Chinese Military Hacked Into Pentagon

iFrated informs us of a successful penetration of US Defense Department computers by the Chinese military last June. From the article: "The Pentagon acknowledged shutting down part of a computer system serving the office of Robert Gates, defense secretary, but declined to say who it believed was behind the attack. Current and former officials have told the Financial Times an internal investigation has revealed that the incursion came from the [Chinese] People's Liberation Army. One senior US official said the Pentagon had pinpointed the exact origins of the attack. Another person familiar with the event said there was a 'very high level of confidence... trending towards total certainty' that the PLA was responsible." The PLA is also accused of breaking into German government computers, including a network in the office of the Chancellor.

Comments

Sanctions

[BWJones]

Here's the deal.... While I acknowledge that there is a potential risk of engagement (and the big Navy folks desperately want this possibility to be the case), I have a tough time thinking that China will allow the PLA to escalate this much given the financial commitments that Chinese industry is trying to maintain and expand with the West..... especially prior to the Olympics. That said, I expect more "defense" related activity in the guise of IT based attacks and probes from the PLA rather than traditional military actions in the future.

It will be interesting to see just what form the response to these sorts of attacks will take. Hard-liners will want old school military war games and confrontation, but I suspect steps like US and EU invalidation of Chinese purchased US and EU debt and economic sanctions will be far more effective.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't really see anything coming out of this. It sounds more like a pissing contest to me than anything else, and I'd be more concerned about their other capabilities (e.g. nuclear warheads, lasers that can shoot down satellites ala Cardinal of the Kremlin, Chinese economy) than how well they can hack into some bigwigs computer.

Additionally, there seems to be enough doubt as to provide "plausible" deniability, or it could just be attributed to "...someone's unilateral wet dream" (quoted from Enemy of the State). Seems too small to make a big deal out of, to this observer at any rate; who knows what they're not telling us...

Re:Sanctions

[killdozer3k]

Its an act of war. But ehy are long-game players and the USA plays too short. they have bought in deep into the old USA with T-bonds and so on. While they work to dismantle it. If we were smarter we would really do something big.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

It will be interesting to see just what form the response to these sorts of attacks will take. Hard-liners will want old school military war games and confrontation, but I suspect steps like US and EU invalidation of Chinese purchased US and EU debt and economic sanctions will be far more effective.

Hold on, dude! There are enough problems with Iraq, and drums are sounding for Iran (and Korea?)... Just in case George W. gets strange ideas, have you people checked the General Strike called for 9/11/07? It might be more even more needed now!

Re:Sanctions

[vandan]

Sanctions? You've GOT to be fucking kidding, man! The US economy is based largely on importing cheap Chinese goods. The US is at the mercy of the Chinese government, who could at any time start selling BILLIONS of their US dollars and driving the currency into the dirt. The US does NOT have the upper hand here.

The military option is even more laughable. The US can't even secure Afghanistan or Iraq, 2 countries crippled by DECADES of war and sanctions. There's no way in hell the US has any prospect of even sneezing in the general direction of Bejing without their prior consent.

Re:Sanctions

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

The Olympics dont mean a dam thing to anyone. I remember an opening ceremony but did the Olympics pass already? hehe I could careless.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

If we threaten debt repudiation then we have to be willing to accept massive devaluation of our currency. Actually going through with such a thing would send the dollar into free fall, so China would assume that it is an empty threat. Sanctions of some variety seem more likely, but even there I have my doubts - and unless the EU were entirely on board with it it would be suicidal to even try.

You can't play the "carrot and stick" game with Asian countries. It doesn't work, they'll smile and tell you exactly what you want to hear and nod and agree to meet again and form working groups and check off action items on a checklist - but they won't actually do anything. China especially has a huge chip on its shoulder about colonialism, I honestly don't they even consider lying to white foreign devils to be lying, it's just the way you deal with white foreign devils.

Re:Sanctions

[heretic108]

I don't really see anything coming out of this. It sounds more like a pissing contest to me than anything else, and I'd be more concerned about their other capabilities (e.g. nuclear warheads, lasers that can shoot down satellites ala Cardinal of the Kremlin, Chinese economy) than how well they can hack into some bigwigs computer.

The problem: if the Chinese military can get enough control over Pentagon computers, then it doesn't really matter what their own hardware capabilities are, they'll be able to deploy some US military hardware for their own objectives.

Re:Sanctions

[sumdumass]

We could secure both Afghanistan or Iraq. The problem is, that to do it effectivly, we don't get the governments we want put in place. We end up with more of the same to no end. The idea behind putting a democracy into the mix is two fold. One, it lets the people have some say in how their countries go, and two, it makes it extremely obvious when a totalitarian group like th Taliban takes over and imposes a bunch of restrictions.

In the later case, it would be very likely that other countries would come to their aid if more then a minority of citizens wanted the democracy back. It creates a sense of stability even among chaos if it is present. If we chucked all that out the window and just went for securing the countries, it would be done by now.

Re:Sanctions

[vandan]

We could secure both Afghanistan or Iraq.

That's SO far from the truth that I don't know whether you're lying or incredibly deceived. The US army is at breaking point, and the situation is spiraling out of control in both occupations.

The problem is, that to do it effectivly, we don't get the governments we want put in place. We end up with more of the same to no end.

There's no such thing as a democracy under military occupation. The UN even says so.

In the later case, it would be very likely that other countries would come to their aid if more then a minority of citizens wanted the democracy back.

That statement carries the absurd assumption that some people don't want democracy. EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination.

If we chucked all that out the window and just went for securing the countries, it would be done by now.

You're obviously under the false impression that our aim there is to create a beautiful, blossoming democracy! It's not. It's to grab resources and set up military bases. Democracy is a word that the ruling class throw around. It's meaning in this context is, "A group of individuals of considerable power who will do our bidding". And they can't even get THAT right. But the main goal is to secure Afghanistan and Iraq, and is slipping further away from us each day.

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[MightyMartian]

The Olympics dont mean a dam thing to anyone. I remember an opening ceremony but did the Olympics pass already? hehe I could careless.

Manufacturers of blood transfusion equipment and anabolic steroids care.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

Um no, you're a fucking idiot.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

um no, you're the fucking faggot that has learned to use the word "idiot".

Re:Sanctions

[pravuil]

Yeah, it does seem too small considering the type of attack. Sounds to me that some individual wanted to test their skills or at least test the security of Pentagon computers. Could be that a computer from the PLA was used as a proxy. That's more of a possibility. While I hate to even suggest this, it might mean that there are people out there instigating conflict between countries. That in itself could mean that terrorism has taken a new form. I really hate using that word but considering the parties involved and what would be at stake if there was a conflict between the two, it seems plausible that there would be a third party involved.

It really is hard to say whether the China is responsible or not after reading both articles. I don't know what kind of security policies they use within their government and I don't really care to know. Unfortunately, how they handle hackers is ultimately their own business. How we deal with our own data gathering policies is another story altogether. IMHO, I think America's paranoia finally caught up with us. It's too early to say what will happen. This is an isolated event and I doubt anything serious would come from this. To be honest with everyone, I don't like where any of this is going. I hate using this adage but if only the strongest survive then it means that death will be the only thing the strongest will see for quite a long time. What good is that?

Re:Sanctions

[fluffy99]

Exactly. China doesn't want war, but they want desperately to close the military and technology gap. Stealing the technology instead of developing it themselves is vastly cheaper, quicker and easier. The are not the only country friendly or not who engages in corporate and military espionage against the US. ANd don't think the US isn't spying on the other countries either.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

"The problem: if the Chinese military can get enough control over Pentagon computers, then it doesn't really matter what their own hardware capabilities are, they'll be able to deploy some US military hardware for their own objectives."

Bullshit, do you really think we have not done the exact same thing to their networks? Besides, this is not a movie; most military systems (and all if they felt the need) are on a private intranet. While this can be hacked into in theory, if that becomes an issue, we can simply take the stuff offline. Tanks don't need Wi-Fi uplinks to kill people.

And besides, this is moot. China does not have to resort to high-tech fantasy tricks to beat us. China has a GDP of 7 trillion dollars, while the US has one of 12 trillion. Their economy is growing at 10% per year, ours grows at 3%. Do the math, in a decade or so, even if Chinese have one 5th the per capita income of the US, they will have a larger GDP.

With a larger GDP, they will be able to outspend us militarily, without causing any strain on their economy. In the face of such a demographic certainty, the worst thing we can do is to act aggressive and provoke China into an arms race. Unlike the Soviet Union, they could actually win one.

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[Ours]

Correction "Cardinal of the Kremlin" was about an anti-missile laser. Zapping missile silos before they ever leave.

Re:Sanctions

[killjoe]

Another thing is that you can force your enemy to spend tons of money and time rebuilding networks that were broken into. Economic warfare is the next frontier and china is better situated to fight that war then anybody else.

Re:Sanctions

[Nullav]

With a larger GDP, they will be able to outspend us militarily, without causing any strain on their economy. In the face of such a demographic certainty, the worst thing we can do is to act aggressive and provoke China into an arms race. Unlike the Soviet Union, they could actually win one.

Screw arms races, take out factories of all sorts and carpet bomb the heavy trade areas. I'm sure a nuke would work wonders in a country with such high population density (and if it escalated to that point, I doubt too many people would be against it).
Sure, this doesn't sound like the cleanest solution, killing millions of innocent people, crippling the government and wreaking havoc on their economy (and likely the US economy, for that matter), but it looks like China won't care for talk once they're in a position to do away with the US.

Re:Sanctions

[delt0r]

EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. Can you back that up? I doubt it, because its one of the things that comes from the USA, that democracy is good and pure and everyone wants it. Like everyone wants to live in the USA.

Oh yea, just so you know, most of the 6 billion people on this earth don't want to live in USA.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but we're so heavily dependent on their factories that wiping them out will probably result in an economic disaster of our own.

Re:Sanctions

[_Sprocket_]

That statement carries the absurd assumption that some people don't want democracy. EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination.

That would explain all the democratic governments in the region.

You're obviously under the false impression that our aim there is to create a beautiful, blossoming democracy! It's not. It's to grab resources and set up military bases. Democracy is a word that the ruling class throw around. It's meaning in this context is, "A group of individuals of considerable power who will do our bidding". And they can't even get THAT right. But the main goal is to secure Afghanistan and Iraq, and is slipping further away from us each day.

And I suppose you're under the delusion that this is about "blood for oil." A "blossoming democracy" is only part of the concern. What you're missing is "financially successful" and "secular". "Friendly to the U.S." is probably in there as well.

Kuwait already provides tactical advantage and resources (more to economic allies than the U.S.) but hardly an example to hold up. Afghanistan could be that secular democracy... but lacks the resources to drive home the financial success that has neighboring citizens wanting. Iraq could be everything.

Of course, Iraq would be difficult even if it wasn't attracting external interest. There is plenty to gain and lose inside Iraq. And there are more than a few entities who would gain from scuttling a secular democratic government friendly to the U.S. Scuttling is the easy side of the battle considering Iraq's internal politics / culture.

It's a situation that's blowing up in this Administration's face. I'm not even sure they really appreciated how difficult it would be - they certainly didn't seem to have a plan. You'd think they had a clue. Many of the players were involved in Bush Sr.'s Administration - and they made the wise choice of staying out of this mess (even if the plan was to let Iraq take care of Saddam). Maybe one can just chalk it up to arrogance.

Re:Sanctions

[w000t]

it looks like China won't care for talk once they're in a position to do away with the US. that sounds an awful lot like the WMD bullshit used to justify the invasion of Iraq.
enough with the paranoid FUD.

Re:Sanctions

[KDR_11k]

*activate tinfoil hat mode*
This COULD be a fake designed to give the impression that China is planning a war, kinda like Operation Himmler.

Re:Sanctions

[KDR_11k]

China has MAD capabilities, you fire a nuke, they fire a whole bunch back. The result would just leave both countries severely crippled and vulnerable to a third party that might decide it's invasion time.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

"You're obviously under the false impression that our aim there is to create a beautiful, blossoming democracy! It's not. It's to grab resources and set up military bases."

If this is truth, then why did the US not simply do like France and give weapons and equipment to Saddam in exchange for the oil?

Re:Sanctions

[zig007]

Hm.
"US and EU invalidation of Chinese purchased US and EU debt"

What, you think it is that easy? "We don't owe you anymore?".
That would be to completely destroy all U.S. economic credibility. An incredibly stupid move.
Even to stop paying interests would be catastrophic.
And why the hell should EU get behind that?

And what do you think the Chinese would counter with? Maybe sanctions? Maybe they are less dependent of the U.S. than the other way around? Do you really want to test that? This is not Venezuela we are talking about.

The only result would be that all nations that feel they might have differences with the U.S.(of which there are many) in the future would stop lending money to the U.S.

Also, this is insanely hypocritical, as U.S. has been doing this for ages.
That the U.S. performs industrial espionage has been, and is, widely recognized as a fact by other countries.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

vulnerable to a third party that might decide it's invasion time. Eurasia?
No way, they are our allies!

Re:Sanctions

[forgotten_my_nick]

Not sure why they would need to steal it. Most electronic stuff comes from China anyway.

Re:Sanctions

[Nullav]

China is a large country with the largest standing army in the world and a strong economy. Quite different from Iraq. I was suggesting that things might get ugly, not saying that they should and that the US should invade China.
Although, I could have worded that post a lot better than I did. (For one, countries generally don't go to war for the sake of it, Mongolia would probably be a better target if it were just a war over territory, and breaking into computers isn't necessarily an act of aggression. Also, I'd like to think large-scale war between two large countries wouldn't be possible in this time. (No one likes noisy neighbors, war interrupts trade, and I'm sure everyone has all sorts of neat little toys to tell everyone to shut up.)

tl;dr - I should read what I write before posting, espionage doesn't have to mean war, and it probably would be an arms race or economic war if anything, with both countries learning not to keep important stuff connected to the network.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

hahaha... invalidation of government debt as a measure against China?

That would bring the entire global financial system down instantly. China has over 1 trillian dollars of US government debt. If it was invalidated there would be a rush on the RMB (China's currency) like you'd never seen before. As EVERYONE tried to pull their investments out of China the value of anything in China would collapse. That means anyone who's invested in China would find it impossible to recoup even a small fraction of their investment.

A very large portion of US foreign investment goes to China. With the current US financial market turmoil which the world is only getting through without too much pain because of the robustness of Chinese demand, the US wouldn't even think about this kind of measure even in the face of full scale war between the two countries.

Despite the impressive array of technical knowledge demonstrated on /. I never cease to be amazed by the ignorance of economic issues.

ps. IAAE (I am an economist)

Re:Sanctions

[coaxial]

That statement carries the absurd assumption that some people don't want democracy. EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination. World history is full of dictatorships that rose to power with popular support. And I'm not even talking about bait-and-switch dictatorships (ala communism). To say a majority always wants democracy is absurd. People always want security. They always want a food and shelter. They always want "respect," whatever that means to them. That democracy isn't on the list.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

We could secure both Afghanistan or Iraq.

That's SO far from the truth that I don't know whether you're lying or incredibly deceived. The US army is at breaking point, and the situation is spiraling out of control in both occupations.

--------------

No, the US could theoretically secure Iraq and Afghanistan. The real reason this isn't done is because it can only be done by scorched earth (i.e. kill everyone, man, woman, child, dog, donkey, etc). The US can sure as hell do this (a few dozen hydrogen bombs should do the trick)... but it doesn't exactly achieve the objective now does it?

Re:Sanctions

[vishbar]

Wow! It's like the Wizard of Oz...a straw man that needs a brain.

He never mentioned American democracy, and ESPECIALLY never mentioned that "everybody" wants to live in the USA. He just mentioned that a group of people will always want democracy because they have the chance to have a say in government...argue against what he said, don't put up a ridiculous strawman to defend a point he wasn't attacking.

Re:Sanctions

[shutdown -p now]

EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination.

Would you care to give us a proof for your statement? From what I've seen the majority of the population in any country care more about "stability" than they do about "democracy". In Western countries those usually went hand in hand, and now are strongly tied together. But in e.g. China and Russia, a lot of people support nondemocratic measures taken by the government when they are perceived to be for the sake of stability and prosperity of the nation.

Re:Sanctions

[kcelery]

Some people think google and Yahoo are run by FBI. If the google earth server receive GPS trail of sensitive region in China, it might be collected in some where within the pentagon.

Re:Sanctions

[vandan]

Would you caret to give us a proof for your statement?

Firstly, have a quick think about things. People like being in control of their life, right? No-one wants to be a slave or anything like that, do they? Show me ONE society on Earth that actually WANTS to be enslaved, as individuals. If you look at the history of imperialism, it's also the history of national liberation movements. Examples are aplenty, but a couple are: Ireland, India, even the fucking US of A. This translates naturally from the national level to the personal level. People also want to have a say in how society is run. To suggest otherwise - to suggest that people don't want a say in how the society they live in operates - is absolutely absurd. It's so clearly against human nature that I am astonished that I hear it so often - but then I remember the racist propaganda we're drowning in, and I understand a little ...

Seriously, all people want a say in how society is run. If you don't believe me, ask people. Travel and ask people. You'll be pleasantly surprised.

As for the bit about stability, it all depends on your perspective. I think people are willing to endure some turbulence in the name of achieving real democracy.

But in e.g. China and Russia, a lot of people support nondemocratic measures taken by the government when they are perceived to be for the sake of stability and prosperity of the nation.

Yes, these are different forms of capitalism: State Capitalism, and they are typically even worse than Western capitalist formations in terms of democracy. It's important to remember that in Western countries, people are falling over themselves at this very moment to support anti-democratic measures such as the Patriot Act and the rest of the 'war on terror', and all in the name of stability, prosperity, security, etc. Unfortunately, with the media being almost exclusively corporate-controlled, it's easy to get the population to rally behind some very stupid and dangerous stuff.

Re:Sanctions

[kestasjk]

The problem: if the Chinese military can get enough control over Pentagon computers, then it doesn't really matter what their own hardware capabilities are, they'll be able to deploy some US military hardware for their own objectives. Yeah, it's like the Cold War again, but with modern technology. For illustrative purposes I've recreated what probably happened during the security breach:

hu.jintou@chinese.government.mil.gov.cn connection accepted.

Enter password to access pentagon mainframe...
HACKING ATTEMPTS DETECTED, LOCKING DOWN IN 5..
4..
3..
2..
Access granted. Welcome to the pentagon.

Please select an option:
1. Self destruct the USA
2. Remote control all submarines to dive to breaking point
3. Wire all money in all US controlled banks to China

You have selected "Self destruct the USA". Are you sure? (Y/N)

Confirmed. Self destructing the USA in 5.. 4.. 3.. 2..

[Connection terminated and day saved by no-nonsense FBI boss and nerdy-but-misunderstood ex-criminal hacker]

Seriously; world affairs aren't a movie, the pentagon isn't hooked up to any military hardware, the sources are dubious, China has denied it, the pentagon hasn't said who they think did it, and the Financial Times has shown that it likes to stir up China-phobia before.

Re:Sanctions

[delt0r]

No he didn't. He said EVERYBODY wants democracy. Typical dribble from the New World.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yea, just so you know, most of the 6 billion people on this earth don't want to live in USA.

Eh, I doubt that. If you started going around to people and asking them if they wanted to live in the United States, no strings attached, no repercussions from their current governments, I'm sure a majority of them would say yes.

Re:Sanctions

[dnoyeb]

"That statement carries the absurd assumption that some people don't want democracy. EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination."

That is completely absurd. In the US conservatives are generally not after democracy. They want the rest of the country to live under rules they choose. That is not self-determination.

Most people's views on government is tied strongly to their beliefs and values which is tied to their religion. Democracy is not a common theme in world religions.

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[sumdumass]

That's SO far from the truth that I don't know whether you're lying or incredibly deceived. The US army is at breaking point, and the situation is spiraling out of control in both occupations.

You must not be paying attention. First, the army isn't over stretched. They might be stretched further then they want to be, or more likely more then you want them to be but they aren't in any place that cannot handle. Second, The reasons we are in the position we are in is because we aren't fighting to win a war like traditional wars have been won.

Instead of going in and defeating the countries to the point they want to give up and give in, we are attempting to retain a resemblance of their nationality and instill a governmental system we approve of. This is completely different from a traditional war where you go in and destroy anything capable of fighting back then enslave the people while gradually letting them have their rights back. And to that note, America hasn't been very successful in the past when fighting wars like we are now. It seems that if you don't beat the will of the people, you have a lot harder time at it.

There's no such thing as a democracy under military occupation. The UN even says so.

I don't know why you even put this on the block. I said we are having the problem we are because of what we are trying to do. That would be instilling democracy. You already pointed out that we aren't doing that very well. But you see, as long as democracy isn't there, we will be and then when they are closer to democracy, we start moving out. Then about the time they are a democracy, we are gone. Well, at least from a controlling position. We might stick around for defensive reasons at their request. And as of right now, we are there at their request. Bush had said repeatedly that is either countries acting/controling government asks us to leave we would. It would be an insane move on their behalf right now but it would be an option.

that statement carries the absurd assumption that some people don't want democracy. EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination.

History has proved that too many times people will give up democracy in support of some dictatorship. Everyone doesn't want democracy, maybe most everyone but it would be foolish to say every one. There are non democracies that don't abuse the citizens and there are non democracies that don't enslave the people. And to the point that people think something is right or wrong is subject to the relativeness of their experiences.

If you had no idea what a democracy was, you wouldn't miss it. And if you never experienced it, you wouldn't miss it. It is like having a craving for a food. You can't crave a food if you have never saw it or tasted it before. You can crave something sweet, something chocolaty but if you never tasted a chocolate bar, you couldn't crave it. Now take chocolate and place democracy in there, it is completely interchangeable.

And to the point i was making with the statement I made. If we don't stay and attempt to set a democracy up, a dictator will rise from the chaos and we will be in the same boat we are in or were before the wars. I wasn't making any point to someone not wanting a democracy. It was to the likely chain of event absent our presence.

ou're obviously under the false impression that our aim there is to create a beautiful, blossoming democracy! It's not. It's to grab resources and set up military bases. Democracy is a word that the ruling class throw around. It's meaning in this context is, "A group of individuals of considerable power who will do our bidding". And they can't even get THAT right. But the main goal is to secure Afghanistan and Iraq, and is slipping further away from us each day.

