American, here. Given that there is no hard proof that Huawei actually spies on their customers and that Huawei critics use the same talking points in the media to criticize Huawei and China, I am starting believe that this is not about China as a threat. That they could be a threat is not the same as the being a threat.

Rather, Western leaders no longer have the willingness or belief that we can compete in tech with China (on the contrary, we can and should), so they've given up and threw a tantrum, screaming 'no fair no fair, they steal our IP', which is predictable, given that Western corporate leaders have outsourced all manufacturing to China...dumb.

There are real issues to criticize with China, and Huawei is not the worst one.