Cite as: 535 U. S. 467 (2002)
Opinion of the Court
might well be within its rights to insist, for example, on providing a loop and a switch in a combined form when a naive entrant asked just for them, while refusing later to combine them with a network interface device, which is also ordinarily combined with the loop and the switch, and which is necessary to set up a telecommunications link. But under Rule 315(c), when the entrant later requires the element it missed the first time, the incumbent's obligation is to "perform the functions necessary," 47 CFR § 51.315(c) (1997), for a combination of what the entrant cannot combine alone, First Report and Order ¶ 294, and would not have needed to combine if it had known enough to request the elements together in a combined form in the first place. Cf. id., ¶ 297 ("[I]ncumbent[s] must work with new entrants to identify the elements the new entrants will need to offer a particular service in the manner the new entrants intend").
Of course, it is not this aspect of Rule 315(c), requiring the combination of what is ordinarily combined, that draws the incumbents' (or Justice Breyer's, see post, at 563) principal objection; they focus their attack, rather, on the additional requirement of Rule 315(c), that incumbents combine unbundled network elements "even if those elements are not ordinarily combined in the incumbent['s] network." 47 CFR § 51.315(c) (1997). To build upon our previous example, this would seemingly require an incumbent to combine the loop, switch, and interface (ordinarily combined in its network) with a second loop and network interface (provided by the incumbent as a separate unbundled element), so that the competitive carrier could charge for a second-line connection, as for a fax or modem. See Brief for Petitioners Worldcom, Inc., et al. in No. 00-555, at 48 (providing the example).
But this provision of Rule 315(c) is justified by the statutory requirement of "nondiscriminatory access." § 251(c)(3). As we have said, the FCC has interpreted the rule as obli-
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