From: "Phillip M. Hallam-Baker" <hallam@ai.mit.edu>
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 19:55:21 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks <cypherpunks@toad.com>
Subject: Re: Fighting the cybercensor
Message-ID: <199701280355.TAA16061@toad.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain




Dale Thorn <dthorn@gte.net> wrote in article
<5ch8v4$co9@life.ai.mit.edu>...
> blanc wrote:
> > From:   Dr.Dimitri Vulis
> > However U.S.G. is able to say that people of Iraq or Lybia or Cuba
should
> > not be permitted on the 'net. It also bombs Iraq and murders their
> > civilians
> > in retaliation for something their governments supposedly did.
> 
> > The U.S.G. has many more resources than most of us to do these things,
> > including equipment, cooperative troops, money, and recognition from
other
> > governments.   If other nations disagree with the U.S.G. they have the
> > resources to discuss, bargain, negotiate, criticize, form alliances,
take
> > their chances and retaliate, etc.
> 
> I wish this were true, at least of nations which would be friendly
> to someone like me (white, Western, etc.).  A bully on a school
> playground can always be knocked down, no matter how big or how
> vicious he is.  Sadly, the U.S. bully cannot be knocked down.  Bad
> enough you get nuclear, chemical, and/or biological stuff waved at
> you - if you get into a hot war like Desert Storm, your country is
> carpet-bombed with fleets of B-52's until it is thoroughly debilitated.

Actually the US is being remarkably ineffective in keeping
Cuba etc off the Net. If you don't believe me just try
the cuban home page.

We had a Web server running in Sarajevo during the siege
back in '93. There is no way that the US govt. can hope to
control the Internet any more than it can control the
phone system. 

What is astonishing is that the Cuban authorities are so
keen to import a technology that breaks down their
propaganda.

The Cold War was not won by the arms race, it was won in
Eastern Europe which was never a major participant. The main
instrument that won it was West German TV which broadcast
pictures of supermarkets with full shelves into the homes
of East Germans every night. The viewers could see that it
was not mere propaganda and their relatives confirmed the 
fact. As a result the East German guards on the Berlin wall
simply decided to leave their posts one night.

The East Germans couldn't stop the TV signals either. When
Dresden started to become a ghost town because people wanted
to move to a town which could recieve the broadcasts the
East Germans ended up installing their own relay to keep
the locals happy.


		Phill