Do we really want to copy China’s 5G strategy?

Published February 22, 2021 6:07pm ET



In light of the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing with Eric Schmidt on Tuesday, it may be worth revisiting his views on 5G.

Schmidt believes that China is winning or has already won the 5G race. If true, shouldn’t the United States adopt the Chinese approach to 5G and nationalize its network to compete? The Department of Defense and the former Google CEO would have you believe so. Recently, the Pentagon put out a request for information seeking input as to how it can take that action. Two problems. First, there is little evidence demonstrating that the U.S. is actually trailing China in 5G. And even so, there’s even less justification for nationalizing our networks.

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