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Comment by jacquesm | Hacker News Reader

Replace "China" with "The USA" and "Eastern" with "Western" and the other way around and not much of meaning or value would be lost.

It's the rest of the world that's really up the creek without a paddle in this respect, they have no options other than to side with either behemoth and hope for the best.

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The increasingly bad news for the US is that countries are siding with China in the world. Due to strikingly different approaches to foreign policy. For example, China went into Africa and is building up their roads, factories, and infrastructure. Now consider how the US spent decades doing drone strikes in the middle east. That doesn't build trust.

Even this year, the consequence is now that the Taliban is now actively working with China, to build a oil pipeline to Iran. So it makes sense that these countries will end up buying network/software/hardware in the future from China too. Not to mention the price advantage China is offering to developing countries on their products.

Western countries have spent decades doing similar things in Africa, often with blank checks thru institutions such as the IMF. And of course the ROI is rarely there; but China has played the game differently. When these poor countries ultimately cannot afford to pay back the loans, they take land/ports/infrastructure, which they also built to Chinese standards (requiring Chinese products forever). They also use their own citizens as the laborers, so the total risk is far more minimized. It’s a new more modern version of colonialism except with less violence and everyone thinks it’s a good deal to begin with. They’re not doing these things out of the goodness of their heart.

China attaches strings to their "help", China also provides the help. As you said they import labours and actually build things

Western Nations help is more or less shipping pallets of cash to a corrupt government on the promise they will build a school or road, or something..

Any bets on how often that school or road actually gets build after the cash is delivered?

Less violence for now. Colonialism didn't start off with armies, it too started off with trade. Only later forms of colonialism when with war from the get go.

Not always true [1].

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_conquest_of_Algeria

> Replace "China" with "The USA" and "Eastern" with "Western" and the other way around and not much of meaning or value would be lost.

> > This goes beyond classified material and extends to China cheating on trade including, but not limited to, the wholesale theft of intellectual property through "partnerships" and other means as the price Western companies pay for "access" to the Chinese market.

> > Why the issue with those born in mainland China? Because China doesn't allow dual-citizenship. Those that become naturalized in the United States, for example, lose their Chinese citizenship. This then becomes a carrot the CCP can dangle in front of those wishing to return: restoration of citizenship. That is, of course, if you happen to have a particular set of knowledge or skills deemed important to China.

Those things aren't true of the US though.

For the first there is direct evidence, for instance the USA has repeatedly used its espionage setup to lift IP from 'partners'.

The second is true, but that gets balanced out by the USA wanting its income from its passport holders no matter where they reside in the world.

> For the first there is direct evidence, for instance the USA has repeatedly used its espionage setup to lift IP from 'partners'.

Be specific: which American companies exactly are using stolen IP from foreign countries?

Except when the CIA "transforms" the country in a "democracy" and american conpanies syphon all patents from those "democracies'". It happenned in eastern europe for example.

Network infrastructure is just a microcosm of the issues facing small countries. They need protection, access to markets and resources, investment, and access to technology just to name a few.

> Replace "China" with "The USA" and "Eastern" with "Western" and the other way around and not much of meaning or value would be lost.

This is nonsense, and basically textbook whataboutism. Companies in the US are not an extension of the state in anyway near the way Chinese firms are, even if some collude. The US allows dual citizenship.

How do you think the US government gets access to Internet and phone traffic? The exchanges give the US government direct access including letting the government install their own equipment.

The parent comment is quite obviously correct. The US Internet isn't just some large exchanges. It consists of many tens of thousands of services/companies/sites with private data exchanged over TLS. The US Government does not control those services/sites; in China it directly controls all of it, top to bottom and without exception.

Does the US Government control GitHub? Imgur? Do they have monitors implanted at the organizations to control them?

Do you know why there was so much anti-Trump content on services like Imgur, Reddit or Twitter, during those administration years? It's precisely because the US Government does not control such services, and fortunately it's an area of real freedom that the US still largely excels at.

In the US I can set up a file/media hosting service tomorrow morning, with zero oversight by the US Government. I can make it a politically focused service for the left or right as I see fit. I can blast Biden 24/7 via the service, hosting media that is anti his administration, or focus that against Republicans instead.

Or I can set up an encrypted data service, where you can post encrypted files, text notes, whatever. I can do that any time I see fit, the US Government has nothing to do with it. Try that in China and see what happens to you.

Those are intentionally simple examples to make a point. You can do none of that in China, starting from step one of just setting up an open file hosting service that can take in almost any content you want it to (outside of things like CP).

