BBC has an interview with a Moscow woman who was filmed being taken away by enough police to subdue Hulk Hogan. They must have been afraid of something other than this woman because she was not very aggressive or physically threatening. BBC says there were "tens of thousands" of people in Moscow Square to protest corruption. This relates to my post yesterday on the potential for instability in Russia, where standing on the street on the wrong day can be a life-changing event.
After seeing real radicals on both sides in our national election, it was amazing to see a woman so much like a normal person caught up in political intrigue. She did not look or speak like the type, but she also knew what words to say to try to stay out of jail in a trial. Up to 1000 such people were arrested, not all of them of her type. Some will get convicted and reduce their chances of ever getting anywhere in life after that. It is a politically corrupt system kept afloat by police and FSB officers who don't play nice with their own citizens. It is a sure pressure cooker of an environment to hold a national election.
Wednesday, March 29, 2017
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
Running against the Tide
Anyone who runs against Vladimir Putin should already know what they are up against - the power of the state. The consequences can be less violent than they used to be, but the same tactics that were used in the Ukraine still dominate those in Russia proper. Criminalization of behavior is top on that list. Enter Alexis Navanly, who organized anti-corruption rallies that bring out quite a few people for a country that does not favor this kind of thing. Several outlets are saying as many as 8,000 attended and about 1,000 of those were arrested. For his part Navanly gets a short sentence which prevents him from running for political office just in time for the forthcoming election. A thousand of his supporters now have a record and can be identified in case they get too involved in further anti-corruption activities.
This is what revolutions are made of. The Russian government can demand a press that responds to what it wants, can keep its political opponents from running, and can continue to expand its reach into the new Russia, but the one thing it cannot do is pretend to be a democracy when it isn't. China does the same thing. Both of these countries spend more time worrying about revolution than they do keeping the peace inside their countries. Sooner or later, as they both know, the only choice for leadership change is revolution.
This is what revolutions are made of. The Russian government can demand a press that responds to what it wants, can keep its political opponents from running, and can continue to expand its reach into the new Russia, but the one thing it cannot do is pretend to be a democracy when it isn't. China does the same thing. Both of these countries spend more time worrying about revolution than they do keeping the peace inside their countries. Sooner or later, as they both know, the only choice for leadership change is revolution.
Thursday, March 23, 2017
China VS South Korea
This is a match made in heaven - China vs South Korea - at a time when the South is upsetting China to no end by putting U.S. THAAD missiles on their doorstep. China has to host a soccer match between their national team and that of the South. It must gall them that the South could all but eliminate them from the World Cup contention if they lose. Size of country does not matter much in this sport; ask Ireland, Jamaica, or the U.S. about that.
What I noted from the article today in the Wall Street Journal was the security at this event. There are 10,000 security people and only 31,000 attending. That is a ridiculously small number to attend a game of this level. The Chinese don't want many people from the South attending, so "security" is defined differently here. Leave it to the Chinese, who have lots of security for anything the international public will attend, to have enough to watch for any signs of interaction between fans. The only demonstrations, and you can bet there will be some, will be carefully staged and produced for the effect the Chinese want to have on world opinion. These demonstrations won't have much to do with the game.
Place your bets, if you live somewhere where that is allowed. There won't be much need for a coach to give a motivational speech for this one.
What I noted from the article today in the Wall Street Journal was the security at this event. There are 10,000 security people and only 31,000 attending. That is a ridiculously small number to attend a game of this level. The Chinese don't want many people from the South attending, so "security" is defined differently here. Leave it to the Chinese, who have lots of security for anything the international public will attend, to have enough to watch for any signs of interaction between fans. The only demonstrations, and you can bet there will be some, will be carefully staged and produced for the effect the Chinese want to have on world opinion. These demonstrations won't have much to do with the game.
Place your bets, if you live somewhere where that is allowed. There won't be much need for a coach to give a motivational speech for this one.
Wednesday, March 22, 2017
North Korea Once Again
wow. North Korea is about to be named as the group that hacked the Fed in the famous Heist involving several countries and Swift. https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-preparing-cases-linking-north-korea-to-theft-at-n-y-fed-1490215094
This will be a hot topic that will make all those missiles seem like a small thing. Imagine the idiots in the North being able to undermine international finance. The world's banks need to turn on them while they still can. When a group crosses that imaginary line of being able to undermine the banking system the reaction has to be painful enough that they won't do it again. If China helped them this could be very close to the kind of action that leads to war. North Korea doesn't think any country can hurt them enough to make a dent in their regime. We are about to find out.