Re:Sanctions

[vtcodger]

***The problem: if the Chinese military can get enough control over Pentagon computers, then it doesn't really matter what their own hardware capabilities are, they'll be able to deploy some US military hardware for their own objectives.***

Not a problem. Really. Not a Problem

• First of all, this is EXACTLY what the NSA routinely does wrt to Chinese, Russian, French, Israeli etc computers. Probe the things. Look for weaknesses. Extract any accessible data. Nobody thinks that the NSA is going to take over the world. The NSA apparently can't even find Osama bin Laden.
• Nobody, not even the bumbling incompetents in the Bush administration, is going to put command and control for weapons systems onto the Internet. There ARE limits to human stupidity (At least I think there are).
• The DOD has rules about handling classified data. There may be interesting and sensitive stuff on the computers in question, but things like the Permissive Action Link codes for US nuclear weapons are not going to be anywhere where China, Isreal, or a teenager in Bulgaria can get to them.
• If you want to know what is going on in the DOD, you do not depend on hacking the computers. You get a few of your people hired as bartenders and wait staff at watering holes near the Pentagon.
• China is doing quite well with a multi-decade effort to buy the United States piecemeal. Why would they imperil that and damage both the home country and the property they are acquiring by starting a war? The US may be led by fools. China is not.

Re:Sanctions

[delire]

Agreed. Beyond pissing off the government, you're also encouraging desperate retaliation from other groups (eg terrorism).

Terrorism follows fast in the footsteps of trade embargos and economic sanctions: a fast and reliable way to incite hatred in anyone is to restrict their growth. The one reason some countries are so angry at America is precisely because of it's embargos: the assumption that it has the right to police and punish them economically or otherwise.

The popular press will tell you terrorism is an expression of "a hatred of freedom". It couldn't be farther from the truth: terrorism is so often just a desperate and sadistic act designed as a message: "We want our freedom back - leave us the fuck alone."

The Bush administration has created enough trouble for Americans and people elsewhere - I doubt the angst many countries feel toward America could be greater right now. More embargos would be foolish - and nothing short of dangerous for the American people.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

let's hope they steal Windows!

Re:Sanctions

[ToasterofDOOM]

I don't think it's surprising that China or anyone else is spying on the US or vive versa, what is surprising, or at least alarming is that they succeeded. It's like exposing a new severe security bug in Windows, because nobody's surprised but everyone's worried.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL, this is the most uninformed post I have read in a while!

Re:Sanctions

[tha_mink]

And besides, this is moot. China does not have to resort to high-tech fantasy tricks to beat us. China has a GDP of 7 trillion dollars, while the US has one of 12 trillion. Their economy is growing at 10% per year, ours grows at 3%. Do the math, in a decade or so, even if Chinese have one 5th the per capita income of the US, they will have a larger GDP. To use your word, "Bullshit". While their GDP might match ours, their per captia GDP barely beats out the Philippines and lies slightly under the vast military power of the Republic of the Congo. Of course their GDP is huge, they have billions of people. The problem is, they have billions of people. GDP by itself is a useless metric.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

No need to resort to paranoia(besides, all of the images Google Earth receives were taken at some point by a spy satellite.), a US spy plane crashed in China a couple of years ago.

Re:Sanctions

[ProppaT]

The thing is, no specs or plans for building weapons and other technologies would be on a network that could be hacked into. This would be completely separated from the internet as a whole and safeguarded as classified information. China knows this...the only reason they would do this is to prove that they can do it. The only thing they could get from such an attack is names and numbers of people who possibly could leak them information with coercion.

I always think it's funny when people think that government secrets are accessible via hax0ringz teh net.

Re:Sanctions

[baboo_jackal]

Besides, this is not a movie; most military systems (and all if they felt the need) are on a private intranet. While this can be hacked into in theory, if that becomes an issue, we can simply take the stuff offline. Tanks don't need Wi-Fi uplinks to kill people.
Totally agree. Anything essential the military does uses its own private network infrastructure. Chinese script kiddies just can't get to it without some sort of physical intervention that would constitute, oh I don't know, espionage, treason, or act of war. Tanks can definitely use network connectivity to kill people more effectively and in a more coordinated fashion, however.

And besides, this is moot. China does not have to resort to high-tech fantasy tricks to beat us. China has a GDP of 7 trillion dollars, while the US has one of 12 trillion. Their economy is growing at 10% per year, ours grows at 3%. Do the math, in a decade or so, even if Chinese have one 5th the per capita income of the US, they will have a larger GDP.
Totally disagree - what do you think that all that money just goes into a giant pot for the government to use? Even in Communist China, Money does not earn You! (Plus, their per capita GDP (2006) is like $6,000. Ours is like $44,000.) Plus, that's a big assumption you made there, that China's GDP growth will continue for ten years! (And what part of that growth rate is artificially inflated by misreporting? Certainly not zero...)

The problem isn't that China will somehow become some sort of threat - Chinese economic growth helps the world in general, and I'm rooting for them. It's just that as they try to transition into a more-Capitalist global economic player, those old-school USSR-style, "Rutabaga production is up 500,000%, well ahead of target, Comrade!" total bullshit reports will just end up hurting foreign investors and their own people in very real ways.

But I guess, when you compare "having a slow economic year," or "market takes a big hit" to "dragged out back and shot" or "run over by tank," it's not so bad. (Or, I guess that stuff probably still happens...)

Re:Sanctions

[t0rkm3]

You present the answer to the problem, or more correctly stated, why their GDP is not necessarily a problem in your diatribe.

Simply put, their GDP is based on population size, that population has to be supported via that self-same number. Our per capita productivity and wealth far outstrips their numbers by such a margin as to be laughable. Therefore, we can afford to spend far more of our capital on warfare than they can without resorting to cannibalizing our infrastructure or quality of life to do so.

Over time this gap will shrink. What will be interesting to see is how quickly the tables will turn against China's economy as their productivity far outstrips their ability to import foodstuffs and raw materials.

That will be an interesting geo-political situation.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

"To use your word, "Bullshit". While their GDP might match ours, their per capita GDP barely beats out the Philippines and lies slightly under the vast military power of the Republic of the Congo. Of course their GDP is huge, they have billions of people. The problem is, they have billions of people. GDP by itself is a useless metric."

Did you miss my point? GDP is by itself a useless metric if you want to calculate living standards, but it is the perfect metric to describe military might. It does not matter why they have a large GDP, it means that if their government spends the same percentage of their GDP as the US does, they will be able to afford more tanks, better technology, and more research, then we can.

As an aside China's GDP per capita is 20% higher that The Philippines and 7 times larger then that of the Republic of the Congo. Also, China's population has been stagnant over the last decade, while GDP per capita has been growing rapidly. They seem to be following the same economic path of development as Japan, South Korea, and Singapore. This suggests that their GDP per capita should level off at around 70% of US levels. But with a population 5 times larger, they will have a much larger GDP.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

First of all, this is EXACTLY what the NSA routinely does wrt to Chinese, Russian, French, Israeli etc computers. Probe the things. Look for weaknesses. Extract any accessible data. Nobody thinks that the NSA is going to take over the world. The NSA apparently can't even find Osama bin Laden.

Agree that NSA isn't trying to take over the world, but it is an arm of the US Department of Defense and is very capable of doing more than analyze and exploit networks. As far as finding Osama, NSA cannot find what's "off the grid" - their only hope is to find a reliable Chatty Cathy who knows where he's hiding.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

Beyond pissing off the government, you're also encouraging desperate retaliation from other groups (eg terrorism).

I believe this to be true. You'll piss off "terrorist" orgs. as well.

a fast and reliable way to incite hatred in anyone is to restrict their growth.

Technically, what you need to say here is to "repress" them. I believe there to be a difference between the two.

The popular press will tell you terrorism is an expression of "a hatred of freedom". t couldn't be farther from the truth: terrorism is so often just a desperate and sadistic act designed as a message: "We want our freedom back - leave us the fuck alone."

The problem with the 21st century and the "rise of terrorism" (so to speak) is that one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. But I think the appropriate phrase here is "two wrongs do not make a right."

The Bush administration has created enough trouble for Americans and people elsewhere...

If you believe it's just the Bush administration that's created these problems, then you're the one who needs to stop believing the "popular press".

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

How exactly is per capita income relevant to how much the government can spend on the military?

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

Thank you for the intelligent and well written reply.

While inaccurate reports certainly are a problem, they are more prevalent in regional numbers(central Chinese states trying to get more funding). International Auditors and Agencies have done their own calculations that confirm that overall Chinese growth is in the same ball park as claims suggest.

I realize that the growth will not continue at the same rate forever(though it seems that their biggest concern, sub-prime fall-out causing a decrease in international consumption, did not materialize) , but China can have a much lower GDP per capita then us while still having a larger GDP. The money does not go into a giant pool, but if the government chooses to raise an income tax, they will be able to afford a larger military then us. But we should do all we can to avoid this kind of arms race.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

Please don't misunderstand me, I don't believe that their GDP is a problem either. I am rather happy that the Chinese people are doing well, and I don't see their rising wealth as any sort of threat. I am just trying to bolster my argument that we should not try and confront China militarily.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not surprised. Have a look at how many home computers are hacked and no one knows. I think the different with the military is that they at least notice, even if it's after the fact.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

You're an idiot, and in desperate need of an atlas, too. America is part of the New World.

Re:Sanctions

[vtcodger]

***Agree that NSA isn't trying to take over the world, but it is an arm of the US Department of Defense and is very capable of doing more than analyze and exploit networks.***

Their major role used to be interception of electronic communications and code breaking. I assume that they still do that. ***As far as finding Osama, NSA cannot find what's "off the grid" - their only hope is to find a reliable Chatty Cathy who knows where he's hiding.***

I very much doubt that bin Laden is actually "off the grid". He needs to talk to other fundamentalists or he is effectively dead -- at least as far as his goal of purging islam of impurity. I doubt that bin Laden is laying low out of fear for his life. He's a man with a mission.

He's there somewhere. Or he's in a center of islamic thought like Egypt where he can meet with people face to face. But I doubt that as he is around 6 foot 5inches tall, unusually skinny, and his face is well known to about a billion people --not easy to disguise him. And there are probably a number of people who know roughly where he is -- also on the grid. Problem is probably that he and his contemporaries have quit using easily tracked technology and have developed some discretion since it is apparent that sloppy communications can cause death and other inconvenient outcomes.

Re:Sanctions

[rdavidson3]

And we Canadians are "supposedly" spying on the Americans too. Maybe the Chinese should emulate this: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNew s/20070507/spy_coin_070507/20070507

Re:Sanctions

[mdalal97]

Well said!

Re:Sanctions

[ThousandStars]

China has a GDP of 7 trillion dollars, while the US has one of 12 trillion.

How does this idiocy get modded up, when even a cursory examination (warning: .pdf) shows that China has a GDP of 2.6B, compared to 2.9 for Germany, 4.3 for Japan, and 13 for the U.S.

With a larger GDP, they will be able to outspend us militarily, without causing any strain on their economy.

We spend about $466B, the rest of the world combined spends about $500B, and China $65B. Granted, China's PPP means they get more stuff for their $65B, but they still spend far, far less than we do.

The parent post is so wrong that it should be modded down.

Re:Sanctions

[kalaf]

Seriously, all people want a say in how society is run. If you don't believe me, ask people. Travel and ask people. You'll be pleasantly surprised.

That doesn't mean they support democracy. Sure, I want a say. That doesn't mean I want everyone else to have a say as well...

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

In other words, see Maslow's hierarchy of needs. People don't care about totalitarianism vs. democracy if basic needs aren't fulfilled. And they will support anyone that can provide for those needs.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

You have a lot more faith that government employees following proper security principles than I do. In my opinion, it is irrelevant if anything important was on the computer. I want to hear two things.

1. They've fixed the hole and are investigating their security which has failed.
2. We're going to do some form of retaliation.

I'd rather not know anything else.

Re:Sanctions

[Retric]

GDP is only one factor in a countries ability to support military spending. The real cost of feeding 1billion people > real cost of feeding 300 million people. So if GDP A = GDP B and Country A's population is 3x as large then they have less surplus capital spend on the military.

Think of it this way substance farmers increase GDP but they do little to aid military spending.

Re:Sanctions

[Anonymous Coward]

we can secure these areas, but we have been defamed and goaded out of it. we currently play this game where we storm in, oust the current government, ask the locals to form a new government, stick around as easy targets while we wait for the locals to get their shit together. we are straddling the fence on caring about what the rest of the world thinks about US. This makes us very vulnerable. "mr. president, if we invade, the world will call us an evil empire" president: "well, just invade, oust the current government, then sit tight while the locals get their shit together" we need to decide whether we care what people say about us or not. if we do care, then don't invade. if we don't, invade, conquer, imperialize! glory to the empire!

Re:Sanctions

[janrinok]

I'm afraid that I think you are wrong. They wouldn't want to live in the US. They might once have wanted such a thing, but I even doubt that.

Re:Sanctions

[GigG]

Yes and no. It was about an anti missle laser but not in the silos. It's time for a re-read.

Re:Sanctions

[RexRhino]

I very much doubt that bin Laden is actually "off the grid". He needs to talk to other fundamentalists or he is effectively dead It is very likely that he is more than effectively dead... he is probably dead. There hasn't been any public communication from him for a long time, and it isn't like he is some sort of Lex Luther evil genius or anything - by all accounts his main asset was his ability to rally people for his cause, which he is obiously not doing right now.

Re:Sanctions

[Danathar]

Ahhh...but they don't have a cache of secret military gear developed from crashed alien spacecraft in the SW.....

You don't ACTUALLY think they pay $500 for a hammer do you?

Re:Sanctions

[Danathar]

Yes....

And when the Angelic light of liberal Democrat rule is achieved the new government will enlighten the public on the true meaning of "social justice" thus establishing the next secular social paradise where the Evil of conservatism is washed away by a free education system managed by those that understand how things should be.

Puleeze.....remember that NAZI's and Brownshirts in pre-war Germany had strikingly similar methods even though each was on the extreme end of the political spectrum opposite of one another.

Colleges and Universities are the biggest group think places on the planet. Sure they have lots of different perspectives, as long as they are all left of center.

Re:Sanctions

[Archiviste]

Nobody, not even the bumbling incompetents in the Bush administration, is going to put command and control for weapons systems onto the Internet. There ARE limits to human stupidity (At least I think there are).

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the universe."
(Albert Einstein, likely apocryphal)

Re:Sanctions

[Kjella]

To use your word, "Bullshit". While their GDP might match ours, their per captia GDP barely beats out the Philippines and lies slightly under the vast military power of the Republic of the Congo. Of course their GDP is huge, they have billions of people. The problem is, they have billions of people. GDP by itself is a useless metric.

Is X% of a market any more or less whether it's per capita or not? If the government can make people set off X% for things like an army, space program, R&D does it really matter if they are 5x as many contributing 1/5th each? Yes, living in China will still be substandard to the US. But if you look at it from "Which economy is more important?" or "What government got the most money to spend?" then GDP isn't that bad. To invert your logic, since my country's GDP pro capita is higher than the US, we should be a greater superpower than the US. Ever heard of Norway, a small country on the outskirts of Europe? If not, maybe it's got something to do with absolute size...

Re:Sanctions

[socz]

I don't understand why anyone is surprised! Because come on guys, anyone who's played Command & Conquer knows that the Chinese have crazy tanks and hackers who hack their enemy and steal their $$$. And the more time they spend hacking, the better they get. You can even built an internet cafe for the hackers and then they really make some cash!

This must be one of those instances of life imitating art :P

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

Your numbers consider nominal GDP, while for the purposes I was exploring(determining how much the Chinese can actually buy), I thought that PPP numbers would be more relevant. If you would like to check those numbers, check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ GDP_(PPP) .

"We spend about $466B, the rest of the world combined spends about $500B, and China $65B. Granted, China's PPP means they get more stuff for their $65B, but they still spend far, far less than we do."

Do you know what the grammatical phrase "will be able to" means?

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

This is a valid point, and I thank you for bringing it to my attention. But baseline food costs are rather small, and China's GDP per capita is rather high. I'm not sure if it would really be an issue for them, with their current rate of growth.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

I realize that you are supporting me here, but I want to bring to your attention that those statistics are a bit sketchy. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_th e_People's_Republic_of_China and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_th e_United_States

Re:Sanctions

[mcmaddog]

a US spy plane crashed in China a couple of years ago.

Are you talking about the EP-3 that was rammed in midair by a Chinese military jet while flying in International airspace and forced to land at a Chinese military base? Also Google Earth's images come from privately owned satellites, not government controlled spy satellites, or do you mean anything Google Earth has has already been photographed by spy satellites previously?

Re:Sanctions

[sgt_doom]

Frankly, this sounds like some type of inter-family squabble. After all, the PLA owns all those factories producing all that stuff that the American-based Multinationals (who also own the Pentagon and the Presidency) outsource to them (also known as offshoring).

So what's the problem here????? It's all in the family (of scumbags)......

Re:Sanctions

[vandan]

That doesn't mean they support democracy. Sure, I want a say. That doesn't mean I want everyone else to have a say as well...

It's hard to tell whether you're being childish, irrational, or arrogant. Which one is it?

Re:Sanctions

[Rebelgecko]

If I remember correctly, the system was at first tested by melting a satellite, and the resulting heat signature was detected by an American aircraft.

Re:Sanctions

[vandan]

If you had no idea what a democracy was, you wouldn't miss it. And if you never experienced it, you wouldn't miss it. It is like having a craving for a food.

That's a very childish arguement. How do you explain the fight for democracy, or to improve things generally? If people are as patently stupid as you suggest, then we'd have no progress at all. But in fact people DO understand how society is run, whether it's by them or not, and they have opinions on the matter.

I have grown use to your type.

And I yours.

Re:Sanctions

[delire]

If you believe it's just the Bush administration that's created these problems, then you're the one who needs to stop believing the "popular press".

I most certainly don't believe the problems were soley created by the Bush administration. There has been something of a legacy of similar tactics by American governments since Nixon.

'Policing the world' - primarily to the ends of geo-strategic and economic gain - has been a self-appointed project since America's involvement in WWII.

Re:Sanctions

[bdjacobson]

This is a prime example of why we should never have gone over there in the first place. You incorrectly assume they care about Capitalism. That they care about freedom.

They don't.

You should talk to some of our soldiers. Know what happened? Grandmothers and 4 year old children welcomed us with open arms. We performed the coup and instantly they were trying to shoo us out. Started grumbling about American presence. Etc.

Their country has been the grounds for a factional war for centuries between the Sunnis and Shiites. They wanted our help overthrowing the power they couldn't themselves. Then they wanted us out so they could go exact revenge on that power.

If a radical group had been killing members of your family for generations-- and I mean literally, generations, would you care about "Democracy"? About "Capitalism"? The thought is laughable! They care about killing the people who killed their fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters. They wanted our help in destablizing the government authority so there would not be repercussions to their vendetta.

As a result, the violence is not predictable as it once was.

If we want the Iraqi population to welcome democracy with open arms in such a way that we can leave and be sure they'll stand up themselves and say "NO" when another dictator tries to rise to power, then we've got to give them something so much more impossibly desirable than what they've ever known so that they'll give up the prospect of revenge. As it is, all they've ever known their and their parents' whole lives is violent dictatorship after dictatorship. They haven't grown up with the western mindset that they have rights; let alone that they should want them. To them another dictatorship rising to power would simply be another guy at the top. Nothing they haven't already seen. So they wouldn't have the gut vomiting reaction we would if the same happened here (well it kinda is hah); not unless we have them something infinitely better, that they can see as such, to replace what they've known. I'm talking about government pressure on Hollywood to produce middle-eastern films that are shown weekly for free in Iraq that have nothing but stories of people being oppressed and overcoming the tyranny and how much better off they are when they finally do overcome it, of free love, of women with rights and the wondering ways they can help our society; BASIC propaganda work. In the absence of this, it's a 30 year job. The fact that people thought from the start that this could be a 1-2 year in-out (that's all it took before people here started complaining) was enough reason by itself to not start this. Sixty years ago our country had the character and will and dedication to rebuild another country. Not so now.

Frankly I'm of the opinion that the NSA/CIA/FBI failed us on this one. They should have had more operatives in the middle east studying their culture; if not before then certainly after 9-11. To know how they think, because that's the first and most important place you start. Then they also should have been considering the way we Americans think now. It was their job to see that our country didn't have the guts to go through with such a long job, and they missed it. Big time.

So we're stuck with our pants down in a catch-22 while the economy is sputtering along as long as we can keep getting loans from other countries, while our middle class is slowly but surely ground to low-middle-class and finally lower class; all while our politicians work for their next 4/6 years to the detriment of all our next 50.

Re:Sanctions

[kalaf]

Umm... Honest?

I'm sure there are a number of people here who think they could do things better if they were in charge. And, lets face it, none of us are going to be winning any elections...

Re:Sanctions

[Kelbear]

None of the above. There's nothing wrong with his statement, and you're being overly defensive, you never specified democracy as the method an individual wants in influencing their government, just that they would want /a/ method.

Right below the grandparent's post is a post giving a specific example of people who want to influence their government, but do not want everyone else to have a say as well.

Re:Sanctions

[sumdumass]

That's a very childish arguement. How do you explain the fight for democracy, or to improve things generally? If people are as patently stupid as you suggest, then we'd have no progress at all. But in fact people DO understand how society is run, whether it's by them or not, and they have opinions on the matter.

lol.. childish. The major part of human history has been controlled outside democracy. The first reaction people have when something they don't agree with is the government should make a law about it. But tell me, You would have a hard time living without your computer. I can understand that. Do you think a person in 1950 would be able to? Do you think a person in 1776 would be wishing he had a car? No, and why? because they don't have the concept of it. Now people can get the concept of an idea several different ways. One is visiting another locality and bringing what they saw home with them. Another is to be left free of the government controls and discover that you and your fellow citizens are capable of governing yourselves. This is one reason that communist countries like Russia and China had agent offices in so many locations. They didn't want to to discover you would be better without them.

Literature can also tell people what freedom and democracy is too. The bible was one of the biggest driving forces in pushing it once the people were able to interpret the religions in ways other then the state mandated ones.

Now, if there is some inherent drive for democracy and freedom, then tell us why most of recorded history is something else. Why is it that outside the roman empire, and only if you were roman, was everything different and democracy is a relatively new thing?

And yes, people don't want for what they don't know. It is impossible. Do you want a xagzer? In 200 years it will be the latest rage.

