9 ms·

Huawei is dividing Western nations

78 points by ajaviaad 7y ago

Priem19 7y ago
Does someone have a source without this nonsense? https://guce.advertising.com/collectIdentifiers?sessionId=3_cc-session_bb176a60-85a0-4720-8f0a-4c000253c231 https://guce.advertising.com/collectIdentifiers?sessionId=3_...
- ganzuul 7y ago
  Yeah, this is unacceptable bullshit. http://archive.is/wXQaO http://archive.is/wXQaO to the rescue.
- yesenadam 7y ago
  "Privacy Badger detected 27 potential trackers on this page." I'm a pretty new user, but gee, I don't think I've seen a third that many on a page before.
echelon 7y ago
What are the British thinking? Do they think they'll get a better deal from China than the US? Or is their intention to use this as a bargaining chip against the US?
- Jonnax 7y ago
  Thinking? Telcos want to deploy 5G, customers aren't willing to pay more for it. So they want to do it as cheaply as possible.
- g_p 7y ago
  In addition to the "it's cheaper" point (due to Huawei being a significant recipient of state aid, and European alternatives not being able to receive any state aid), it's worth keeping an eye on some of the wording being used by the UK government. They've said nothing safety critical or necessary to critical national infrastructure can run over Huawei base stations. It will be a brave (i.e. foolish) mobile operator that turns away large connected vehicle contracts (clearly there will be significant safety implications there), or large scale industrial IoT users. If the rules are applied as it seems they are designed to, it looks like the intention is to let the operators make that choice, rather than dictating who they will use, while putting in sufficient restrictions to heavily influence it. Prior to the government's (long overdue) decision on this topic, which came after 5G non-standalone networks were deployed in the field in some cities, the operators all came out to say how much it would cost them to remove all their Huawei equipment and replace it. They lobbied hard to be allowed to keep using it! But it seems that perhaps they have been given a decision that they themselves haven't quite realised will feel an awful lot like a ban...
- i_have_suffered 7y ago
  Well, I think it's along the lines of "The US has behaved recklessly for the last 20 years, and any personal or corporate preferment for a US entity has been supported at the cost of the national interest of its allies. We have discovered all sorts of theft and malpractice by US companies and intelligence agencies and yet any complaint made to the US government is met with a smirk and a shrug. Not only does the US ignore our national interest, but US officials are openly contemptuous of it. The Chinese are evil and their values are alien to us, but the US is increasingly more similar to Saudi Arabia in it's values, system of government and international outlook than it is to us. We don't trust the USA and we need to have options." If the UK goes all in with the USA we will end up looking like Mexico. If we go all in on Europe we will end up looking like Italy, or Greece (as was made clear in the aftermath of the 2011 veto). Many people who are not from the UK seem really keen that the UK is smashed up and humbled, we are supposed to be poor, sardonic and to provide cutting edge humor. This is not a great direction of travel for everyone who lives here though. Fundamentally the UK is alone in the world and needs to grow up and act like it - so we need to make some sort of bargain with the Chinese, and the Russians (which is much harder as they are acting as the perfect irrational player in the game of international relations right now).
- tonyedgecombe 7y ago
  The UK is weak following Brexit, it needs friends wherever it can find them.
  - i_have_suffered 7y ago
    The UK's weakness was exposed by the 2011 veto and subsequent upending of the EU treaties to suit everyone apart from the UK. We had been floundering in that club since 2009, despite bailing out other members (ie. Ireland) - and when push came to shove Germany and France made it clear that the UK could shove off. The UK is no weaker now than it was then - it's just that it's clear where we stand. The great powers of the world (China, US, Germany) act in their own interests, the UK must act as if that is true and attempt to navigate around them - or we must simply be subjugated to one of them. I believe that Germany in particular will regret this situation in the future, with a pretense of a triumvirate of powers and associated allies (ie. France, Italy, Spain etc; UK, Poland, etc; Germany and everyone else) there was a chance of a very different EU. That's gone now and Germany must take the reigns - and it will be in a very different strategic context.
    - tonyedgecombe 7y ago
      We had a huge influence over the EU, that's gone out the window now. You can't become great by isolating yourself.
      - i_have_suffered 7y ago
        We had a huge influence right up until push came to shove and then we had none. I agree we can't become great - isolation or not; I believe that isolation isn't on the table either - next few weeks excluded. The reality is that France and Germany shafted the UK publicly and conclusively during the euro crisis, they also shafted the Greeks - but I'm not Greek so that's less of a problem for me. Remember also that they removed an Italian government and installed a technocrat. Yet lots of people seem to have forgotten that and either don't care or can't bring themselves to see the reality of the situation.
- guacamole4 7y ago
  UK banned Huawei from all critical parts of their network, all sensitive locations (factories, military, energy, etc), as well as restricted market share to 30% elsewhere. They also officially labeled Huawei as the only provider that is a threat to national security. Even Beijing slammed their decision. Trump wanted to have the complete ban to go even further, but that wouldn't bring any practical value to the UK given the limitations they did impose.