See my previous posts
On Janet Yellens views on this
And on the follow up required by banks
This will be a hot topic that will make all those missiles seem like a small thing. Imagine the idiots in the North being able to undermine international finance. The world's banks need to turn on them while they still can. When a group crosses that imaginary line of being able to undermine the banking system the reaction has to be painful enough that they won't do it again. If China helped them this could be very close to the kind of action that leads to war. North Korea doesn't think any country can hurt them enough to make a dent in their regime. We are about to find out.
See my previous posts
On Janet Yellens views on this
And on the follow up required by banks
Misunderstanding Microsoft
I know most of you are not going to like this, but a nice piece in the Wall Street Journal today says Microsoft is making a version of Windows 10 just for China. It will implement some of the required controls for government access to citizens of China - and anyone else who uses their software- which includes access to any user and the content of their systems. If it follows its own policies, discovered in analyses done on web browsers in China, it may also include some interesting and very intrusive information like the WIFI links around the user, the serial number of hard drives on the computer, the physical location of the device, the unique identifier for the device, and a number of things that one wonders how any intelligence service could store. Microsoft is not saying what controls they are giving to the government nor what changes they have made. The public reaction to that would probably not be good for business, since privacy - even someone else's privacy - can be a sticky issue.
Microsoft is being misunderstood by those criticizing this new product. It has a billion potential customers in the country, though fully 2/3 of them still get pirated software of some sorts. When President Obama invited a Chinese delegation to discuss trade issues, that was among the items he mentioned. It did no good to discuss it. Microsoft figures something is better than nothing, which is a good business attitude for a company that doesn't care what the Chinese do with their products. Why should it be Microsoft's concern that their products become tools to collect intelligence and monitor a population according to Chinese laws? This is strictly for censorship the Chinese will say. They are allowed to censor their own citizens. You have to give it to Microsoft on that.
China says this is for use in China, but the Chinese make a good many of the computers in the world and they can make them with this software for a number of countries. For reasons that are hard to explain, the Chinese believe that policies they set are binding on the rest of the world. We won't be able to tell whether this version is being used or another less intrusive version for the international market. Microsoft can probably help with that, since allowing that to happen will hurt the bottom line on software sales everywhere in the world. Somewhere in the software development labs, there must be a way to identify this new version and make sure it isn't used outside China. Isn't there?
The Chinese swear they are only interested in having this version of software because they are concerned that some nefarious characters may have backdoors in the software and they can't control it. That is perfectly rational, since they know for sure if backdoors are needed they have their own. I tend to see Microsoft's view of this since the Chinese have been stealing their products for years and this is a chance to license something that they won't steal. Both China and Microsoft will embrace it.
Just in case you thought this was a new, brilliant idea by Microsoft, Bill Gates who ran Microsoft then, offered to provide a version of Windows and the complete Office suite to the Defense Department. We were concerned many years ago about the updates Microsoft was sending out. Those would end and a special version would be made just for Defense. They thought about it for few days, then said No thanks. Any guess as to why?
Microsoft is being misunderstood by those criticizing this new product. It has a billion potential customers in the country, though fully 2/3 of them still get pirated software of some sorts. When President Obama invited a Chinese delegation to discuss trade issues, that was among the items he mentioned. It did no good to discuss it. Microsoft figures something is better than nothing, which is a good business attitude for a company that doesn't care what the Chinese do with their products. Why should it be Microsoft's concern that their products become tools to collect intelligence and monitor a population according to Chinese laws? This is strictly for censorship the Chinese will say. They are allowed to censor their own citizens. You have to give it to Microsoft on that.
China says this is for use in China, but the Chinese make a good many of the computers in the world and they can make them with this software for a number of countries. For reasons that are hard to explain, the Chinese believe that policies they set are binding on the rest of the world. We won't be able to tell whether this version is being used or another less intrusive version for the international market. Microsoft can probably help with that, since allowing that to happen will hurt the bottom line on software sales everywhere in the world. Somewhere in the software development labs, there must be a way to identify this new version and make sure it isn't used outside China. Isn't there?
The Chinese swear they are only interested in having this version of software because they are concerned that some nefarious characters may have backdoors in the software and they can't control it. That is perfectly rational, since they know for sure if backdoors are needed they have their own. I tend to see Microsoft's view of this since the Chinese have been stealing their products for years and this is a chance to license something that they won't steal. Both China and Microsoft will embrace it.