Re:Sanctions

[KaiserXavier]

"Tanks don't need Wi-Fi uplinks to kill people" Yes they do, they need it to coordinate their attacks and for "Friend or Foe" target acquisition. Take that away, or bring in some carefully planned misinformation and you have total chaos among your enemy's troops.

Re:Sanctions

[DavidShor]

"Friend or Foe" target acquisition is not done through the internet, at least not exclusively. The details are obviously classified, but from what I understand they mostly rely on radio transponders.

The internet is very very new, and outside of Operation Iraqi Freedom(when most of the military internet infrastructure had not been rolled out yet), we have not had any conventional wars where internet access to troops has been available or decisive.

It is very easy to see how hooking up every tank to the internet might be helpful, but it is rather trivial to think of how to disable such capacities(Primitive cannons shooting tin foil over the area could destroy reception if done correctly). Military planners know this, so they have built their forces so that they do not rely too heavily on any one type of communication. Or atleast I hope they have.

Carte Blanche

[Enderandrew]

What is the US going to do?

Nothing. Quite frankly China has tested the limits of both the US and UN for years, and neither the Clinton nor Bush administrations were willing or capable of doing anything. With problems in Iran, Syria, North Korea, oh and those two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US does not have the capability to swat a fly elsewhere, let alone threaten the military might of China.

China knows they can get away with such actions, so they will. If you don't believe me, look up recent actions regarding Taiwan, Tibet and East Timor, amongst other things. China also does nothing to combat the millions of dollars in lost US revenue from stolen IP, yet we give them favored trading partner status, making our trade deficit worse.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

But they did give us General Tso's chicken, which is worthy of not only favored trading partner status, but worthy of several Nobel prizes.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree with what you're saying. What the US should do is hit China where it hurts most, the pocketbook. How is this done? Stop shopping at Walmart.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

And Mexico gave us nachos. That's why we rewarded them with NAFTA (Canada was included for their pioneering work with Canadian bacon).

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

East Timor? Since when was China invading East Timor. Or are you confusing Indonesia with China?

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget fortune cookies, which are just as Chinese as General Tso's chicken. (Which is to say, not at all.)

Re:Carte Blanche

[hasbeard]

I looked at a carton of General Tso's chicken at the supermarket the other day. With all the carbohydrates in it, it should probably be classified as a bio weapon.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

I really hope we stop doing business with China. Our greed will be the end of us.

Re:Carte Blanche

[demachina]

"Quite frankly China has tested the limits of both the US and UN for years, and neither the Clinton nor Bush administrations were willing or capable of doing anything."

What exactly do you propose the U.S. do? The Chinese are holding such huge U.S dollar reserves they could ruin the U.S. economy just by dumping them, though they would probably cause a global economic collapse and suffer as much as everyone else if they did.

The U.S. has transfered so much capital and IP to China, and we are so dependent on the steady stream of container shipping from China you pretty much have to look the other way at anything short of open warfare.

Besides which China is a Republican businessman's fantasy come true. It has a vast pool of dirt cheap labor, no labor unions, almost no business regulation, no environmental controls, and workers either keep their mouths shut or they are harshly dealt with by the state. They have one party authoritarian rule and as long as that one party is pro business, which they have been for the last couple decades, they are a Republican's wet dream. Why do you think so many big western corporations are rushing to China lock, stock and barrel. Liberal democracies sucks for business, you have to pay people more than a subsistence wage, you can't kill 4000 a year in coal mines like you can in China, you can't lock workers up if they bitch....

The new Fascist China is pure heaven for Republicans, so their is almost nothing China is going to do they are going to have a problem with including this. Most western businessman and politicians are way more fixated on kissing Chinese ass these days than they are starting some kind of confrontation with them.

Besides which when it comes to network security if you are stupid enough to put anything important on the Internet, and you can't keep it secure you kind of deserve what you get, doesn't really matter where the attack comes from.

Re:Carte Blanche

[StikyPad]

Ironically, that, along with many other "Chinese" cuisine are virtually unknown in China. I've never been to China proper, but I've been to Hong Kong, and I was hard pressed to find anything that resembled Westernized "Chinese" food. Even the rice is different.

Re:Carte Blanche

[eli pabst]

As a form of protest, we should change the name to something else, like General Tommy Franks Chicken...that will teach 'em!

Re:Carte Blanche

[Aetuneo]

And a lot of the toys they were(?) making turned out to be along the lines of chemical weapons, and a lot of their pollution is migrating to the west coast. Perhaps China has declared war with the USA already and no one has noticed yet? Or, more likely, no one is being allowed to notice yet (which raises the question of the wisdom of presenting this theory).

Re:Carte Blanche

[Foobar of Borg]

Canada was included for their pioneering work with Canadian bacon

Now, if they could only be kicked out of NAFTA on account of their beer :-p

Re:Carte Blanche

[Foobar of Borg]

top shopping at Walmart.

It's not just Walmart. Lots of stores have tons of Chinese made goods. Trying shopping for baby stuff. About the only thing I found not made in China was an English made pushchair. It is possible to go China-free (and probably healthier, considering all the issues with Chinese goods that have come up lately), but is hardly a simple proposition.

Re:Carte Blanche

[dbIII]

look up recent actions regarding ... East Timor

Dude - that was Australia involved there!

Re:Carte Blanche

[Foobar of Borg]

East Timor? Since when was China invading East Timor. Or are you confusing Indonesia with China?

[American mode] All them thar' funny lookin' Asian people's the same. [/American mode]

Or, [King of the Hill mode] So, are you Chinese or Japanese? [/King of the Hill mode]

I have run into this sort of problem. There are so many people in the US who don't even know the difference between Indonesian and Filipino. Just a bunch of brown-skinned island dwellers, as far as they are concerned.

Re:Carte Blanche

[tshetter]

But seriously, how many chineese can tell the difference between a british and an irishman?
Or a frenchman and a german?

Nationality doesnt mean much, and really it shouldnt.


But back on the topic....the US, China and every other nation has services that spy on other countries.

Im sure the US has compromised some Chineese systems but they would never reveal that.

I would also assume that the Chineese still have access to other systems, maybe in multiple other departments of the gov.

Re:Carte Blanche

[king-manic]

Ironically, that, along with many other "Chinese" cuisine are virtually unknown in China. I've never been to China proper, but I've been to Hong Kong, and I was hard pressed to find anything that resembled Westernized "Chinese" food. Even the rice is different.

Being chinese and visiting often I can see the distinctions. Anything involving frying with batter is more San Fran then H K. Although dim sum is still close to home in style and substance.

Re:Carte Blanche

[DavidShor]

What exactly do you have against China? Seriously, what have they done in the last 20 years against us? At all? Yes, they have an evil government, but this kind of thinking is what got us into Iraq.

Re:Carte Blanche

[NMerriam]

I really hope we stop doing business with China. Our greed will be the end of us.

On the contrary, their greed will be the end of them. Coca-Cola, Levi's and Rock 'n' Roll have ended communism in more countries than any military or political action.

Re:Carte Blanche

[DavidShor]

"China knows they can get away with such actions, so they will. If you don't believe me, look up recent actions regarding Taiwan, Tibet and East Timor, amongst other things. China also does nothing to combat the millions of dollars in lost US revenue from stolen IP, yet we give them favored trading partner status, making our trade deficit worse."

China invaded Tibet in the 50s; I'm not sure what you mean by "recent abuses". China has had rather good relations with Taiwan in the last decade; I think you can now get direct flights between the two nations. And East Timor is a bit north of Australia; they have nothing at all to do with China.

Re:Carte Blanche

[DavidShor]

Why?

Re:Carte Blanche

[scribblej]

Someone's going to have to explain the joke to me. What's so wrong about carbohydrates? If I eat a potato or a plate of spaghetti, am I going to get cancer? Die? Get fat, even? I ate a bowl of rice for lunch, and I felt pretty fucking healthy about it.

Seriously. What's so wrong about carbohydrates that this makes for a joke?

Re:Carte Blanche

[Zekasu]

What I'm guessing at is the fact that sugar, large doses, such as soda, is linked to diabetes. Diabetes is on the rise in America, along with every other obesity-related disease, etc., etc., and therefore the artificial carbohydrates added to General Tso's chicken make for a good case of disease causing food. Of course, if Chinese food isn't your liking, there's always Mickey D's.

Re:Carte Blanche

[HungWeiLo]

Chinese food is probably one of the more universally adapted foods in the world, given that Chinese immigrants are found in many corners of the globe. In Italy, Chinese restaurants serve their food in traditional Italian-like courses - antipasti, secondi, etc.

Because of the Chinese Exclusion Act in the U.S. in the late 1800's, Chinese men were not allowed to bring wives/women over to the U.S.. As a result, these lowly-paid unskilled laborers had to cook their own food, later developed into things like chop suey. (I was told that this "Chinese" food made its way even to the deep trenches of Africa - a place supposedly called "Golden Dragon" in Niger in the Sahara serves goops of chop suey, so I was told) So American and Canadian Chinese food has a tradition of crappiness stemming from immigration restrictions, which finally changed with relaxed immigration policies in recent times.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Jacer]

I was going to mod this, but I decided I would comment on how I think most Canadian beer is better than most American beer(piss)

Re:Carte Blanche

[Yvanhoe]

There is no problem with not reacting militarily in most of these cases. There has been reactions, diplomatic ones, giving ammunition for subsequent commercial negotiations.

As long as the red line that will cause military action is very clear, there are no problems with not reacting to the other side's provocation as long as they are minor enough.

Of course, not having a red line and reacting at random to provocations from other countries (or even without provocation) is a very dangerous attitude.

Re:Carte Blanche

[someonehasmyname]

Most Canadian beer is better than the crappy "twist-off" American beers. But Yuengling and many other beers are great. Germany still has the best though, IMHO.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree with your general sentiment, although I happen to live in Taiwan where every Western-looking person is an American, even if they're really English, German, French, Austrian, Russian, Italian, Irish, Canadian etc.

Re:Carte Blanche

[kcelery]

That's because rice in Hong Kong is cooked differently. Chinese in that neighborhood like soft rice, it is made by pouring water into a pot of raw rice, filling the water level to about 3/4 inch above the surface of rice and slowly cooked until all water evaporates.

Westerners like rice more chewy, so for the same rice, it is put into a big pot of hot water and the rice is cooked like sphagetti.

Re:Carte Blanche

[vishbar]

Seriously, what have they done in the last 20 years against us? At all?

Hacked into the Pentagon, apparently.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know where you live but I'm european and I sure believe China is conducting some type of economic warfare against us. I mean, chinese stores financed by the state of china with the objective of forcing the dumping of chinese-produced crap are popping out on every street corner back here.

Re:Carte Blanche

[treimor]

Hey, just as long as the chinese don't screw up the commerce between our countries, they can hack us all day.

I mean, seriously. Where else would i go for cheap WoW gold?

Re:Carte Blanche

[kcelery]

The govt has done that already, they pressed the Chinese to let RMB appreciate against USD by 5% annual and a bond yield of less than 5%. Now the chinese are holding ... shit, there is not enough zeros for my calculator.....

Re:Carte Blanche

[KDR_11k]

They're long past communism, what you need to create there is a govt that doesn't mercilessly repress its citizens when it feels like that.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Carewolf]

Atkin's diet. Many Americans now think carbonhydrates, carbs are the main reason for obesity, but fat is good. So they view low-carb products as healthy, and high-carb as baaaad.

Don't get me started on how insane that view is.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Ajehals]

There is a major difference between not knowing the difference and not being able to tell the difference. If you told me to pick out an Irishman or a Swede from a line-up I couldn't, but I wouldn't confuse the two and I know that both exist separately and where their respective countries can be found n a map.

Re:Carte Blanche

[hasbeard]

Actually, I'm under no illusions that carbohydrates in themselves are bad or evil. However, anything taken to excess is bad. In making the joke I was assuming that the reader would be able to discern a high degree of exaggeration in the joke. I didn't expect that anyone would seriously believe that any untainted food would be used as a bio weapon. Nor did I expect anyone to believe that General Tso's Chicken or anyone other food consumed in moderation and responsibly constitutes a worrisome risk to one's health.

Re:Carte Blanche

[DavidShor]

There is no such thing as economic warfare, they just make many goods much cheaper than you can(the restrictive labor laws, high taxes, and social net could have something to do with it)

Re:Carte Blanche

[keithburgun]

CARBOHYDRATES are the most EVIL THING on the PLANET!!! or at least so we're told so they can sell us a new line of no-carb products. 10 years from now it will be sodium, then it will be something else. it's called a marketing ploy. Enjoy your General Tso's!

Re:Carte Blanche

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not really that they put in more water. There is also the difference between long grain and short grain varieties of rice. Asian rice is mostly of the short grain variety, which cooks up softer and wetter, making them stick together more. Long grain rice cooks up dryer and fluffier and don't stick together as much. Chopsticks work better with short grain rice.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Abcd1234]

Westerners like rice more chewy, so for the same rice, it is put into a big pot of hot water and the rice is cooked like sphagetti.

Ugh, only if the westerner has no taste. Hell, many people I know own rice cookers, because they prefer a nice, soft, sticky rice (myself included). 'course, these days, most of the rice I eat is basmati (wickedly easy to make, tastes awesome, and it's whole grain).

Re:Carte Blanche

[SamLowrey]

You are right that the US will do nothing (remember the US plane China forced to the ground and Bush did nothing about it??). This is more to do with the internationalist's desire for trade at any and all costs. Look who is in office/running for office that is a member of CFR.

We don't have any problems in Syria or Iran, though other than the ones we create and bring on to ourselves via our suicidal support for the extremists in Israel - support that costs us billions directly and trillions indirectly (like fighting their war in Iraq for them).

Think Bush cares about freedom and democracy? Then why did he oppose Taiwan's bid for UN membership to favor Communist China?

Re:Carte Blanche

[Foobar of Borg]

but I decided I would comment on how I think most Canadian beer is better than most American beer(piss)

If you are talking about "beers" like Budweiser and Michelob, then I heartily agree with you. However, there are some good American beers, like Sam Adams. There are also a lot of local microbreweries in the States that have their own special, and quite good, taste.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Foobar of Borg]

I agree with your general sentiment, although I happen to live in Taiwan where every Western-looking person is an American, even if they're really English, German, French, Austrian, Russian, Italian, Irish, Canadian etc.

True, there are "rednecks" in any society. I have Chinese friends, but then I've also had the misfortune of working with Chinese who think anything or anyone that is non-Chinese is inherently bad and/or stupid.

Re:Carte Blanche

[socz]

The U.S. has transfered so much capital and IP to China, and we are so dependent on the steady stream of container shipping from China you pretty much have to look the other way at anything short of open warfare.

I had a friend in the army who said, for every 1 US soldier, they are worth 3-5 chinese soldiers. Forget about the disrespect he is paying them... I argued, even if that was the case, at the time our total armed forces was 300k. You compare that to 1M chinese and you don't have enough for a 1:3 ratio.

He argued that technology would beat them out. And i didn't have a counter argument to this. But! Years later, someone made an interesting pointed when we talked about this, and that is mentioned here too!

The U.S. has transfered so much capital and IP to China, and we are so dependent on the steady stream of container shipping from China you pretty much have to look the other way at anything short of open warfare.

As they so simply put it, we're going to be looking for them on their land, in our waters trying to approach us so we can blow them sky high, but they'll already be here, in containers waiting for the right moment.

we can't even inspect all of the containers and catch all of the illegal items and even less illegals entering the country "by the boat/container"

So from my point of view, it's a little arrogant and vary ignorant to think china can't do a thing to us. Like someone else mentioned, take away the 1 child limit and they can feed a war like no one else. Sure, it's not just about people, but look at russia, who sent men with no guns into battle! Sometimes it's just strategy.

Re:Carte Blanche

[AP31R0N]

i know this is won't happen, but we ought to boycott the Olympics and China until they release Taiwan, Hong Kong and Tibet and then free their own people. We can conquer them without firing a shot by using our greatest weapon, our economy. You want to sell us stuff? You want to enjoy our pop culture? Then become a democracy with a mostly free market. i'll keep on dreaming.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Kelbear]

General Tso's chicken was invented by a /Taiwanese/ man in New York.

Re:Carte Blanche

[Jacer]

Yes, I was referring to the larger chain/commercial beers. There are some very delicious domestic beers, I personally fancy Fat Tire quite a lot. There's also a decent micro not too far from where I live.

In Soviet Amerika

[Ethanol-fueled]

Pentagon hack into you.

Re:In Soviet Amerika

[Howitzer86]

The next time you say anything like this, your head will explode and take anyone else who dares mangle a Yakov Smirnoff "In Soviet Russia" joke.

Re:In Soviet Amerika

[Anonymous Coward]

wanker

Re:In Soviet Amerika

[coren2000]

In Soviet Slashdotistan Howitzer fires YOU.

Windows to blame?

[Orthuberra]

I know this is gonna sound like a troll to some, but it isn't, imo. But with Microsoft's shared source program with governments (China's included) what if they found an exploit and and simply didn't tell Microsoft, but instead used it to their advantage. Could shared source create problems such as this? I know the military uses Windows for most of its computers (at least when I got out last year). Not sure about the ones attacked, however. Just some musings from me.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Kadin2048]

They don't need Microsoft's shared source program -- Microsoft provides the Windows source code to foreign governments pretty freely (assumedly under NDA, but it's not like that's really going to mean much to the PRC government). I'm sure the Chinese already have it. All they'd need to do is threaten do dump Windows on all their bureaucrats' machines if MS didn't pony up and let them comb through the source. They hand the source over to their own security people for verification, to make sure it's not backdoored ... but if those same security people find a fault, there's no reason why they'd notify Microsoft (or the US government) about it.

The way Microsoft provides access to source code favors whoever is (1) big enough to twist MS into give them the source in the first place, and (2) with the most resources to assign to combing through it for vulnerabilities. Just for manpower reasons alone, I suspect China wins #2 handily.

Re:Windows to blame?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Ok, I use Linux, but that doesn't make a lot of sense...

Why is Windows Shared Source more vulnerable to this type of attack than Linux and other Open Source things?

Re:Windows to blame?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure if China really wanted to screw with our economy they would "leak" any microsoft code they had- that would put an end to Bill's empire quite efficicntly and all those billions would need to work elsewhere. certainly that would cause the economy to shift a little, wouldnt it?

Re:Windows to blame?

[McGiraf]

think about it five seconds.

Re:Windows to blame?

[jombeewoof]

Ok, I use Linux, but that doesn't make a lot of sense...

Why is Windows Shared Source more vulnerable to this type of attack than Linux and other Open Source things? Simply put,
With thousands of eyes that have many varying goals, any security vulnerability in an "open" sourced product would be reported to the correct people many times by many different users.
Closed source projects on the other hand have very specific sets of eyes on them, with very specific goals. If a vulnerability was found it would be less likely to be reported.

that's my take on it anyway.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because Linux security is designed around the fact that people can and will view the source. Much of Windows security tends to rely on the assumption that people cannot and will not see its source.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Anonymous Coward]

OH? You didn't work in a spook house, did you! I know, because I did. What you are babbling about is security through obscurity. When I studied cryptography in university, one of the VERY FIRST things we were told, was that if this is what you used (or claimed to use) for security, then you are an idiot, and not worthy in the least of securing anything. Having a hard lock is better security (by a million times) than keeping the inner workings of your crappy lock a secret. Keeping your private information off of public networks is a real good idea. More than once I've called people attempting to put confidential information on public networks idiots. Linux is Open Source software. No one NO ONE! breaks in! I've read lots of crap about "its just as vulnerable". BULLSHIT! In thirteen years I've never had a virus! NOT ONE! And I've been on the internet the entire time. That people are using microsoft systems for secure information makes the people doing acquisition criminally liable. If they suggest microsoft again, JAIL! Get someone in there who has half a brain and half a clue.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Repossessed]

It occurs to me that in this case, open source leads to its own problems, like trying to get code you know is insecure in a very hard to detect manner inserted into an OS. It's not practical for the common assholes who exploit Windows vulnerabilities to do, but the resources of the Chinese just might cook up something nasty to be exploited at a later date.

Of course, the DoD should be capable of it's own very sophisticated analysis of any open source code that they use, which would probably be enough to help counter this possibilty, and for that matter, any security vulnerability present. Except, of course, that the DoD never, under any circumstances, uses code that Microsoft might disapprove of. They probably don't bother to employ that kind of caliber of hackers either.

Somehow, I wonder if this isn't a glaring hole in the defensive (and possibly offensive) network of the US. We don't pout up with civilian grade anywhere else in the military, so why the hell are the computer's all Dell's running Windows?

Re:Windows to blame?

[jombeewoof]

Somehow, I wonder if this isn't a glaring hole in the defensive (and possibly offensive) network of the US. We don't put up with civilian grade anywhere else in the military, so why the hell are the computer's all Dell's running Windows? That is a damn good question. But I have another, and it is probably the same question.

Why, do people who are otherwise extremely intelligent in almost all facets of their life suddenly forget which is the right and left buttons on their mouse. And why, when given explicit instructions do exactly the opposite when in front of a computer.

Vice Presidents of global corporations, experienced managers and district managers, supervisors, HR, Accounting, even the damn security guards.
All either get it, or they don't.

People who make (relatively) important informed decision seem to suddenly not know how to read the damn screen.
I work in support, I have people every single day who need me to help them change their password... On a windows XP box.
Ok, so it's not immediately apparent. But when they hit the change password button and it asks for current, new, confirm new, THEY STILL NEED TO BE TOLD WHAT TO DO.

Re:Windows to blame?

[fireforadrymouth]

when they hit the change password button and it asks for current, new, confirm new, THEY STILL NEED TO BE TOLD WHAT TO DO. I feel your pain.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Repossessed]

Heh, I work support too, and I've realized there two very distinct class of people out there when it come to computing. It's not about experience, or education, or anything like that. It's about the people who, when presented with the options of 'ok' and 'cancel', never had to be told what those meant, versus those that did. (There is a third class, of those who need to be told every time, but I prefer not to think about them). and no, it's not at all unusual to find out that the person you're talking to who needs to be told to do what the instructions on screen are already telling them to do, is actually quite intelligent as long as you take their computer away.

Re:Windows to blame?

[weicco]

I'm puzzled. I thought that Shared Source meant that the Source is Shared... And Open Source isn't always the be-all-end-all answer to everything. Take for example PHP security bugs.

Re:Windows to blame?

