US-China tech competition accelerates: on Friday 05/15 new sanctions on Huawei, on Monday 05/18 Samsung chief visits China

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

1 hour ago, Marcin2 said:

That is the major problem with current US strategy of China tech containment . China is not going to sanction any US companies, for sure not manufacturing in China.

They are playing long game, 20 years game, that is why it is so dangerous for US, that is why I started this thread.

So you think that after all the recent bullshit that Western companies, in general, and American companies, i specific, will either continue to operate in China, pump more money into Chinese ‘joint’ ventures and continue to be ripped off by the CCP?

Companies were already fed up with Chinese bureaucracy and corruption BEFORE the pandemic and were looking towards other Asian nations, the backlash from the pandemic will only exasperate this.

China may be playing the long game, but shortly they will be playing by/with themselves.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

 

“I think China would never attack Taiwan. They could attack US forces if they are located in Taiwan, cause this is worse for China than were Soviet nukes in Cuba.”

 

Really? Soldiers on the ground in a hostile country are more worrisome than nuclear missiles? Your grasp on reality and common sense is questionable.

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

3 hours ago, El Nikko said:

No they could attack Taiwan, and Japan would get involved and things escalate from there.

I don't think either sides are seeking war but sometimes wars happen regardless.

I'd be willing to bet they'll dip their toes in the water before long, for any variety of reasons.  Almost anything they do will be for internal consumption, to back some strategy of why they have to retreat within.  Any excuse to cover for the loss of exports?

[Marcin2 + 724]

There are many voices at this forum and also at this thread that China would be deserted by global manufacturing, that nobody would co-operate with China.

I think this is an exaggerated view.

I believe there  are 2 forces to de-Sinicize global manufacturing:

- China is going up the value chain , No longer cheap country so labour intensive industries are either automated or moved to less developed countries: Bamgladesh, India , whole SE Asia etc.

Take a look at the T-shirt/shirt you wear at the moment. I checked and mine was Made in Bangladesh.

- move to diversify manufacturing due to various reasons like National Security or just Business continuity safety.

I think Covid-19 is exaggerated although Nobody would know for the next 1 year until stats About FDI for 2020 and Q1 2021 appear.

But this may affect 20% tops of China manufacturing capacity.
Fact:

Latest data about FDI in China show that the country is still top global manufacturing destination.

FDI q1 2020 in China 10.8% down from q1 2019 but still amounted 30.6 billion dollars. And this was

quarter of pandemic in China.

[0R0 + 6,251]

5 hours ago, Marcin2 said:

You are right , It is probable, but Fortunately not in 2020. Chinese ( and all other countries) reaction is NO reaction until 2020 US election.

I do not think Hong Kong would be the reason for the start of new war.

The farthest the animosity US-China can go here is Economically  treating  Hong Kong as another Chinese province.

I think the trigger of the war would be Taiwan or technology.

Taking @Wombat's war theory as a guide. Japan Australia and a number of other regional navies are intending to take out China's navy, after which we can only guess what happens. The US may or may not participate. But the main point is that there will be no trade with China after that point. If that is the future, and these countries are telling EU heads of state that such a move is in the works, then there will be no further corporate inroads into China supply chains, its market nor its equipment in 5G or anything else.

Trump wanted a commercial relationship with China to continue developing on terms the US can live with. He got some indication that China would play ball and they are making some reforms within their system that might make it possible. But their political and media clamp down from long before the CV19 episode is pointing to an altogether different direction. It is pointing to a China that is folding into itself and will detach from global commerce into a N. Korea style Maoist hermit kingdom. They never made it to having a useful deep sea navy, nor managed the BRI initiative to provide actual political capture of the countries involved. Their plan would take 10 years longer to have come online but they don't have that time. Their economy was headed to mass collapse financially as their boomers pass the halfway point of going into retirement, and economically as their narrow Millennial cohort plateaus in consumption over this decade and falls off.