Just in case you thought this was a new, brilliant idea by Microsoft, Bill Gates who ran Microsoft then, offered to provide a version of Windows and the complete Office suite to the Defense Department. We were concerned many years ago about the updates Microsoft was sending out. Those would end and a special version would be made just for Defense. They thought about it for few days, then said No thanks. Any guess as to why?
Tuesday, March 21, 2017
Investigating the Russians
Yesterday's hearings on the Hill brought two of my favorite places to work, the FBI and Congress, together in the same room. Both were true to form. The FBI says little to nothing about on-going investigations. Congress asks about them anyway, because they want to be seen to try, but they usually don't get anywhere with that track. They didn't this time either.
The real link with Russia is slightly different than some of Congress wants to admit. The Russian news outlet RT published a lengthy outline of what it considered to be U.S. State Department interference with the Russian national election, starting with communication between the Hillary Clinton-led State Department and Golos (an independent election watchdog in Russia) Executive Chief and Deputy. The RT article claims Golos was paid for violation reports, and before the investigation was finished in Russia, Hillary Clinton criticized the election results were “unfair”. They quoted Vladimir Putin as saying “However, when financing comes to some domestic organizations which are supposedly national, but which in fact work on foreign money and perform to the music of a foreign state during electoral processes, we need to safeguard ourselves from this interference in our internal affairs and defend our sovereignty.” As Dov Levin of the Washington Post described, Vladimir Putin and Hillary Clinton were not friends. Mrs. Clinton had a long record of criticizing Putin directly, and held the most hawkish views on Russia of any of the Obama foreign policy team. So, if Putin really believed the U.S. was interfering with Russian election processes, and he believed that the author of some of those actions was the hawk in the White House meetings, he might have sought some reciprocal action. This is the nature of Information War.
The real link with Russia is slightly different than some of Congress wants to admit. The Russian news outlet RT published a lengthy outline of what it considered to be U.S. State Department interference with the Russian national election, starting with communication between the Hillary Clinton-led State Department and Golos (an independent election watchdog in Russia) Executive Chief and Deputy. The RT article claims Golos was paid for violation reports, and before the investigation was finished in Russia, Hillary Clinton criticized the election results were “unfair”. They quoted Vladimir Putin as saying “However, when financing comes to some domestic organizations which are supposedly national, but which in fact work on foreign money and perform to the music of a foreign state during electoral processes, we need to safeguard ourselves from this interference in our internal affairs and defend our sovereignty.” As Dov Levin of the Washington Post described, Vladimir Putin and Hillary Clinton were not friends. Mrs. Clinton had a long record of criticizing Putin directly, and held the most hawkish views on Russia of any of the Obama foreign policy team. So, if Putin really believed the U.S. was interfering with Russian election processes, and he believed that the author of some of those actions was the hawk in the White House meetings, he might have sought some reciprocal action. This is the nature of Information War.
We have yet to hear much about the real reasons for Russia's interest in our national elections, but my take on it will be slightly different than the Democratic view.
Sunday, March 19, 2017
Looking For Good Urban Infrastructure Discussion
If you are looking for a good Infrastructure conference see the one below:
The Infrastructure Resilience and Research Group (IRRG), Office of the Dean, Faculty of Engineering and Design, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada—in partnership with ASIS International and the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) of Canada—will be hosting the 2017 International Urban Security and Resilience Conference, Workshop and Exhibition (May 16-19 in Toronto).
The purpose of this Event is to provide a high-level forum for approximately 1,200 representatives of the security intelligence and law enforcement communities, public and private security practitioners, government officials, community and corporate leaders, and nongovernmental agencies to engage in a dialogue with the view to developing new strategies to counter the evolving security challenges of the 21st century.
Weather should be great by then and there are a group of very nice people who show up.
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Friday, March 17, 2017
China's Offier for N Korea
So, if you give up having joint exercises with South Korea, North Korea will give up development of nuclear weapons.... sounds like a deal to me - a bad deal, but at least a proposal for deal making to start. If we want to know the history of this story, go to the website for the Arms Control Association. A fascinating history it is too.
If anyone ever imagined North Korea doing anything it said it was going to do, or that China said it was going to do, check the facts. The process takes forever - while they continue to work on nuclear weapons - their are agreements that lead to nothing. President Bush pulled all the nuclear weapons out of the South, so the North would have no incentive to have any. Now they want to skip over the South and launch them on long-range missiles right to the U.S.
We tried sanctions. We tried inspections by the International Atomic Energy Association, which showed "discrepancies" between what the North said they had and what they actually had. We tried sanctions again. We may try sanctions again on Chinese companies that are helping the North with the development of their weapon systems. At least we have figured out who is developing the weapons now. It is not North Korea.
