecoming marked more than just a change of scenery; it symbolized a turning point in China's global narcotics campaign — what some analysts have begun to call a Reverse Opium War.

This modern drug war is not a chaotic convergence of criminal actors, but rather a long-planned, state-enabled assault on the West — orchestrated by a strategic alliance at the highest levels of the CCP, known here as the Ye-Xi clique. The Ye-Xi clique, composed of military intelligence spy master Ye Xuanning, the ‘Emperor of the South’ Ye Xuanping, and their protégé Xi Jinping, originated a doctrine of political warfare leveraging Chinese organized crime and the United Front Work Department (UFWD) as dual instruments of subversion. The goal: to exploit Canada for launching indirect attacks on the United States.

Tse Chi Lop’s record in North America — including his extensive network across Toronto, Vancouver, and the U.S. — appears to have earned him a major promotion within this covert war machine. In the years following his return to Asia, Tse orchestrated the following:

· Coordination of an industrial-scale supply chain for synthetic drugs like fentanyl, methamphetamine, and ketamine, using factories and chemical suppliers in southern China, particularly Guangdong, but also in Southeast Asia.

· Unification of warring triads, including the 14K and Bamboo Union, under a single entity known as Sam Gor (“The Company”), with Tse himself as the undisputed boss (this was impossible without the involvement of the CCP).

· Creation of a business plan that integrated logistics, distribution, money laundering, and political influence operations, many of which appear designed to destabilize and corrupt Western governments.

This network did not grow by accident. It evolved with what can only be described as military precision, with overlapping operations in Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, Australia, Mexico, and North America. These developments, the writer argues, would have been impossible without the knowledge and support of Xi Jinping and his insiders who assumed control after the Ye brothers passed away, Ye Xuanning died in 2016 and Ye Xuanping in 2019.

To understand the roots of this modern drug war, one must revisit the role of Ye Xuanning, son of Marshal Ye Jianying and longtime head of the PLA General Political Department’s Liaison Office — China’s equivalent of a covert operations HQ. From 1986 to 1998, Ye Xuanning served as China’s spy master, directing influence operations, illicit finance, and United Front activities. Though officially retired in 1998, Ye reportedly continued to serve as the CCP’s shadow strategist until his death in 2016.

The writer believes Ye Xuanning personally selected and promoted Tse Chi Lop, overseeing his development in Hong Kong, tracking his movements in Canada and the U.S., and ultimately placing him atop the Sam Gor, or The Company. Under Ye’s guidance, Tse joined a broader network of operatives tasked with waging this clandestine war against the West. These operatives included:

· Lai Changxing, mastermind of the multibillion-dollar Yuanhua smuggling scandal, with deep ties to Fujian and Guangdong CCP factions;

· Ng Lap Seng, the Macau billionaire and UN bribery convict who channeled CCP funds into U.S. politics during the Clinton era;

· Ye Jianming (no relation to the Ye brothers), Xi Jinping’s personal influence machine, succeeded in penetrating both US political parties from 2014-2018;

· Zhenli Ye Gon, the Chinese-Mexican chemical supplier whose firm shipped vast quantities of synthetic drug precursors to Mexican cartels;

· Wan Kuok-koi (“Broken Tooth”), former 14K triad boss turned patriotic entrepreneur with ties to CCP United Front operations across Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands.

Together, these figures represent a covert alliance of criminal syndicates, business fronts, and intelligence networks, assembled by Ye Xuanning to operate in parallel (and at times in conjunction with) official Chinese diplomatic staff and businesses.

One of the earliest public warnings of this campaign occurred in the mid-1990s, when Chinese companies with links to the PLA attempted to smuggle military-grade weapons into the Port of Oakland. The weapons were reportedly destined for gangs in California, a chilling early signal of Beijing’s interest in weaponizing organized crime inside the United States. Although the U.S. media largely downplayed this incident, those familiar with CCP strategy viewed it as a trial balloon — a testing ground for deeper infiltration and disruption. Also, the weapons smuggling cloaked in secrecy abroad, may have been repackaged at home as a triumphant public relations campaign to glorify its architects and legitimize their power. (see Wide Fountain’s “Chinagate” paid post).

This incident, like much of the modern drug war, leads back to Ye Xuanning and the Ye-Xi clique. Their strategic vision, the writer contends, is not just to enrich themselves or eliminate dissidents, but to dismantle Western resistance through addiction, corruption, and subversion.

As synthetic drugs continue to claim lives in record numbers across North America, it is time, the writer argues, for the West to confront Beijing directly. The systematic export of fentanyl precursors, the laundering of drug profits through CCP-connected networks, and the political shielding of known traffickers like Tse Chi Lop, Zhenli Ye Gon, and Broken Tooth all point to a coordinated campaign of narcotic warfare - a Reverse Opium War.

Postscript: My on-the-ground experience in Hong Kong, China, and Southeast Asia since the mid-1980s led me to question the nature of Chinese strategic corruption over the past 35 years and to conduct extensive independent research in search of answers. In this Substack I share my observations and research and look forward to the day when strategic corruption is no longer hidden behind diplomacy, and accountability replaces denial (on all sides).

Notes:

Tom Allard, Reuters, Oct, 14, 2019

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/meth-syndicate/

Joshua Berlinger, CNN, Sept. 7, 2021

https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/06/asia/tse-chi-lop-sunblock-intl-hnk-dst