Wireless Wars

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What to expect

As the world rolls out transformational 5G services, it has become increasingly clear that China may be able to disrupt—or even access—the wireless networks that carry our medical, financial, and even military communications.

This insider story from a telecommunications veteran uncovers how we got into this mess—and how to change the outcome.

In Wireless Wars: China’s Dangerous Domination of 5G and How We’re Fighting Back, author Jon Pelson explains how America invented cellular technology, taught China how to make the gear, and then handed them the market. Pelson shares never-before-told stories from the executives and scientists who built the industry and describes how China undercut and destroyed competing equipment makers, freeing themselves to export their nation’s network gear—and their surveillance state. He also reveals China’s successful program to purchase the support of the world’s leading political, business, and military figures in their effort to control rival nations’ networks.

What’s more, Pelson draws on his lifelong experience in the telecommunications industry and remarkable access to the sector’s leaders to reveal how innovative companies can take on the Chinese threat and work with counterintelligence and cybersecurity experts to prevent China from closing the trap. He offers unparalleled insights into how 5G impacts businesses, national security, and you. Finally, Wireless Wars proposes how America can use its own unique superpower to retake the lead from China.

This audiobook is about more than just 5G wireless services, which enable self-driving cars, advanced telemedicine, and transformational industrial capabilities. It’s about the dangers of placing our most sensitive information into the hands of foreign companies who answer to the Chinese Communist Party. And it’s about the technology giant that China is using to project its power around the world; Huawei, a global super-company that has surged from a local vendor to a $120 billion-a-year behemoth in just a few years.

For anyone curious about the hottest issue at the intersection of technology and geopolitics, Wireless Wars offers an immersive crash course and an unforgettable read.

Critics Review

  • “An extremely compelling must-read for industry experts, intelligence professionals, and concerned citizens interested in protecting our nation.”

    William Evanina, former director of the National Counterintelligence Center
  • Wireless Wars shines a bright light on the ongoing battle for national supremacy and global security in cyberspace, with China and the United States being the primary actors, and 5G networks providing the latest battleground. Jon Pelson has an insider’s knowledge of this territory, and his book has important implications not only for policy makers, defense leaders, and technology investors, but for interested citizens, as well.”

    Geoffrey A. Moore, internationally bestselling author
  • “In Wireless Wars, Jon Pelson accurately describes the transfer, both consciously and unconsciously, of US wireless equipment manufacturing to China…This is about what happens when a hostile government subsidizes its vendors to take over a market and forces the bankruptcy or merger of competing vendors who played by the rules. Pelson describes the resulting national security threats of having untrusted vendors subject to foreign government control place their equipment into some of our most sensitive networks.”

    Eric Burger, former chief technology officer of the Federal Communications Commission
  • Wireless Wars chronicles how America squandered a virtually insurmountable technological lead in the telecommunications equipment market, allowing China to gain preeminence. It makes a compelling argument for the necessity of the US regaining leadership in this vital sector. More importantly, it charts a path for achieving that goal. A must-read for anyone interested in 5G, innovation, and national competitiveness.”

    Joseph B. Fuller, professor of management practice at Harvard Business School and cofounder of Monitor Group

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