Roritharr 7y ago
China is indeed very divise for our global powerstructures. This Video shows a WHO official battling with this(if you want to look kindly upon him): https://twitter.com/nathanlawkc/status/1243889673207832577 https://twitter.com/nathanlawkc/status/1243889673207832577 What bugs me is that I'm really unsure if I should post anything critical of China, it's scary what that could mean for my family 30 years down the road.
- echelon 7y ago
  > What bugs me is that I'm really unsure if I should post anything critical of China, it's scary what that could mean for my family 30 years down the road. I thought the same and I have no family ties there. (Though back in the early 00's I had fun studying in China and had wished to return.) I'm more worried about what happens if we don't speak out. While we need to fix our Western democracies, we can't ignore the biggest threat to freedom in the world. I think this virus situation could potentially unite the world in looking critically at supply chains and the CCP's motives and behavior. When this is all over, I hope every county tallies the bill for the virus and subtracts that from their debt to China. The CCP lied, hid information, and told us to keep travel open while simultaneously welding people inside their homes. They then shifted blame to the West and threatened to cut off critical medical supplies. It's worse than negligent, and they should lose their investments overseas to repay the damage done.
  - chrischen 7y ago
    > When this is all over, I hope every county tallies the bill for the virus and subtracts that from their debt to China. They lied, hid information, and told us to keep travel open while simultaneously welding people inside their homes. It's worse than negligent, and they should lose their investments overseas to repay the damage done. I think you're being generous to the administration for assigning blame to China. We didn't really trust anything coming out of China before so why would we conveniently be expected to trust China regarding the virus? There was also plenty of time to see warning signs in countries like South Korea... not to mention several countries that much higher risk for the spread of the virus have contained it (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore). If you are to believe Trump then he saved a lot of lives by banning travel from China... and then killed a lot of people by doing absolutely nothing after that.
chvid 7y ago
I think the main issue is that most europeans are just not so hot on a war with China as the americans are; even after a massive media campaign. I believe the next move by the US will be to force TSMC not to supply Huawei. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-huawei-tech-chips-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-prepares-crackdown-on-huaweis-global-chip-supply-sources-idUSKBN21D2E4 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-huawei-tech-chips-exc... That will be a major blow to Huawei (and TSMC) and will force the Chinese to setup their own chip production as fast as possible. Will probably be quite a thing to follow.
- thre234324 7y ago
  The Americans might think of East Asians as their slaves, but experience has showed that even the vassals of the US are generally not as hard as the Americans/Europeans would like. This is but a reprisal of the old colonizers running around wrecking Asia to their will; I wonder if India will serve its old role of being the mercenary for destroying Asia again.
  - eklavya 7y ago
    Hmm, what have we Indians ever destroyed?
    - mlvljr 7y ago
      Tourists' stomachs with (some of) your foods, allegedly!
    - manquer 7y ago
      Perhaps he is alluding to India’s involvement in the opium trade during the 19th century ?
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
    - blackrock 7y ago
      Do you really not know your own history? The Indian soldiers were the grunts in the British army. The British promised you riches, if you participated in the raping of China, during the Opium Wars, and you fell for it. The British played you well. And they also payed up. This is why there is a heavy presence of Indians in Hong Kong, and some of them seem to come straight out of the 1800s, as if time stood still for them. Like, they’re a direct lineage from that military past. The British even made you believe that it was your own fault for the Bengal famine of 1943. That’s how brilliant they were at manipulating you. Nowadays, they release movies of James Bond, and make you love them, and want to be like them, and forget all about their past transgressions. Their brainwashing propaganda is so subtle and insidious, that it’s brilliant. Look up the background to George Orwell’s 1984 novel. This was actually about his real life experiences in the British intelligence services in India, and about their incredible brainwashing ability. Where reality is indeed, stranger than fiction.
millstone 7y ago
How is it that the west allowed Huawei to gain such a lead in 5G? If this has national security implications, why didn't the US support its domestic telecom firms?
- freyir 7y ago
  The US hasn't had domestic telecom infrastructure firms for many years. We rely on Nokia and Ericsson, and both have failed to compete with Huawei.
  - millstone 7y ago
    What about Qualcomm, Motorola, Intel?
    - g_p 7y ago
      When it comes to building the mobile network itself, none of the companies you mention have any footprint in that space. It's really the 3 (Nokia, Ericsson and Huawei) along with some less prominent players (Samsung, ZTE etc). The vast majority of networks are using the big 3.
    - freyir 7y ago
      They're on the handset side. The cellular infrastructure itself comes from Huawei, Ericsson, and Nokia.