[SanityInAnarchy]

It occurs to me that in this case, open source leads to its own problems, like trying to get code you know is insecure in a very hard to detect manner inserted into an OS. It's not practical for the common assholes who exploit Windows vulnerabilities to do, but the resources of the Chinese just might cook up something nasty to be exploited at a later date.

Which they could also do with Shared Source.

Of course, the DoD should be capable of it's own very sophisticated analysis of any open source code that they use, which would probably be enough to help counter this possibilty, and for that matter, any security vulnerability present.

Which they could also do with Shared Source, if the license allows it.

Don't get me wrong, the "many eyes" theory probably makes the most sense here, but what bothers me is roughly 80% of what people are saying about this issue is pure bullshit, where you can literally replace "open source" with "shared source" or vice versa and make the argument work for the other side.

I know Shared Source has some scary licenses, and Microsoft is not to be trusted, and I say that without sarcasm (think OOXML, Java, etc). I know open source is often better simply by being open source and moderately popular, and I generally will choose a slightly worse open source product simply because it's open source, ignoring price.

But let's not throw all rational thought out the window at the mere mention of Microsoft...

...but I must be new here:

We don't pout up with civilian grade anywhere else in the military, so why the hell are the computer's all Dell's running Windows?

Re:Windows to blame?

[Anonymous Coward]

And the next thing you know the military will be handing out cell phones manufactured in china to each of their soldiers.

Re:Windows to blame?

[Repossessed]

Um, thats nice, but can you get Windows itself as shared source, at any price?

Unclassified

[ratnerstar]

DoD unclass networks aren't any more secure than your standard corporate ones. Obviously, it's not good if the Chinese (or anyone) gain unauthorized access to them. But hacking something like JWICS or even SIPRnet would be much more disturbing.

Re:Unclassified

[hcmtnbiker]

Last I knew this would be nearly impossible since JWICS and SIPRnet computers arn't normally hooked up to what we know as the internet. It's more of a military intranet. So basically the only way to hack them is either raid a workstation on the network, splice some fiber or hijack a satellite.

Re:Unclassified

[tftp]

So basically the only way to hack them is either raid a workstation on the network

Doable if you have an agent inside. Aren't those workstations tamper-proof, though?

splice some fiber

That's not a big problem. Send a clumsy contractor, tear the cable, and then send some other contractor to repair the damage. The link will be better than new :-)

or hijack a satellite

If you are routing your ciphertext over a satellite link then Chinese military only needs to point an antenna at it to intercept everything. Then crack the encryption. It might be difficult, but it would be even harder without the ciphertext :-)

Uh oh

[spleen_blender]

Gates was probably just playing WoW and got his account hacked.

Re:Uh oh

[Foobar of Borg]

Gates was probably just playing WoW and got his account hacked.

Well, that's not nearly as bad as what happened to Hitler.

What did they hack into?

[Anonymous Coward]

NIPRNet? SIPRNet? Or higher?

If it was just the NIPRNet, then if the Office of the Secretary of Defense was following the correct computer security rules only unclassified information was compromised.

Re:What did they hack into?

[Anonymous Coward]

"then if the Office of the Secretary of Defense was following the correct computer security rules only unclassified information was compromised"

Good luck with that...

Re:What did they hack into?

[Zatic]

"only" unclassified information?

That's bad enough. In fact, that may be exactly what they are after. Don't believe they rely entirely on their hacker espionage squad. Those guy do only the first step. The hackers break into "unclassified" networks and get "unclassified" information like names, ranks, Who is responsible for what, meeting minutes, Powerpoint calendars, flight schedules, etc. This kind of information is exactly what the "real", meaning real-life spies need to work effectively.

They probably have one of the best espionage networks in the world. Don't believe they just try to pull a Wargames hack and give up as soon as they only find "unclassified" information.

Issues with all this

[Anonymous Coward]

The first is that it is impossible to KNOW exactly where the attack originated from, once it truly leaves a country. In a number of nations, there are packets taht appear to come from a country, when in reality it is coming from the edge router itself.

With that said, there is little doubt that China is doing there utmost to gain as much info about other militaries as they can. In particular, they are wanting info on submarines (how to keep them quiet and fast; American nukes and German diesel), cruise missiles (American), and Lasers( American ). Finally, they want to know exactly what we have. Since it appears that Gates is willing to hook classified systems to the net, then it pretty much made it fair games.

Sad really. This admin has helped out our enemies and our future enemies. I suspect that once Chinese leadership believes that they are close to American Military power, we will see the next global war. Hopefully, before that time, we put all of W's admin in prison.

Re:Issues with all this

[DavidShor]

"Sad really. This admin has helped out our enemies and our future enemies. I suspect that once Chinese leadership believes that they are close to American Military power, we will see the next global war. Hopefully, before that time, we put all of W's admin in prison."

Why? What at all do they want from us that only war will give them?

Re:Issues with all this

[Anonymous Coward]

"Why? What at all do they want from us that only war will give them?"

Natural resources and enough raw material to fuel the growth of their 1.6 billion+ population. When that country gets to big to feed itself, it will simply eat it's neighbors if it has to. We will need the same from these "neighbors", and that's where conflict will arise. Will it be war with guns and bombs or with $ as with gas today, who knows?

Re:Issues with all this

[Anonymous Coward]

Consider the facts:

1. that they are playing the same games with other nations that we played.
2. the military is building up at a rate seen only by countries that are going to war (such as America or Germany prior to WW II).
3. that they are not spending their surplus in a sane fashion (with trillion dollar surpluses, they are not buying things to help their country).
4. their leaders are not held accountable via a vote.

We are most likely headed for a cold war, if not a hot war.

Re:Issues with all this

[DavidShor]

Their population growth is slowing down, in a couple years it will start shrinking. Why exactly can't they just buy the food? It would most likely be cheaper than attempting to conquer us. Not only that, but if they were to invade a nation for Food, Uzbekistan would be a more natural choice then America.

questions, assumptions

[Gothmolly]

Questions:
* were they secured computers? You know, the ones networked via fiber in concrete-filled conduits so that the physical layer can't be compromised?
* is this even a new thing?

Assumptions:
Is everyone so sure that the US hasn't ALREADY hacked the Chinese computers?

Before everyone gets their panties in an uproar, some context would be nice.

Re:questions, assumptions

[Anonymous Coward]

Is everyone so sure that the US hasn't ALREADY hacked the Chinese computers?

Not that you'd ever hear about it of course. After all, that would be compromising "State Security"!

Re:questions, assumptions

[rtb61]

Technically you can still do tricky stuff with wireless or even with the power supply. Just because a power is a power supply it does not mean it can not also be fitted out to send data back up the power cable, hmm, didn't think of that one did you. Besides China is tapped into the data by greed route and prefers sneaker net when it comes to pilfering data.

This would simply be poking the US to see what happens, to see how lame they have become, push and push a little bit more. When it comes to hacking the network, China is much more interested in inserting controlled hardware that will simply die and crippling the western economy during any conflict by targeting infrastructure computers (transport bookings, traffic computers, law enforcement) and business computers.

Feeding false information in the network would also be of benefit i.e. making honest citizens look like terrorists and simply overloading law enforcement with thousands of false leads that they have to follow up.

Re:questions, assumptions

[Plutonite]

My friends work with the DoD and DoE, when you walk into the rooms where the servers are there are two big columns with public facing machines (and network circuitry) in one, while the real DoD servers are in another. They are not connected. Relax. Hacking into some stupid workstation that belongs to a politician's secretary is not a big problem given that microsoft has it's wonderful OS and software on all of them. Exploits go for 10 grand in some places..it's just a matter of finding the computer in question. Already you can see the IDS systems picked the intrusion up..they weren't even trying to hide themselves.

Meanwhile, it would be interesting to see how far a single mole operating the data centers could cause trouble by planting hardware. Almost everybody has a price you know, especially politicians.

Re:questions, assumptions

[craagz]

If America did hack into Chinese Networks and got some confidential information.. Then

[NES] lol
[NES] I download something from Napster
[NES] And the same guy I downloaded it from starts downloading it from me when I'm done
[NES] I message him and say "What are you doing? I just got that from you"
[NES] "getting my song back fucker"
Chinese were getting back their data!!

Clarification

[Kadin2048]

Rereading the GP, I think he may have been trying to make the same point I was going for; I didn't realize that Microsoft's revealing of the Windows source code to governments was part of the "Shared Source" program (I thought "Shared Source" was just the code name for their quasi-OSS stuff, available to anyone).

It cuts both ways

[Nazlfrag]

You know, America has tested Chinas resolve for years by sending hackers into its systems, yet China isn't willing or capable to do anything. With hundreds of American military bases around the world and a mass of troops in Japan, Taiwan and the rest of the Pacific, they do not have the capability to move an inch outside their borders, let alone threaten the military might of America.

Re:It cuts both ways

[Enderandrew]

I've seen first-hand some of the incredible technology and training we had in the military, but neither China nor the US really wants a piece of each other. That is a conflict that only ends badly pretty much for everyone.

Re:It cuts both ways

[TapeCutter]

"they do not have the capability to move an inch outside their borders"

Regardless of who is in power China it has had a "foreign policy" that for 2000yrs has shown little (if any) interest in expanding China's borders.

US generals have all read and still use Sun Tzu's "art of war", I suggest you read the bit entitled "on the use of spies" before you pick a fight with the guys who turned strategic "games" into an artform.

Re:It cuts both ways

[emilper]

Regardless of who is in power China it has had a "foreign policy" that for 2000yrs has shown little (if any) interest in expanding China's borders.

that is true ... considering that about 2000 years ago China reached the desert or the tundra in the North and North-West, the high plateau of Tibet in the West, the ocean in the East and South and the evil sons of ... that do not understand true manners (i.e.: submitting to Chinese rule) in Vietnam, Burma and Korea.

When looking at a map, China does not seem so big, but it's just an illusion, and Mercator is to blame. It's huge, and hugely heterogeneous: an "ethnic minority" in China might be tens of millions strong and live on a territory larger than a large European country. There are more religions that you can care about if you are not a Eliade clone, and enough scripts to fill the blank spaces in the UTF standard. Talking about 100 BC China is an anachronism: most of the time, since there are any kind of written records about China up to now, there were several states warring among themselves, who sometimes recognized the "emperor", and most of the times did not even have the concept of an "emperor of China".

I am tired of the Chinese complaining about Western imperialism. In the early 1800s China was pretty much draining Europe of gold by high tariffs and trade restrictions. Western merchants could trade only in a few ports, only with a few government-approved Chinese trading houses, and opium was the only merchandise that had a high enough profit margin to make smuggling it in pay for the expenses. The treaties that were imposed on China were not different than the treaties the European powers signed among themselves.

The greatest obstacle in the way to Chinese world dominance is not USA. It's China itself. The greatest threat to USA and Europe is not a strong China, but China breaking up in warring states. China does not build up it's military to teach a lesson to Japan or USA, but to be able stomp on any local party leader that might begin to believe he can emulate Eltsin and his pals and carve his own empire out of the "Middle Kingdom".

We should pray for a strong and prosperous China. Soviet Union fired up it's propaganda machine in preparation for it's surrender in the Cold War and the possible secession of it's republics about 1988, and not to prevent that, but to make sure it happens peacefully. China does not seem to be willing to do the same, and, in my opinion, it will stay in one piece only as long as the central government will be able to offer the local leaders something they cannot (or are not allowed to) provide for themselves: Western know-how and financing. When that spring will run dry, only the high tech army that the central government is building now will be able to delay a repeat of the civil war of the early 1900s

Re:It cuts both ways

[JordanL]

Regardless of who is in power China it has had a "foreign policy" that for 2000yrs has shown little (if any) interest in expanding China's borders.

Vietnam and Mongolia called. They said they have 2000 years of "fuck you".

Re:It cuts both ways

[Anonymous Coward]

That is a conflict that only ends badly pretty much for everyone.

Unless you are talking about total loss of power (i.e. surrender), the governments on all sides of war always benefit from war. They are the ones running the business of war, and make no mistake: this is one of the most lucrative busineses that has ever existed. The people, of course, are the real losers -- they are the ones who are forced to sacrifice in ways (loss of life, property, employment, security, etc) that don't affect the power elite who control government.

As the saying goes, war is the health of the state. War is the single most effective tool for expanding government, both in revenue and power over the people. This isn't just a theory; this is pure history.

Re:It cuts both ways

[Ajehals]

Since when is Sun Tzu Japanese? Last I looked he was Chinese.

Have I been misinformed?

Re:It cuts both ways

[Loke the Dog]

Man, is it SO hard for us westerners to remember who and what belongs to chinese history and to japanese history. Sun Tzu was Chinese.

Re:It cuts both ways

[TapeCutter]

I knew I was guilty of gross oversimplification before I posted. :)

Re:It cuts both ways

[emilper]

well, Sun Tzu was not really Chinese ... China did not exist yet at that time, was only invented later (look up for the great burning of books :) ); he was a citizen of Wu, one of the states that preceded Qin. Saying that Sun Tzu was Chinese is the same as saying that King Artur was English.

Re:It cuts both ways

[Dan_Bercell]

If China declared War on US or the US declared war on China it would escalate into a another World War which would turn out badly for the entire World.

Re:It cuts both ways

[Maximum Prophet]

Scene: The advancing Chinese Army.

A US general stands, shaking his fist: "Sun Tzu, you SOB, I've read your book!"

Ok, now back to our regularly scheduled non sequiturs.

Re:It cuts both ways

[jafac]

It's not the foreign policy issue that I would worry about.

If China builds a large manufacturing base and military machine, and becomes economically dependent upon it as the US and Russia, and the UK has - THEN I would worry. Because THAT is what will then drive economic and foreign policy. (and I think that that has already begun to happen in China).

What you see happening in countries like Iran, where you've got a loudmouth trying to cling to power using transparent nationalistic appeal propaganda - that's a different game, and really, less of a threat, because it's a small number of people without much of a stake in the game.

But when you've got a large chunk of the population with their livelihoods invested in the military industrial complex, you'll find they're willing to delude themselves quite deeply, to fight to protect that livelihood, as we have done in the US for three generations.

Re:It cuts both ways

[gad_zuki!]

That is a conflict that only ends badly pretty much for everyone.

Exctly. I think when ordinary joes (especially internet nerds) hear about espionage, suddenly theyre all conspiracy theories and "omg go to war." Espionage and lots of unethical behaviors are part of the nation state game. Its not a justification for war. War or military action should always be a last resort.

Not to mention westerners never heard about what their own spies are doing. If you dont think its as nasty as what the Chinese have done then youre not really paying attention.

Re:It cuts both ways

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, America has tested Chinas resolve for years by sending hackers into its systems, yet China isn't willing or capable to do anything.

It's sort of funny. I work at a company that sold the Pentagon the software they almost certainly used to detect the hacking, isolate it, and shut it down without crippling the rest of their network. We sell the same software to China. They also have some pretty bright network engineers and computer scientists over there. I'd say there is about parity for capabilities, with both sides being hampered mostly by enormous bureaucracy.

...they do not have the capability to move an inch outside their borders, let alone threaten the military might of America.

China is behind in technological research, but way ahead in manufacturing capability. Every day, they are getting stronger. They also have the numbers. If the Chinese army were to march west into Europe and Asia, and fight a ground war, the US and allies would be screwed. All they need to do is rescind their population control laws and they can send the same number of troops we killed in all of Vietnam against us every day with us killing all of them, and their population would not decrease. The US would be forced to make the conflict nuclear or be eradicated and that is a losing proposition for all of us.

Re:It cuts both ways

[manifoldronin]

Regardless of who is in power China it has had a "foreign policy" that for 2000yrs has shown little (if any) interest in expanding China's borders.

Wrong.

Don't worry...

[Jafafa Hots]

This won't escalate into anything. While its true it could be seen as an act of war, we in the U.S. are not going to do anything that might jeopardize our supply of Happy Meal toys.

Re:Don't worry...

[devilradish]

Lead filled though they may be.

Re:Don't worry...

[Anonymous Coward]

we in the U.S. are not going to do anything that might jeopardize our supply of Happy Meal toys.

Agreed. Lead poisoning our children didn't cause us to find another vendor, so I doubt that this will.

Re:Don't worry...

[Oktober Sunset]

dude, the lead is what makes them tasty.

Ummm...

[porkThreeWays]

Why does the world seem to turn a blind eye to China's crap? If a terrorist group did this, we'd be at war. But since it's China, somehow we'll work around it. It just seems like a pattern of behavior from China. Their government is 100x worse than any middle eastern country, constantly imprisoning their own people and doing horrible horrible things (including murder). And because we can get cheap toys we turn a blind eye? That's the ultimate hypocrisy.

Re:Ummm...

[vandan]

Exactly. Not only do we turn a blind eye to their human rights abuses, but we honour them by letting them host the Olympic Games! Whenever anyone tells you that the US is acting in the name of 'freedom', remind them to follow the money trail.

Re:Ummm...

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

It simple. They have nuclear weapons and a bigger army that can kick our American asses. They also have cheap slave labor that puts toxic materials in the products they make for us, killing our dogs, our children, and even their own babies.

Re:Ummm...

[OakDragon]

I'm sorry, who lets them host the games? Also, Americans don't "honour" anyone; we may "honor" someone or some thing, though...

Re:Ummm...

[Anonymous Coward]

cuz if they do threaten China, US will bankrupt.

"Their government is 100x worse than any middle eastern country, constantly imprisoning their own people and doing horrible horrible things (including murder). And because we can get cheap toys we turn a blind eye? That's the ultimate hypocrisy."
US imprisons their own people, and other people too, lol. and i wonder wat the CIA does. hmm, i think they bring people back to life?
u got the whole thing wrong. its not about cheap toys. its about the economy.
ur the hypocrite cuz ur blaming the US for being ignorant.
also, middle eastern countries (naturally, except saudi arabia who ISN'T A DEMOCRACY)are targeted by US cuz they have oil. some countries changed from trading in dollars(which is inflating fast) to trading in euros(which is on the rise), which takes away US power in the Middle eastern oil industry, which means that the US cannot just print more money to get oil. which means US cannot satisfy its hunger for power. which means the US is falling. fast.

the US is 1000x worse than any other country (under the surface). It is superficially the best.
you should stop getting brainwashed by the media and start thinking for urself.

and this is being told to you by a 15 year old.

btw, US hates the "terrorists" in mid east cuz they have israel to support.

my point is, try thinking for urself with solid facts. It is up to ur judgement to decide if the facts are believable. sometimes, look at opposing points of view. you might get to understand some stuff better. also, try not to be the patriot u are. don't believe everythinh the gov't or the media says. the US media only tells the facts supporting the US. so you WILL not get enough facts for thinking for urself. internet sites (news in other languages) or other people's interpretations are good.

plx be embarrassed that a 15 year old is telling u how to think and make ur own opinions and not just say what the gov't wants us to say.

It is the job of the people to correct the mistakes of the politicians.
"knowledge is power" by sir francis bacon

Re:Ummm...

[MightyMartian]

I'm agreeing with most of what you say, but why would anybody be surprised that China is using its hackers to bust in to foreign networks. Everyone, I'm confident does it, including the US trying to break into Chinese state networks.

Espionage is one of the oldest tools of civilization. Heck, even allies spy on each other. Wouldn't surprise me at all if the Brits were doing the same things to the US.

Espionage, in fact, can be a very good thing for peace. The Soviets and the Americans knew so much about each others' military capacity and arsenals that neither side dreamed of an open, direct conflict. A lack of knowledge of the opposing side's capacity would have been infinitely more dangerous.

Re:Ummm...

[geekboy642]

A larger (by the numbers) military they may have, but in a non-nuclear military confrontation with China, the US forces could absolutely decimate them. There would be NO contest. (In a nuclear fight, of course, nobody wins) The only thing to be concerned about wrt China is the massive quantity of our debt that they own. If they were to dump those bonds on the international market, they could very easily crash our markets. It would be like 1929 all over again.

Re:Ummm...

[bdo19]

plx be embarrassed that a 15 year old is telling u how to think and make ur own opinions and not just say what the gov't wants us to say.

U are trolling and ur intellect is not as superior to everyone else's as u think.

"Hire a teenager, while they still know everything." Seriously though, the "I'm 15 and I know how to think better than you" is not going to get you anywhere. Yeah, you were 9 years old on 9/11 and you're telling me why we hate terrorists. If you have an argument, just make your argument. But stop thinking you're the only one in the world with any critical thinking ability.

my point is, try thinking for urself with solid facts.

What is your point, exactly? Because all I got was that you're smarter than us.

Re:Ummm...

[dbIII]

Because if you go to war at the merest insult while insulting everyone else people see you as a clueless barbarian.

Re:Ummm...

[NewsWatcher]

Why does the world seem to turn a blind eye to China's crap? If a terrorist group did this, we'd be at war. But since it's China, somehow we'll work around it.

This sort of thing is routinely accepted by all countries. China puts up with US intelligence agencies hacking into their systems, the US puts up with Russian, Chinese, North Korean, Iranian etc etc hackers trying to get into their systems.

You may remember a few years ago China shot down a US spy plane above their skies. The US defence was that the surveillance was just routine spying.

There is nothing new in this behaviour, and a huge distinction between this and the actions of terrorists. China didn't fly a plane into the Pentagon to get access to those computers and didn't kill anyone to get the information.

Their government is 100x worse than any middle eastern country, constantly imprisoning their own people and doing horrible horrible things (including murder). And because we can get cheap toys we turn a blind eye? That's the ultimate hypocrisy.

I agree with you China gets away with lots of shit because they are such an important trading partner. You may want to look at what the US gets away with because of their size too.

I am thinking specifically "extraordinary rendition" where the US kidnaps people and ships them off to countries where they can be legally tortured, often with very little reason.

The US also runs a camp in Cuba where detainees (you apparently can't call them prisoners until they have been charged with something) are routinely tortured, something the US government admits (they admitted to water-boarding, considered torture).

The US often abuses its trade position to demand concessions from smaller countries, and to deny access to US markets to countries such as Australia (who can produce sugar more cheaply and efficiently that US farmers can).

Re:Ummm...

[Anonymous Coward]

What is your point, exactly? Because all I got was that you're smarter than us. I learned a valuable lesson from his post, that societies that practice child sacrifice have the right idea. God damn i hate kids. Typing 'ur' or 'ne1' should be grounds for a violent beating first offense, broken thumbs for a second offense, and sacrifice to Molech on a third offense. Give me that old time religion.

Re:Ummm...

[coren2000]

What did you say to me? Im going to bomb your house you insensitive clod!

