Mum's the Word On Google Attack At Davos 217
theodp writes "BusinessWeek reports that the cyber attack on Google was the elephant-in-the-room at the annual meeting of world leaders in Davos. 'China didn't want to discuss Google,' Josef Ackermann, CEO of Deutsche Bank AG and a co-chair of this year's World Economic Forum, said in an interview. China's Vice Premier Li Keqiang made that clear, he added. Even Google CEO Eric Schmidt didn't bring up China, and Bill Gates was mum on the topic in an interview. The reluctance of companies to talk about China illustrates the pressure on them to protect their business in the country, while the US government doesn't want to upset Chinese investors, said Andy Mok of Red Pagoda Concepts LLC. 'People have their commercial interests,' explained Deutsche Bank's Ackermann."
Soooo.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:might *does* make right (Score:2, Interesting)
The only question is whether the USofA will fall from its position as the world's superpower with any kind of grace, or whether it'll make life hard for everyone else as it falls.
Sorry, no. The real question is whether or not your new Chinese overlords will put up with the same silly European bullshit the US has. I seriously doubt they will.
Elephant in the room (Score:3, Interesting)
Elephant in the room [pbase.com] by The New Yorker.
Re:Get used to it. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Soooo.... (Score:2, Interesting)
The interests of capitalism and nationalism may overlap, but they are never the same.
What may favor commercial interests may not work well for a given nation or nations.
"Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains."
Thomas Jefferson
Re:Soooo.... (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:might *does* make right (Score:3, Interesting)
It's idiocy to get on their bad side or lock yourselves out of their market. Smart players will play by China's rules and not try to upset them.
The thing a lot of people don't get is that morals don't matter in international politics and business. "Might makes right" *does* matter.
So, by your logic, the appropriate response to Hitler's Germany was to keep mum, because it was a superpower? By what most commenters to this article in general, it seems it was OK for IBM to supply Hitler the machines for the German census as well. History repeats itself indeed.
It makes sense (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Not spending-wise...the US is by far #1 (Score:2, Interesting)
Extending a curve on a graph onward "a few decades" is unreasonable when there's such a poor record of being able to predict things even two years ahead. Even more so when the bit of curve you want to extend a few decades is shorter than a few decades long.
Predictions of dominance based merely on population size tend to be wrong (otherwise India and the EU would individually be towering over the US, economically and/or militarily). Predictions of dominance based on will and opportunistic ruthlessness have often been wrong too (in the late 70s, the soviets were going to eat our lunch! in the early 80s, the soviets were waiting in long lines for bread).
China's growing at 10% (of a smallest total) whereas the US is growing at 4% (of a big total) TODAY, but China's growth is driven by technological catchup and a wide price differential. China's GDP is still only around 1/3 that of the US. As the tech catch-up continues, there is less tech to catch up to and the catching up becomes much harder. As the price differential narrows, there is less artificial incentive to buy Chinese and the growth rate slows. China overtaking the US would require a drastic shift in strategy that has not yet even begun - and thus doomsday predictions based on this cannot yet be made.
IMO, China won't get much past half the US GDP; the trade balance shifts by then to other countries being cheaper than China.
Much Easier to Trash the USA (Score:4, Interesting)
It truly is a back-handed complement that people have no qualms trashing America in their public comments. It's as if they are saying "we don't like you or some of the things you do, but you aren't truly big enough bastards to retaliate against us."
Truly evil regimes like China and Russia get different treatment.
And if you are truly idiotic like Hugo Chavez, you get visits from Sean Penn and kudos from Oliver Stone.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Look, for the time being these "guys" (big corporations) own and run the world.
Until we're really ready to throw off our yokes, the best we can do is learn to discern the companies that are behaving decently and those that are not. There's a lot of information out there that we can use in the cause of this sort of discernment.
Yes, Google is "all about self-interest". But until we learn that they've done something evil like fund a coup in Nigeria or Haiti or the Honduras or plunder some third world country or poison a water supply, or contribute to the Republicans (kidding, relax), we might as well give them the benefit of the doubt and judge them on their actions.
Exxon, ADM, Monsanto, Haliburton, Blackwater, DuPont...well, it's not such a pretty picture there. But if a corporation behaves there's no reason that their "self-interest" should damn them (again, not until we're ready to throw of our yokes).
Precedent (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd say the US will have hung itself with it's own rope. All China will have to do is claim that the United States has the capacity to conduct terrorism, and then if it has the means, China can setup a blockade, wage a currency war, or invade under the precedent we set a few years ago. Since we've destroyed the power of the UN and the World Court, we won't even have symbolic legal recourse.