China loves having the North threatening its neighbors and the U.S. And it continues to support the "discussions" without a real intent to do anything about stopping the North from getting a weapon it can use on a long-range missile. This time, we are supposed to believe that if we just stop having those joint exercises with the South, the North will stop nuclear weapons development. This sounds like the same negotiators that put the Iran nuclear deal together. They are not going to stop, and either China can't do anything about it, or chooses not to. My guess is the latter.
The Chinese have violated sanctions every time we have set them up. They even voted for Iran sanctions which they then violated over and over. For all the screaming and yelling during the election process when candidate Trump talked about having nuclear weapons in other countries, he may have been onto something. Maybe Japan could defend itself and retaliate. Maybe the South could too. In a bizarre set of circumstances China may be encouraging us to send weapons to places we tried to keep free of them. Then, the U.S won't be the only ones facing weapons aimed at them by parties they can't control.
Yes, this is a dangerous game. So, why do we let China play it by their own rules?
If anyone ever imagined North Korea doing anything it said it was going to do, or that China said it was going to do, check the facts. The process takes forever - while they continue to work on nuclear weapons - their are agreements that lead to nothing. President Bush pulled all the nuclear weapons out of the South, so the North would have no incentive to have any. Now they want to skip over the South and launch them on long-range missiles right to the U.S.
We tried sanctions. We tried inspections by the International Atomic Energy Association, which showed "discrepancies" between what the North said they had and what they actually had. We tried sanctions again. We may try sanctions again on Chinese companies that are helping the North with the development of their weapon systems. At least we have figured out who is developing the weapons now. It is not North Korea.
China loves having the North threatening its neighbors and the U.S. And it continues to support the "discussions" without a real intent to do anything about stopping the North from getting a weapon it can use on a long-range missile. This time, we are supposed to believe that if we just stop having those joint exercises with the South, the North will stop nuclear weapons development. This sounds like the same negotiators that put the Iran nuclear deal together. They are not going to stop, and either China can't do anything about it, or chooses not to. My guess is the latter.
The Chinese have violated sanctions every time we have set them up. They even voted for Iran sanctions which they then violated over and over. For all the screaming and yelling during the election process when candidate Trump talked about having nuclear weapons in other countries, he may have been onto something. Maybe Japan could defend itself and retaliate. Maybe the South could too. In a bizarre set of circumstances China may be encouraging us to send weapons to places we tried to keep free of them. Then, the U.S won't be the only ones facing weapons aimed at them by parties they can't control.
Yes, this is a dangerous game. So, why do we let China play it by their own rules?
Wednesday, March 15, 2017
Russian FSB Agents Hire Yahoo Hackers
The indictment published by the Los Angeles Times says quite a bit about the Russians charged in stealing access to accounts at Yahoo. First, this was an FSB operation targeting Yahoo and using hackers for hire, one of whom was on the FBI's Most Wanted list of Hackers. His name was Aleksey Belan. Belan was indicted twice and arrested once overseas at an unnamed country, but was allowed to leave that country before being extradited to the U.S.
The two named Russian FSB officers were Dmitry Kovuchaev, aka "Patrick Nagel" and an associate Igor Sushchin, but a third supervisory officer was named to the Grand Jury. Sushchin was also the head of Information Security at the Russian Financial Firm, a curious name to say the least. All three worked for the Second Division of FSB Center 18, the FSB Center for Information Security.
The hackers were at work loading malware onto Yahoo since sometime in 2014, and subsequently downloaded internal databases of Yahoo. The information the hackers were looking for included e-mail accounts at Yahoo, which were then used to try to get other email accounts from places like Google. The named targets were an assistant to the Deputy Chairman of the Russian Federation, an officer of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, members of the Russian press, and others including some outside of Russia. If they had success and other access was required, a Canadian, Karin Baratov, was given the task of getting into those accounts.
There is some detail in the indictment of the kinds of techniques used to get in and keep access to the large number of users. It is two pages and too lengthy to summarize there. This story has all the makings of a movie. Russian spies, big tech companies, hackers and beautiful women. Perfect.
The two named Russian FSB officers were Dmitry Kovuchaev, aka "Patrick Nagel" and an associate Igor Sushchin, but a third supervisory officer was named to the Grand Jury. Sushchin was also the head of Information Security at the Russian Financial Firm, a curious name to say the least. All three worked for the Second Division of FSB Center 18, the FSB Center for Information Security.