- g_p 7y ago
  This is the key question! Both Europe and the USA took their eye off the ball. Europe's overly strict rules on "state aid" (giving public money to fund private sector work) mean that large, publicly traded telecoms companies are outsourcing their own R&D out to China, simply to save money. Few people realise, but that's where Nokia and Ericsson do a lot of their 5G R&D, and this can be verified with a quick dig around jobs and LinkedIn etc. Huawei is the recipient of large quantities of state aid domestically, as well as the beneficiary of inter-governnental loans from the Chinese government to other countries for the purpose of building a mobile network! https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-journal-calculated-huaweis-state-support-11577280830 https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-journal-calculated-huaw... In terms of the USA, they don't have a significant notional domestic player in base stations - if we consider significant players as being Nokia, Ericsson and Huawei, and consider the former 2 as being mostly European. The obvious existing networking business to enter from the US perspective would be Cisco, and they weren't interested in this kind of low margin stuff (which says a lot about their other pricing!) https://www.ft.com/content/536d28c8-4e87-11ea-95a0-43d18ec715f5 https://www.ft.com/content/536d28c8-4e87-11ea-95a0-43d18ec71... (soft paywall, access via Google referrer)
chrischen 7y ago
America historically is infamous for making sure that anything besides their system (capitalism, supposedly) fails to work, and taking quite an active approach to make sure it happens. In theory, if you believed you're doing things the right way then you shouldn't have to worry about making sure another system fails (if it doesn't fail, then maybe you were wrong?). This applies as much to startups and their attitudes towards competitors (you shouldn't worry about what your competitor does, only that your product is good) as it does to nations and their attitudes towards competing economic and government systems. The crux of this issue is purely political, and based on fears of potentially losing American supremacy. The article even references China as a "rival", and that's exactly what the fears are based on: rivalry. If you believe that these anti-China sentiments from these politicians have anything to do with a belief in freedom, democracy, or human rights, then you're just as brainwashed as the supporters of the Chinese communist party. If our politicians believed in human rights then why didn't they do anything to stop China earlier? Why do they only care when China releases cheaper better technology that could potentially unseat their dominance? Seems like a convenient time to start caring about freedom. Why is accepting cheap plastic crap acceptable, but advanced technology not acceptable? What is the end-game here? If you disagree with the Chinese system then you should be taking action against them. Otherwise it seems like the goal is just to keep the country in a subdued position for eternity, allowing human rights violations so long as your own supremacy is kept?
- SturgeonsLaw 7y ago
  This comment's getting downvoted but I can't really see anything here I disagree with. Would any downvoters like to share an alternative opinion in the interests of discussion?
  - MR4D 7y ago
    I didn’t downvote, but I’ll take a shot at answering it for you.... > If our politicians believed in human rights then why didn't they do anything to stop China earlier? They did. Multiple administrations held the belief that if they could pull China into the fold economically, then they would open up. This strategy was literally the opposite of what the US did with the Soviet Union, with the idea that we didn’t want another Cold War. Clearly it didn’t work, but until a couple years ago, everyone thought it was.
shasheene 7y ago
Huawei is in large part built upon technology stolen from Cisco and Canada's Nortel Networks. In the latter case, there is strong evidence China was able to maintain access to Nortel's internal networks for over a decade (!!) which helped kill the 117 year old company. [1] The government of China is systematically hacking corporations through the Ministry of State Security, and attempting to the switch the allegiances of all ethnically Chinese people across the world through the well-funded overseas political interference organization called the "United Front Work Department" [2]. In both the Australian and New Zealand parliaments, China has actually succeeded in installing individuals with undeclared links to government of China political interference and espionage organizations: Gladys Liu and Jian Yang. While there is no smoking gun that they are directly acting as spies, there is significant amounts of circumstantial evidence that they have been compromised by government of China influence operations. I don't need to explain the risk of politicians compromised by an adversarial government making key national defense decisions. With this reality, why would any government risk allowing Huawei in their networks? [1] https://www.afr.com/technology/how-chinese-hacking-felled-telecommunication-giant-nortel-20140526-iux6a https://www.afr.com/technology/how-chinese-hacking-felled-te... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTXPxWtl8Zw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTXPxWtl8Zw
- baybal2 7y ago
  > which helped kill the 117 year old company. [1] If Nortel ever been killed by somebody, that was by financial engineers from hedge funds, and inexperienced managers that came to board after the bubble popped
- AndyMcConachie 7y ago
  The idea that Nortel was killed by anything other than incompetence and mismanagement is laughably ignorant.
- mettamage 7y ago