I war you! rwwraaaaaarrrr.

Re:Ummm...

[DavidShor]

Could you at least use spell check? Don't think youre so intelligent, I'm a 16 year old math major in my senior year of college, and I have met a bunch of kids smarter then me.

But to actually debate your point, the US is not perfect. Your heart is in the right place, but I suggest that you take some classes in economics, read a couple more books about the Middle East(I recommend "The Lemon Tree" and "From Beirut to Jerusalem") and realize that the US is not the only place that has problems.

Re:Ummm...

[bdo19]

And I thought I had flamed him!

Re:Ummm...

[Anonymous Coward]

not just that, but because so much of our computer hardware is made in china, we'd cripple our own infrastructure. Dropping them and dealing with taiwan would start a physical war, and because everyone relies on china, we'd be pissing everyone in the world off by attacking china.

So really it isnt so much because we like our happy meal toys, it's because china has all the cards. we just have the illusion of economic control, where they really control everyone.

that and the multinational entities that use china wont stand for it. and they own politicians in many nations.

That's why china has nothing to fear.

Re:Ummm...

[cwmaxson]

Terrorists have neither the complexity nor the will to crack the DoD. This, as many have stated, is the big business of big nations. We turn the other cheek with China because we do the same thing. This isn't hypocrisy, it's sportsmanship. We go after "terrorists" because we can't make money off of them, and in fact, they stand in the way of our money. China does the same with their "terrorists" (ie Falun Gong), hence the wink, wink, nudge, nudge from us.

Re:Ummm...

[ForumTroll]

In a non-nuclear war the Chinese army would be totally useless against the US. The Chinese have no bases even close to the US that they could effectively launch attacks from, and the US has a far superior Air Force and Navy that would demolish any Chinese attempt to mobilize their army. The entire war would be decided by the Air Force and the Navy, and in that respect the US has the upper hand against any nation, and practically any collection of nations, on the planet.

Obviously, if it went nuclear nobody would win and it would be a disaster for the entire planet.

Re:Ummm...

[Anonymous Coward]

"A lack of knowledge of the opposing side's capacity would have been infinitely more dangerous."

This is more accurate than you might know. One of the preconditions for most wars is the mutual assumption of victory. The US wouldn't have gone in to Iraq without the assumption of victory. In WW2 all participants expected a quick victory, as in WW1. The expectation of pain is what prevents leaders from embarking on many potential wars, and is certainly what has kept the US and China apart over issues such as Taiwan, communism, maybe human rights, the US spy plane in 2003, the US bombing of the Chinese Embassy in 2001 and numerous other incidents.

Re:Ummm...

[Anonymous Coward]

If a terrorist group did this, we'd be at war.

What terrorists are you thinking of? You're probably thinking of the Saudi Arabian guys (Saudi Arabia being an allied country, whose royal family is pals with the Bush family) that entered the US on passports and crashed planes into the WTC? No? Maybe you're thinking of Osama bin Laden (whose family is pals with the Bush Family) who used to e a CIA asset, and leads a group armed directly and indirectly by the US?

Do not worry. While asset stripping the US, Bush unloaded a bunch of it on the chinese. They own most of what the arabs, japanese and swiss don't own. The chinese won't do anything to mess up one of their most conspicuous holdings and client populations.

Re:Ummm...

[Maximum Prophet]

I worked with a contractor who was in the Air Force in the 1950's. While he was stationed in France the US put on an Air Show for Soviet Generals and Diplomats. He was complaining that we were showing them Top Secret stuff that would get him thrown in the brig or shot for divulging. The thing is, we were giving them controlled access to the capablities of our hardware so that the deterant would be effective. A nuclear deterance does no good if the other side is completly in the dark about what you have. They have to know what could happen to them if they were to attack first.

Another twist of the cold war was that the KGB was telling the politicians what they wanted to hear rather than the truth. Kruchev was told the US was on the brink of a military coup during the Cuban Missle Crisis, which was why he backed down. He was afraid the US Military would take over and really start WWIII.

Re:Ummm...

[vandan]

Both of your points demonstrate the pathetic self-fascination of Yanks.

Firstly, when I said 'we' let China host the games, I was talking about the west in general, not the US.

Secondly, Americans don't honour anyone, because they're fucking Yanks with different spelling to us fucking Australians. You see, here in Australia, that's how we spell honour. Get over it.

In conclusion, the US is not the centre of the world.

Re:Ummm...

[OakDragon]

Sorry, your original post did not make it clear that 'we' referred to 'the west' (or rather, western civilization) in general. Your follwing statement made a reference to the US, and that was the cause of my confusion. I really thought you were either pretending to be an American, or an American affecting an alternate spelling, hence my snide tone.

Re:Ummm...

[Ren.Tamek]

"Why does the world seem to turn a blind eye to China's crap?"

They've got nukes, dick head, and lots of them. Going to war with china wouldn't just be blasphemy, it'd be M.A.D.ness...

Wire up the IDS

[Quila]

Having an IDS hooked up to some missile launchers is starting to look good around now. I don't see any real difference between online war and physical war, and this was an act of war.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[qbwiz]

Make sure you tell the enemy first, or they won't know to avoid triggering your doomsday device.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[m50d]

I don't see any real difference between online war and physical war

Get help, now. Hint: people die in one of them.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[PhreakOfTime]

Well, if you dont see any difference, I expect to see you in the enlistment line first thing tomorrow morning. And dont make up some BS that youve 'already served' because it will be a lie. NO SINGLE PERSON who has been in war, will make the suggestion to simply to go to war over a PC break-in.

And if you STILL dont see any difference, try the following links; http://theheretik.typepad.com/the_heretik/images/c hild_of_war_life_in_death_053005.jpg http://www.videos1.informationclearinghouse.info/i mages/seven.jpg

Those that modded this 'insightful' I would expect will be in the front of that enlistment line tomorrow, right ahead of you.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[sholden]

Because no country has ever tried spying before in all of history.

Life would have been so much better if any spying attempt by the USSR/USA on the USA/USSR had resulted in the nukes being launched. Would have made the cold war a lot shorter anyway...

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Mr. Roadkill]

Yeah, smart move.

I can see it now. Some wack-job malcontent who would otherwise have loaded up a truck with explosives and taken out half a federal building and its daycare centre will instead penetrate the network of a western company in China. From there, he will penetrate a Chinese low-security network, and launch an attack against the toilet paper inventory system at the Pentagon. This will trigger the IDS, and the next thing we know the United States of America launches a first-strike against the Henan branch of the People's Yak Testicle Grading Board because that's who the attacking IP address belongs to. China retaliates. The U.S.A. retaliates against the retaliation.

Still look like a good idea?

(And for fuck's sake, nobody mod this funny. Okay, the People's Yak Testicle Grading board is hilarious, but the thought of *any* automated system being hooked up to launch controls is the stuff of nightmares... especially when there's no real way to tell if the "attack" is from your opponent or someone else who wants to pin the blame on them. Someone massing troops on the border or lobbing nukes your way? Worth a military escalation. Someone probing your network? Not so much.)

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Anonymous Coward]

Having an IDS hooked up to some missile launchers is starting to look good around now. I don't see any real difference between online war and physical war, and this was an act of war.

You would think the Chinese would be smart enough to drive next to someone's house & piggypack on their unprotected wireless connection...

Re:Wire up the IDS

[darkmeridian]

People die in real wars. And knocking out electronics sounds great, but if you fight a war with a country that owns the bears' share of your stock, and to whom you are indebted for billions each year, and which provides a lucrative potential market for your industry, that may not be good for the economy that keeps the war machine going.

Why do you think America is on good terms with Communist China--even bringing them into the WTO--while we have an embargo on Communist Cuba? Because China doesn't execute people and steal their organs? Or because China doesn't kill religious practitioners?

Be realistic. That Tom Clancy novel you read isn't accurate anymore. How are you going to fight against the guy who's cutting you checks to fight Iraq?

Re:Wire up the IDS

[dbIII]

Easy - people die in real wars. There are several going on at the moment to find out about.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[devnullkac]

Lighten up, Francis.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Tablizer]

I don't see any real difference between online war and physical war, and this was an act of war.

Like the US doesn't hack to spy? Get real.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[arivanov]

Depends which Yak. If it is the Yak 141 "testicle" grading board it should probably be the first one to be hit.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Anonymous Coward]

The US doesn't attack anyone who (they expect) can put up a fight.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[HeadlessNotAHorseman]

Looks like in spite of your pleas, you were modded funny. This is just another example of slashdot groupthink...Just once I'd like to see a comment mentioning yak testicles that does not get modded funny!

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Quila]

People die in real wars.

Yeah, I kind of figured that out back when I was in one.

Bits and bytes and bombs and bullets are integrated these days. When you compromise the computer systems, you potentially compromise the safety of the troops on the ground, and people die. It's a real war, either way.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Quila]

Well, if you dont see any difference, I expect to see you in the enlistment line first thing tomorrow morning. And dont make up some BS that youve 'already served' because it will be a lie.

Not a lie. I did my war -- it's your turn.

Let me guess -- your first image is a kid that Hamas sent out to disassemble a rocket launcher after it fired on Israeli civilians, and he was killed when the Israelis destroyed the launcher in self-defense. Yes, I know that those we are currently fighting have no problem sending children to die so they can kill more of the infidel. That alone is a great reason to stop them.

BTW, seen worse, live. Pictures don't transmit the smell, which makes it much worse.

Re:Wire up the IDS

[Quila]

I didn't realize how Strangelove that sounded. I wasn't thinking about automatic launch when I wrote that, only an IDS system that can pinpoint the source of the attack and target missiles accordingly. I can't think of an instance where a completely automated weapon system would be a good idea. Aegis will automatically kill everything it thinks is a bad guy in about a 100 mile radius at the push of a button -- but you still do need that person to push the button.

Unacceptable

[OrangeTide]

Our relations with China have been completely unacceptable, this is just one more strike against them. But not to worry China, America's spineless greedy politicians will not disrupt the status quo.

I feel my nation is being sold wholesale to foreign interests that do not even share our ideology.

Re:Unacceptable

[vandan]

I feel my nation is being sold wholesale to foreign interests that do not even share our ideology.

Ah, but they DO! The only difference is the way that they get there. The ruling class in the US play the 2-party-politics game, and swamp the population in propaganda to fool people into thinking they're in a democracy. In China, they've simply done away with this formality. The end effect is the same: complete lack of democracy, eroding workers' rights, real wages declining, and the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.

If you want to see the US ruling class' real stance on democracy, suggest to them that we get rid of politicians, and instead vote directly for POLICIES. Then they turn purple, and rage about the tyranny of the majority

Re:Unacceptable

[Dunbal]

and the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.

      This has been the case since the first man beat up his neighbor and forced him to become his slave. This rich will ALWAYS be richer, but the poor increase their standard of living. Today being "poor" in the West means having a small tv, and a second hand car, a used fridge and electricity, and a menial job. 200 years ago it meant starvation, and it still does in some places. Your point is?

Re:Unacceptable

[OrangeTide]

Many (but not most) of the US's "poor" own a home. Being poor in a third world nation is hugely different than in an industrialized nation.

Here in the US the middle class (who also do most of the voting) also pay proportionally the largest taxes and have the most difficulty in paying for college. Generally the middle class has to live on debt, the poor do not need to borrow thousands of dollars to go to college, and neither does the rich.

As popular as attacks on the rich have become in the 20th century, perhaps it is time to look forward and realize that the rich are not the root of all of society's ills. The idea of a worker's paradise is utterly obsolete here in the 21st century. It's time to cling to a new ideal, perhaps one that is actually attainable and less corruptable. or at least one where corruption can be self-correcting.

Re:Unacceptable

[mcrbids]

Today being "poor" in the West means having a small tv, and a second hand car, a used fridge and electricity, and a menial job. 200 years ago it meant starvation, and it still does in some places. Your point is?

HUZZAH! Wish I had mod points, I'd bump you that last step towards +5. People in the west don't know what it means to be poor. In the United States, you can dig through garbage on the street and still make a global living at about the 90% level! (meaning, 90% of the world is doing WORSE off than you)

Techical definitions of poverty aside, true poverty isn't when you have to steal to live. It's when you can't even steal enough to live. It's a state of hunger, apathy and deprivation that is actually hard to imagine.

I've done charity work for an orphanage in Haiti and the experience has left me with newfound appreciation for the wealth we have here in the States. You can quite literally fund the education of an entire family (several kids) with just $0.50 per day, a single Starbucks Latte per week! Simple skills, like the ability to read, write, basic chemistry (acid/alkali knowledge comes in very handy when trying to find out why your food crops won't grow) all make a huge difference in the quality of life...

Overall, the poor *ARE* getting richer, in every continent and nearly every country, but there's still plenty of work to be done, and of course, global warming threatens to undo the gains we've made so far.

So pitch in! When you are dealing with the 3rd world, your $20 makes more difference than you can possibly realize!

Re:Unacceptable

[DavidShor]

Why can we only trade with people who think exactly as we do?

Re:Unacceptable

[dcollins]

The poor will always increase their standard of living? No.

Consider average personal income in the US in 2005 dollars:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_th e_United_States#Over_time_-_by_Race_.26_Sex
From 1950-1970 it went up quite a bit.
From 1970-1990 is basically flatlined.
From 1990-2000 it went up a little.
From 2000-2004 it went back down.

So no, it does always increase. We have to be vigilant and smart as a society to make sure we maintain or increase prosperity. Magical faith will not suffice.

Re:Unacceptable

[OrangeTide]

There is a difference between trade and allowing influence of government policies.

As long as a country respects basic human rights, or at least is making serious attempts to correct the problems I think it's fine to trade with them. The US trades with Europeans despite them thinking health care is some kind of right. :)

But allowing extreme trade deficit at the expense of the working class and structuring of government policy because of the economic ties to such a degree that China has an unfair advantage over "friendly" countries when dealing with the US. They are allowed much more leeway than other nations when dealing with the US, and in my opinion too much leeway.

Maybe the US shouldn't participate in the UN or start wars until they can stand up to China?

Re:Unacceptable

[RightSaidFred99]

You want to know why the poor get poorer? Because they breed like animals. It's as simple as that. I have 0 sympathy for "the poor" as a class. They are self sustaining. Look at who's having the most children - poor people. Look at who has the highest rate of child abuse (of all sorts) and neglect - poor people. Maybe in my youth it was nice to frame some picture of the "noble poor", but as early middle age looms, I generally can't stand poor people (again, as a class).

Yes yes.. some of them are noble, and work, and are honest...yes yes I know. But as a whole, they spit out kids they can't take care of and/or raise badly and create more poverty. Then their messed up kids do the same thing. And we, middle America, feel sorry for them. Fuck poor people, especially if you're poor and you have kids you can't take care of them or raise them poorly.

Re:Unacceptable

[Colin Smith]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_based_monetary_s ystem

Re:Unacceptable

[coaxial]

The point was apparently completely missed by you.

The line wasn't "the rich are richer," as you implied but rather "get richer" as in "increase wealth relative to the rest of society." It is well known that of the destabilizing influence large economic gaps have on societies. The creation of a permanent underclass is not conductive to democracies, nor productive economies. For instance, it's well known that the wealthy have better access to the legal system through being able to afford more and better lawyers, while the poor often have no access to legal council in civil settings, and inadequate council in criminal settings.

It's relative wealth, not absolute wealth that matters to the fabric of a society. Attempting to place emphasis on absolute wealth, while ignoring the very real effects of large relative wealth disparity is a well known trick of the wealthy to attempt distract the majority poor into supporting that are not in their economic self-interest.

You really should learn some socioeconomics.

Re:Unacceptable

[Anonymous Coward]

Right on bro.

In fact if we drill a bit deeper into this guy, we might see some kind of subconscious magical thinking whereby he thinks that defending the ultra-rich will somehow make him ultra-rich.

It's amusing that a lot of the people defending the free market economy / free market politics are middle to lower class people (obviously, since they statistically make up 95% of the country) who would in fact be better of, socioeconomically speaking, in a more socialist-redistributionist economy :)

Re:Unacceptable

[Dunbal]

we might see some kind of subconscious magical thinking whereby he thinks that defending the ultra-rich will somehow make him ultra-rich.

      No I'm just a realist. Even under a "socialist" economy, where you steal from the rich and give to the poor, the political elite - those who actually control who get what, will be FAR richer than you. Remember the Soviet Union? The place where shortages existed in everything from bread to clothing? Ahh, but if you were a high ranking party member, there was a SPECIAL store you could go to, where they had everything in stock. No politburo member ever had to wait in line for anything.

      There will always be rich, and there will always be poor in ANY society. Also my financial situation is none of your business, but you are WAY off...

Re:Unacceptable

[DavidShor]

"But allowing extreme trade deficit at the expense of the working class and structuring of government policy because of the economic ties to such a degree that China has an unfair advantage over "friendly" countries when dealing with the US. They are allowed much more leeway than other nations when dealing with the US, and in my opinion too much leeway."

How exactly is the trade deficit a bad thing? It means that they are giving us actual goods, and we are giving them nothing but green slips of paper. They devalue their currency in order to boost trade numbers for propaganda purposes, and we get a lot of free stuff. It seems like a win-win. The "working class"(a rather ephemeral phrase, since even rich people work, and this country does not have much factory labor any more) is getting cheaper goods, and more jobs. Yes, more jobs, Unemployment very low, and if you adjust for education, median wages are going up too.

"Maybe the US shouldn't participate in the UN or start wars until they can stand up to China?"

I would love for the US to stop starting wars, but I fail to see what the UN has to do with this.

"As long as a country respects basic human rights, or at least is making serious attempts to correct the problems I think its fine to trade with them. The US trades with Europeans despite them thinking health care is some kind of right. :)"

When the US was first founded, we were the only democracy. Would it have made sense to cut off trade with the rest of the world? And isn't the definition of democracy somewhat iffy? Iran has free and fair elections, coupled simultaneously with an autocratic police state, Ethiopia has such elections, and Thailand is an absolute monarchy where the king is actually worshiped by the people. In fact, it is rather likely that Hu Jintao (president of China), has a higher domestic approval rating then George W. Bush.

It is not really our business to judge other peoples way of life. If we really want to save people in autocracies, we should let in as refugees, not cripple their homeland with sanctions and bombs.

Re:Unacceptable

[bit01]

where you steal from the rich and give to the poor

Your bias is showing. Somebody else might say the rich are currently stealing from the poor. Rich/poor wealth ratios appear to be growing. Pure capitalism is just warlordism, might makes right.

Successful real world societies have both competitive, non-sharing elements and cooperative, sharing elements. What is the best trade off between the two is still very much an open question.

---

You communist! Breathing shared air!

Re:Unacceptable

[Dunbal]

Somebody else might say the rich are currently stealing from the poor.

      No, the rich EXPLOIT the poor. Because they set the terms for the labor force and if the workers don't like it, we'll just find more workers elsewhere. Yes sometimes this exploitation is even abusive - when the labor force (or the envronment, etc) is harmed. Then it can be considered "theft". This is where governments have to regualte, to prevent abuse by the wealthy. But if the labor force wants a full share in the profits, then they should be forced to swallow the RISKS of the investment/business as well. After all it's only fair, no?

      However nationalizing corporations (a la Hugo Chavez), banks (Britain under Labour?) and the private holdings of wealthy families (a la Soviet Union, China and any other communist country you care to mention: this is outright theft.

Re:Unacceptable

[OrangeTide]

Well your idea of trade deficit would be fine and dandy if it were true, but the way it actually works is clearly different than you describe. Inflation growing at a higher rate than it has in decades(note it's not high yet, I just said the rate was high), and to me "adjust for eduction" means that people really can't find jobs. The midwest is currently experience massive unemployment.

It's hard for us to compete against China's prices, even when we build robots to automate manufacturing they are still more expensive than teenage girls working 12 hour days for a few dollars.

The US and the UN have turned a blind eye to China for years, which is also a member of the UN. You realize that the UN has many programs, right? Programs that the US funds, that only seems to target the weaker nations and has no teeth against the superpowers.

In the early years the US did very little trade with other nations, adjusting for GDP, so I don't see your point. But it is no longer the 19th century. And I never said a country has to be a democracy for us to trade with them. I just think we should favor trade with countries that think the way we do, rather than doing the exact opposite. Why can't we trade more with India, Brazil, South Africa(which seems to be going in a positive direction), etc. If we only invest in China, then they will continue to be the industrial juggernaut and which will only make it more difficult for our democratic allies to compete.

And to be sure, China is not the worse offender out there, just the biggest and most powerful.

Yes, it is our business to judge other people's way of life. We don't live in a vacuum or a cave. The original idea is we should not judge other cultures too harshly, that is to remain flexible in our assessment of others. Somewhere along the way people forgot the full idea, but often people go from one inflexible viewpoint to the opposite inflexible viewpoint and think it is progress.

We should not prop up unfair autocracies with our financial support or prop up indirectly via our apathy towards their imperialism and unjust behavior.

Re:Unacceptable

[Dunbal]

You really should learn some socioeconomics.

      And perhaps you should look at history, because what I am saying is that this is NOTHING NEW. 99% of the wealth has ALWAYS been in the hands of less than 1% of the population. Be it the emperor or the King and his friends, or the heads of large corporations. Or the small group of elite politicians in the so called "communist" states. You are just kidding yourself if you think it was ever any other way.

      As production increases, the rich benefit most. Yeah, so the rich get richer. The poor are still slaves - if not whipped to death nowadays, they are simply enslaved by credit, mortgages, fees, etc. But the poor today have public transport (and even vehicles). The poor today are allowed to "own" their property. They are allowed to travel, and they are allowed to do anything that the rich can do, provided they can afford it. Now if they can't manage the little money they have and try to live beyond their means, then it's their own damned fault if they end up in a huge mess. A fool and his money are soon parted - be he RICH or POOR alike.

Re:Unacceptable

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

And perhaps you should look at history, because what I am saying is that this is NOTHING NEW. 99% of the wealth has ALWAYS been in the hands of less than 1% of the population.

This is factually incorrect. The Gini coefficient is a measure of wealth disparity and in agrarian populations there tended to be significantly less wealth disparity than there is now. In fact, since the 50s as the US and China have both been becoming more and more industrialized, wealth disparity has been increasing in both countries, whereas in more progressive parts of Europe the rates have been declining. From a historical perspective, wealth disparity in the US hasn't been this bad since before the new deal.

