“…Around the same time DOD determined that around 50 gigabytes or more F-35 stealth fighter jet data had disappeared. We know where it went: China, and we know the result, China was able to field a stealth fighter jet in record time…”
They improved it dramatically by adding a second engine.
The real issue revolves around who is the first mover and how fast the weapon system can be put into the field in meaningful numbers. If the second mover can put almost as good into the field twice as fast and in ten times the number and keep increasing that ratio indefinitely, you are hosed regardless of how secure your operations are.
First mover Tesla in China getting buried by BYD and similar who are almost as good in what matters in China, are everywhere that matters in China and sell for a third the price. Did the Chinese steal some secret Tesla documents to get a favorable position a little faster. Maybe. Who cares? The end result is the same.
Ditto for current American Tesla type military doctrine.
Stephen, I guess you're far more focused on the Yellow Peril than the Red Peril because China is a real competitor on almost every level, but as Jensen Huang argues, America will lose any zero-sum game, and the challenge is to up your competition with the sole emerging rival rather than waste time and resources trying unsuccessfully to close them out of the race.
DOD as you know has a tiered security system, with more sensitive information protected in various sophisticated ways, including blockchain crytography.
But they'll still need outside help managing office supplies and payrolls in the overall cloud architecture.
The F35 design hack was from Lockheed (announcing 80% profit rise today) not DOD.
And quantum computers will not become a significant resource in this decade.
Your concerns about the DOD cloud remind me of the paranoia over Chinese balloons above the clouds two years ago.
But America has run on Manichaean paranoia since the 1620s, so I guess we should get used to it :-)
Probably no harm done. Maybe Microsoft is already working on version 2.0?
Somewhat more seriously though, the digital age has to be a security nightmare for every nation. Just like for private citizens, you gain a huge advantage in access to information and its distribution, but you potentially open yourself up to exploits by nefarious entities. There's always a trade-off.
2) Why would we assume China needs to steal any knowledge from the USA, when China has a much smarter population than the USA? China produces far more STEM graduates than the US.
"In the United States, 54% of American adults read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level, and nearly one in five adults reads below a third-grade level."
It just seems like a Narrative from Above, that of China stealing intellectual property from the US. They want us to hate China, and they (the Western elite) are totally deluded as to .. well.. reality?
The answer is straightforward. Why reinvent anything that already has been developed at the cost of many billions over many years? The second answer is that by understanding the details on the F-35 an adversary can counter it. While the F-35 has some problems, it is effective. Ask Israel.
Your comments on American "stupidity" are irrelevant and unacceptable.
Not sure why it's unacceptable to cite a fact about American literacy. And "stupid" is your word, not mine. At least I've reread my comment 3 times and can't find where I said (as you claim) that Americans are stupid. Probably because I don't think Americans are stupid. I actually think Americans are much smarter than the elite think.
I believe you used a strawman argument here. When a person ignores someone's actual argument and changes the content into something everyone finds unacceptable.
If it's irrelevant and unacceptable to talk about the state of the American public's educational and literacy level with respect to comparing our country's pool of engineers with that of another country's engineers, well, I don't understand the rules of this substack account.
I should be shocked, but I am not. You have a computer company that makes computer operating systems like sieves, completely open to hacking and viruses, led by a man who makes billions from anti-virus drugs and gene therapy. Then he hires Chinese individuals to digitally ESCORT the data from the DoD cloud so our DoD data system is like a sieve open to the CCP.
The person or people who compromised national security by hiring Chinese escorts have committed a treasonous offense and should be investigated if not tried for treason.
MTGA: Make Treason Great Again. We live in a time period of the exposure of treasonous crimes by former President Obama, his staff, and others, yet treason has rarely been charged or prosecuted in America in the past. Why? Because no one has had the courage to stand up to powerful people. Americans, at least conservative Americans, want treason investigated, charged, and tried. There will never be national security again until this has taken place.
"That, by the way, creates a significant problem in being able to find enough cleared American employees to do the job. And I'm not sure they are so readily available."
this is silly. We have them but this is a minimum wage issue. If you want to pay wages from the last decade then H1B is needed.
Let's hear it for American ingenuity. There is nothing we can't outsource.
“…Around the same time DOD determined that around 50 gigabytes or more F-35 stealth fighter jet data had disappeared. We know where it went: China, and we know the result, China was able to field a stealth fighter jet in record time…”
They improved it dramatically by adding a second engine.
They had no choice because they lacked a single engine with enough power.
Given a choice, there’s not many pilots that would prefer to have just one available engine rather than two.
The F-22 has 2 engines; the F-35 one.
Richard Roskell
Combat jet pilots! who needs em? They are so last century.
"BuT wE cAn SaVe So MuCh MoNeY!"
That does seem to be what it is always about
The real issue revolves around who is the first mover and how fast the weapon system can be put into the field in meaningful numbers. If the second mover can put almost as good into the field twice as fast and in ten times the number and keep increasing that ratio indefinitely, you are hosed regardless of how secure your operations are.
First mover Tesla in China getting buried by BYD and similar who are almost as good in what matters in China, are everywhere that matters in China and sell for a third the price. Did the Chinese steal some secret Tesla documents to get a favorable position a little faster. Maybe. Who cares? The end result is the same.
Ditto for current American Tesla type military doctrine.
