
China warns India of 'reverse sanctions' if Huawei is blocked - cik
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-huawei-india-exclusive/exclusive-china-warns-india-of-reverse-sanctions-if-huawei-is-blocked-sources-idUSKCN1UW1FF
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hourislate
Buying 5G technology from a benign country like Finland or Sweden seems like a
good strategy. Both these countries have no aspiration for world domination
and have track records of honest business dealings. I don't think either
Ericson or Nokia has ever been accused or guilty of spying or stealing
technology.

~~~
ETHisso2017
They also have cooperated with GCHQ and the NSA.

~~~
nullwasamistake
Personally I think "the devil you know" mentality is better when considering
that any Telecom tech could be compromised. Yeah everybody is probably spying,
so you should get your gear from your strongest allies.

Would you rather have a friend or an enemy spying on you? That appears to be
the only options now that technology has thoroughly penetrated every day life.

Another point not mentioned enough is that societies with free press are far
more likely to find and report exploits/backdoors. In a country like the US
you see this a lot. There's many cases of security researchers reporting
possible government funded exploits against their own government. In a place
like China reporting something like that would probably mean you disappear

~~~
Bendingo
> Would you rather have a friend or an enemy spying on you?

A better decision rationale would be; which of the two is more likely to use
their spy-data against you?

And the answer to that is without doubt; your own local spy agency, not the
one operating in another country.

~~~
yipbub
In the long term, I'd not want my country's national security compromised by a
morally bankrupt govt not subject to democracy.

~~~
krageon
Fundamentally much of what you think in this way is the direct product of
propaganda from your own state. It would behoove you to investigate your own
preconceptions and realise where you first got them.

~~~
yipbub
It would behoove you to not guess at how I arrived at my beliefs and where I
live and then claim _I 've_ got preconceptions.

I can see the facts of the Chinese government's authoritarianism, their
persecution of their minority populations, and their international behavior
just fine. In fact, they're so economically influential, that I find criticism
of them is muted, and tolerance of their crap is high.

~~~
xbmcuser
Tolerance of US crap is high from bombing civilians with drones using CIA
black sites. Putting people on no fly lists for arbiratory reasons.
Incarcerating minorities are some of the things that the US government does.
So when US agencies say they don't like or trust Chinese tech I understand as
they probably have backdoors in a lot of the western tech and when Chinese
tech is used they lose the back doors. For most countries using Chinese tech
vs Western tech is choosing the spying of 1 or the other.

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yumraj
There are very few Indian companies operating in China anyway.

India should block Huawei now even more. Just like in the case with US, China
has more to lose that India.

Edit: in case there was any confusion, when I said "US" above I was referring
to US-China not US-India.

~~~
sremani
India has $60 billion trade surplus with US it is not same relationship when
with China, India has $60 billion deficit.

India is not that important for US, it is useful, Yes. Strategically
important? Absolutely NOT!

Edit: To Provide Context, there is low scale tit-for-tat going between US and
India regarding trade. [https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/15/economy/india-tariffs-
us-trum...](https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/15/economy/india-tariffs-us-
trump/index.html)

~~~
adventured
For 2018 the India goods trade surplus with the US was $21 billion ($33.5b in
US exports to India; $54.3b in India exports to the US).

US exports to India climbed from $21b to $33b over the prior two years (2017 &
2018). That's a nice increase of $12b or 57%; their exports to the US
increased by $8b over that same time frame.

To put that into context, US exports to India will match US exports to France
this year approximately, so it's already a serious export market for the US
(and 50%+ larger than US exports to Italy, which is the 8th largest economy).
Importantly, India has serious economic growth and a likely high long-term
growth trajectory, whereas most of the top 20 economies have had very little
or zero growth the past decade plus. If you're the US and you're seeking
export growth, India is one of the best options.

The primary benefit to maintaining a good, equitable economic relationship
with India, is that they're likely to have a very large economy in the near
future. Even though they will remain poor per capita for a long time, they're
almost guaranteed to become the world's third largest economy behind the US
and China in the next few decades.

In terms of economic output they passed France this year and will soon pass
the UK (within 6-12 months if they haven't already). That puts them #5 behind
Germany, which they'll plausibly pass in six or seven years. 20 years from now
when they have a $8 or $10 trillion economy, as an American, I'd prefer that
the US have a reasonable economic relationship with India that benefits both
sides. In the future they will probably be a very important market for the US,
so you should try to take care of the relationship today.

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tekkk
Tit-for-tat. From my scarce knowledge of game-theory and world-politics it is
generally accepted as the default move in these types of situations.

But well, if India sees Huawei as security threat, shouldn't they have a quite
good justification for blocking them? It's not that they are outright
punishing Huawei for just existing, but that there is, in their opinion, a
real cause for them to fear Huawei of spying their networks behalf of Chinese
government?

Although the real reason would be a lot more nuanced as usual with politics.
But to me it seems a bit unfair. Russia and China (and others, sure) have
effectively blocked many foreign companies in different sectors in their
respective countries because of security reasons, so why India isn't allowed
to do the same thing?