  Aren't certain Chinese people in China relatively open about this on a high level? I mean, to me it always sounded as non-believable but there have been some places (documentaries or texts) where a Chinese person would say that the goal of China is to get Chinese people in high places all over the world in a 200+ year time span and then rule it. As I said, I never took it seriously. But maybe people should look into claims like that? Unfortunately, I can't find a source for this because it didn't happen that often and I'm not that politically minded.
kasperni 7y ago
So the US preaches nationalism, protectionism, and isolationism except when it's not in their own interest? Edit: My point (which probably wasn't clear) was that if you run an "America First" agenda. Don't be surprised when your allies start prioritizing their own interest above mutual interests.
- buzzlair 7y ago
  shouldnt be a surprice bro. they have been doing this for decades but still under the pretense of the opposite. protecting marketshare, by bringing up national security as excuse is no surprise move.
- malux85 7y ago
  Um, yes?! Is that surprising?
- Veen 7y ago
  Yes. Each nation looks out for its own interests and the interests of its citizens. The only thing that's surprising is that a large number of citizens seem to think that this is unusual or immoral.
  - thawaway1837 7y ago
    A large number of citizens think that it makes sense for a certain set of nations to work together in many arenas. For decades, Western Europe and North America worked together to both regions’ mutual benefit. Trump has torn that apart, which has basically hurt both sides to China’s benefit which appears as a far less capricious partner.
    - Veen 7y ago
      Nations should work together when their interests coincide. That's just a generalization of the idea that nations work to support their own interests. But, quite often, those interests are in conflict. Some people appear motivated to shit on some nations while ignoring the depredations of others. Perversely, they are opposed to the nation of which they are citizens and embrace "the other side". For example, the claim that "China appears the less capricious partner" ignores an enormous amount of evidence that China screws over international partners with no hesitation should that be in its interests. See the recent stories about WHO delaying the release of information from Taiwan about the coronavirus. https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68 https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6... (The U.S. currently being lead by a lunatic is a side issue.)
nimbius 7y ago
>...the goal of American policy on Huawei is less about security and more about market share – and making sure America, not China, owns the future of 5G. Bingo. Most HN readers saw this for exactly what it was. Most of the premise for the arrest of Meng Wanzhou was comical at best. 30 years of US companies ignoring ITAR with at most a small fine, only to suddenly watch the US issue an extradition warrant for a chinese CFO accused of doing the same thing? I guess if its the cold war its different. Huawei made it to market first. Most of this theatricality from the US government is a last-ditch effort to buy time until US communications companies come out with something remotely 5G. AT&T did their usual tactic with 4g, and rolled out a watered down branded 5GE experience even to phones with no 5G chipset whatsoever in a desperate attempt to brand something they'll likely buy at twice the cost from a US supplier in 2021 just to spite their loss at Huawei. I hate the term intellectual property and its easy to slander people for theft, but the US paved this road in my opinion with massive cuts to education and a public policy that actively persecuted hackers and anyone interested in STEM since the sixties. The US decided to turn their colleges into luxury sports arenas driven by unforgivable student loans and underpaid graduate students as teachers. It drafted legal DMCA and DRM to punish curiousity and reward obedience, and now for the past decade its tried to play both sides of the field. Insisting STEM is something all its citizens must learn, while at the same time branding anyone too interested in technology as aberrant and unlawful, a circumventor in violation of the license for the product they own. Unless and until this changes, im sure China or Korea or some other slave of the international market will own 6, 7 and 8 G as well.
- champagneben 7y ago
  > the US paved this road in my opinion with massive cuts to education How much has the US cut its education budgets?
  - DeonPenny 7y ago
    It as the worlds highest education budget.
    - pas 7y ago
fulafel 7y ago
After decades of campaigning against good security in internet protocols, mandating backdoors in networks, etc - government security organs are miffed that things can't safely run on untrusted networks.
zhengiszen 7y ago
Western nations don't need anyone to divide. Just see the brexit or covid-19 situations ...
- rumanator 7y ago
  Arguably brexit is the result of Russia's psyops effort on the UK, much like it did in the last US presidential elections. And let's not pretend that Russia hasn't been caught financing and supporting far-right parties throughout Europe. https://www.ft.com/content/48c4bfa6-7ca2-11e9-81d2-f785092ab560 https://www.ft.com/content/48c4bfa6-7ca2-11e9-81d2-f785092ab...
  - easytiger 7y ago
    That's unbelievable rubbish
haecceity 7y ago
Western nations divide themselves. Must be nice to shift blame to other though. Wish I could do that.
ngcc_hk 7y ago
Look at the wuhan virus. Trust china you are doom. Just not worth it.
DeonPenny 7y ago
A lot people are to comfortable with china controlling a lot of the world's tech. I'm not in europe but it seems a strange thing to conclude. Either was I will vote against anyone in the US that does and its the best I can do.

