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Comment by craftkiller | Hacker News Reader

Interesting that the US and Russia get so close to touching and yet I don't see any cables going between the two countries. All our west coast cables seem to go south to Japan/China/Australia.

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Almost none of the Russian population lives on the East coast of the country. To be useful, they would have to have overland cables going thousands of miles. It's much easier to get to the bulk of their population from the west via Europe.

Both Russia and the USA have cables there though, they're just not connected.

Gray cables are planned, not yet laid.

Not a strong disagree or anything, yet Khabarovsk (~617,000)[1], Vladivostok (~605,000)[2], and Yakutsk (~312,000)[3] are somewhat large in the Far East. There's probably an economic case for 1.5 million citizens access.

Admittedly, it's probably much easier to go through China, Korea, or Japan if those countries are accepting. There's decades of political and social issues to wade through with Russia / US cables, vs just going to China, Korea, or Japan, and then jumping over the Pacific. Canada would likely also be an easier possibility.

Which is pretty much what it looks like Russia did with the Hokkaido-Sakhalin Cable System[4], and Russia-Japan Cable Network.[5]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khabarovsk

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladivostok

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakutsk

[4] https://www.submarinecablemap.com/submarine-cable/hokkaido-s...

[5] https://www.submarinecablemap.com/submarine-cable/russia-jap...

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