Comment by alistairSH
Comment by alistairSH 3 days ago
Isn't that true of any supply chain that involves foreign states? Usually it's just surveillance, not destructive stuff, but expecting state actors to stay out of things is... naive?
Comment by alistairSH 3 days ago
Isn't that true of any supply chain that involves foreign states? Usually it's just surveillance, not destructive stuff, but expecting state actors to stay out of things is... naive?
China already infiltrated our supply chain at least once [1]. And then there was Stuxnet. Doesn’t seem like a leap that the Israelis can do the same and worse with their actual (as in shooting engagements) enemies.
1 - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-h...
Wait, so was the Supermicro attack real? There was a lot of skepticism around it, and nobody was able to confirm it with certainty. Then a few years later Bloomberg unexpectedly doubled down on it, again without proof (if I'm not mistaken). Was there anything new after that? I haven't been following the story since then.
It's naive to think that every country that supplies you with goods and you are at war with would go down a route like this. Is there really a single country you'd expect not to sabotage goods you buy from them if you continuously rain rockets onto their population?
I think the point is that, whatever probability a potential target would have placed on this sort of thing yesterday, those calculations have shifted now. Previously it was more abstract and something of this scale and physical attack would have been little more than a thought experiment. If a news pundit on Fox or CNN last night had been claiming China was doing this with Huawei phones then many people would have looked at it as fear mongering while of course knowing China has in all likelihood setup other supply chain attacks. Today it would sound a lot more likely.
The difference is between theoretical capability & Israel's demonstrated willingness & successful execution of it.
It's pretty reasonable now to think a little harder about "huh, I wonder if our Israeli supplier..." but yesterday it would have been a bit paranoid, not naive, to spend more than a passing moment on the thought if you weren't in a member of the March 8th club, or Iran.