China does not have an option but to obtain the technology to produce its own advanced chips. However, there is a large barrier in Western chip technology companies countermeasures against Chinese industrial espionage that has been effective for 30 years. Since the key leaders are US and Japan, with some contribution from Europe (Germany and Netherlands). Having a shutdown of interaction with them is instant death to any chip company. The key customers of those companies, where they are paid externally to advance their technology is via DARPA the Pentagon projects and the national laboratories. This is 50 years worth of advancement in chip technology that is under strict lockdown and the industry itself has no independent control of it. Which is why this directive in the OP is real world enforceable.

China is not going to reach DIY advanced chip making before it has to shutdown externally due to CCP fears of being ejected from power after its economy keels over. Same thing with robotics. It will not reach advanced robotic manufacturing because (1)  the markets needed to support that large scale capacity simply don't exist. (2) the advanced technology embedded into them is not going to be available to China at all very soon, (3) the German and Japanese robotics leaders are definitely not selling and have taken extreme measures to keep  China industrial espionage out of their companies.

 

The big tell as to China's economic state will be how the recovery proceeds out of the CV19 collapse. So far it looks like the last 6 weeks have seen consumer spending trending down after its initial spurt up due to pent up demand. While the service sector seems to be waking up slowly, manufacturing continues shrinking and final goods prices are falling more or rising less than input materials or component costs. Only food prices continue rising, eating up more and more of consumer's wallet share while a large number are still unemployed. After most were rehired in March and April, they were furloughed or fired again due to empty order books. The Apr services PMI continued indicating further slowing rather than a rebound .

https://www.markiteconomics.com/Public/Home/PressRelease/62c70775a2b74fce87c79598d4907fd9

2. Employment in the services sector contracted at the fastest pace on record. The measure for employment hit its lowest level since the survey began more than 14 years ago. China will work to bail out services companies hit hard bythe pandemic, as policymakers have made stabilizing employment their top priority. Bigger tax and fee cuts are urgently needed.

China's manufacturing continued shrinking, though at a much lesser intensity. The PMI is at a bad 47.6 vs. the services rather terrible 44 reading. which would indicate the economy still shrinking at around a 4% rate. (not from using Caixin's correlation to official data, which has consistently been underwhelming.

.

[Marcin2 + 724]

I am long enough at this forum to know nearly every scenario of future US-China hegemony conflict that was presented by users here.

I think that big boom, boom, boom scenario is the least probable, although I think probability increased in recent years. I mean any war in the air, at sea, on land is going to be nuclear fast so not in the national interest  of any party, rather terrible mistake / miscalculation.

It is good that they exist cause we know what is ultimately at stake.

But society that have decent lives had never wanted war in the past.

Citizens of all the countries we are discussing about here live in relative comfort, even in China.

I give boom-boom scenario 5% probability, still huge.

But discussing doom scenario is rather futile. The people that would survive initial nuclear explosions would later die out of hunger during nuclear winter.

 

 

[Marcin2 + 724]

Leaving boom-boom scenarios behind, there are also 2 groups of extreme economic scenarios:

First group is: China (or US) would collapse.  There would be civil war, hunger, doom and gloom, country would desintegrate into parts.

I find this very improbable. Both countries are huge and strong, so stable. Both US and China long-term could be self-sufficient in everything but raw materials and in case of China also food.

Second group of scenarios:

all foreign manufacturing would leave China immediately and this would cause the same ad in the first group of scenarios.

Because China is a very large country foreign trade and foreign manufacturing are not indispensable for its development. it is not Germany or South Korea.

Global manufacturing is in China because of cluster effect, good infrastructure, unlimited qualified workforce, large domestic market, proximity of Asian and European markets.

Even if they would like to relocate there is still No place that can accomodate this huge manufacturing base.

 

 

Edited May 21, 2020 by Marcin2
Typo

[0R0 + 6,251]

9 minutes ago, Marcin2 said:

I am long enough at this forum to know nearly every scenario of future US-China hegemony conflict that was presented by users here.

I think that big boom, boom, boom scenario is the least probable, although I think probability increased in recent years. I mean any war in the air, at sea, on land is going to be nuclear fast so not in the national interest  of any party, rather terrible mistake / miscalculation.

It is good that they exist cause we know what is ultimately at stake.