78 points by ajaviaad 7y ago

Does someone have a source without this nonsense? https://guce.advertising.com/collectIdentifiers?sessionId=3_cc-session_bb176a60-85a0-4720-8f0a-4c000253c231 https://guce.advertising.com/collectIdentifiers?sessionId=3_...

ganzuul 7y ago
Yeah, this is unacceptable bullshit. http://archive.is/wXQaO http://archive.is/wXQaO to the rescue.
yesenadam 7y ago
"Privacy Badger detected 27 potential trackers on this page." I'm a pretty new user, but gee, I don't think I've seen a third that many on a page before.

echelon 7y ago

What are the British thinking? Do they think they'll get a better deal from China than the US? Or is their intention to use this as a bargaining chip against the US?

Jonnax 7y ago
Thinking? Telcos want to deploy 5G, customers aren't willing to pay more for it. So they want to do it as cheaply as possible.
g_p 7y ago
In addition to the "it's cheaper" point (due to Huawei being a significant recipient of state aid, and European alternatives not being able to receive any state aid), it's worth keeping an eye on some of the wording being used by the UK government. They've said nothing safety critical or necessary to critical national infrastructure can run over Huawei base stations. It will be a brave (i.e. foolish) mobile operator that turns away large connected vehicle contracts (clearly there will be significant safety implications there), or large scale industrial IoT users. If the rules are applied as it seems they are designed to, it looks like the intention is to let the operators make that choice, rather than dictating who they will use, while putting in sufficient restrictions to heavily influence it. Prior to the government's (long overdue) decision on this topic, which came after 5G non-standalone networks were deployed in the field in some cities, the operators all came out to say how much it would cost them to remove all their Huawei equipment and replace it. They lobbied hard to be allowed to keep using it! But it seems that perhaps they have been given a decision that they themselves haven't quite realised will feel an awful lot like a ban...
i_have_suffered 7y ago
Well, I think it's along the lines of "The US has behaved recklessly for the last 20 years, and any personal or corporate preferment for a US entity has been supported at the cost of the national interest of its allies. We have discovered all sorts of theft and malpractice by US companies and intelligence agencies and yet any complaint made to the US government is met with a smirk and a shrug. Not only does the US ignore our national interest, but US officials are openly contemptuous of it. The Chinese are evil and their values are alien to us, but the US is increasingly more similar to Saudi Arabia in it's values, system of government and international outlook than it is to us. We don't trust the USA and we need to have options." If the UK goes all in with the USA we will end up looking like Mexico. If we go all in on Europe we will end up looking like Italy, or Greece (as was made clear in the aftermath of the 2011 veto). Many people who are not from the UK seem really keen that the UK is smashed up and humbled, we are supposed to be poor, sardonic and to provide cutting edge humor. This is not a great direction of travel for everyone who lives here though. Fundamentally the UK is alone in the world and needs to grow up and act like it - so we need to make some sort of bargain with the Chinese, and the Russians (which is much harder as they are acting as the perfect irrational player in the game of international relations right now).
tonyedgecombe 7y ago
The UK is weak following Brexit, it needs friends wherever it can find them.
- i_have_suffered 7y ago
  The UK's weakness was exposed by the 2011 veto and subsequent upending of the EU treaties to suit everyone apart from the UK. We had been floundering in that club since 2009, despite bailing out other members (ie. Ireland) - and when push came to shove Germany and France made it clear that the UK could shove off. The UK is no weaker now than it was then - it's just that it's clear where we stand. The great powers of the world (China, US, Germany) act in their own interests, the UK must act as if that is true and attempt to navigate around them - or we must simply be subjugated to one of them. I believe that Germany in particular will regret this situation in the future, with a pretense of a triumvirate of powers and associated allies (ie. France, Italy, Spain etc; UK, Poland, etc; Germany and everyone else) there was a chance of a very different EU. That's gone now and Germany must take the reigns - and it will be in a very different strategic context.
  - tonyedgecombe 7y ago
    We had a huge influence over the EU, that's gone out the window now. You can't become great by isolating yourself.
    - i_have_suffered 7y ago
      We had a huge influence right up until push came to shove and then we had none. I agree we can't become great - isolation or not; I believe that isolation isn't on the table either - next few weeks excluded. The reality is that France and Germany shafted the UK publicly and conclusively during the euro crisis, they also shafted the Greeks - but I'm not Greek so that's less of a problem for me. Remember also that they removed an Italian government and installed a technocrat. Yet lots of people seem to have forgotten that and either don't care or can't bring themselves to see the reality of the situation.
guacamole4 7y ago
UK banned Huawei from all critical parts of their network, all sensitive locations (factories, military, energy, etc), as well as restricted market share to 30% elsewhere. They also officially labeled Huawei as the only provider that is a threat to national security. Even Beijing slammed their decision. Trump wanted to have the complete ban to go even further, but that wouldn't bring any practical value to the UK given the limitations they did impose.