The hackers were at work loading malware onto Yahoo since sometime in 2014, and subsequently downloaded internal databases of Yahoo. The information the hackers were looking for included e-mail accounts at Yahoo, which were then used to try to get other email accounts from places like Google. The named targets were an assistant to the Deputy Chairman of the Russian Federation, an officer of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, members of the Russian press, and others including some outside of Russia. If they had success and other access was required, a Canadian, Karin Baratov, was given the task of getting into those accounts.
There is some detail in the indictment of the kinds of techniques used to get in and keep access to the large number of users. It is two pages and too lengthy to summarize there. This story has all the makings of a movie. Russian spies, big tech companies, hackers and beautiful women. Perfect.
Monday, March 13, 2017
Twisting Cyber Command's Tail
There is a good article in Cipher Briefs today by General Hayden on separating Cyber Command and NSA. I wish he had written it 10 years ago, but he probably couldn't. General Alexander who set up the whole thing was not having any of that, setting up an empire that he was going to rule. Congress got in his way more than once, but never succeeded in doing what is being proposed now. General Hayden is finally getting a lot of these arguments out in the open.
Secrets for Software Developers
In one of the world's great ironies Wikileaks is offering help to the big makers of software to try to set them straight on how their softeware is being hacked. This is fantasy, farce, and irony all rolled into one.
If anyone believes the intelligence services of the world have discovered something the vendors of software do not already know, hold up your hand. The fantasy part is that the vendors not only know, they have known for years, that their software is full of holes that allow hackers in. They just haven't done anything about it. All you have to do is be involved in a few of these cases to know that the vendors are well aware of what is wrong with their software but they take their good old time fixing it. In some cases, forever, or as long as they can avoid liability for the outcomes of the problems they have created.
The farce is that the vendors really care about the holes an intelligence service has found. As a simple case, I worked with the U.S Cert on a couple of findings of vulnerabilities in some of our favorite software. The Cert is not allowed to force a company to make changes and cannot announce a problem until the fix is in for it. This makes sense, only where there is action to make a fix. Some of the vendors were waiting a year or more to fix something that needed to be fixed urgently. To them, this was "due diligence" since the developers don't have to worry about liability for anything they do. Our legal system exempts them from making a product with known faults and not correcting those faults even though it causes harm. Contrast that with the auto industry where recalls are common. When did a software vendor ever recall anything? They issue a new patch - in a few months - and are "dismayed" when people don't install it. The burden is always on the user.
The irony lies in the ability of some intelligence services to exploit things that the vendors say they did not know about. Excuse me, but this is what they get paid for. They are supposed to find ways to get intelligence, and the fact that they might be good at it is not a bad thing. Wikileaks has not been quick to point out how the Russians and Chinese have been attacking systems in the free world, subjecting them to some criticism that is deserved. But there is probably a better reason for that than we know. If Wikileaks did start publishing the internal files of Russia or Chinese intelligence agencies, they would be on the Internet for only a few minutes after they did it. The irony lies in the fact that Wikileaks has been openly publishing damaging information on the United States, yet is allowed to continue its operations. Not many people in the U.S benefit from that. Now Wikileaks is trying to show that it is benevolent, offering to help out the vendors. There is enough irony in that to fill a book.
If anyone believes the intelligence services of the world have discovered something the vendors of software do not already know, hold up your hand. The fantasy part is that the vendors not only know, they have known for years, that their software is full of holes that allow hackers in. They just haven't done anything about it. All you have to do is be involved in a few of these cases to know that the vendors are well aware of what is wrong with their software but they take their good old time fixing it. In some cases, forever, or as long as they can avoid liability for the outcomes of the problems they have created.
The farce is that the vendors really care about the holes an intelligence service has found. As a simple case, I worked with the U.S Cert on a couple of findings of vulnerabilities in some of our favorite software. The Cert is not allowed to force a company to make changes and cannot announce a problem until the fix is in for it. This makes sense, only where there is action to make a fix. Some of the vendors were waiting a year or more to fix something that needed to be fixed urgently. To them, this was "due diligence" since the developers don't have to worry about liability for anything they do. Our legal system exempts them from making a product with known faults and not correcting those faults even though it causes harm. Contrast that with the auto industry where recalls are common. When did a software vendor ever recall anything? They issue a new patch - in a few months - and are "dismayed" when people don't install it. The burden is always on the user.