But society that have decent lives had never wanted war in the past.

Citizens of all the countries we are discussing about here live in relative comfort, even in China.

I give boom-boom scenario 5% probability, still huge.

But discussing doom scenario is rather futile. The people that would survive initial nuclear explosions would later die out of hunger during nuclear winter.

 

 

A naval culling of China would not end up with them pulling the nuclear trigger. They are automatically the losers in any nuclear war. So that is not something China will do regardless of the damage to them. Even if they lose Shanghai the nukes stay in the silos. I entirely reject your play ground nuclear math. China will not start something it is sure to lose and lose totally.

China's navy is not an existential loss.

Like you, but for different reasons, I expect that @Wombat war scenario is not the top probability. In the face of it coming, China would back off its aggressive stance in the S China Sea and let go the islands they militarized.

[0R0 + 6,251]

8 minutes ago, Marcin2 said:

Leaving boom-boom scenarios behind, there are also 2 groups of extreme economic scenarios:

First group is: China (or US) would collapse.  There would be civil war, hunger, doom and gloom, country would desintegrate into parts.

I find this very improbable. Both countries are huge and strong, so stable. 

 

China is not internally economically stable. Its demographics preclude the kind of consumer economy they have been trying to create for a decade or more. They couldn't, so had to repeatedly inject stimulus averaging 9% of the GDP each year since 2009. I don't believe they can push any further sizeable stimulus of this type without accelerating food inflation further.They need to cut 1/3 of their industrial capacity to reach an economic equilibrium with available export markets and domestic demand levels.There was never any point to reaching the capacities they put in place, there is ever less reason to expand it any further.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

17 hours ago, Marcin2 said:

We observe a very interesting accelaration of China- United States tech rivalry this week:

 

1. On Friday 15 May 2020 new, much tighter regulations were imposed by Department of Commerce to prevent access of Huawei to any semiconductors.

Key Huawei chip supplier stops taking orders after new US sanctions

https://www.techradar.com/news/key-huawei-chip-supplier-stops-taking-orders-after-new-us-sanctions

TSMC is the world's biggest contract chipmaker

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, has reportedly stopped taking orders from Huawei following the latest round of sanctions by the US government.

Huawei chips

TSMC has become an increasingly important supplier over the past year, producing Huawei’s custom processors and providing it with key components such as networking chips. The Chinese mobile giant is now TSMC’s second largest customer, after Apple, accounting for anything up to a fifth of its revenue.

However Washington is intent on increasing the pressure on Huawei and has closed what it believes to be a “technical loophole” that allows chipmakers to ensure their components are not classified as ‘US-made’ despite including American technologies.

All chipmakers wanting to supply Huawei will have to apply for a licence,  handing the US government greater control over the company’s supply chain.

 

Nikkei says TSMC is no longer taking new orders from Huawei but will honour existing commitments, in line with the latest US regulations. It is said that the Chinese mobile giant hs been preparing for every eventuality over the past year and has been stockpiling networking chips.

 

 

2. On Monday 18 May 2020, Samsung (de facto) chairman Lee Jae-yong visits China in its first overseas trip since the start of COVID-19 epidemic:

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/tech/2020/05/129_289724.html

Samsung's Lee visits China amid easing virus fears

Group leader's visit to the firm's Xian plant comes after US hits Huawei hard

By Baek Byung-yeul

Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong visited the company's key semiconductor plant in Xian, China, Monday, resuming his on-site inspection activities after his pledge to help the consumer electronics giant continue its upward trend.

Samsung said the vice chairman used his Chinese trip to encourage employees who have been trying hard to overcome difficulties from the COVID-19 pandemic. Lee is the first "global businessman" to visit China since the virus erupted, Samsung said.

This was Lee's first overseas business trip since January when he inspected TV and smartphone manufacturing lines in Brazil. His visit was possible as Korea and China began operating a fast-tracked border entry system, exempting businesspeople from a 14-day mandatory self-quarantine period starting this month.

Lee's visit to China came at a time when the United States announced it will limit the supply of memory chips made with its technologies to Chinese telecommunication equipment maker Huawei Technologies, May 15.