Roritharr 7y ago

China is indeed very divise for our global powerstructures. This Video shows a WHO official battling with this(if you want to look kindly upon him): https://twitter.com/nathanlawkc/status/1243889673207832577 https://twitter.com/nathanlawkc/status/1243889673207832577 What bugs me is that I'm really unsure if I should post anything critical of China, it's scary what that could mean for my family 30 years down the road.

echelon 7y ago
> What bugs me is that I'm really unsure if I should post anything critical of China, it's scary what that could mean for my family 30 years down the road. I thought the same and I have no family ties there. (Though back in the early 00's I had fun studying in China and had wished to return.) I'm more worried about what happens if we don't speak out. While we need to fix our Western democracies, we can't ignore the biggest threat to freedom in the world. I think this virus situation could potentially unite the world in looking critically at supply chains and the CCP's motives and behavior. When this is all over, I hope every county tallies the bill for the virus and subtracts that from their debt to China. The CCP lied, hid information, and told us to keep travel open while simultaneously welding people inside their homes. They then shifted blame to the West and threatened to cut off critical medical supplies. It's worse than negligent, and they should lose their investments overseas to repay the damage done.
- chrischen 7y ago
  > When this is all over, I hope every county tallies the bill for the virus and subtracts that from their debt to China. They lied, hid information, and told us to keep travel open while simultaneously welding people inside their homes. It's worse than negligent, and they should lose their investments overseas to repay the damage done. I think you're being generous to the administration for assigning blame to China. We didn't really trust anything coming out of China before so why would we conveniently be expected to trust China regarding the virus? There was also plenty of time to see warning signs in countries like South Korea... not to mention several countries that much higher risk for the spread of the virus have contained it (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore). If you are to believe Trump then he saved a lot of lives by banning travel from China... and then killed a lot of people by doing absolutely nothing after that.

chvid 7y ago

I think the main issue is that most europeans are just not so hot on a war with China as the americans are; even after a massive media campaign. I believe the next move by the US will be to force TSMC not to supply Huawei. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-huawei-tech-chips-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-prepares-crackdown-on-huaweis-global-chip-supply-sources-idUSKBN21D2E4 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-huawei-tech-chips-exc... That will be a major blow to Huawei (and TSMC) and will force the Chinese to setup their own chip production as fast as possible. Will probably be quite a thing to follow.

thre234324 7y ago
The Americans might think of East Asians as their slaves, but experience has showed that even the vassals of the US are generally not as hard as the Americans/Europeans would like. This is but a reprisal of the old colonizers running around wrecking Asia to their will; I wonder if India will serve its old role of being the mercenary for destroying Asia again.
- eklavya 7y ago
  Hmm, what have we Indians ever destroyed?
  - mlvljr 7y ago
    Tourists' stomachs with (some of) your foods, allegedly!
  - manquer 7y ago
    Perhaps he is alluding to India’s involvement in the opium trade during the 19th century ?
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  - blackrock 7y ago
    Do you really not know your own history? The Indian soldiers were the grunts in the British army. The British promised you riches, if you participated in the raping of China, during the Opium Wars, and you fell for it. The British played you well. And they also payed up. This is why there is a heavy presence of Indians in Hong Kong, and some of them seem to come straight out of the 1800s, as if time stood still for them. Like, they’re a direct lineage from that military past. The British even made you believe that it was your own fault for the Bengal famine of 1943. That’s how brilliant they were at manipulating you. Nowadays, they release movies of James Bond, and make you love them, and want to be like them, and forget all about their past transgressions. Their brainwashing propaganda is so subtle and insidious, that it’s brilliant. Look up the background to George Orwell’s 1984 novel. This was actually about his real life experiences in the British intelligence services in India, and about their incredible brainwashing ability. Where reality is indeed, stranger than fiction.

millstone 7y ago

How is it that the west allowed Huawei to gain such a lead in 5G? If this has national security implications, why didn't the US support its domestic telecom firms?

