Huawei, China, China’s leading telecommunications producer, is advancing towards the 5G wireless communications. A 5G network system will help China’s economy and national security, and by doing so, China will also improve it technological convenience The only problem with this is that China will be dominant in the world’s technological system, thereby affecting nations under their pressure. In fact, China will be able to utilize its technological benefit to retrieve any private information from the US, Britain, or even Poland, to name a few places.

The delegation of American officials state, “Any economic benefit of using cheaper Chinese telecom equipment is outweighed by the security threat to the NATO alliance” (New York Times). When the world moved from 3G to 4G, nations received significant benefits, such as an improvement in the Global Position System, carriers with fewer towers, and even unprecedented speed with smart devices. Now that the world is moving into 5G, there is imminent success regarding technological improvement. However, unlike the move from 3G to 4G, which granted equal upgrades in wireless communications for each nation, the move to 5G has not been the same.

China will pose a serious threat to how information will flow through networks, and thus alter data without user’s knowledge. Even more, China would have access to the military, government, and corporate communications; accordingly, China’s authoritarian government would also add to such a threat. In fact, China also had previously rerouted the traffic across the United States and China. Due to the world’s view on this new technological platform as “revolutionary,” many countries have been captivated by the idea of how China’s power can also disrupt the NATO alliance. China is now second in the world for producing cell phones, and it has generated a great amount of money in the telecom-equipment industry.

David E. Sanger, Julian E. Barnes, Raymond Zhong and Marc Santora stated, “Any economic benefit of using cheaper Chinese telecom equipment is outweighed by the security threat to the NATO alliance.” Despite all the benefits that a 5G network can provide for each nation, the power one nation can exert to abuse such benefit can greatly impact other nations. In other words, a 5G network would be unhelpful to today’s society. However, with the awareness of the imminent conflict, the US and its allies are working to prevent Huawei’s dominant position from reaching any further. The American Intelligence has made it clear that Huawei is a threat, while American officials assert that a war with China is “not just about trade but a battle to protect the national security of the world’s leading democracies and key NATO members” (New York Times).

Despite these concerns and the “technological arms race,” the United States has worked to block Huawei from the 5G technological platform development. If the US and its allies succeed in doing so, they can connect users around the world and can change the way businesses or even agriculture impact the world. The only downside does not just come from Huawei’s advancement, but mainly from the feasibility of accessing private data. However, China still plans to have its 5G network system implemented by 2020, while other nations such as Japan, South Korea, and the US have planned to do the same.

Despite possible conflict in the near future, it is up to the US and its allies to determine ways of preventing China from overpowering other nations with the significant benefit it can receive from the 5G network system.

<Grant Oh / University High Grade 11>