Under that new sanction, companies using chip-making technology from the U.S. will be required to obtain a U.S. license before supplying chips to Huawei, which means Korean chipmakers such as Samsung and SK hynix will have to cut off their chip supplies to Huawei unless they get waivers from the U.S. commerce department.

Given Huawei is one of the largest buyers of chips made by Samsung and SK, it remains to be seen how Samsung could seek a breakthrough in the semiconductor industry which faces a series of negative factors such as the U.S.-China trade row and global economy slowdown sparked by COVID-19.

 

 

Comment:

It is interesting how fast are events occuring in the present technology conflict. I am interested what is opinion of people with knowledge about semi industry like @Ward Smith.

A few observations and questions:

- Huawei will probably be finished in the next 12 months if do not find any measures to supply components,

- At the spotlight would be 2 major foundries: TSMC and Samsung,

- Unusual visit of Samsung chief could mean there are already negotiations taking place,

- It is very probable that Huawei workaround would be to move chip manufacturing to Samsung foundries: Samsung is too big to be sanctioned by US this would stop global tech industry, TSMC on the other hand is relatively small,

- the political powers at play are huge, the largest countries involved: US and China. Many smaller countries: Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Germany, the Netherlands would need to play a cautious game of hedging their bets but not angering any of the superpowers,

- future of 5 trillion dollars technology industry is at stake, with great impact on many other related industries,

- Will China play tit-for-tat now or wait till US elections ? What would be their answer ?

- What would be the impact on global supply chains ?

- Would countries have to choose sides and loose one of the 2 largest consumer markets ?

 

Samsung is introducing sub 5nm chip capacity Soon. While they design and build their own chips they haven't made the Intel mistake of keeping everything proprietary. A state of the art fab is inordinately expensive, so why not share it across multiple customers? My semi company was fabless, which was made possible explicitly because of this model. 

Months ago you'll recall I called out TSMC as the Achilles heel and now we're seeing this play out. You could be entirely correct, Huwai could run out of vital components soon, or customers could get the idea in their heads that Huwai could run out of vital components, like when their system is down and their customers are screaming at them. 

Is China stupid enough to invade Taiwan to get access to the fab? No way China is that stupid, but the morons in the CCP? Possibly. I believe by now you've read the speech by the head of China's military. They know they can't win toe to toe with us in a conventional war, but a bio weapon? This first time could have just been the dress rehearsal to see how everyone reacts. The next time? Horrible disease with only one cure they possess? The ultimate blackmail weapon. Or just the usual spy thriller plot? 

[0R0 + 6,251]

17 hours ago, Marcin2 said:

Comment:

It is interesting how fast are events occuring in the present technology conflict. I am interested what is opinion of people with knowledge about semi industry like @Ward Smith.

A few observations and questions:

- Huawei will probably be finished in the next 12 months if do not find any measures to supply components,

- At the spotlight would be 2 major foundries: TSMC and Samsung,

- Unusual visit of Samsung chief could mean there are already negotiations taking place,

- It is very probable that Huawei workaround would be to move chip manufacturing to Samsung foundries: Samsung is too big to be sanctioned by US this would stop global tech industry, TSMC on the other hand is relatively small,

- the political powers at play are huge, the largest countries involved: US and China. Many smaller countries: Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Germany, the Netherlands would need to play a cautious game of hedging their bets but not angering any of the superpowers,

- future of 5 trillion dollars technology industry is at stake, with great impact on many other related industries,

- Will China play tit-for-tat now or wait till US elections ? What would be their answer ?

- What would be the impact on global supply chains ?

- Would countries have to choose sides and loose one of the 2 largest consumer markets ?

The first perspective is that China is largely a pass through technology consumer, re-exporting the bulk of its high end chip imports, and its domestic demand is for low end chips nobody makes money on anyway. It is the EU but mostly US companies in China that "consume" the high end cash flow rich chips for mostly export out of China. The actual value of China is not as a destination but as the workshop of technology companies. One they have been loath to replace as prior attempts to do so fell far short of what they wanted. Given an actual threat of an eventual  cutoff of advanced chip supplies into their China production capacity in order to prevent CCP companies access to them, then they will finally get started on mass evacuation out of China. Apple is the real question. It has been entirely intransigent in responding to any effort to get them to move production out of China, only setting up production in India, which has not been a great experience.