freyir 7y ago
The US hasn't had domestic telecom infrastructure firms for many years. We rely on Nokia and Ericsson, and both have failed to compete with Huawei.
- millstone 7y ago
  What about Qualcomm, Motorola, Intel?
  - g_p 7y ago
    When it comes to building the mobile network itself, none of the companies you mention have any footprint in that space. It's really the 3 (Nokia, Ericsson and Huawei) along with some less prominent players (Samsung, ZTE etc). The vast majority of networks are using the big 3.
  - freyir 7y ago
    They're on the handset side. The cellular infrastructure itself comes from Huawei, Ericsson, and Nokia.
g_p 7y ago
This is the key question! Both Europe and the USA took their eye off the ball. Europe's overly strict rules on "state aid" (giving public money to fund private sector work) mean that large, publicly traded telecoms companies are outsourcing their own R&D out to China, simply to save money. Few people realise, but that's where Nokia and Ericsson do a lot of their 5G R&D, and this can be verified with a quick dig around jobs and LinkedIn etc. Huawei is the recipient of large quantities of state aid domestically, as well as the beneficiary of inter-governnental loans from the Chinese government to other countries for the purpose of building a mobile network! https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-journal-calculated-huaweis-state-support-11577280830 https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-journal-calculated-huaw... In terms of the USA, they don't have a significant notional domestic player in base stations - if we consider significant players as being Nokia, Ericsson and Huawei, and consider the former 2 as being mostly European. The obvious existing networking business to enter from the US perspective would be Cisco, and they weren't interested in this kind of low margin stuff (which says a lot about their other pricing!) https://www.ft.com/content/536d28c8-4e87-11ea-95a0-43d18ec715f5 https://www.ft.com/content/536d28c8-4e87-11ea-95a0-43d18ec71... (soft paywall, access via Google referrer)

chrischen 7y ago

America historically is infamous for making sure that anything besides their system (capitalism, supposedly) fails to work, and taking quite an active approach to make sure it happens. In theory, if you believed you're doing things the right way then you shouldn't have to worry about making sure another system fails (if it doesn't fail, then maybe you were wrong?). This applies as much to startups and their attitudes towards competitors (you shouldn't worry about what your competitor does, only that your product is good) as it does to nations and their attitudes towards competing economic and government systems. The crux of this issue is purely political, and based on fears of potentially losing American supremacy. The article even references China as a "rival", and that's exactly what the fears are based on: rivalry. If you believe that these anti-China sentiments from these politicians have anything to do with a belief in freedom, democracy, or human rights, then you're just as brainwashed as the supporters of the Chinese communist party. If our politicians believed in human rights then why didn't they do anything to stop China earlier? Why do they only care when China releases cheaper better technology that could potentially unseat their dominance? Seems like a convenient time to start caring about freedom. Why is accepting cheap plastic crap acceptable, but advanced technology not acceptable? What is the end-game here? If you disagree with the Chinese system then you should be taking action against them. Otherwise it seems like the goal is just to keep the country in a subdued position for eternity, allowing human rights violations so long as your own supremacy is kept?

SturgeonsLaw 7y ago
This comment's getting downvoted but I can't really see anything here I disagree with. Would any downvoters like to share an alternative opinion in the interests of discussion?
- MR4D 7y ago
  I didn’t downvote, but I’ll take a shot at answering it for you.... > If our politicians believed in human rights then why didn't they do anything to stop China earlier? They did. Multiple administrations held the belief that if they could pull China into the fold economically, then they would open up. This strategy was literally the opposite of what the US did with the Soviet Union, with the idea that we didn’t want another Cold War. Clearly it didn’t work, but until a couple years ago, everyone thought it was.

shasheene 7y ago

Huawei is in large part built upon technology stolen from Cisco and Canada's Nortel Networks. In the latter case, there is strong evidence China was able to maintain access to Nortel's internal networks for over a decade (!!) which helped kill the 117 year old company. [1] The government of China is systematically hacking corporations through the Ministry of State Security, and attempting to the switch the allegiances of all ethnically Chinese people across the world through the well-funded overseas political interference organization called the "United Front Work Department" [2]. In both the Australian and New Zealand parliaments, China has actually succeeded in installing individuals with undeclared links to government of China political interference and espionage organizations: Gladys Liu and Jian Yang. While there is no smoking gun that they are directly acting as spies, there is significant amounts of circumstantial evidence that they have been compromised by government of China influence operations. I don't need to explain the risk of politicians compromised by an adversarial government making key national defense decisions. With this reality, why would any government risk allowing Huawei in their networks? [1] https://www.afr.com/technology/how-chinese-hacking-felled-telecommunication-giant-nortel-20140526-iux6a https://www.afr.com/technology/how-chinese-hacking-felled-te... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTXPxWtl8Zw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTXPxWtl8Zw

baybal2 7y ago
> which helped kill the 117 year old company. [1] If Nortel ever been killed by somebody, that was by financial engineers from hedge funds, and inexperienced managers that came to board after the bubble popped
AndyMcConachie 7y ago
The idea that Nortel was killed by anything other than incompetence and mismanagement is laughably ignorant.
mettamage 7y ago
Aren't certain Chinese people in China relatively open about this on a high level? I mean, to me it always sounded as non-believable but there have been some places (documentaries or texts) where a Chinese person would say that the goal of China is to get Chinese people in high places all over the world in a 200+ year time span and then rule it. As I said, I never took it seriously. But maybe people should look into claims like that? Unfortunately, I can't find a source for this because it didn't happen that often and I'm not that politically minded.