"Skills Gap: Digital escorts often lack the technical expertise to police foreign engineers with far more advanced skills, leaving highly sensitive data vulnerable to hacking."© ProPublica Microsoft and other American IT giants have long been using foreign talent both domestically and through outsourcing. What Stephen presented was not a scam, but a clear example of treason and the undermining of national security. This is always the case when you start trusting your secrets to businessmen who are constantly "cutting costs." The very idea of transferring data to "cloud" servers was bound to meet resistance and disapproval. You won't know if it's a separate infrastructure for the federal government or a rented facility; where these servers are actually located; who is maintaining them; who is checking them (we've already seen that "assistants" need to improve their skills)... Microsoft initially hired Chinese engineers to fulfill the Pentagon's contract because there was a shortage of American professionals at the time (and even more so now).
Stephen, I guess you're far more focused on the Yellow Peril than the Red Peril because China is a real competitor on almost every level, but as Jensen Huang argues, America will lose any zero-sum game, and the challenge is to up your competition with the sole emerging rival rather than waste time and resources trying unsuccessfully to close them out of the race.
DOD as you know has a tiered security system, with more sensitive information protected in various sophisticated ways, including blockchain crytography.
But they'll still need outside help managing office supplies and payrolls in the overall cloud architecture.
The F35 design hack was from Lockheed (announcing 80% profit rise today) not DOD.
And quantum computers will not become a significant resource in this decade.
Your concerns about the DOD cloud remind me of the paranoia over Chinese balloons above the clouds two years ago.
But America has run on Manichaean paranoia since the 1620s, so I guess we should get used to it :-)
Probably no harm done. Maybe Microsoft is already working on version 2.0?
Somewhat more seriously though, the digital age has to be a security nightmare for every nation. Just like for private citizens, you gain a huge advantage in access to information and its distribution, but you potentially open yourself up to exploits by nefarious entities. There's always a trade-off.
New subscriber here with questions.
1) Why would China or any country want to steal specs on the F-35, when according to the GAO's 2022 report, "Seven years after its introduction, the plane still has four major “Category 1” deficiencies, and 822 lesser “Category 2” problems." Source: https://www.theinteldrop.org/2022/12/13/from-neck-breaking-ejection-seats-to-frightening-lightning-f-35s-top-ten-problems/
2) Why would we assume China needs to steal any knowledge from the USA, when China has a much smarter population than the USA? China produces far more STEM graduates than the US.
Source:
https://cset.georgetown.edu/article/china-outpaces-u-s-in-stem/
"In the United States, 54% of American adults read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level, and nearly one in five adults reads below a third-grade level."
Source: Literacy: Building a Brighter Future - The Policy Circle https://share.google/9itgVqLvODThBjblY
It just seems like a Narrative from Above, that of China stealing intellectual property from the US. They want us to hate China, and they (the Western elite) are totally deluded as to .. well.. reality?
The answer is straightforward. Why reinvent anything that already has been developed at the cost of many billions over many years? The second answer is that by understanding the details on the F-35 an adversary can counter it. While the F-35 has some problems, it is effective. Ask Israel.
Your comments on American "stupidity" are irrelevant and unacceptable.
Not sure why it's unacceptable to cite a fact about American literacy. And "stupid" is your word, not mine. At least I've reread my comment 3 times and can't find where I said (as you claim) that Americans are stupid. Probably because I don't think Americans are stupid. I actually think Americans are much smarter than the elite think.
I believe you used a strawman argument here. When a person ignores someone's actual argument and changes the content into something everyone finds unacceptable.
If it's irrelevant and unacceptable to talk about the state of the American public's educational and literacy level with respect to comparing our country's pool of engineers with that of another country's engineers, well, I don't understand the rules of this substack account.
Regardless if DOD approved or not. Using Chinese engineers to work on a defense department cloud date base is criminal malfeasance.
I should be shocked, but I am not. You have a computer company that makes computer operating systems like sieves, completely open to hacking and viruses, led by a man who makes billions from anti-virus drugs and gene therapy. Then he hires Chinese individuals to digitally ESCORT the data from the DoD cloud so our DoD data system is like a sieve open to the CCP.
The person or people who compromised national security by hiring Chinese escorts have committed a treasonous offense and should be investigated if not tried for treason.
MTGA: Make Treason Great Again. We live in a time period of the exposure of treasonous crimes by former President Obama, his staff, and others, yet treason has rarely been charged or prosecuted in America in the past. Why? Because no one has had the courage to stand up to powerful people. Americans, at least conservative Americans, want treason investigated, charged, and tried. There will never be national security again until this has taken place.
My assumption is DoD approved the use of Chinese engineers. I would like to know who was involved in the government.
I would too. Whomever made the choice or approved the choice to use Chinese engineers should be investigated for treason.
There have to be consequences for endangering national security.
Overseers monitoring the overseers. When does the chain end?
"That, by the way, creates a significant problem in being able to find enough cleared American employees to do the job. And I'm not sure they are so readily available."
this is silly. We have them but this is a minimum wage issue. If you want to pay wages from the last decade then H1B is needed.
not really --it is a problem clearing people
you ought to know that
I know two guys right this second one junior and other senior. I will tell them about your comment as their project is dropped. Defense work
Is more like a migrant worker vs dude with truck at Home Depot. Would never let my kids work for them