The irony lies in the ability of some intelligence services to exploit things that the vendors say they did not know about. Excuse me, but this is what they get paid for. They are supposed to find ways to get intelligence, and the fact that they might be good at it is not a bad thing. Wikileaks has not been quick to point out how the Russians and Chinese have been attacking systems in the free world, subjecting them to some criticism that is deserved. But there is probably a better reason for that than we know. If Wikileaks did start publishing the internal files of Russia or Chinese intelligence agencies, they would be on the Internet for only a few minutes after they did it. The irony lies in the fact that Wikileaks has been openly publishing damaging information on the United States, yet is allowed to continue its operations. Not many people in the U.S benefit from that. Now Wikileaks is trying to show that it is benevolent, offering to help out the vendors. There is enough irony in that to fill a book.
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
China Plays at Sanctions
In case you were wondering if anything was ever going to happen to ZTE for intentionally violating the Iran sanctions, it has. It took years for anything to happen, and a change in the White House, but it has come to a $892 million fine. If you read the Wall Street Journal editorial on this today, you would think this was the most terrible thing to ever happen to a company and likely to bankrupt ZTE. The whole piece is slanted in such a way that I was pretty sure it was written by ZTE's public relations people and not the Wall Street Journal's editorial staff. Shame on them for publishing this kind of propaganda.
We have to remember what this is all about to get the context for why ZTE was fined at all:
The Commerce Department which enforces these sanctions said ZTE acted "contrary to the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States”.
"Authorities allege ZTE broke export rules by supplying Iran with U.S.-made high-tech goods and said they uncovered plans by ZTE to use a series of shell companies 'to illicitly reexport controlled items to Iran in violation of U.S. export control laws.'"
The Commerce Department published internal documents of ZTE Corp marked "Top Secret, Highly Confidential" to substantiate its claim that ZTE knew what it was doing when it funneled hardware and software from Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, and Dell to Iran. The first document is well worth reading. It clearly shows ZTE knew what the export rules required, and knew there would be trouble if they were discovered trying to skirt them. Group Z described in this document is North Korea, Vietnam and Cuba. ZTE at the time of their writing, was exporting U.S. produced products to Iran, Sudan, North Korea, Syria and Cuba. They outline the methods used to avoid detection in all of these countries.
http://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/about-bis/newsroom
This is the kind of behavior that deserves more than a slap on the wrist. Note that ZTE and another Chinese business were selling to North Korea during all of this. While China whines about their poor neighbor being persecuted in the world, it helps North Korea at every turn, setting up front companies to deal with their business interests. They do not want the North to stop doing missile tests and thumbing their nose at the international community. They make sure it can go on, using the best equipment they can get.
We should do more than just fine these companies. Commerce knows who the comapanies are and the methods they are using to circumvent the sanctions for various countries. It is a joke told in the back rooms of the United Nations that the cuts announced in coal purchases from the North were a complete farce. The Chinese participated in putting the announced sanctions together, then violated them. They did the same thing with the Iran sanctions program that ZTE was violating. China does not even play the game anymore.
We have to remember what this is all about to get the context for why ZTE was fined at all:
The Commerce Department which enforces these sanctions said ZTE acted "contrary to the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States”.
"Authorities allege ZTE broke export rules by supplying Iran with U.S.-made high-tech goods and said they uncovered plans by ZTE to use a series of shell companies 'to illicitly reexport controlled items to Iran in violation of U.S. export control laws.'"
The Commerce Department published internal documents of ZTE Corp marked "Top Secret, Highly Confidential" to substantiate its claim that ZTE knew what it was doing when it funneled hardware and software from Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, and Dell to Iran. The first document is well worth reading. It clearly shows ZTE knew what the export rules required, and knew there would be trouble if they were discovered trying to skirt them. Group Z described in this document is North Korea, Vietnam and Cuba. ZTE at the time of their writing, was exporting U.S. produced products to Iran, Sudan, North Korea, Syria and Cuba. They outline the methods used to avoid detection in all of these countries.
http://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/about-bis/newsroom
This is the kind of behavior that deserves more than a slap on the wrist. Note that ZTE and another Chinese business were selling to North Korea during all of this. While China whines about their poor neighbor being persecuted in the world, it helps North Korea at every turn, setting up front companies to deal with their business interests. They do not want the North to stop doing missile tests and thumbing their nose at the international community. They make sure it can go on, using the best equipment they can get.
We should do more than just fine these companies. Commerce knows who the comapanies are and the methods they are using to circumvent the sanctions for various countries. It is a joke told in the back rooms of the United Nations that the cuts announced in coal purchases from the North were a complete farce. The Chinese participated in putting the announced sanctions together, then violated them. They did the same thing with the Iran sanctions program that ZTE was violating. China does not even play the game anymore.