The Golden Rule ain't for nothing. You can call it silly European bullshit I guess, but you also seem like the sort of person who fantasizes about nuclear war. Too bad.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:3, Interesting)
A large part of it may have been luring Jihadis to fight us in Iraq, where it is easy to supply the US military (ports, good roads, etc) rather than Afghanistan where it is not. Assuming a finite supply of young Muslims willing to die fighting the US, it is best to engage them where the US has the most advantage.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Ive actually been doing a lot of studying on the entire debacle, and everything comes down to two things. Money and Power. Now that sounds like a standard cover-it-all generality, but it really is true. The answer to the "Why...?" questions is answered, the specifics of How the Why was accomplished under the worlds nose is a bigger matter. But I digress, even the Iran containment theory holds no water, because both the Taliban and Saddam were pretty much sworn enemies of Iran and they mostly contained it by themselves. In many cases, any happenings in the Mid-East must be looked at through the Sunni or Shia tinted glasses to give you a better feel of what is going on. Anyway just a quick thought I'd throw out there to ya, since you seem to be relatively more intelligent about the subject than most people nowadays. I highly encourage people to start doing a lot more fact checking and reading, with a objective and rationale mind you just very well may have all kinds of beliefs challenged.
I have no doubt it's being discussed (Score:4, Interesting)
Oh, you can bet it's being discussed. Just not publicly. That's why people go to Davos in the first place, to have the ability to discuss things privately.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:4, Interesting)
The American people chose to go to war by supporting Bush.
Except for the part where Bush originally ran on a platform of non-intervention, diplomatic involvement, and "we are not the world's police force".
Not that I enjoyed a single thing the guy did while crash landing my country over eight years, but you should see John Stewart's Bush vs. Bush debate [thedailyshow.com], comparing the things he said on the campaign trail to the rhetoric he took in office. I know that politician campaign promises have a snowball's chance of making it into reality during their term, but I have never--not even with Obama and government openness--seen such a turnaround as Bush made on foreign policy... Bush didn't just fail to keep his promises, he made totally new ones. It's like some sort of presidential mental breakdown followed shortly after 9/11.
Now, 2004? Well, there was no excuse for that except Kerry rolling a 1 on his Diplomacy check.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:1, Interesting)
At least partly because of long standing ties to Al Qaeda and Saddam's regime in Iraq. The first truck-bomb attack on the World Trade Center was due at least in part to training given by Iraqi intelligence to Al Qaeda members. While there has never been a link shown between Iraq and 9/11 directly (of course nobody has claimed such either, especially Cheney) and because U.N. weapons inspectors believed that if Iraq did not have WMD's they had programs waiting to be started up as soon as the U.N. was no longer looking, and that's just *if* they didn't have them already. We did find such weapons after invasion, no huge stockpiles but we did find some, and what was found is consistent with stockpiles having to be moved on very short notice with a few barrels or war-heads not finding space on trucks and being left in warehouses across Iraq. It is very likely that the rest of the contents of those warehouses were what was on the convoys of trucks seen driving over the border into Syria. Also if you want to believe that the Bush administration made up the "WMD's" bit to legitimize the war, then you also have to believe that the Clinton administration was complicit in that ruse years earlier for indicting Osama Bin Laden for attempting to purchase WMD's from Iraq, an act that requires sworn eye witness testimony. So "no Weapons of Mass Destruction hasn't really panned out either.
In short we went to war in Iraq because of a history of helping an organization that had been at war with us for about a decade, the U.N. weapons inspectors belief that Iraq had weapons programs waiting to be started as soon as scrutiny eased if they did not have stockpiles of weapons already.
Why are we still there? I'm sure oil is was a motivator for staying, but it's kind of daft to think it's that simple. My theory is that we stayed to build up Iraq into a middle eastern democracy with friendly ties to the U.S. and that also had a bunch of oil.
As far as all those other nations on the verge of civil war, that's not relevant, much the same way no one got involved in our civil war, though England was about to help the south (cheap cotton) until slavery was abolished, which would have turned that into a bad political move. As far as all the other oppressed nations, none of them gave aid to an organization conducting a war against the U.S. Also there's the old adage that 'you have to pick your fights,' to take on *all* of the oppressive regimes in the world would stretch us too thin and would become a P.R. nightmare no matter how noble the intent was. Any innocent casualties, as well as any casualties that can be made to appear innocent on the news coverage, would be held against us and used to hurt our geopolitical standing. Look at Vietnam. All anyone knows about is all the innocent villages that got burned down, taking someone else's word for it the whole time. Nobody remembers that the U.S. made a promise to South Vietnam to stay there until North Vietnam was no longer a threat. Nobody remembers either, that 2 million innocent people died as a result of our decision to leave Vietnam, or that the war was started to stop the militarized spread of communism (google Yuri Bezmenov to hear how communism was spread, he was one of the guys doing it until he defected. I believe his video is still hosted on Metacafe).
