Microsoft finds Huawei to get Chinese biz back on its sales ledger: US permits Redmond software supply line The US Department of Commerce has decided to grant Microsoft a licence to flog its software to Huawei – America's fave bogeyman – despite the Commerce Secretary describing the Chinese company as "frightening". A Microsoft spokesman sent us a statement but was unable to answer further questions at the time of writing. "On …
Of course Huawei are being used as a bargaining chip in Trumps trade war with China. And I have no doubt the orange one will lift the ban once he get what he wants out of China in a trade deal. Even if people like Wilbur Ross will still be claiming that Huawei are a danger as Trump only listens to the advisers he wants to.
"once he get what he wants out of China in a trade deal."
I can see a scenario where he *thinks* he's won. In the short term, which as far ahead as he will be able to see. But I can also see the same scenario giving China what it wants in the longer term, which is how they have historically planned things.
If you think Trump actually wants a trade deal with China, I've got several hundred miles of brand-new wall along the Mexican border to sell you.
The vendetta against Huawei is posturing for his base, it's distracting from his malfeasance, it's creating new back channels for backhanders to him and his henchmen, and most importantly it's making companies like Microsoft play his game - instead of doing what they should be doing, which is calling bullshit on the whole thing. If companies like them apply for (and get) permits to do this kind of stuff, then that validates the "trade war" in general.
Henry Kissinger, someone not noted for his dovish instincts, gave his thoughts on US/China relations a couple of months back. They're quite insightful:-
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/the-key-problem-our-time-conversation-henry-kissinger-sino-us-relations
Reading his remarks highlights just how clueless our present Administration is and how their uneven, piecemeal, approach to foreign policy is causing us harm rather than furthering our interests. (This has been obvious to many of us but since I don't have quite the statue that Henry Kissinger has when it comes to foreign relations its probably better to quote him.) What this means is that any policy initiatives from the US government about who's technology can be used where, what constitutes a threat and so on has absolutely no meaning or significance, its just an impediment to making progress that hopefully will become history in a year.
"I am genuinely frightened by what we have learned from our investigations of them." = They make really good hardware at a sensible price that dumps all over that of the companies that lobby/pay me.
My P20 Pro is a flipping great phone, and when my dear old ma & pa asked me and my brother if we were worried about the Chinese tracking us, "What? On top of Google, Facebook, Cisco backdoors, bugger knows how many other intelligence services, Amazon, any sod else whose site we've even looked at, etc, etc. No"
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