Tuesday, March 7, 2017
Malaysia Plays Game with N Korea
We haven't seen a good game of tennis between two international participants in a long time, but this one between North Korea and Malaysia is pretty good. That is because Malaysia knows how to play with the North and won't put up with their one-sided attempts at extortion. The North says no citizens of Malaysia can leave the country, so the return volley is that no North Koreans can leave Malaysia - not that there are very many there anyway- setting a principle that the North needs to see for what it is. Malaysia is one of the few countries in the world where North Korea has an embassy. Maybe not for much longer.
Too many countries try to negotiate their way out of disagreements with North Korea. They give the most money or recognition that makes them feel better about themselves. Neither of those are good things. It encourages bad behavior. A better approach is to tag China first and tell them to get the North under control. They don't want to do it and have worked around sanctions at every turn. That part is a joke. But we need to see that China encourages this type of behavior and allows the North to create international incidents so it can observe and say "it wasn't me" over and over., while they continue to trade with the North and feed them. The U.S has wised up to this nonsense and China is starting to get the message, even though they are still not doing anything to get the North under control - at least not yet. The U.S is putting THAAD into the South to counter these missiles flying over Japan and the South.
Turning loose VX nerve agent at a public airport was a stupid idea that was done for effect. It was the same kind of effect that was done with anti-aircraft guns and artillery to execute people in the North. When they are in their own country, nobody cares what they do.
Too many countries try to negotiate their way out of disagreements with North Korea. They give the most money or recognition that makes them feel better about themselves. Neither of those are good things. It encourages bad behavior. A better approach is to tag China first and tell them to get the North under control. They don't want to do it and have worked around sanctions at every turn. That part is a joke. But we need to see that China encourages this type of behavior and allows the North to create international incidents so it can observe and say "it wasn't me" over and over., while they continue to trade with the North and feed them. The U.S has wised up to this nonsense and China is starting to get the message, even though they are still not doing anything to get the North under control - at least not yet. The U.S is putting THAAD into the South to counter these missiles flying over Japan and the South.
Turning loose VX nerve agent at a public airport was a stupid idea that was done for effect. It was the same kind of effect that was done with anti-aircraft guns and artillery to execute people in the North. When they are in their own country, nobody cares what they do.
Monday, March 6, 2017
China Cheats on North Korea's Sanctions
I never get tired of hearing China talk about its view of North Korea as a stubborn child who won't behave unless somebody from outside the school decides it needs discipline. It is their child after all.
The Wall Street Journal updated its editorial on China's imports of North Korean coal to show how China managed to cram a year's quota into one month, then sell more using exceptions granted to the rules of the U.N resolution. The Chinese seem to think that everyone in the world body is stupid. It is only so if the reaction to Chinese-engineered exceptions in the agreement makes them appear to be following along like some lap dog. That is one definition of stupid, I have to agree.
This is form over substance. If the members of the United Nations think it is OK to have form, without delivering any lessons to North Korea, then we have enough to make everyone happy. They just fired four more missiles across the bow of South Korea without even a whimper from anyone in the international community. At the pace they have set, they will be out of missiles before the sanctions have any effect, then China can say, "Yes, our sanctions have taken hold and the North is behaving like a normal child."
The North is certainly justifying everything the South is spending on anti-missile defenses, so when the U.S-built THAAD is installed in the South, maybe it can pick a few of those passing overhead and blow them out of the sky. That would be fun.
The Wall Street Journal updated its editorial on China's imports of North Korean coal to show how China managed to cram a year's quota into one month, then sell more using exceptions granted to the rules of the U.N resolution. The Chinese seem to think that everyone in the world body is stupid. It is only so if the reaction to Chinese-engineered exceptions in the agreement makes them appear to be following along like some lap dog. That is one definition of stupid, I have to agree.
This is form over substance. If the members of the United Nations think it is OK to have form, without delivering any lessons to North Korea, then we have enough to make everyone happy. They just fired four more missiles across the bow of South Korea without even a whimper from anyone in the international community. At the pace they have set, they will be out of missiles before the sanctions have any effect, then China can say, "Yes, our sanctions have taken hold and the North is behaving like a normal child."
The North is certainly justifying everything the South is spending on anti-missile defenses, so when the U.S-built THAAD is installed in the South, maybe it can pick a few of those passing overhead and blow them out of the sky. That would be fun.