~~~
erikpukinskis
Works well on games.

Only problem is trade isn’t a game.

Or, to put it another way, you have no idea when your opponent will stop
playing this game and start playing another one.

~~~
__s
Game theory is about decision making. If you reject game theory, you reject
rational decision making being possible. Note that game theory is still useful
in the context of making good decisions against irrational decision makers.
Your "put another way" is merely pointing out that often in real world
scenarios the game's rules are often part of the unknown information

Everything involving decisions is a game. Trade is a game

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kool_kid1
If the technology is great, every country will use it without questioning its
source, but Chinese tech has never been so innovative, always copying and
pasting with a bit of modifications. If you are forcing a country to use your
technology, then there's something wrong.

~~~
addicted
I believe this is incorrect in this case. Huawei is ahead of competitors in
the 5G space.

~~~
HashHishBang
Considering the sheer volume of mobile devices in asia, and China in
particular, this wouldn't surprise me. However, I was under the impression
that "5g" doesn't _actually_ mean anything. As in there is no technical
definition or standard that Huawei could be ahead of. Are we just talking
about general mobile technologies or have things changed wrt 5G?

~~~
cesarb
> However, I was under the impression that "5g" doesn't actually mean
> anything. As in there is no technical definition or standard that Huawei
> could be ahead of. Are we just talking about general mobile technologies or
> have things changed wrt 5G?

I believe most people mean 5G NR
([https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/5G_NR](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/5G_NR))
when they talk about 5G, the same way 4G usually means LTE.

~~~
HashHishBang
Ah, I didn't know this was a thing. Thanks mate.

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anmatapp
So basically, the big companies own the government in their county.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
There has long been suspicion that Huawei is actually owned and controlled by
the PLA. Not that it really makes much difference even if that were true
(China would protect it even if it were a completely private enterprise).

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naruvimama
As an Indian I personally root for Huawei. If not for any other reason that
Ericsson (70% just a decade ago) and co have had a monopoly for far too long.

The only jobs that Ericsson brings to India are low end back office jobs and
at the most billing software. Even though it could have been one of their
largest growth markets.

This could be a good opportunity to get them/Huawei to setup more cutting edge
R&D (especially PHY layer), co-development and manufacturing. India should
hand out some Chinese medicine to the Chinese.

High tech is a chicken and egg problem, India has all the ingredients, but
apparently free market doesn't work when monopolies are involved.

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rdtsc
China has a good relationship with Pakistan.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93Pakistan_relatio...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93Pakistan_relations)

I wonder how that plays into it, given the recent events in Kashimir:
[https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/india-revokes-
kashmir...](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/india-revokes-kashmir-
special-status-latest-updates-190806134011673.html)

If I had to guess these sanctions and warnings are never purely technological
and are mostly political.

~~~
eximius
I don't know anything about this, but it seems quite surprising, given China's
record of 'disappearing' millions of Muslims (and other citizens) right next
door to Pakistan

~~~
hangonhn
People from the outside has a tendency to over estimate the unity of other
groups. For a long time, the first world nations thought all the Communist
countries were buddies but China had border wars with both the USSR and
Vietnam. In the Islamic world, Muslim nations fought each other all the time
as they still do today. In the Christian realms, the Crusades started with
Western Christians sacking Constantinople and the wars of religion between the
Catholics and Protestants were pretty brutal. France was at one point allied
with the Turks during the period of the "Italian Wars".

It tends to be that people think first of their own welfare and then maybe of
their allegiance to the groups they belong to.