The US Government does not control the US Internet other than with some quite basic regulations. In China, the CCP now directly controls all relevant corporations, all Internet services, anything that matters whatsoever.

The US is a set of entrenched interests that are now working in concert with the government. The government doesn't have to do things directly. They just have the companies do it.

Stop focusing on the government and look at how the whole system works. Post something critical of a government official and it gets censored. It happens on Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Hacker News, Nextdoor, YouTube, etc... We aren't talking Trump or antivaxxers either.

So what? The government of China also maintains a network of roads, just like the US. By narrowing your focus you can always find ways that the US is "just like China."

Of course, right now, in the 21st century, the government of China is using its various powers to, among other things, send its citizens who members of a particular minority ethnic group to concentration camps. Criticize the US all you want, but the US government are not rounding people up, torturing them, and then forcing them to work in jobs the government picked out for them. The US does plenty of awful things, sometimes as part of its official policies, but it is still a far cry for the sort of things that the CCP is doing.

Still sounds better than killing hundreds of thousands of them in the Middle East.

The US government did round people up, torture them, and put them in concentration camps. How do you think the WHOLE country was built? We living in this country benefited and are CONTINUING to benefit from it.

Ever hear of the Indian reservation system? The US government rounded people up, took their land, and forced them into concentration camps. If they left the reservation, they were hunted by the US cavalry.

It is so rich to conquer a people and then show remorse while continuing to occupy the land.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_of_Tears

How would you compare that part of American history to the Nazis? Or how about comparing that to the Japanese in WW2? Is the US really any better?

Given how the US is allies with Saudi Arabia, has conducted wars killing over a million people the last 30 years, do you actually think the US changed its ways?

The US is an imperial power and there is a power struggle between it and China.

There is no morality. There is mostly propaganda on both sides.

If you want me to spell it out, it is quite simple. The US committed genocide against native Americans.

I am sorry that you got downvoted. In 6th grade civics class (in California) we learned about the wide scale killing of the native populations. I live in Arizona, and we have a landmark nearby called Bloody Gulch where a US general who was supposed to march a tribe a few hundred miles to a new reservation, after about a few dozen miles decided it was simpler to just gun the whole large tribe, babies, children, and adults.

I am glad to be a US citizen, but for us to not acknowledge bad mistakes that we have made in the past (and including the recent past) is wrong, and diminishes our chances to do better morally and to improve our future chances of continued prosperity.

Mistake is much too light a term for a thing like that. Crimes against humanity are never mistakes, they are crimes.

Juniper networks is evidence that the us will backdoor things just the same as China.

It's not 'just the same as China' - that backdoors exist is true, but that's where the comparison ends.

The US generally doesn't use espionage to steal trade secrets, it might happen now and again, but it's not a strategic policy.

The US is also fairly open. TikTok is the #1 app in the US and it's literally Chinese owned!

The US is selective about where it gets protectionist / nationalist. Even the populist chest-thumping is not a reflection of what's actually going. That's just for Twitter politics.

For whatever reasons, China is very authoritarian/controlling and that has to be folded into the equation.

Aside from complicated moral issues with Taiwan/Tibet/Uyghurs - really all of that protectionist stuff is 'their choice'.

It's up to them how they want to play the game.

We have to just accept that reality and collectively respond to it rationally.

Dropping Huawei is a reasonable choice as is dropping any company known to be involved in shenanigans. Some data laws for where traffic can travel and under what terms would be reasonable as well (I'm looking at you Zoom!).

We can get along but we need good boundaries.

It's never whataboutism to replace US with China. People often love the whataboutism argument, but logically it only applies when it's a digression of the original issue. A citizen applies for FOIA request shouldn't be answered 'see what China is doing'. In terms of global politics, comparing the major players is definitely valid.

Hint: In China officials control capitalists more or less, while in the US it's probably a different story.

You guys really need to substitute "state" with "elites", then it's pretty much the same story globally. You have to learn to unlearn the trick that they feed you (OH the state is evil but private is good).

You misunderstand the term 'whataboutism'. Besides being a shallow dismissal you should at least apply it properly. 'Turnabout is fair game' would be more applicable here.

'Even if some collude' -> those are the largest companies in the world, see 'Snowden'.

Yes, the US allows for dual citizenship. And will then proceed to levy those with US citizenship the world over for taxes, no matter where they actually reside, a practice few other countries follow.

> Companies in the US are not an extension of the state in anyway near the way Chinese firms are, even if some collude.

In the US, the state is an extension of the corporation.

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