Current unemployment of the barista and waitstaff nationwide, provides a huge labor pool that is available to be trained and started on production. Since the vast bulk of them are coming from serving in cities that will see their office occupancy fall by half, and their office worker population by 28% according to surveys. They will be forced to leave as most of their jobs will not be coming back. So this is the opportunity for Flextronics to staff its Wisconsin facilities and finish their construction. I think the rhetoric coming from the Republican side and from the rank and file Dems is uniformly heading towards cutting off China from the high tech business altogether. Only Biden and the Dem leadership are standing in the way of major lashouts against China and companies that still use it as an export platform..

[PTakacs + 59]

5 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

And when, for years, you’ve been claiming the entire South China Sea at the expense of your neighbors, you’ll quickly find out what they really think of you...

To be fair, Taiwan also claims that the SCS belongs to one "China". Obviously Taiwan thinks it is the real China. I digress. 

[PTakacs + 59]

16 hours ago, John Foote said:

India is not a factor. 

A decent state-of-the-art fab is years in the making, and multi-billion to put into place. And India isn't known for protecting IP. Building a significantly capability would take a national initiative, much as Korea has in the 90s for the memory business, and Taiwan for the foundry business. Ironically many of the leading physicists who drive the semiconductor process and tool industry are from India. 

I don't view Samsung as a foundry, though along with Intel and TSMC, are the 600 lb gorillas in the buying tools business. There are small niche fabs. Who knew the same folks who make a B2 bomber had a fab?

Direct labor is barely a factor in semiconductor manufacturing. Why go to an India? And the semi tool company I work with does have a significant footprint in India, but used mostly for sustaining engineering of older products.

There is Saxony Valley, around Dresden, huge in chips for the automotive industry. Israel has significant fabs, and Intel has a major presence there. There are many "fabless" semiconductor companies. They might have a small fab for developing the process, but a foundry does the volume, even for larger folks now like IBM or AMD. China is pretty much still shut out of the sub 25 micron world, but size isn't everything. Especially with analog chips. 

The USA can be, should be, a 5G leader. CISCO will not go down easily. Working remotely is yet another godsend driving demand. And my little sector was already at full capacity. COVID has disrupted supply chains somewhat, but being "critical" has kept us going close to record levels.

I shipped some R&D stuff to a communications chip customer in the states just a few weeks ago. But in the USA it's not a national government thing, it's driven by the corporations. Intel learned long ago, and most everyone else in the industry, you will be cloned and IP taken in China, so if it goes there, it's years old. Life cycles are so short that they are still well behind and can't manufacture much leading edge.

If you are a Chinese National in an American semiconductor company it's tagged the email address, and many accesses are denied. Outfits like Facebook have bought fabs, not to seriously make chips, but rather so they can complete own the design and manufacturing method. In a few years Apple won't have Intel, or Motorola inside for their core CPUs. IP is the war, not the manufacturing. But as Intel has proven, if you don't really know the manufacturing, and control it, you will lose the IP faster. All worthwhile IP will be copied, you just buy yourself time. What is the infamous line, "Only the paranoid survive."

Trump is absolutely right to worry about China. I have issues with the how, not the basic why.

Everything here is right and true. And I would like to add that 5G dominance should not be a political issue. Huawei does lead in 5G tech as of now, so we have to better our environment to facilitate a good catch-up (and no it is not advisable to skip 5G to go directly to 6G). 

Note that while the discussions here relate to country vs country, in the real world it is more company vs. company -- my No.1 concern is not U.S. vs China, but how I can beat my competitors in the next round. Sometimes this would include beating them in the Chinese market, which has been a cash cow for us. 

[El Nikko + 2,145]

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

The idea that the US can prevent China from getting chips is laughable. Cutting off sales of one of the few products they buy from you is stupid, they will find another maker or do it themselves.  Don't be so arrogant to think they can't do it.

