Huawei is dividing Western nations

All the wireless companies spend their money on shareholder dividends and purchasing restricted access to the airwaves. And now the US government doesn't like the new gatekeeper (i.e. China) controlling these companies.

Due to government selling the rights to our airwaves to the highest bidder, the modern portable computer + radios are locked down and obscured under layers of corporate control and constraint. I'd much rather have the software and network be required to be more open and radio waves more unrestricted for the public to use (e.g. sell me a better CB). Give me that over 5G, telecom companies and "unlimited" data.

I'm following meshtastic and disaster.radio projects. I like these little low bandwidth programmable long range transceivers running on the unlicensed bands. I bought a pair for $60 to play with. One could imagine P2P networks sprouting up on houses, cars, trees, etc with free low bandwidth services like weather info, email, chat, etc...

1 - coming from Belgium, my statement is valid for Europe mostly too. Don't change my statement as you please :)

2 - That's nuts, looking at what China actually does with the data, it's way more dangerous for everyone involved.

You are targeting US, but forgetting that China actually has concentration camps ( calling it education doesn't make it better) with millions of people currently in it, ...

China is actively bullying Taiwan, Hong Kong and all their neighbouring countries.

Be glad that you can share your opinion on a popular US platform without censorship.

( There is active moderation, but this is done in a very open way). In China, you would just suddenly disappear.

Saying China has a bad track record is a serious lack of judgement.

No one in the West will put you in concentration camps for having your opinion.

They won't censor it also

Permanent ban on wet markets before December first 2019 would have been a good start. A media campaign to get people to stop buying into "traditional Chinese medicine" would have been good too. Make them use that propaganda machine for something good for once.

No excuses for this one. China could have done something and not only choose not to, but actively attempted to surpress information about the disease. They're lying about every number related to this crisis. They are manipulating the WHO. This is a country which claims that "only" a "few hundred died" in tiananmen square. The 50 cent army actively brigades many types of anti-CCP dissent at home and abroad.

Yes. It's reasonable for them to have done more sooner. They had an obligation to do more sooner.

>With this reality, why would any government risk allowing Huawei in their networks?

Well firstly because the USA does the same thing. Being technologically ahead, it tends to work on giving it's companies an edge over regulators or competition rather than stealing tech. But no one is being fair here.

So you're not choosing between a good guy and a bad guy

I'm happy to agree the USA is morally less repugnant than China. I'm neither American nor Chinese but I'll take US hegemony over Chinese. But that's still picking the less bad option.

And either way, you lose some sovereignty. And both nations will be in your infrastructure whether you buy their kit or not, because most such espionage is software based, so it doesn't really matter.

So the question is really not the one your asking. A better question is, "how much will I lose to the security issue and how much will I gain from the tech I'm buying and how does this affect everything else I am doing including relations with both sides?"

Since China has better 5G tech, and the loss is the same, you buy Chinese based only on the first part of that question.

And that is the reason the USA is making so much noise: since the 70s, after the US got scared into pushing for technological progress by sputnik, the USA has been the leader in tech. Now Cisco etc have dropped the ball and the Chinese have edged ahead in this one product...

It's also worth noting how unfairly EU/Asian companies have been treated in US markets over the last decade. There might be value buying Chinese to dissuade US bullying given that the age of peaceful cooperation (economically) seems to be over (Deutsch bank fines, Toyota recalls etc).

Plus increasingly the EU wishes to deviate from us foreign policy and have its own policy. China doesn't care unless you're messing about in their back yard because they don't have much foreign policy beyond there. But the US expects compliance world wide. If you buy Cisco, and then refuse to sanction Iran for no reason, will you still be able to get Cisco spares?

You can disagree with my assessment of parts of this, that's fine. But the point is, this is 100 times more complex than buying a knock off version with security flaws or a proper piece of kit...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/09/nsa-spying-bra...

https://www.cnet.com/news/nsa-spied-on-eu-antitrust-official...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/16/iran-says-it-i...