Somebody in the National Security Council wants to use some nebulous threat from China as an excuse for the feds to seize control of the nation's mobile network.
Reporters from Axios got their hands on the presentation and published the details Sunday evening. Axios summarizes:
The PowerPoint presentation says that the U.S. has to build superfast 5G wireless technology quickly because "China has achieved a dominant position in the manufacture and operation of network infrastructure," and "China is the dominant malicious actor in the Information Domain." To illustrate the current state of U.S. wireless networks, the PowerPoint uses a picture of a medieval walled city, compared to a future represented by a photo of lower Manhattan.The best way to do this, the memo argues, is for the government to build a network itself. It would then rent access to carriers like AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile. (A source familiar with the document's drafting told Axios this is an "old" draft and a newer version is neutral about whether the U.S. government should build and own it.)
First of all, the idea that the federal government is going to be able to build this faster than the private market is utterly absurd, as can be demonstrated by every single government project that has gone over budget and taken much longer than expected. As Axios notes, the wireless industry is already deploying 5G networks to customers. AT&T started rolling out 5G service with the start of the new year.
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