Trying to take China's ball away because they are better at the game... sad.

[frankfurter + 562]

15 hours ago, Strangelovesurfing said:

There's another medium size foundry in upstate NY.

 

On to the fun stuff... Hi Frankfruter, Trump=fascism now thats quite a declaration from a guy who's took the handle of a German food, but Germans should know fascism when they see it. Like when all the Nazi's recently just bubbled back up out of the depth of Germany's subconscious and protested in the streets. 

American fascism.... hummmmm, yeah, did a check and it seems no matter what you think about Trump all you can really point to as far as his HUGE, GINORMOUS effect on the rest of humanity is..... he can be a jackass. So let's do an equation, American (in your eyes) fascism = no real effect besides sanctions (oooo, scary) and jackassery (even more ooooo scary!) on the rest of the world. Germany = you already know.

 

Blocking imports is one thing. Blocking exports is another. This goes against the rights and freedoms of Americans, in the name of nationalism, and is an action no different than that of a fascist or communist regime. Trump is far worse than a simple jackass. 

[Hotone + 412]

13 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

So you think that after all the recent bullshit that Western companies, in general, and American companies, i specific, will either continue to operate in China, pump more money into Chinese ‘joint’ ventures and continue to be ripped off by the CCP?

Companies were already fed up with Chinese bureaucracy and corruption BEFORE the pandemic and were looking towards other Asian nations, the backlash from the pandemic will only exasperate this.

China may be playing the long game, but shortly they will be playing by/with themselves.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/neither-coronavirus-nor-trade-tensions-can-stop-u-s-companies-push-into-china-11589880603

This is from Wall Street Journal, not me

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

25 minutes ago, Hotone said:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/neither-coronavirus-nor-trade-tensions-can-stop-u-s-companies-push-into-china-11589880603

This is from Wall Street Journal, not me

I’m not too worried about Louisiana fried chicken joints, are you?

High tech companies, pharmaceuticals, heavy equipment have been, and will be looking elsewhere. Any firm who has had intellectual property, will be looking elsewhere. Firms whose supply chains have been bottlenecked, will move out. This is simply good business sense and the virus has made it timely to do so.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

9 hours ago, PTakacs said:

To be fair, Taiwan also claims that the SCS belongs to one "China". Obviously Taiwan thinks it is the real China. I digress. 

Nonsense. Taiwan at no time has claimed ownership of the South China Sea. 

That Taiwan believes it is the rightful government of China is no longer true, but was definitely a tenet of the Guomingdong Party. However, they're no longer in power in case you haven't noticed. 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

7 minutes ago, Ward Smith said:

Nonsense. Taiwan at no time has claimed ownership of the South China Sea. 

That Taiwan believes it is the rightful government of China is no longer true, but was definitely a tenet of the Guomingdong Party. However, they're no longer in power in case you haven't noticed. 

The Chinese Civil War was a civil war in China fought between the Kuomintang (KMT)-led government of the Republic of China (ROC) and the Communist Party of China (CPC) lasting intermittently between 1927 and 1949.

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

30 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

I’m not too worried about Louisiana fried chicken joints, are you?

High tech companies, pharmaceuticals, heavy equipment have been, and will be looking elsewhere. Any firm who has had intellectual property, will be looking elsewhere. Firms whose supply chains have been bottlenecked, will move out. This is simply good business sense and the virus has made it timely to do so.

80% of the human race is outside the clutches of the CCP, we need to start focusing elsewhere.

Edited May 22, 2020 by Strangelovesurfing

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

 

5 hours ago, frankfurter said:

Blocking imports is one thing. Blocking exports is another. This goes against the rights and freedoms of Americans, in the name of nationalism, and is an action no different than that of a fascist or communist regime. Trump is far worse than a simple jackass. 

Please expand on how blocking exports is another? Another what exactly? Every country on earth has the right to decide how it trades. The CCP does it all the time, blocking exports, burning foreign business, encouraging riots by way of the neo-Boxers whenever it suites their purposes. 