Be it the emperor or the King and his friends, or the heads of large corporations. Or the small group of elite politicians in the so called "communist" states. You are just kidding yourself if you think it was ever any other way.

There has never been zero wealth disparity, nor will their ever be. So what? Wealth disparity is the most probable causative factor for increasing violent crime and for a violent overthrow of the existing government. Ignoring it is foolish. Looking to decrease it in order to make society better makes a lot of sense, especially when you target the unfair mechanisms of increasing wealth disparity, namely the wealth condensation effect from interest.

As production increases, the rich benefit most.

The amount the rich benefit is not really related to production levels. If the stock market crashes, the wealthy are in the best position to use their wealth to take advantage of other's misfortune and buy real estate and commodities. If the economy is strong and so is the stock market, the wealthiest collect the most interest by loaning money to those who want to do real work growing production levels.

Yeah, so the rich get richer. The poor are still slaves...

The rich get richer, compared to the median. Wealth is power. The more wealth disparity, the less power and more like slaves the rest of the people are.

But the poor today have public transport (and even vehicles).

They did back in the day too. It was called public roads and your feet. Some owned donkeys or camels or whatever. The interesting thing is, public transportation is government subsidized. In effect, it is socialism. Real socialism, not authoritarianism by the socialist party somewhere. Public transport is owned by "the people" and counts against wealth disparity. Every person owns a little bit of it.

The poor today are allowed to "own" their property.

I disagree with this. Most can't afford to own property and for those that can, eminent domain and property taxes mean they can never truly own it. You pay regularly or they take it from you.

They are allowed to travel, and they are allowed to do anything that the rich can do, provided they can afford it.

What a joke. The amount of money you have has a lot do do with what happens in the courtroom. See the drunken rich bimbo who crashed their car into someone this week and notice how much jail time they serve.

Now if they can't manage the little money they have and try to live beyond their means, then it's their own damned fault if they end up in a huge mess. A fool and his money are soon parted - be he RICH or POOR alike.

This is quite simply not true. You're trying to equate the system with a meritocracy, where the foolish will soon be poor. The problem is, it just isn't true. Wealthy or poor, the most likely deciding factor is not your wisdom, intelligence, work ethic, or genetics, it is who your parents were an how much money they give you. That is why wealth disparity is going out of control.

Re:Unacceptable

[DavidShor]

"Well your idea of trade deficit would be fine and dandy if it were true, but the way it actually works is clearly different than you describe. Inflation growing at a higher rate than it has in decades(note it's not high yet, I just said the rate was high), and to me "adjust for eduction" means that people really can't find jobs. The Midwest is currently experience massive unemployment."

No, it meant that inflation adjusted median wages are going up for people with college degrees, while they are stagnant for those without. But really, there is no shortage of jobs. Unemployment is very low right now (no educational adjustment or anything, it is currently in the low 4 percent range). Ironically, this inflation you mention is most likely because of our low unemployment. You have to love the dual mandate.

"It's hard for us to compete against China's prices, even when we build robots to automate manufacturing they are still more expensive than teenage girls working 12 hour days for a few dollars."

Were you paying attention in Intro to Microeconomics when they proved that even if one country has an absolute advantage in every single good over another, both nations would be better off then if they had not traded? If not, I'll gladly pull it out and post it.

And believe me, we are not anywhere near that point. There are many goods that we possess an absolute advantage in, and many goods that we never will. This is the point of trade in the first place.

"The US and the UN have turned a blind eye to China for years, which is also a member of the UN. You realize that the UN has many programs, right? Programs that the US funds, that only seems to target the weaker nations and has no teeth against the superpowers."

That has more to do with the structure of the UN; China is given permanent veto power, on the same level as America. There is nothing we can really do about that.

"And I never said a country has to be a democracy for us to trade with them."

Actually, this seems to be exactly what you are saying. China thinks very much like the US, in every way except our political system.

"We should not prop up unfair autocracies with our financial support or prop up indirectly via our apathy towards their imperialism and unjust behavior."

Show me one example of a nation brought down by economic sanctions. If all it took was to cut off trade, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Myanmar, and countless other nations would have been democracies.

You can not force democracy on a people, and the truth is that at the moment, the Chinese do not want democracy. Some of them do, and these people are either in Taiwan, the west, or jail. But the others have been brainwashed by government propaganda, history, and an entirely different value system. If you don't believe me, find a friend who can read Chinese and ask him to read some of the posts on a Chinese forum. After decades of propaganda, the Chinese are some of the most nationalistic people alive, and as the anti-Japanese riots a couple of years ago showed, the government is rather powerless to stop it. If the Communist part of China was swept out of power, it is rather terrifying thought to consider what would replace it.

China is a powder keg of hundreds of ethnicities and religions, historic hatred and distrust between them, and billions of dollars worth of weapons (some of them nuclear). Do you really want to destabilize them?

And here...

[Xenographic]

I thought you were going to say it was because they hacked into Mr. Gates' computer...

Re:And here...

[KDR_11k]

Wouldn't that be a vulnerability in OSX then?

OMG! CHINA = TEH NEW TERRORISTS!!@#$

[Anonymous Coward]

They hack into pentagon! They can do anything! WE must stop them now! Take off every `zig`. FOR GREAT JUSTICE! (and taking care of that deficit thing - get rid of two stones with one bird!)

Why?

[WindBourne]

Look, America has shifted a lot of manufacturing to China. They have a trillion dollars of ours. But so what? At this time, the chinese leadership can easily attack us, and simply bit the bullet WRT to the deficit. If they were really concerned about the deficit, they would be spending a lot of that money on cleaners for coal plants, bigger nuclear plants, equipment for cleaning up their pollution. But they are not spending 1 penny on it. Instead, they are trying to get us to GIVE them the know-how. They are not concerned with the lose of the money. It would simply be considered a minor lose, if they are able to take America (and perhaps EU) on and defeat them. If they can do it with out a war, all the better for them. BTW, you should look in at CIA.gov and check out the deficit. They take a lot of good from Japan, but not from America. My guess is that they are trying to draw Japan into being dependent on them, and separate them from us.

Re:Why?

[DavidShor]

"They take a lot of good from Japan, but not from America. My guess is that they are trying to draw Japan into being dependent on them, and separate them from us."

Have you ever considered that China's economy is not centrally planned anymore? Japan just happens to be the closest industrialized country to China, so that is where it makes the most sense to import heavy machinery from? It seems that South Korea, Singapore, and Australia seem to have large surpluses too, adding credence to the theory.

Re:Why?

[Sycraft-fu]

That's not as clear cut as you might think. Lots of people make the mistake of applying the kind of economics that happens on a personal scale to nations. Doesn't really work that way. What we have with China is sort of an economic MAD situation. It isn't a case of them holding the stick, it is a case of them being able to fuck up our economy, and destroying theirs in the process.

There's two problems with trying to use their cash to screw over the US. The first is that what good is money if you can't spend it? What they hold, by and large, is promissory notes and bonds from the government. If the US government wishes, it can simply refuse to honour those. Doing so would have severe consequences as currently US treasury securities are thought of as some of, if not the, most secure in the world but they have the power to do that. All of a sudden that wealth is just non-existent, unspendable, especially if the US's allies play ball.

The second, and more important, is that China's economy is totally dependant on its continued growth and that, indeed even being able to sustain where it is now, it totally dependant on the US as a customer. Screw up the US economy, people will go in to recession mode which means less spending, especially on non-essentials which is most of the Chinese market. They stop spending, your economy starts shrinking, there's big problems, possibly even civil unrest or revolution. To destabilize the economy of their biggest customer could, literally, be suicidal for their government.

As such we have a somewhat stable situation. Neither country may see eye to eye and both want to use the other for their own gain, but neither is going to fuck over the other one just to be spiteful, as it would fuck them over as well.

It is not the situation that so many people online like to portray of the Chinese being able to just sink America any time they want and have no repercussions.

Re:Why?

[wellingj]

This is anecdotal to be sure, but close to home for me personally so I am not worried.
As long as China will play a fair ball-game economically, the world will win.

Re:Why?

[kcelery]

For a pair of NIKE shoes, how much do you think the Americans are paying the factory. I think you got no clue. Walmart is buying DVD machine from China and the factory is making just US$1 per machine. The most important thing is not how much the Chinese earn, the point is, the Americans are earning X times the Chinese. While you are busy creating this message other fellow citizens are busy flipping through http://www.alibaba.com.cn/ in sourcing cheap products to import.

No one I met in China would even talk or think about taking on and attacking other countries.

Many Japanese goods compare favorably over US goods in terms of price and service. If you would like to reduce the deficit, you are welcome to set up your office in Hong Kong or Shanghai where many foreign companies are racing to open their far east office.

Re:Why?

[WindBourne]

it totally dependant on the US as a customer. Screw up the US economy, people will go in to recession mode which means less spending, especially on non-essentials which is most of the Chinese market. They stop spending, your economy starts shrinking, there's big problems, possibly even civil unrest or revolution. To destabilize the economy of their biggest customer could, literally, be suicidal for their government. First, they are trying hard to diversify and prevent our having that large of an impact on them. In particular, during the 60's/70's, if any one nation quit trading with America it would never have hurt us. That is where China is trying to head for.

As to suicide for their government, I can only think of Tiananmen square. If China were a democracy, then no problem. As it currently is, the leadership has only itself to worry about. Bear in mind, that the average Chinese does not want war. They simply want the same thing as those on this site want; the OPPORTUNITY to get ahead, and live comfortably. That is understandable. As to the not f(*king each other over, surely u jest. Look at their money politics. It is designed to keep trade with America going in one direction only. They supposedly moved to a basket of multiple monies, but their changes are obviously not tied to a single formula. It moves at will. IOW, it is a political, not financial based.

Re:Why?

[Ash Vince]

If they were really concerned about the deficit, they would be spending a lot of that money on cleaners for coal plants, bigger nuclear plants, equipment for cleaning up their pollution. But they are not spending 1 penny on it. They are certainly spending money on improving their nuclear reactor technology as they are one of the few countries looking at investing in Pebble Bed Nuclear reactors. Check out this page and the section on china:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_reactor

Here are some more links:

http://world-nuclear.blogspot.com/2006/02/chinese- pebble-bed-reactor-to-begin.html
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2003/pebble.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11080908/site/newsweek /

Why bother spending money on improving coal efficiency if you plan on phasing it out entirely? This would make them the world leaders in advanced, safe nuclear power generation.

Re:this is bullshit!

[larry bagina]

however, if you punch him in the belly, he goes poop poop.

Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Doc Ruby]

Is anyone else nervous that these clowns are armed to the teeth, with enough firepower to destroy the world and make the rubble bounce several times?

They're not just too incompetent to defend their systems (I'm sure the US penetrates the Chinese, too). But they're too dumb to refrain from penetrating each other, or just not get caught.

These are the kinds of "brinksmanships" that keep us all close to the edge of destroying each other ("ourselves"). The kinds of stupid, complicated slap-happiness that gets out of hand. And gets into killing.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Doc Ruby]

Moderation -1
    100% Troll

What, exactly, was the response I was "trolling" for? TrollMods think they're armed to the teeth with mod points.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Dunbal]

Is anyone else nervous that these clowns are armed to the teeth, with enough firepower to destroy the world and make the rubble bounce several times?

      Yes. America makes me very nervous. Oh, isn't that what you meant?

      China has around 200 nuclear weapons, compared to the US's 5000+.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Doc Ruby]

That's almost exactly what I meant. 5200 nukes is 5200 too many, especially in the hands of these jokers.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[tekrat]

Usually it's the dumber people who have all the weapons. Ride the subway in NYC and you'll understand this concept. It doesn't take any brains whatsoever to kill someone. In fact, having less brains makes it easier, since you're less likely to consider the consequences *before* pulling the trigger.

And frankly, the bigger the weapons, the less brains behind them.
With King George W. the least brainy of all, with the most firepower.

And this is the way it's been since man walked the Earth.
Mankind will never make it to the stars. We're destined to destroy ourselves first.

I wonder if this is why we've never found intelligent life in the universe yet.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[T Murphy]

I know you want to use the US nuke stockpile issue more for arguments sake, but I hope no one here believes that argument. The US government is far more likely to be held accountable than just about any other government in the world. Knowing that, I feel the US should have the largest nuke stockpile by far. Not that I think we should use them, but because then I know the largest quantity of nukes in the world is in the safest hands it can be in. As long as we have the bigger stick, those who think the size of the stick matters will be held in check. To anyone who thinks it to be smarter to destroy our nukes: would you be fine if China, or maybe North Korea, has the largest nuclear stockpile in the world, or rather let it remain the US' title?

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[king-manic]

That's almost exactly what I meant. 5200 nukes is 5200 too many, especially in the hands of these jokers.

What exactly gave you the impression they were jokers?

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[RightSaidFred99]

Umm, aren't you forgetting? God is an American. Ergo, we shouldn't make anyone nervous. Yes, there's sarcasm in one or more of these sentences.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Anonymous Coward]

The only country in the history of man, that has used nuclear weapons in war against civilians, is USA. I fear the US stockpile of nuclear weapons much more than the russian or chinese one. Russian and chinese presidents seem to be more atheist and logical than the american religious nuts. However it would be best if noone had any nuclear weapons, but I do not trust USA.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Weedlekin]

"Mankind will never make it to the stars. We're destined to destroy ourselves first."

We'll get there if something's discovered that somebody wants, which will ensure that somebody else will devote enormous resources into putting an army there to prevent them from having it.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Dunbal]

What exactly gave you the impression they were jokers?

      What planet have you been living on for the past few years? If you wish to call the Bush administration an intellectual elite, I guess that's your right. The polls, however, are starting to support the "joker" category.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[PetrusMagnusII]

From reading the comment, it's very obvious that the parent was referring to the US government as the clowns.

We indeed do have more nukes than anyone else, but does it really matter? After a certain point it becomes overkill and anything beyond that is just a deterent. It only takes 1 to take out an entire city and while 200 is a comparatively small number, it's more than enough to destroy the entire world.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[king-manic]

The 5000 possibly but the 200 are controlled by some very scary but competent men. Even those 5000 is not under the exclusive control of the executive branch. Those entrenched military folk have some competence even if the executive branch chooses to hobble them.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Dunbal]

Even those 5000 is not under the exclusive control of the executive branch.

      Are you sure? After all, everything ELSE seems to be...

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Kehvarl]

It only takes 1 to take out an entire city and while 200 is a comparatively small number, it's more than enough to destroy the entire world.

While I agree in principle that beyond a certain number, more nukes is a meaningless gesture, calling 200 nukes "enough to destroy the entire world" is not entirely accurate.

The largest nuclear weapon ever detonated, Tsar Bomba, was calculated by the US to be 57 Megatons and officially reported by all Russian sources since 1991 as 50 Megatons. The fireball from this blast would cause third degree burns at a range of 100 kilometers from the actual explosion, with additional thermal damage further out.

If we assume all 200 weapons in question are of similar class to Tsar Bomba, and all 200 were simultaniously detonated, the total yield would be on the order of 5000 megatons, or a mere 5 gigatons of TNT. In Contrast, the asteroid impact which produced the Chicxulub Crater released an estimated 5x10^23 joules of energy, or approximately the same as 100 Teratons or 100,000 gigatons. Admittedly, the event which formed the Cicxulub Crater could be considered "World Destroying" in the sense that very little on the surface would remain, but the energy released by the simultanious detonation of 200 of the largest nuclear devices ever produced would generate a mere one half of one percent of such an impactor.

Another way to consider it is: if 1 thermonuclear device of 50 megatons would completely annihilate one city, then 200 will account for 200 cities and their surrounding areas. While the destruction of 200 cities would be incredibly disruptive and even catastrophic in terms of economic, military, and ecological impact not to mention the vast death toll, It would hardly result in the destruction of the entire world.

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Etcetera]

Usually it's the dumber people who have all the weapons.

There are so many things wrong with this statement, it's not even +1 Funny.

And frankly, the bigger the weapons, the less brains behind them.
With King George W. the least brainy of all, with the most firepower.

Are you seriously blaming the entirety of the range of weapons of the US Armed Forces on President George Bush?

And BTW... Bush got better grades at Yale than Gore did at Harvard, and averaged slightly better than Kerry at Yale as well. http://www.spokesmanreview.com/breaking/story.asp? ID=4149

Re:Highly Armed Nincompoops

[Anonymous Coward]

That just shows how horrible the system is. If neither party can find a good candidate that could get an A average in school, then what kind of people are in those parties?

Hacking vs connecting?

[AHuxley]

As Gary McKinnon showed, its not really hacking, more just connecting to default MS junk.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_McKinnon

Re:Hacking vs connecting?

[segra]

Yeah, its kinda surprising this is news... it would appear pretty obvious if he could walk in, so could anyone else who connected, including china :)

America's spineless greedy politicians

[Dystopian Rebel]

America's spineless greedy politicians will not disrupt the status quo

I'm no fan of politicians but if the citizens of a democratic nation don't stand up for anything, they are more despicable than the politicians.

\! bill gates

[Anonymous Coward]

robert gates. likely.

keyword : jointly

suspicious.

Is Vista really the Answer to the question everyone is thinking ?

Great Powers Always Spy on Each Other

[tjstork]

The obvious flipside to this is, is the USA spying on Chinese computers? I would bet that we are!

With that said, to some degree, spying is something that Great Powers have historically done. But, now, in an era where public intentions are something different than the real ones, by any national actor, allowing a rival some degree of a looksee can be a useful tool.

For one, you can feed the rival disinformation, and in the USA, that's pretty easy to do. We let the Chinese have a look at some "secret" Pentagon systems, then, turn around and leak that such an assault was made to the popular media. This surely gets some airplay, helping to validate the "true" nature of the Pentagon secrets. China then absorbs some made up junk as its canon, and the USA pulls a fast one. OR, the data might actually be legitimate, if we want to make sure that, for example, that our putting an extra carrier in the Persian gulf is not an act to form up a "bomb China" invasion force.

Used properly, spying can be used to win diplomatic initiatives, and to prevent wars among great powers, which, these days, would be a humanity damaging affair.

Vote Ron Paul in 2008!

[SaDan]

Hey, he may not be perfect, but he's a pretty decent alternative to the other people who'd like to be in the oval office.

http://www.ronpaul2008.com/

Re:Vote Ron Paul in 2008!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ron Paul is an isolationist fascist pretending to know what the much abused word "conservative" really means.

God, you Ronnie-zealots are even more annoying than the me-too Ayn Rand fanboys.

Re:Vote Ron Paul in 2008!

[SaDan]

Thanks for chiming in there, AC.

Ron Paul would support your continued right to privacy on the internet, but I don't know about the rest of the GOP gang or the Democrats.

This zealot votes, BTW. Do you?

What operating system?

[zymano]

Linux? Bsd? Billsoft?

Re:What operating system?

[eli pabst]

You seriously think Robert Gates is using *BSD? I'm sure he's constantly emailing W about the best way to optimize gcc to compile his kernel as well :-]

Re:What operating system?

[Corporate Troll]

I'm sure he's constantly emailing W about the best way to optimize gcc to compile his kernel as well

He said *BSD, not Gentoo ;-)

Does anybody actually believe

[denissmith]

Come on....the Chinese military is capable of hacking Robert Gates' office, yet is completely incapable of obscuring their tracks? You really believe that? This is another set up situation - an insider trying to scuttle a deal, or to embarrass someone, or to effect policy in some minor way, or just to get you going. I have no doubt the office was hacked - why admit something that makes you look so incompetent, but are we really to believe that they tracked down the ACTUAL culprits? Let's ask to see the evidence, for once - they never seem to have any of that these days.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[Dunbal]

This is another set up situation

      I agree. Yet another anti-china story, in a long list of anti-china stories over the past few weeks, ever since the chinese threatened to call in the US debt when the US demanded the chinese revaluate the Yuan. More American propaganda being fed to the people, to make sure that China is slowly moved to the "axis of evil" category.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[eli pabst]

I hadn't heard anything about the "threat to call in the US debt" on the news, so I was going to call you out to provide a link. Then I did a google search. Makes you wonder about the timing of all these recalls on everything from childrens toys to pencils.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[The Master Control P]

Propaganda was unnecessary. I placed their government in the "axis of evil" catagory all by myself. The Chinese Fascist Party (No point pretending that they're communist anymore) is the antithesis of everything that the concepts of freedom and human dignity stand for: Rewriting history, massive censorship, "re-education," the murder of dissenters, the mass murder of pro-democracy advocates at Tiananmen Square.

The only thing that makes me sicker than the Chinese government is that the US supports them by trading with them.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[DavidShor]

And if we stopped trading with them, who exactly would that hurt? The Communist party leaders will be rich anyway, using at least the black market to procure US goods. The people however, will be stripped of their prosperity.

Besides, if the US never traded with autocracies, there would never have been a US in the first place.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[Anonymous Coward]

Categorizing an entire country by the past actions of their government doesn't show quite much insight or willingness to find it.
We could probably find embarrassing moments in the history of every nation out there and most of them would be quick to lie in order to cover it up.

I've lived in three continents for more than 6 years each (6 in China, 11 in France and 11 years in the Us) and to be honest, I don't feel the people in China are being oppressed quite as much as what the us is trying to make it look like.

In fact, the average population here has access to pretty much the same amount of information that the rest of the world does...
The fatal assumption that all of us could make is that the Chinese somehow think differently. They don't; they are exactly the same folks as we are.
On an average day, joe six-pack and lee steamed-dumplings (bear with me here, work drains me of my inspiration) are gonna skim through the same propaganda on the idiot box, type the same flames in their Wow farming session and go through the same crap in order to download a track from their respective favorite band on bt mumbling something about vista sucking before going to bed.
They don't like the evil in their government a bit more than we do; they are aware of every bit of corruption out there as well as in their backyard. They are exactly as intelligent as the average american citizen and share the exact same ethical views as we and the rest of the world.
They do actively attempt to increase the quality of personal freedoms education and lives in general to the same extent as our own risk/reward ratio let's us.

In other words, they aren't the massively stupid/gullible/apathetic/evil/manipulating humanoids some people are trying to paint them as; they are people, just like you, just like me and just like the guy who invented popcorn. And as much as their government can be evil as ours at this moment, just the fact that the Us propaganda has succeeded in making people use stupid terms such as "axis of evil" is making me profoundly sad.

