Hacker News Reader

Comment by azinman2 | Hacker News Reader

It’s about allies versus active enemies. There are shootouts on a regular basis between India and China, and they’ve intensified recently.

View on HN

> There are shootouts on a regular basis between India and China, and they’ve intensified recently.

There are no "shootouts". There are standoffs sometimes (think once a year if you want to define regularity) due to the loosely demarcated Line of Actual Control (LAC) between India and China. It's usually a melee. Even the recent escalated incident wasn't a shootout. There are agreements between Indian and Chinese governments that prevent usage of firearms in standoffs like these.

I agree that "shootouts" is the wrong word, but "melee" doesn't quite capture the gruesomeness of human beings beating each other to death with spiked clubs.

20 Indian soldiers died just two weeks ago: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/16/asia/china-india-border-clash...

Yes, I'm aware of the news. It still wasn't due to a "shootout".

> What’s happening along the Himalayan border is an unusual kind of warfare. As in the brawls last month, Chinese and Indian soldiers fought fiercely without firing a shot — at least that’s what officials on both sides contend. They say the soldiers followed their de facto border code not to use firearms and went at each other with fists, rocks and wooden clubs, some possibly studded with nails or wrapped in barbed wire.

From https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/16/world/asia/indian-china-b...

So it's just opportunism, then? Condemn the other; refuse reflection. Or am I misunderstanding you?

I can’t say what India’s motivation is for sure. Maybe there’s a credible threat in a way that Facebook isn’t. Maybe it’s just anti-Chinese fervor. But saying anything outside of India should be treated the same is not taking into account geo-politics and individual country’s behaviors.

Coordination with the US means jobs and economic opportunity for both sides. Coordination with China means gunfights and border tension.

It's pretty simple if you don't try to extrapolate everything to logical extrems. India and US is ally, India and China is rival. Full stop, it ends there. KISS

We live in interesting times, ripe for manipulation and propaganda, both if which China and Russia have spread in the EU during the last months. India's ban is completely warranted. The fact that they also have a border dispute with China only makes things worse. I'd rather they ban a few apps than escalation and war.

It's about harm and risk reduction. All other things held equal, you would expect your enemies to be doing more to undermine you than your allies would.

Using opportunity to actually perform a good thing for privacy (tiktok at least was found snooping all it can from users phones, not sure about the rest but given how chinese run things that would be expected).

No tear will be shed for those apps, regardless from which country they come from (I know this is very targeted due to recent tensions, but its still a step in the right direction re privacy)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com