Your real worries are showing through here Franky. In case you forgot the US didn't trade much with the Soviet block. except for food so the mighty Soviet Union wouldn't starve. Apparently you were/are under the impression that you have the right to access the US tech ecosystem, you do not have that right, the US has allowed you that Privilege of using it's IP and IT. I think your now getting the picture. 

Oh and you can save the whole China's just going to catch up faster now. Good luck with that one. China (and Russia) lost the tech race as soon as the integrated circuit was invented in....America. China decided to lock it's self in a room and punch itself in the face in the cultural revolution and great leap forward instead of R&D. They knew about the invention but the whirl-wind blew everything apart. Russia is Russia so they excel in narrow areas like physics but unfortunately cant get an all around economic ecosystem due to, well being Russia.

If you actually look inside Chinese tech companies you will see, Harvard, Yale, Stanford bla bla bla, all over their offices. Every Chinese tech company is built on a silicon valley model that requires access to the US tech ecosystem. Kick them out and it all collapses, just like whats about to happen to Huawei.

Oh and I cry no tears over that company's demise, they got their start by ripping off Motorola for base stations, Cisco next for their routers and switches, Google when the CCP hacked their servers and gave Google's algos to their internet companies to improve their search abilities.

Diamond Glass, which Huawei stole from an inventor in the US, is a very recent one, go read the Bloomberg article if you want to know more (doubt it of course). I don't know if they have figured how to make that one at this time but I do know when the sample provided from the inventor to Huawei was returned broken and missing pieces which of course violated their contract and broke export laws in the US, they analyzed it and determined it was hit with a 100Kw laser. You see Diamond Glass might possibly be useful for laser optics. Explain how a "telecommunications" company is using military grade lasers? I'm sure AT&T, British Telecom, NTT, have giant lasers they use all the time just for the fun of it.

Hi-tech, especially at the level things are at now, in the West anyway, is quite often more art and nuance than hard science. An example of what I mean by this is Intel, once they perfect a new wafer-manufacturing advance, will replicate the exact structure of the room they perfected it in including cement type, wiring, optics etc, they will even do a spectral analysis of the room. The reason they do this is due to small sub-atomic variations that can effect the wafer etching process since it's so tiny. The highest of high tech can't be stolen in a blueprint, otherwise China would be pumping out the best of everything.

Another thing about the highest of high tech, it's all a collaborative effort, you can't get one person to turn and spill all the beans. All they will know is one small part of the whole. So without access to modern (US) tech China's got to start way way back. The US isn't standing still, in 30 years when China (maybe) has progressed to where the US is now, the US will be at least another 30 years ahead.

You can only have it by good old R&D and the slow slog of invention. In order for China to 'catch' the US they must build an entire ecosystem which you cant command from the Forbidden Palace. China, at their native tech level cant even make a modern jet engine, let alone modern chip fabrication equipment. I'm being charitable, the engines in the J20, China's supposed challenger to the US F22 are 1970's Soviet design origin, improved since then but still 1970's Soviet engineering. The 'advanced' ones they are trying to make keep blowing up and as far as I know they're not making progress, neither is Russia, theres doesn't work either for the Su57 that's another old engine design, more advanced than the J20's but still old and creaky at this point.

You're obviously anti-American, yet like all anti-Americans, you just cant stop thinking about us, how sweet... big kiss back at ya! Unlike your assumption and presuming my hatred in another post, I support your RIGHT to have and express that opinion. Just like I have the right, but not your support, to express my opinion in reply. See us stupid ignorant Americans can actually deal with adverse opinions, even strong ones, without getting completely bent out of shape, you can't say that about your beloved CCP, or really China as a whole.

I find it a bit odd how your so taken aback by the US not exporting it's tech after all you cant stand America, you should be happy! Is it really just dawning on you that all the tech you have, even the stuff labeled "Made in China" completely depends on American tech? Look Franky, your using American tech (right now as you read this) voicing your opinion (or taking directives from your overlords, who knows), insulting people, I mean face it buddy your practically American already, welcome to the USA!

Edited May 22, 2020 by Strangelovesurfing

[SUZNV + 1,197]

I don't think China would take over Taiwan in near future.