Please think for yourself; ask around from the people who know, do some research, travel and get your own information if that's what it takes but please don't take the word of some random news with questionable interests.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[Anonymous Coward]

100% behind you there. Mao Tse Tung was responsible for more people's deaths (The "great leap forward", Cultural revolution, Tibet - 70 million total) than Hitler and Stalin put together, yet he still has his portrait up on Tiananmen square.
I'm even scared of writing this, which is why I'm anon coward for this one. I guess they'll track me down through the server logs anyway but...

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[DanielMarkham]

Or it could be that the Chinese are slowly pushing the limits, looking to a day where they have a deep water navy and can leverage Taiwan into the mainland.

Simply because something may have a propaganda value to one nation or another does not dimish its importance, or its veracity.

It's not an either-or situation. Both things may be true. I worry that people want to ignore real threats by simply characterizing them as propaganda. Let's stay friends with the Chinese. To do that, we're going to need to have a honest conversation about what each partner is doing. This story helps with that.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[rickwood]

China went into my Axis of Evil on the 5th of June, 1989. I'll never forgive them sumbitches for that. Never.

Re:Does anybody actually believe

[Anonymous Coward]

For all we know the hack could be accidental.
Loads of computers in China are scanning random IP adresses all the time looking for unsecured windows boxes.
If the attackers IP resolves to a Chinese military's computer (I don't know how anyone could really tell for sure), who's to say that is not cracked too.

It's not very hard...

[theMerovingian]

Everyone knows the password is "Joshua"... Just stick to the Chess simulation when you get inside the DoD servers or you could be absconded by the FBI in an unmarked panel van.

US Military could benefit

[heretic108]

Plant a few honeypot boxen around the Pentagon network, and load them up with tasty disinformation, aiming for outcomes like:

• Making an advanced US capability seem flaky or ineffective
• Making a flaky or undeveloped US capability seem advanced and devastating
• Sending the Chinese into fruitless directions in R&D, costing them billions
• Trick the Cninese into types of action that could yield up some useful intel for the US

The opportunities are endless.

Re:US Military could benefit

[tftp]

Those are awfully dangerous and scary things. Underestimating an opponent may prompt a war that will be expected to be brief but in reality will drag for years (Iraq). Overestimating an opponent may cause the feeling of an imminent threat where none exists, and you can be attacked over that presumed threat. Giving them ideas? And what if they succeed? Finally, pushing the opponent into a certain direction also reveals your intentions, and the player can be played in return.

But this would be fortunately useless because countries do not act on a single piece of information unless there is no other source. History knows a few examples of such single-source deceptions, but they are mostly wartime tricks, where the opponent is forced to decide here and now. In peace time it's far more likely to have hundreds of agents dispatched to check on the information, and you can not be sure that they won't find any of your real secrets...

IMO, full awareness of other side's intentions and capabilities, provided that they are matched well, was the best guarantee of peace in 20th century. I do not know if this will remain so in this century.

Re:US Military could benefit

[king-manic]

Plant a few honeypot boxen around the Pentagon network, and load them up with tasty disinformation, aiming for outcomes like:

        * Making an advanced US capability seem flaky or ineffective
        * Making a flaky or undeveloped US capability seem advanced and devastating
        * Sending the Chinese into fruitless directions in R&D, costing them billions
        * Trick the Cninese into types of action that could yield up some useful intel for the US

The opportunities are endless.

Operation GW commenced January 20th 2001 and has successfully misled the world into thinking we are idiots. We have made it appear we make vast amounts of wealth disappear through military industrial graft and sunk our monetary values 40% relative to other western powers. We've gotten involved in a war we knew we couldn't leave gracefully, and shown corruption at every level. We have given the appearance of crushing our education system with theology, and appeared to have revised the public education curriculum to cater to the dumbest common denominator. We have lulled the entire world into thinking we are a country of backwards mouth breathers.As soon as we devalue our currency to 20% relative value and ensure 99% of all top ivy league school student are foreign we will truly be in a position to surprise the world without awesome cunning and leap forth and conquer the world.

Re:US Military could benefit

[The One and Only]

I think we've done this sort of thing before. I used to know a Navy captain who had the occasion of meeting a Russian counterpart during or after the Cold War. Evidently we had let fall into Russia's hands plans for a steam catapult (for use launching fighters off aircraft carriers), but the plans were severely wrong and the Russians couldn't fix them without redesigning the whole thing themselves anyway.

Re:US Military could benefit

[Lesrahpem]

This is obviously the kind of plan to discuss on the internet.

Re:US Military could benefit

[arivanov]

Not that they needed as Kiev class aircraft carrying cruisers did not use a steam catapult anyway. They did not need to as all of their aircraft are VTOL. It is just about now they start looking into using steam catapults on the latest generation of aircraft carriers.

It is a classic example of cold war military idiotism playing stupid secrecy games. Reminds me of one of my dad stories. He got forcefully drafted by the Bulgarian Intelligence service (IIRC with KGB involved) to evaluate a number of "highly valuable articles" obtained by "our great spies". These ended up being the foreign presenter notes for an international conference held a couple of weeks prior to that. The idiots from the intelligence service ruffled through the guests luggage and took photocopies of everything they could find including what the guests intended to present. So my dad took the piss and sent them the official copy as well as the official reviewers notes on each of the publications prior to their acceptance for presentation as well as a complaint that they presented him with very low quality material for review and oh, by the way, here is the same thing photocopied properly. IIRC they did not bother him after that.

Re:US Military could benefit

[The One and Only]

Not that they needed as Kiev class aircraft carrying cruisers did not use a steam catapult anyway. They did not need to as all of their aircraft are VTOL. It is just about now they start looking into using steam catapults on the latest generation of aircraft carriers.

Why do you think it took them so long? The Nimitz class was built in the 80's. If Soviet Russia could have matched that at the time, they would have.

Re:US Military could benefit

[KDR_11k]

Or, to put the first two like Sun-Tzu did:

"When weak, appear strong. When strong, appear weak."

Re:US Military could benefit

[Oktober Sunset]

those are all terrible ideas, a SWF of Wen Jiabao being fucked in the ass by George Bush to the sound of deliverance banjo music would be the best thing to leave.

Supervisor: Report your progress soldier! Chinese cracker: Sir, I have successfully cracked the pentagon, have downloaded many secret files.
(Banjo music starts) Supervisor: What the fuck! You dishonour our glorious leader! Gulag for you traitor!

Re:US Military could benefit

[YrWrstNtmr]

Not that they needed as Kiev class aircraft carrying cruisers did not use a steam catapult anyway. They did not need to as all of their aircraft are VTOL. It is just about now they start looking into using steam catapults on the latest generation of aircraft carriers.

All of their aircraft are VTOL? Hardly. The Kiev class ships carried the Yak-38 Forgers. Those are/were VTOL. However, the aircraft reportedly sucked, and it could only carry a dozen or so. Why did the Kiev not carry other aircraft? Because it was too small to carry any other fighter aircraft of the day. At roughly 1/2 the displacement, and a 150' shorter flight deck, the Kiev is significantly smaller than a Nimitz-class ship. So no cat, because it couldn't carry aircraft that would need one.

The next 'class' of Russian carriers, Kuznetsov, does carry conventional/non-VTOL aircraft such as the MiG-29K and Su-33, but still only a dozen or so. Launched off a ski-jump deck. Even though the Kuznetsov is again smaller than the Kennedy, it can have a longer takeoff roll because there aren't so many aircraft cluttering up the deck. Because of the ski-jump and the longer roll, no cat needed.
I put 'class' in quotes, because there is only the one. In fact, the Kuznetsov is currently the entirety of the active Russian carrier fleet. And just a couple of weeks ago, they restarted flight ops from the Kuznetsov after a two year break.

The 'next' generation of Russian carriers? Vaporware.

Re:US Military could benefit

[arivanov]

While they do not want to confess to it the primary reason is the Hitler/Doenitz/Goering syndrome also known as "everything that flies is mine". It was absolutely the same in Soviet Russia.

Their navy never ordered a pure aircraft carrier so it does not fall under the command of the air force and AA. All of their aircraft carriers are actually aircraft carrying cruisers carrying a significant air-to-surface and naval warfare capability. Same as remit of the Graf Zeppelin in Nazi Germany which had some heavy artillery mounted on it just in case Goering decides to stake its claim to it. This is also the reason why they carry considerably less aircraft than a UK, French or US carrier group. All those Granit missiles on the Kuznetsov (and earlier generations on the Kiev class) take quite a lot of space. This is also one of the reasons why the Navy continued to order special aircraft different from the ones used by the airforce.

The name of their only "proper" carrier is actually quite significant. It is called Admiral Kuznetcov who is renouned for a number of things:

• He disobeyed Stalin direct order and put the Soviet Naval forces on red alert on the eve of 22nd of June 1941. As a result the fleet suffered very few casualties with some units like the Black Sea Fleet having no ships lost on the 22nd. Stalin never forgot that and two years after the war he had him demoted, exiled and the heavy line cruiser and aircraft carrier building programme terminated. The nearly finished Soviet Union class heavy cruiser whose hull design was also supposed to be used for the first USSR aircraft carrier was scrapped.
• Stalin reinstated him in preparation to WW3 in 1951, but the damage to the fleet was already done. USSR no longer had a shipbuilding programme. Kuznetcov tried to reinstate it only to be demoted and retired soon after Stalin's death in the ensuing power tussle. Zhukov diverted all finances diverted to the army, air force and the development of missile forces.

From there on, the development of navy hardware in Russia practically stalled till the 1970-es when the analysis of the use of carrier groups by US in the Vietnam war reawoke it. By that time it was too late, it was 30 years behind and most navy planners were still afraid to order a proper carrier design.

Re:US Military could benefit

[arivanov]

After a quick check with the russian websites they have played with it for a long time and have thrown it away as useless anyway. Russian fleet units have the design remit to be able to operate in the Arctic ocean and there is no current catapult capable of operating there. It will freeze once in a while and as a result you will lose a plane straight away. At least if the russians are to be believed on the matter this is the primary reason why they went for a ramp and a very short takeoff and landing design.
This actually rings true as I have yet to recall any case of seeing an USA carrier group going to exercises anywhere very cold.

Re:US Military could benefit

[fossilstar]

The military would be smart to do this. Someone probably even proposed it, but probably then his idea was chopped off at the knees, and contracted out to KBR or someone. They probably were paid tens of millions up front, and the whole thing exists only as a Power Point presentation left unknowingly on an Internet-accessible drive.

Re:US Military could benefit

[egreshko]

Don't we US citizens already do that with our tax dollars?

It doesn't make any sence...

[B5_geek]

Lets make a couple of assumptions..

(1) That the Pentagon doesn't have a Windows box connected to the Internet with a public IP address.
(2) That the 'hackers' are smart-enough to actually hack into the Pentagon (ergo they are not script-kiddies).

Wouldn't these hackers be smart enough to originate these attacks from some-other hacked network via an anonymous proxy? (And then delete any logs that still might point to their activities.)

At the very least I would expect a simple IP spoofing to have taken place.

This was too easy, something is up.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[Tsiangkun]

interesting. I think it was too easy, suspiciously so, even with the third assumption. (3) The pentagon is staffed by the most competent people, and not, um, anything else.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[Zero__Kelvin]

"Lets make a couple of assumptions..

(1) That the Pentagon doesn't have a Windows box connected to the Internet with a public IP address.

Why would you make such an almost certainly erroneous assumption? The U.S. Military uses Micro$hit, as do most (all?) fortune 500 companies. There are an astounding number of incompetant "sysadmins" who think that an M$ certification is an indication that they are computer gurus. There is a reason why there is a joke about Military Intelligence being an oxymoron.

Are there some super-smart people in the military? Of course. Are there incompetant ones in positions of power as well? I don't know. Let's ask the Commander in Chief ... Oh wait ... I do know ;-)

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[thanatos_x]

I recall reading a story about attacks on one of the research labs (Los Alamos, I think). Someone noticed something was going on, the attacks were incredibly well disciplined, like a good burglar - get in, get what you can grab quickly, and get out. They didn't spend too much time on anyone thing, they just downloaded anything they could grab and got out, to repeat some other time (~2am local time)

He eventually traced their attacks to a Chinese IP, after they hopped numerous machines in the process. He turned his findings over to the CIA, and in the end got what he deserved; fired, for violating and hacking the Chinese - despite the "We'll ignore how you got this information if you just give it to us" from the CIA.

The point is I'd hope we could figure out who did it.I would hope the computer experts at the Pentagon knew a bit more about hacking/counter hacking than you, and have some idea how to trace the hacking to the root of the problem. The point is that you're assuming they didn't have to do 'work' to get the information. The article doesn't state what they did, but I imagine the Chinese and US both used methods of which the actual implementations are beyond most people on slashdot.

Of course this forgets the prime rule that most people who post on the internet have a PhD in the subject they comment on.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[tmasman]

Why would we make the assumption that the IT folks here in the US would be too stupid to look for any anonymizing technologies?

There are ways to track just about anything. It's all a matter of resources & attention to details.
There are also more forms of intel than just IP packets & log files... Not everything has to come from a computer screen.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[inKubus]

That's because the incursion was authorized. It's a lot cheaper to have China make our missiles for us, since labor is way cheaper over there. I also heard they are outsourcing Congress to India in an effort to save money.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would you make such an almost certainly erroneous assumption?

It's not an erroneous assumption, in fact it's quite correct. The first logical step to securing data is not to even allow the data to be transported on a public and even worse international network. It's not a joke when you see movies with the term "classified" on some paper envelope transporting computer media. That means if the computer is to be used for classified purposes, no network connectivity, ever.

But like anything, even the Slashdot crowd is capable of being thrown a bone. Just combine the terms Microsoft, US government, and China and you have a winning useless commentary piling up. The truth is even if the story is way off, it still generates lots of hits for Slashdot.

Re:It doesn't make any sence...

[Zero__Kelvin]

tmasman: "Lets make a couple of assumptions..

(1) That the Pentagon doesn't have a Windows box connected to the Internet with a public IP address."

Zero__Kelvin: "Why would you make such an almost certainly erroneous assumption?"

Not So Anonymous Coward: "It's not an erroneous assumption, in fact it's quite correct. The first logical step to securing data is not to even allow the data to be transported on a public and even worse international network. It's not a joke when you see movies with the term "classified" on some paper envelope transporting computer media. That means if the computer is to be used for classified purposes, no network connectivity, ever."

WOW! I stand corrected by you ... a person who clearly has knowledge of systems inside the pentagon. Now I am truly impressed, as you have helped me to understand that these uber-hackers (whoever they are) actually pulled off the expoit by hacking together an implementation of RFC 1149 (carrier pigeon internet protocol), tricking the Pentagon into letting the pigeons in, and exploiting a hole in the standard. I'm guessing it was the same hole your comment came through ;-)

Cut the crap

[Anonymous Coward]

Says who? A billion Chinese don't scare me. Just a handful of our brightest American hackers in prison do though. Hell, I lived in China. I walked the football fields of sidewalks in Tiannamen square. I love China, and the Chinese, but quite frankly, they don't have a clue about the power of Capitalism. Seriously. If they did, you and me would be posting in Mandarin right about now.

It's not arrogance, but prudence, that we knocked down Soviet satellite after satellite during the 70s and 80s, hidden from the hordes of Swanson chomping Phil Donohue pacifists at the time. Ronny, we need you now.

Free our brightest in prison, put them on the payroll, and watch their Great Firewall sizzle like a candle and two wet fingers. To quote the Gipper, "détente is what a farmer has with his turkey before Thanksgiving." I guess in the end, it really boils down to how much you're willing to spend on your next pair of Nikes.

Re:Cut the crap

[DavidShor]

Yes, but I don't see any reason at all the see the Chinese as a threat to America. We could do it, but I just don't see why.

Re:Cut the crap

[emilper]

If they are in prison, they are not "the brightest".

Re:Cut the crap

[Oktober Sunset]

a billion Chinese don't scare you? bet you daren't say it to their face.

Re:Cut the crap

[ScrewMaster]

it really boils down to how much you're willing to spend on your next pair of Nikes.

I'd say it really boils down to how much you're willing to spend on your next pair of Nukes.

Re:Cut the crap

[Anonymous Coward]

Chuck Norris?

I'm impressed

[jollyreaper]

74 posts and no jokes yet about the Pentagon having a chink in their armor? I'm impressed. Honestly, I'm not sure what's scarier, this or all the cheap crap on the shelves at Wal-Mart.

Re:I'm impressed

[Anonymous Coward]

Chink?!? What a racist thing to say.

Relax

[WindBourne]

The troll marking simply means that you have one following you. I have at least two following me. S*&t happens.

Re:Relax

[Doc Ruby]

I know, it's just another Slashstalker. Still a sign of the sickness among us.

Because you almost certainly return the favour

[Goonie]

This article is a few years old, but I very much doubt anything has changed except the technology has improved even further. And there's this incident.

The Chinese spy on us. We spy on them. While it's inane, expensive, and annoying, it will go on for a long time yet. Heck, the CIA spies on various European countries too...

Wouldn't change a thing.

[Kadin2048]

I'm sure if China really wanted to screw with our economy they would "leak" any microsoft code they had- that would put an end to Bill's empire quite efficicntly and all those billions would need to work elsewhere. certainly that would cause the economy to shift a little, wouldnt it? No, it wouldn't. The Windows source code has been leaked before. It caused more problems for OSS projects than it did for Microsoft. Not sure about today, but you used to be able to find it trivially on most P2P networks. Since it's not legitimately public, you can't do much of anything with it -- not if you're a legitimate business/project, anyway. And it provided a good way for Microsoft to question OSS projects that challenged their monopoly (like ReactOS); if anything played too nicely with actual MS software, they could accuse it of having leaked MS code inside, and force an expensive code audit (at best), or sue them into oblivion (at worst).

Anybody on the black hat side (or in countries that don't care about IP) who wants the Windows source already has it. The Vista source will eventually leak, too. Microsoft doesn't really care, because it's pretty hard for anyone to actually use the leaked code to compete with them in their core markets. No competitor would want to touch it, because it would open them up to lawsuits and death-by-code-audits. No OSS project wants it, for the same reasons. People don't even want to work with developers who've seen leaked MS code; the stuff's like poison. And users don't care about access to a hunk of source code -- all they want is binaries, and anyone who wants to can just get a pirated copy of Windows.

So the Chinese could do that, but it wouldn't do anything to harm Microsoft. The Windows code is out there for the taking already.

Air gaps

[flyingfsck]

The secret military networks are not connected to the public internet at all. I'd like to see a hacker cross an air gap.

Re:Air gaps

[Anonymous Coward]

Well then, we are now talking about Tempest now, aren't we!

Still wondering what to do with that news

[2Bits]

I really don't know what to do with that news, obviously, it's a slow news day. But this kind of things just keep on popping up every month or so. So, here's my take, before going out for a bite.

1) Everyone is scanning or hacking everyone else, big deal, get over it. And even my lowly servers get hit by port scanning and hack attempts every minute from US-based IPs, and believe it or not, some IPs are traced back to some .mil or .gov domains (those might be zombies, or they might be some stupid hacking apprentices from those agencies).

2) The US government even has spy satellite scanning every corner of the globe, sending spy and reconnaissance planes to the border of almost every nation on this planet, has spy subs to the public water zones just an inch beside the territory of every sea-bordered nations. Every country which has the capabilities is doing the same, including Russia, UK, France, Japan (Yes, Japan too, even with their constitution and commitment after WWII not to get into military shit), China, India, Canada, .... Is that news to anyone at all?

3) With the huge budget and the amount of human resources that the US DoD has, and if their system is that easy to hack by an outsider, well, too bad. They might as well consider outsourcing system management work to some other countries which might do a better job, such as India or China (doh...)

4) If your system is hacked by an outside without any physical access, shouldn't you first review your security policies first, instead of sending knee-jerk reaction to blame others? Unless this is just a setup for political games.

5) Political games, scapegoating, knee-jerk reactions, stupid employees, stupid politicians, stupid network admins, stupid journalists looking to stir up a storm in a glass of water, stupid /. submitter, stupid this and stupid that, ... exist all over the place. So, move over, nothing to see here.

And why did I bother to post at all? Stupid me!

Re:Still wondering what to do with that news

[Anonymous Coward]

And why did I bother to post at all? Stupid me!

Dumbfuck...

And if they release to the American public...

[Anonymous Coward]

...the information that was gleaned from the break-in, why, that would put them one-up on Uncle Sam.

Nothing's up

[NeutronCowboy]

I've worked with military networks. No, not everything that ends in .mil is classified. Yes, they also run windows boxes. No, it doesn't require special skill to hack into that kind of network. It's very similar to breaching any ol' corporate network. Granted, the people I worked with were fairly paranoid and quite up to speed on proper security procedures. But this crack isn't the same as getting access to classified hardware.

Call me again when that happens. In the meantime - congrats, they probably found out who went to lunch with whom last Friday, or read the Navy newsletter.

Re:Nothing's up

[tftp]

In the meantime - congrats, they probably found out who went to lunch with whom last Friday, or read the Navy newsletter.

IANAS, but access to unclassified [internal] email may be an efficient source of data to a professional. Since .mil types usually put their service position in the email, it then reveals who is who on the inside - that is clearly more than a common spy can conclude just by looking at people as they go to and from work at Pentagon. And if you get any hint of improper behavior in those emails then you have something to discuss in private with your new prospective source...

This is Slashdot

[MMaestro]

I know the parent post is meant to be funny, but this is Slashdot. The vast majority of readers here simply assume that the computers that were "hacked" were nothing more than honey-pots. There have been reports of China and U.S. hackers trying to break into each other's systems for YEARS. Unless a report comes out saying that some new weapon design or covert plans to invade Iran was stolen by one of these hackers, this is old news.

Which network was it on?

[bitserf]

I'd be interested in whether this machine was connected to the public Internet, or part of the unconnected military network that people keep talking about. If the former, it is probably not a particularly critical breach.

I doubt that the US has not achieved similar penetrations against China - But you'll never hear of it from the Chinese.

NSAKEY

[Werrismys]

Do you truly believe the US has not done the reverse a hundred times already? No wonder China wants to move away from M$ "operating systems."

What's the big deal?

[r_jensen11]

How many Americans are in prison for cracking in to the pentagon? The only difference here is that rather than a group of crackers with no political affiliation, this group of crackers is part of a foreign military. Who honestly believes that the US (ala CIA and NSA) isn't doing the same to some other country (e.g. Russia, North Korea, China) right now?

Re:What's the big deal?

[DragonTHC]

The difference is that the NSA has a back door into all major operating systems. They don't need to crack in.