~~~
chillacy
A great essay on the topic: [https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-
tolerate-anythin...](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-tolerate-
anything-except-the-outgroup/)

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baybal2
I believe the default action for Huawei for such block would actually be
purposefully enact the ban on itself:

Stop all sales including spare parts, revoke signing keys, block IPs of cell
towers and cloud control panels from that country, stop tech support, and look
how soon they will change their musik

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robocat
So India just needs to pre-ask for "reverse-reverse-sanctions" from the US:
Hey Mr States, we'll not use Huawei like you asked us, if you'll give us extra
XXXX access to your country.

~~~
alexis_fr
More like: “Hey India, if you don’t avoid Huawei with us, you’ll have even
bigger sanctions than if you follow Chinese advice. And won’t get spied upon
by the Chinese.”

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dzonga
on a serious note. what are the chances of this whole debacle thing causing a
full scale warfare ? given the animosity between the 2 neighboring countries
India and China. then you factor in US backing India. Then add Russia + china
in the mix. This whole sanction and tariff thing can't continue without one
side completely asserting dominance over the other. & US will not leave it's
position willingly.

~~~
paxys
We are already very close to "full scale warfare", just of the economic kind.
There is likely not going to be the war you are referring to between two
superpowers in today's environment.

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espeed
China has a history of pegging its currency to the US dollar. Is there
precedent for pegging tariffs to the yuan?

~~~
iKevinShah
Well the US government labelled China a "Currency Manipulator" a couple of
days back. Doesnt mean much, but it will add to the trade war between the two

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paxys
> warning there could be consequences for Indian firms operating in China

What Indian firms even operate in China? What firms from _any_ country other
than China have a meaningful presence there?

I guess the threat is meaningful if you include firms doing any business in
China, but by restricting exports or imposing tariffs they are shooting
themselves in the foot as well.

~~~
baybal2
I see people already noticing the timing.

In other news: [https://www.dawn.com/news/1498428/china-says-india-move-
on-k...](https://www.dawn.com/news/1498428/china-says-india-move-on-kashmir-
violates-its-territorial-sovereignty)

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paganel
In an ideal world one should not be spied on by anyone else, but in this
particular case I think India would be more ok (so to speak) of being spied on
by the US than by China, the reason being that India has an ongoing and still
open border dispute with China, while its relations with the US are a little
more benign. Granted, I'm not from India and I've never visited the country,
maybe someone more knowledgeable than me can correct me if I'm wrong.

~~~
Guthur
You'd need to have been living on a different planet to think that the US is
benign. Relatively benign to their own citizens but far and away the most
globally antagonistic country over the last 50 years. The list of wars and
interventions, arms dealing, extradition etc would be far beyond anything
China has done.

No government is beyond over stepping it's boundaries but unfortunately non US
citizens do not have a constitution to protect them from the US government.

China is threatening the US global trade dominance and the US is reacting in
exactly the same way incumbents usually do and unfortunately trade wars
between major powers have been historical quite bloody.

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Havoc
Isn't that just predatory pricing?

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sieabahlpark
Hmm, what a great way to inspire confidence Huawei isn't working with the
Chinese government to add spyware to everything...

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OedipusRex
"Use Huawei's products, which are not controlled by the Chinese government, or
the Chinese government will sanction you".

The Chinese government is about as subtle as an atom bomb.

~~~
luckylion
That's pretty much the policy for any country in the world that sees a
domestic company being -in their view- unfairly blocked from doing business in
another country. They tell them "if you discriminate against us, we will do
the same to you".

~~~
chibg10
Really? What retaliatory action did the US take on behalf of its tech
companies following their blocking in China?

~~~
cdmckay
Which companies were blocked by China from operating?

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sempron64
Google, Facebook, Twitter jump out as examples. These are completely banned
from operating due to censorship. Baidu, WeChat, and Weibo are the domestic
equivalents, arguably dominant only because of this protectionism. WeChat has
outgrown facebook though I think and FB could not win in China now. Corps
which sell products in China (as opposed to those who buy manufactured goods
that are exported from China) operate only crippled subsidiaries with 51%
Chinese ownership for Chinese domestic sales due to their laws.

~~~
luckylion
That's not really correct, is it? Google decided not to comply with censorship
laws (which I think is a good call), they weren't outright banned. There's a
difference between "you must not operate in our country" and "you must not
operate in our country without adhering to local laws".

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chx
> Huawei has carried out operations in India for a long time, and has made
> contributions to the development of Indian society and the economy that is
> clear to all,

And how is this relevant to backdoors? Just wow.

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ycombonator
华为 'hua-wei' means 'Serve China'

~~~
wyldfire
"It's a cookbook, it's a cookbook!"

