TECH NEWS – Although many in the US accuse Huawei of having multiple links to the Chinese Communist Party, somehow a complete ban on the company’s products has not been implemented.
In 2019, a law was introduced in the US legislature to prevent the use of Huawei’s technology (mainly networking). Now, however, it seems that the US Department of Defense cannot prevent this, which has caused some angry moments at the Pentagon, as the department’s headquarters is pushing for a formal waiver that would prevent government agencies from contracting with companies that have installed Huawei-branded hardware.
With a third of the world’s telecom hardware manufactured by Huawei, the company has a pretty deep presence around the globe, making it difficult to replace everything with hardware of the brand and origin that the Pentagon trusts. According to Bloomberg, Brennan Grignon, a former Defense Department official who has since founded 5M Strategies, said: “There are certain parts of the world where you literally cannot get away from Huawei. The original legislation had very good intentions behind it, but the execution and understanding of the implications of what it would mean, I personally don’t think that was really thought through.”
The relevant committees in the House and Senate have rejected the inclusion of the exemption in the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act. The United States has asked the UAE to remove all Huawei equipment, but this has been rejected at the request of Saudi Arabia and some Latin American countries. Others have also objected to the hardware swap, arguing that Huawei offers competitive pricing compared to its competitors. Clyde Prestowitz, president of the Economic Strategy Institute, sympathizes with the Pentagon as it faces an extraordinary challenge, but has also called the organization “lazy.” He says every step must be taken to eliminate Huawei’s presence, but even US military personnel depend on the company’s equipment for many jobs (from conducting operations in Africa to senior officials attending international air shows).
Extending the waiver would allow U.S. authorities to purchase additional hardware, provided it is in line with the country’s national interests. However, the Pentagon is unlikely to ignore the perceived security risk of continuing to use Huawei equipment.
Huawei in Hungary has also responded to our article and their response is reproduced below without change:
“Huawei Technologies is an independently operating, employee-owned, private Chinese company, and any allegations to the contrary are geopolitically motivated and unsupported by any evidence. The company operates in more than 170 countries and regions around the world, strictly abiding by international and local laws and business practices. For more than 30 years, Huawei has not been involved in a single intentionally malicious cybersecurity incident.”
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