This sort of issue could be fixed if the Pentagon switched from using windows based systems to using SELinux systems with mandatory smart card access.

Remember, there are 2 levels of privilege above administrator in windows, and there are 3 backdoor keys into windows. Microsoft's, the NSA's and who knows who has the third?

Re:What's the big deal?

[Reapman]

The problem is, when someone is hostile towards you, you retaliate. Inside a country that means go to prison (or beat the crap outa em). Country to country, that COULD mean a whole lot more like war. I find that happening to be very unlikely, however.

This reminds me of the cold war days, I seriously doubt the US will do much over this, because it's quite possible the US is doing it to them. I'd be suprised if they weren't. I think most countries realize that espionage is a fact of life, and everyone does it on everyone. Even between allies. As long as the espionage doesn't result in a major shift of power one way or another, not much other then a few angry words is gonna be done.

Well duh

[Sycraft-fu]

There really isn't any penalty against countries for spying. The individual spys are in a world of shit if they get caught, but countries don't tend to do anything about it. It is more or less an accepted part of doing business. Read up on the recent history of Aldrich Ames, a spy for Russia nailed in the 90s. You'll notice that there's nothing about any threats to Russia, any sanctions, or anything like that. It's just the way the game is played.

Hell if the US started yelling at other countries trying to spy on them, man would they have an earful. The NSA gets hold of any and every foreign signal (and it seems some domestic now too) it can get its hands on. Tapping international cables, listening in on satellites, whatever you like. They are a big signals hoover of the highest order.

Its not the military

[adamchou]

China's military is a force to be reckoned with... if you're invading. Besides that, China can't mobilize that many people to attack anything off their continent. Regardless, screw the military... if they really wanted to screw over the US, they control our economy. If they decide to make it illegal to stop trading with us, our economy would instantly go into a recession. They have so much US currency that if they let it all go, the value of the dollar would depreciate like it did for Mexico not long ago. In this world and age, military might only scares the small fry that can't fight back. With countries like China, its the financial power that they have that is far more scary.

How did we find out?

[cyberjock1980]

How did we find out we were hacked into? Is it because we have already hacked into their network and found our own data? This would be an interesting story if that were true. I'm also sure we'd never know that we found out this way either, it would be someone that just 'happened' to read about 100,000 pages of logs and realized that 1 single line that had an IP that was clearly not supposed to be there.

---
The 'other side' is always evil when they hack, but it's always acceptable when 'your side' does it.

Re:How did we find out?

[ShannaraFan]

Agreed. What does "hacked" mean in this case? According to ssh_block, the Chinese "hack" my Linux server at least four times a week.

de-Baathification

[Anonymous Coward]

That's SO far from the truth that I don't know whether you're lying or incredibly deceived. The US army is at breaking point, and the situation is spiraling out of control in both occupations. That's actually not quite true. The occupation of Afghanistan is going pretty well considering the history of occupying armies in that country since Alexander the great and keep in mind that that history includes some of the most disastrous attempts at occupation in recorded human history. According to a recent discussion forum on BBC world the Afghans interviewed stated the mood in the country was that people generally aren't happy about having occupying forces in country. They are, however, even less happy about the prospect of them leaving and watching the country degenerate into either the kind of vicious civil war that followed the Soviet occupation or a the kind of Theocratic nightmare it was under the Taleban. That may change in the decade or so but at the moment things could be a whole lot worse.

  Iraq however is a different case. The big mistake in Iraq was the Rumsfeld/Bush position that US forces "dont do nation- building". What did they expect? That they would invade Iraq, everybody would dance in the streets, be really grateful and that reconstruction would happen by it self while they watched? The USA already sucessfully handled such a situation once before, the reconstruction of Germany after WWII, many of the lessons of that effort were forgotten in Iraq. Starting with the fact that disbanding the national army and police is just about the worst single thing you can do closely followed on the dumb ideas scale by failing to (rapidly) reconstruct even basic facilities like water supply, sewage disposal and electricity. All this was handled in Germany post 1945 in a pretty no-nonsense manner. De nazified soldiers and police officers were recruited for the re-organized police force, the Infrastructure was rebuilt with the help of US engineers and local people which often involved rebuilding local industries and experienced civilian administrators that passed de-nazification were quickly put to work running much of this effort under US supervision. As it was the de-Baathification of Iraq was far to stringent and it kept important professionals like teachers, doctors, engineers and experienced military officers out of circulation until the whole process was finally rationalized in 2004 which was far to late.

Black Lotus?

[Anonymous Coward]

Could Black Lotus be far behind?

Worth noting

[rindeee]

That classified networks are not Internet connected. That's not to say that some dumbass didn't store classified materials on teh NIPR (unlcass, Internet connected DoD network) but the real paydirt that China's looking for isn't going to be found on a publically connected system. Let me know when they splice some fiber, crack some HAIPE crypto and get some good stuff. Not gonna happen.

Micro$hit?

[Vicsun]

I prefer the term MiKKKro$hit myself. Not only does replacing soft with shit indicate my opinion of their software, along with the dollar sign indicating how greedy they are, I believe replacing the 'c' with KKK will portray them as the oppressive organization that they are, along with completely destroying any semblance of respect my post might have commanded up until that point.

Old and worthless argument

[WindBourne]

First, we used it PRIOR to knowing what would happen. To hold us accountable when NOBODY knew the full consequences is silly. I mean, do you hold France responsible as well (curie, roentgen)?

But since you brought it up, then I will point out that after the first weapon, Japan was offered the opportunity to call it quits. The emperor said no. He could have realized that they had no chance and given it up. But since he was worried about HIS skin going into prison, he allowed his ppl to be subjected to another bomb before he realized the futility of it all. Sadly, this shows what happens when a nation's gov. is allowed to run without being held responsible. That is the problem with China.

BTW, that is also part of the issues with America right now. Our leaders are voted out of office, but W., like Nixon, reagan, and Clinton, has been able to lie without being held accountable. He will almost certainly hang on until after the election. Once that occurs, the dems will look the other way because they are afraid of being held accountable for their transgressions. In spite of that, I know that our leaders will not be using nukes first.

Finally, China is suspected of having a large and quickly growing stockpile of neutron bombs. They have the advantage of killing LARGE amounts of ppl via radiation, and relatively little blast. It will leave the least amount of radioactive product. It is the PERFECT first strike weapon. The H2 bombs will leave radiation that will exists for several years. IOW, it means that we can not use the area either. It is NOT a good first strike weapon.

Re:Old and worthless argument

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing you can possibly say can speak for the hundreds of thousands of innocents who were slaughtered by the US government. The fact of the matter is that you don't have the slightest right to speak for them -- just as they don't have the slightest right to speak for you. What made you think you had that right?

It certainly wasn't respect for human rights, was it? Except your own.

The cold hard truth is that if you believe in killing "some" for the benefit of "many", then you cannot possibly believe in human rights, specifically the fundamental right to self-ownership. So what are you fighting for, besides glory? You certainly can't be fighting for human rights -- you've already voided that possibility the second you accept the idea that anyone but the individual himself may choose if and when that individual dies.

Clearly, to choose for another man when and if that man dies is the ultimate attack on human rights. No amount of double-speak can weasel you out of that one.

Re:Old and worthless argument

[WindBourne]

First, America was ATTACKED by japan and Britain by Germany, i.e. we were pulled into a war that neither wanted.
Second, given the choice of 100K vs 1.5 million (or more), I will take the lessor.
Thirdly, exactly what human rights are we talking about? The rights of millions of Jews, gays, mentally unstable in the NAZI death camps? Or the Chinese, Americans, Australians, Canadians, etc that were held in Japanese camps and subjected to biological experiments, prostitution, torture, etc? Who was speaking up for any of them? Not even USSR or communist china did that. They had all had agreements with Germany and Japan to stay out of the war and ignore the atrocities. But they were attacked as well, bringing USSR into the war.

Finally, I did not chose that another man should die. Their emperor did. He is the one who was losing the war and CHOSE to keep fighting until the end. Even after the first bomb dropped, they were going to continue fighting. Japan was going to lose the war, and he chose to sacrifice his citizens

It really is hypocritical to speak of the human rights while ignoring the MILLIONS that were slaughtered by the Nazis and the Japanese. To say that America slaughtered these ppl is ridiculous and begs that you need to read history books. It is true weasiling on your part to ignore all the above (just as you stay AC).

Please Add Russia into that statement

[Anonymous Coward]

Leaving Russia out of the playground heroics just gets them madder. If Putin reads this thread he'll announce a new base on Io by 2050 and the world's largest fleet of JetSki missile launching platforms. Just like in the old USSR days.

Re:Please Add Russia into that statement

[Anonymous Coward]

Leaving Russia out of the playground heroics just gets them madder.

Russia isn't out of the playgrounds in any way.

Russia has a shitload of natural resources and shares a 4000 mile border with a country that desperately needs them and has a 60 million boy surplus. Furthermore, they have just about the lowest birthrate in the world (1.12 births per woman) and the highest Muslim population in Europe.

By 2050 there won't even BE a Russia.

Chinese hack the Pentagon?

[skinfitz]

Whatever next? I bet the copy of PC Anywhere they used with default passwords was pirated too.

China denies Pentagon cyber raid

[Anonymous Coward]

The BBC reports that China has denied reports that its military hacked into the computer network of the US Department of Defense in Washington.

APEC summit

[jovius]

The APEC summit is going on at the moment in Sidney. This 'revelation' is for Bush to have something to talk about with Hu Jintao. I suppose the purpose of the american military is to create global talking points and conversation starters. I wish I could employ such an organization for my dates.

It's an attitude.

[SanityInAnarchy]

Of the people who can't use computers, I'd sort them into three categories: Those who actually have mental/psychological problems, those who are inexperienced but willing to learn, and those who have an attitude problem. And combinations of these.

The ones who have mental/psychological problems are pretty rare, outside of a nursing home. These are the people who either lack the mental capacity to learn -- and with respect, the truly elderly, intelligent and wise though they may be, are not good at learning new things. I have a... 90-year-old (I think) grandmother who uses email, but can't learn things like selecting something to delete, or even holding down the backspace key, versus just pressing backspace -- one character at a time -- until she's deleted whatever she needs.

Like I said, there are people outside of a nursing home with these limitations, and I know at least one of them, but they're rare.

The ones who are inexperienced, but willing to learn, are actually often easier to support than the smart ones. They're willing to do what you tell them, without arguing with you about it, and it may take a couple of tries, but they will remember the next time. Over time, they get more and more self-sufficient. They may never approach your own skill, but they'll at least get to where they can get their job done without calling you every two seconds. The really smart ones will also know when they should call you, even if they can do it on their own -- they manage to be smart enough to be dangerous, without actually being dangerous.

The third group is basically identical to the second group in skills, education, intelligence, sometimes even social skills, but for some reason or other, they refuse to learn. For example, at first glance, a teenager may seem like they can't actually grasp new (to them) concepts, like using email instead of Myspace to communicate. The truth is, they just don't give a fuck.

The absolutely #1 most common reason here is the businessperson who has an attitude of "It's not my problem." They do 90% of their work on a computer, and yet, they somehow think that it's not their job to be computer-literate. These are generally the people who are just smart enough to be dangerous -- they have big, important things to do, so they don't have time to actually read a single fucking dialog, they'll just click "OK" or "Accept" or "Allow" or whatever makes it go away. Then, when this causes problems, even if there's some very simple instructions on their screen at the moment, they'll call someone else in to fix it.

These people are the most difficult to work with, because I know of no actual solution other than, say, a dialog box that says "Click OK to receive a painful electric shock," wired to an electrode in their mouse.

I say this because the actually incapable people can at least be trained and/or restricted to areas where they can't hurt themselves -- they generally don't know enough to be dangerous, or to be picky about their environment, so many of them would probably be fine with a Linux kiosk, in the worst-case-scenario. The independent ones will learn on their own, and while they'll make mistakes, those mistakes will at least be interesting, entertaining, and less frequent than the "My computer won't turn on" when they just forgot to turn on their monitor.

It's only when they have an attitude problem that they really start to be a problem, especially when combined with one or both of the above. The classic example is Jerry Taylor -- normally, I don't go after individual people, but this fucker deserved it. After being repeatedly corrected, in simple terms which he obviously could understand (considering he eventually did), the problem is entirely an attitude problem, as evidenced by the fact that he still hasn't apologized for it.

So why did we fight communists?

[cheekyboy]

When now every single product in your home is made in china, from lcds to batteries to adsl to wifi modems.
If its not China is Taiwan, which is why China wants it.

How ironic that the west depends on a communist nation for its own society to function.

Democracy, what is it good for?

[Rocketship Underpant]

I agree with your sentiments, but I think you're off on this statement:

"EVERYONE wants democracy, apart from the small group of people who currently have control, of course. But the majority of the population will ALWAYS support democracy AND self-determination."

Democracy, to me, is a mob and a bunch of corrupt politicians telling me how to live my life and how much of my own money I get to keep. Majoritarianism sucks. I'll take freedom over mob-rule any day.

Re:Democracy, what is it good for?

[rikitikitembo]

Fair enough. But don't go to the ignorants of saying that it's someone telling you how to live your life and how much of your "own" money you get to keep. That's just not true. Sure, taxes are on the rise, but nobody tells anyone in a democracy how to live their own lives. Taxes are not a bad thing, it's the corrupt ways it's being spent that sucks. Don't be so quick to judge things out of context ("telling me how to live my own life")

So what....

[Arimus]

Wow. A computer today got hacked... shock story follows. Not.

The fact that these computers are on the internet and not the DOD secure networks means they're not supposed to have anything sensitive on them... I would suspect probably nothing above restricted if that.

For day to day computing the DoD/MoD/etc are like other corporations... vulnerable and frequently probed/attacked - the real effort goes in securing the really sensitive stuff which won't have a point of access that any script kiddie can get to... dedicated fibre or other links.

Solution: Call CTU

[[000000]]

Solution: Call in

• Jack Bower - CTU

or

• The A-Team !

Simple.

Re:Solution: Call CTU

[[000000]]

However; Jack Bauer may be better at the Job that Jack Bower !

Titan Rain....

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_Rain
That is all......

Facts considered

[DavidShor]

"That they are playing the same games with other nations that we played."

What are those games?

"The military is building up at a rate seen only by countries that are going to war (such as America or Germany prior to WW II)."

No, it has not. Those nations had a dramatic increase in defense spending relative to the size of their economy. China has not done such; their economy has grown at an average of 10% per year. Defense spending as a percentage of GDP has decreased, and is much lower than the United States.

"That they are not spending their surplus in a sane fashion (with trillion dollar surpluses, they are not buying things to help their country."

How can you say that? China is building brand-new cities every day; they are building highways, subway systems, electrical systems, etc. While I detest their government, they have certainly spent their surplus "sanely".

"Their leaders are not held accountable via a vote."

So? If they fuck up too badly, the people, or a general will rebel. It's not like that has not happened before in Chinese history.

"We are most likely headed for a cold war, if not a hot war."

No, I don't think we are. China does not seem to have an appetite for conquest of foreign territories; they learned their lesson from Islamic extremists in Xingjian. And unlike the USSR, they don't really seem to be building up a system of influence or client states.

They have no ideology to export; the only long term strategic goal of the government is to stay in power, by any means necessary. Detestable to be sure, but I don't see how they are a threat.

Subject

[Legion303]

Go away, PLA!

(People who don't know what I'm referring to are going to bury this in moderation)

Re:Subject

[Anonymous Coward]

cactus

MiKKKro$hit

[Zero__Kelvin]

"I prefer the term MiKKKro$hit myself. Not only does replacing soft with shit indicate my opinion of their software, along with the dollar sign indicating how greedy they are, I believe replacing the 'c' with KKK will portray them as the oppressive organization that they are, along with completely destroying any semblance of respect my post might have commanded up until that point."

Bob Margett says that sounds like a solution looking for a problem." ;-)

They are not killing their coal plants

[WindBourne]

They are building SEVERAL each week. Like America, they have loads of coal and are planning to use it. As to pebble beds, they still strike me as overhyped. Since I am not a nuclear engineer or physicists, I hope that I am wrong.

my e-penis is bigger than yours

[theolein]

I love slashdot. It brings out the burning nationalist in so many little hearts everytime a flamebait article is posted on some or other nation versus the US of Duh.

Re:Sanctions (windows)

[belunar]

They already are. Piracy of Windows is so rampant over there, MS acualy endorses it in China, just so they can be the main OS that is used in China. Reference link and related clip from article below.

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_arc hive/2007/07/23/100134488/

'Today Gates openly concedes that tolerating piracy turned out to be Microsoft's best long-term strategy. That's why Windows is used on an estimated 90% of China's 120 million PCs. "It's easier for our software to compete with Linux when there's piracy than when there's not," Gates says. "Are you kidding? You can get the real thing, and you get the same price." Indeed, in China's back alleys, Linux often costs more than Windows because it requires more disks. And Microsoft's own prices have dropped so low it now sells a $3 package of Windows and Office to students.'

Typical "military intelligence"

[macdaddy357]

They should have used a stronger password than "nukeiran".

Its called espionage.

[RexRhino]

Espionage has been around for thousands of years before computers. Every country in the world participates in espionage.

So we are supposed to be shocked that people are using modern technology to commit acts of espionage?

Geez, if it was an actual act of sabatoge, if the "hackers" destroyed data or disrupted operations, thas would be significant. Otherwise, China is pretty much doing what every other country in the world is doing, collecting information on its potential enemies.

I would be much more worried if there was no evidence of Chinese hacking... because that would mean that they were doing a really, really good hacking job.

The U.S. government is probably doing the same thing right back (and they have a duty to be doing the same thing right back)... it is just that in the U.S., security failures are more likely to get reported to the media.

?WTF? ... Sanctions

[OldHawk777]

Please understand the government of China is totalitarian not democratic.
The economy and social system of China is communist not capitalist.
Governments of China, Russia, US, EU India ... do what they want with
the expendable and spendable property/population of the state.

So, the governments of China, US ... will take military action when it is
suspected to be adventitious to the puppet-masters of humanity ....

China has a long history based on (in their psyche) achieving peace by enemy elimination.
China is preparing for war with a long-large vision of survival and peace, by basic SunTzu rules.

China is safe to others when they close their doors and build great walls.
When the doors of China appear open, and that the great walls are symbolic
and easily breached, China is preparing for their future of peace and
prosperity without problems from US, EU or others.

Final Point: The Government of China does not rule the PLA/military;
anymore than the USA Congress rules the President or Supreme Court.

HISTORY has a large bag of forgotten lessons.

Beware the Old School Response

[lordSaurontheGreat]

I'm simply afraid that other nations will take a different response to this activity from China. Older military officials might not be willing to adapt to the new cyberdefense battlefield, and may simply decide that it's easier to totally isolate China from the Internet. China has already demonstrated their willingness to isolate themselves through censorship, so how long before "Western" civilization cuts the leech off their back by reciprocating China's isolationist behavior by completely disconnecting them from the net?

Granted, there will be a stink from those that would have us poison their socialist society with the subtle hints of free market that can leak in through their censorship, but honestly, who's sig is it that says "In Russia, the government controls the commerce?" If Chinese government controls their press, and can censor the net, how can we infiltrate their society and spread the great and infectious disease that we imagine Freedom to be? Yet we keep these ties open and they're raping us through them! Does anyone remember when the Chinese raped our networks at Los Alamos National Laboratories? This kind of espionage is the thing we execute people for. Yet we can't execute the Chinese hackers 'cause they're still in China. This kind of a breach of sovereign territory should be dealt with as such: the personnel involved in the attack should be delivered to the wronged nation to be tried and executed as foreign operatives.

It's how the world worked for generations beyond count. Why not today? Are we now supposed to turn the other cheek and get screwed by people who wouldn't mind seeing us die just for the amusement of watching it happen, all because they've been deluded by a all-powerful state? That's one of the reasons why Rome fell, because they got too soft. Should we repeat history, just like a good little nation should?

memory issues.....

[Anonymous Coward]

so the pla (not the chinese military) hacked the pentagon? sfw?
does the US conduct similar electronic warfare? echelon, anybody? NSA? antiquated and redundant export controls on software and encryption?
has the US managed to extradite the british national (30-something unemployed sysadmin) that hacked -and was caught hacking - the pentagon's computers recently? they aren't just commies and pinko scum trying to bring the greatest democracy in the free world to it's knees, there's also a world of undernourished, unemployed and bitter techies floating around trying to make sense of the dot bomb era...rofl
does the US military use winblows or not in critical infrastructure? who gives a toss, anything connected to a public network is susceptible to being cracked, given enough time and motivation
is the pentagon, like any other entity involving a human, open to the mistakes, corruption and lazy-arsed workmanship? really, how much shit can you swallow if you believe any organisation to be free of the human condition..... pentagon specific -> does anybody remember ollie north and iran-contra "hiccups"...

think before you post, and post something that isn't media hype....
enjoy your war on terror (you lost when you gave it a name, suckers), enjoy the world you build for your grandchildren - the cold war was terrifying for many, the new one will be more so.... and thanks for dragging the rest of polite society along with you, infosec consulting has never been so lucrative.

h.a.n.d.

Apparently.

[SanityInAnarchy]

Google for windows shared source. First result is this page, which seems to suggest that, while you need to be a certain type of entity to qualify, at least this type of entity can be bought outright by having 1500 Windows licenses.

Or something like that; point is, they're not going to refuse the Chinese government just because they're the Chinese government; in fact, they have a program specifically for governments, as well.

More information can be found here.

Re:Apparently.

[Repossessed]

Governments may read and reference the source code but may not modify it. So the answer to my question, while a yes, is also that the shared source aspect is going to do very little good unless your goal is to break into a windows OS, as you would still be dependent on Microsoft to make any necessary changes.

Nor am I interested in doing my own research to defend somebody else's position, so don't tell me to RTMF right here. (RTFA would still be acceptable of course).

Re:Apparently.

[SanityInAnarchy]

Nor am I interested in doing my own research to defend somebody else's position

STFW is generally acceptable when it's the first result to a very obvious Google search.

DoD and the PLA connection

[bronsinbound]

Your argument is so full of holes! Whether you believe it or not, the PLA is constantly undermining the Free World -- even their "trade partners." Just as our military is trying to find out their secrets, so, too, the Chinese are doing the same thing to us, and pretty much everyone else of "interest" to them. The irony is, as you inferred, that we are financing their operations and military buildup with our trade agreements. Does God love irony or what?