kasperni 7y ago

So the US preaches nationalism, protectionism, and isolationism except when it's not in their own interest? Edit: My point (which probably wasn't clear) was that if you run an "America First" agenda. Don't be surprised when your allies start prioritizing their own interest above mutual interests.

buzzlair 7y ago
shouldnt be a surprice bro. they have been doing this for decades but still under the pretense of the opposite. protecting marketshare, by bringing up national security as excuse is no surprise move.
malux85 7y ago
Um, yes?! Is that surprising?
Veen 7y ago
Yes. Each nation looks out for its own interests and the interests of its citizens. The only thing that's surprising is that a large number of citizens seem to think that this is unusual or immoral.
- thawaway1837 7y ago
  A large number of citizens think that it makes sense for a certain set of nations to work together in many arenas. For decades, Western Europe and North America worked together to both regions’ mutual benefit. Trump has torn that apart, which has basically hurt both sides to China’s benefit which appears as a far less capricious partner.
  - Veen 7y ago
    Nations should work together when their interests coincide. That's just a generalization of the idea that nations work to support their own interests. But, quite often, those interests are in conflict. Some people appear motivated to shit on some nations while ignoring the depredations of others. Perversely, they are opposed to the nation of which they are citizens and embrace "the other side". For example, the claim that "China appears the less capricious partner" ignores an enormous amount of evidence that China screws over international partners with no hesitation should that be in its interests. See the recent stories about WHO delaying the release of information from Taiwan about the coronavirus. https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68 https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6... (The U.S. currently being lead by a lunatic is a side issue.)

nimbius 7y ago

>...the goal of American policy on Huawei is less about security and more about market share – and making sure America, not China, owns the future of 5G. Bingo. Most HN readers saw this for exactly what it was. Most of the premise for the arrest of Meng Wanzhou was comical at best. 30 years of US companies ignoring ITAR with at most a small fine, only to suddenly watch the US issue an extradition warrant for a chinese CFO accused of doing the same thing? I guess if its the cold war its different. Huawei made it to market first. Most of this theatricality from the US government is a last-ditch effort to buy time until US communications companies come out with something remotely 5G. AT&T did their usual tactic with 4g, and rolled out a watered down branded 5GE experience even to phones with no 5G chipset whatsoever in a desperate attempt to brand something they'll likely buy at twice the cost from a US supplier in 2021 just to spite their loss at Huawei. I hate the term intellectual property and its easy to slander people for theft, but the US paved this road in my opinion with massive cuts to education and a public policy that actively persecuted hackers and anyone interested in STEM since the sixties. The US decided to turn their colleges into luxury sports arenas driven by unforgivable student loans and underpaid graduate students as teachers. It drafted legal DMCA and DRM to punish curiousity and reward obedience, and now for the past decade its tried to play both sides of the field. Insisting STEM is something all its citizens must learn, while at the same time branding anyone too interested in technology as aberrant and unlawful, a circumventor in violation of the license for the product they own. Unless and until this changes, im sure China or Korea or some other slave of the international market will own 6, 7 and 8 G as well.

champagneben 7y ago
> the US paved this road in my opinion with massive cuts to education How much has the US cut its education budgets?
- DeonPenny 7y ago
  It as the worlds highest education budget.
  - pas 7y ago

fulafel 7y ago

After decades of campaigning against good security in internet protocols, mandating backdoors in networks, etc - government security organs are miffed that things can't safely run on untrusted networks.

zhengiszen 7y ago

Western nations don't need anyone to divide. Just see the brexit or covid-19 situations ...

rumanator 7y ago
Arguably brexit is the result of Russia's psyops effort on the UK, much like it did in the last US presidential elections. And let's not pretend that Russia hasn't been caught financing and supporting far-right parties throughout Europe. https://www.ft.com/content/48c4bfa6-7ca2-11e9-81d2-f785092ab560 https://www.ft.com/content/48c4bfa6-7ca2-11e9-81d2-f785092ab...
- easytiger 7y ago
  That's unbelievable rubbish

haecceity 7y ago

Western nations divide themselves. Must be nice to shift blame to other though. Wish I could do that.

ngcc_hk 7y ago

Look at the wuhan virus. Trust china you are doom. Just not worth it.

DeonPenny 7y ago

A lot people are to comfortable with china controlling a lot of the world's tech. I'm not in europe but it seems a strange thing to conclude. Either was I will vote against anyone in the US that does and its the best I can do.