Chinese Students in U.S. Protest
Chinese students in the U.S are protesting the Dalai Lama speaking on campus. You have to ask yourself why that would be. Those reasons will not go far to explain why foreign students are allowed to champaion their government's causes as part of "free speech". They are not allowed free speech in their own country so one would think when they came to U.S schools they would not be bound by the state propaganda. The Wall Street Journal has an editorial on this democratic expression in today's paper, saying it has more than a passing relationship to the Cultural Revolution where thousands died for their lack of conviction.
We could write this off as "that's just California" only it isn't. I wrote previously about scholarships being given to Chinese students by Chinese faculty in Florida schools. You can bet those people will not be inviting the Dalai Lama to speak there either.
We could write this off as "that's just California" only it isn't. I wrote previously about scholarships being given to Chinese students by Chinese faculty in Florida schools. You can bet those people will not be inviting the Dalai Lama to speak there either.
Saturday, March 4, 2017
China Never Forgets Clintons
There is a small opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal today that is important, but will not be widely read: China Was Bill Clinton's Russia. I had forgotten that there were investigations of Bill Clinton's ties to China during his campaign. It hasn't stopped, and President Obama appealed directly to foreign governments in Germany and Japan to get their support in preventing the election of Donald Trump.
The Daily Mail has a good story on the background of the Clinton money, and the story is more current that we would think. Ng Lap Seng, a billionaire paying money into the Clinton campaign though an Arkansas Chinese restaurant owner who was arrested. After that Ng decided to become unavailable for comment until 2016. Congress was trying to get him in for hearings all that time. This, and the case of Charlie Trie and John Huang regularly offered their services to Congress, also investigated and witnesses testified about conduit payments to the Democratic Party. The Washington Post cited this story in 1997. If you search on his name in the U.S. House of Representatives website, there is a complete version to piece together of all the people involved. None of them were ambassadors to the U.S.
If subtlety is the measure of whether investigations are conducted probably, we should note that the Chinese are careful to follow the laws of the places where they "help the parties" in their elections. The Russians are not as careful, but unless you are not thinking clearly it is hard to believe they are not equal to China. They are not stupid enough to have their senior representatives coming to meetings discussing campaign support. If they do it, they would do it through third parties who were not official representatives. Otherwise, we would have to believe that the Russians are stupid and the Chinese are not. I don't think so.
If we translate that into public policy vs political strategy, the answer for the Republicans is to stonewall the whole story of the Russian involvement in the U.S election and it will die just as fast as the Clinton campaign money did. Hillary Clinton, candidate, got money from Chinese businessmen who were different than the ones previously accused. The Chinese have not stopped and the Russians have not stopped either. The hypocrisy has not stopped either. Republican Congressmen who pretend to go along with the Democratics trying to investigate this mess, should turn their attention to both sides of the story. Maybe some of them have things they would not like to have investigated. I doubt that any of them really want any kind of investigation and need to be sure it doesn't happen. The fallout may bleed over into all kinds of cases of foreign involvement that none of them would like.
The Daily Mail has a good story on the background of the Clinton money, and the story is more current that we would think. Ng Lap Seng, a billionaire paying money into the Clinton campaign though an Arkansas Chinese restaurant owner who was arrested. After that Ng decided to become unavailable for comment until 2016. Congress was trying to get him in for hearings all that time. This, and the case of Charlie Trie and John Huang regularly offered their services to Congress, also investigated and witnesses testified about conduit payments to the Democratic Party. The Washington Post cited this story in 1997. If you search on his name in the U.S. House of Representatives website, there is a complete version to piece together of all the people involved. None of them were ambassadors to the U.S.
If subtlety is the measure of whether investigations are conducted probably, we should note that the Chinese are careful to follow the laws of the places where they "help the parties" in their elections. The Russians are not as careful, but unless you are not thinking clearly it is hard to believe they are not equal to China. They are not stupid enough to have their senior representatives coming to meetings discussing campaign support. If they do it, they would do it through third parties who were not official representatives. Otherwise, we would have to believe that the Russians are stupid and the Chinese are not. I don't think so.
If we translate that into public policy vs political strategy, the answer for the Republicans is to stonewall the whole story of the Russian involvement in the U.S election and it will die just as fast as the Clinton campaign money did. Hillary Clinton, candidate, got money from Chinese businessmen who were different than the ones previously accused. The Chinese have not stopped and the Russians have not stopped either. The hypocrisy has not stopped either. Republican Congressmen who pretend to go along with the Democratics trying to investigate this mess, should turn their attention to both sides of the story. Maybe some of them have things they would not like to have investigated. I doubt that any of them really want any kind of investigation and need to be sure it doesn't happen. The fallout may bleed over into all kinds of cases of foreign involvement that none of them would like.
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