So pretty much everything you've ever heard about "Iraq was bad and Bush is evil" has been ignoring vast amounts of facts about the whole thing. Is it as simple as "the U.S. are heroes and evil doers can suck it?" No, but it's not nearly as simple as "oil" either. We did, in fact, have a legitimate reason to wage a war against Saddam Husein's government. Of course just like in Vietnam, the whole endeavor has been bungled by those individuals who straddle the line between strategist and politician.
Re:The Manchurian Candidate is to GE's presidency, (Score:1, Interesting)
Do YOU want to die for the Kuomintang?
Hi, sorry, late to the party and posting as an AC, so I don't think this will be read by anyone, but I have the urge to post all the same.
Do I want to die? No. Would I? Maybe.
I live in Mainland China. The amount of corruption, of selfishness, of people whose lives have been ruined all for the sake of a dollar is astounding here, and makes the US pale in comparison. You think Enron was bad? That's peanuts compared to the crap people have to take because of simple lack of empathy. I've seen entire neighborhoods razed with the government giving the residents, oh, around 1,000 dollars (which, before you say anything, can't buy another house here regardless of exchange rate) all so a group of people can get another million dollars and cement ties with each other.
It's really, really bad.
Taiwan, not so much. Yeah, it's worse than the States, and it's on its way to becoming another Hong Kong, but at least there's a fairly outspoken group of people who are willing to put their foot down against such activities as what I've mentioned above.
I'm pretty sure I'd be willing to put my life on the line in order to prevent the perversion of another square inch of global soil by Chinese politics.
Re:God bless you, John Yoo. (Score:3, Interesting)
The UN and World Court do exist when they agree with the United States. Isn't that peculiar.
No, it makes perfect sense when you have bodies that require their supporters to bear the weight of every decision they make that are frequently run by a bloated and corrupt bureaucracy. There's a reason that the 17,000 U.S. troops in Haiti weren't donated to the U.N. mission there just like there's a reason why the only action taken against Sudan has been an arrest warrant in Europe. It's unfortunate that the UN security council is a reminder to so many other countries about their comparative lack of power.
So, the trade agreements around the world are a figment of my imagination? Trade embargoes don't exist, multi-party talks to persuade foreign governments exist entirely in my imagination. It is fascinating how insane I am.
Iran. Cuba. Sudan. China, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Germany. You're not insane, those things certainly do exists, but you may wish to note they've been notoriously unreliable at actually accomplishing anything.
And you'd base this on what fortune telling ability? I'm glad simple assertions are gaining traction here on slashdot. By this time next year we can all be Brothers in Christ.
I would base it on logistical difficulty, the current tactical impossibility, and that I imagine both sides being armed with nuclear weapons makes the possibility of ever conquering either one pretty unlikely.
I'd say the US will have hung itself with it's own rope. All China will have to do is claim that the United States has the capacity to conduct terrorism, and then if it has the means, China can setup a blockade, wage a currency war, or invade under the precedent we set a few years ago. Since we've destroyed the power of the UN and the World Court, we won't even have symbolic legal recourse.
1) They don't
2) Why would a one party dictatorship growing rich on the exploitation of their people want to attack the people most responsible for the never ending stream of money that has made their economic success possible?
I have nothing against international law, but to ignore the immense limitation of it specifically with implementation and enforcement is just being unrealistic. It doesn't require you to be a warmonger to realize that the system as it stands now would be ineffective at preventing war between the US and China if that were the course they chose. Acting like a 7th grader on crack when someone points out that taking the moral high ground is sometimes less important than taking the real high ground is uncalled for.
Re:Soooo.... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm always puzzled why our military is "terrible" at fighting a guerrilla/insurgency.
I've read a number of the articles in newspapers where they go along with a patrol, invariably get attacked, and someone from the patrol is quoted as saying the village/building is constant source of sniper fire or an operations base for some local group of insurgents.
It seems to me our "humanity" gets in the way of fighting wars. Were this a Roman campaign, the men in the village would all be killed and the women and children hauled back to Rome as slaves. The village would be burned to the ground and the crops looted or torched.
Rome subdued most of Europe with this strategy.
If we're there to fight, we should be willing to dish out this level of brutality. How many villages have to get wiped off the map before people stop being willing to cooperate with the insurgency? Villages that cooperate should get whatever support we can give them (building materials and assistance, medical care, etc).
I've even read at least one story about post-WWII Germany where "Werewolf" resistance fighters sniped at an American unit entering a village; the American response? Pull out a 1-2 KM and indiscriminately shell the village overnight. By morning, the resistance leaders were either bound or dead in the village square.
Yes, I realize that a lot of "innocent" people get killed. It's extremely cruel. But respecting humanity and extending an occupation 10+ years isn't?