Firstly motivation: Whatever CCP do, their aim is not taking over the world but to consolidate domestic power. A War for uniting China would be the last desperate effort when they feel they no longer stop the economics collapse. In that case they would take Taiwan with them and close China behind Wall for around 20-30 years to digest and wait for a chance to open up again. People living standard would degrade but CCP can say hey, that is the price to unite China. Under the ideal condition that they could capture Taiwan in short amount of time and it would be too late for US to intervene.

CCP didn't have any deed to justify their value to their people but a promise in MCGA (instead of MAGA). Kuomintang, not CCP was the main force to fight against Japan. CCP later won the civil war and Chinese people support by the promising of land reform and telling people that Kuomintang was corrupted. At first ROC China  in Taiwan claimed ownership of China and suppressed local Taiwanese but now they no longer want that ownership anymore and try to embrace local culture to separate from China, as an independent country.

Secondly, too many risks and CCP knew these themselves:

-China military is strong on land only, where they can do "zergling" with heavy artillery support, in Korean War and border skirmish with India and Vietnam. With one child policy, soldier lives are not cheap anymore. And unlike military conscription in small countries and unlike the US join Military for  cheap education, with a huge population, China have to select soldiers with good family background. China is big and people join Military is not for expansion or protect China but for political careers.

-Their navy are built and training for landing purpose. Landing has never been easy, the Normandy landing was supported by superior navy and air strength, which Nazi lacked off. Chinese navy or air didn't have much real experience working together. Take aircraft carrier (AC) as an example, not all AC were built equal. The designs, skills and technology to put as many aircraft on air as possible in short amount of time and multiple landing needs lots of skills from design, communication pilot off and landing skills,  and technologies., but AC is another story as I don't think they matter much in South East China sea. 

-After landing then what? They need strong air and sea logistic to protect supply for inland battles. Taiwan's allies don't want a total war in China mainland but cutting for supplies for battle field on sea is another story. How can China make sure other countries will not  interfere?

About chip or any high tech R&D, like any currency, CNY is bound by USD. Their unlimited spending in anything  is based on constant supplies source of USD, which is from exporting and investment. So if the USD supply cut off from no export or investment, even if China has top of the lines in high tech products, they cannot sustain it for long with only domestic market.

The idea of China to be top of the world in tech or GDP is based on the assumption that  all Western countries keep doing exactly what they did in the past decades and before Covid19 or trade war. Trade war with increase import tax or withdrawing investment is a way to cut off China USD & capital goods with a sacrifice in Consumer good. Investment in Capital goods and sacrifice consumer goods will make USD stronger, less trade deficit and a sustainably lead  in technologies and may even reduce Government's debt. 

The Western countries government (and maybe the people) were arrogant after the Soviet Union collapsed and thought China would open its economy which lead to democracy and the collapse of CCP, a big happy ending. The western governments have  no intermediate threat so they are getting more and more bureaucracy and overlook the rise China or human rights or national interest.

 

[SUZNV + 1,197]

1 hour ago, Ward Smith said:

Nonsense. Taiwan at no time has claimed ownership of the South China Sea. 

That Taiwan believes it is the rightful government of China is no longer true, but was definitely a tenet of the Guomingdong Party. However, they're no longer in power in case you haven't noticed. 

They conveniently  "confuse" between claiming  islands, reefs, banks with claimed ownership of the South China Sea and kick all other countries' fishing boats out of it.

The nine dash was based on a ROC China map drawn with pencil and then later on CCP used it as an evident to claim South China Sea.  Your are right, ROC China never claimed ownership of it.

Edited May 22, 2020 by SUZNV

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

13 minutes ago, SUZNV said:

I don't think China would take over Taiwan in near future.

Firstly motivation: Whatever CCP do, their aim is not taking over the world but to consolidate domestic power. A War for uniting China would be the last desperate effort when they feel they no longer stop the economics collapse. In that case they would take Taiwan with them and close China behind Wall for around 20-30 years to digest and wait for a chance to open up again. People living standard would degrade but CCP can say hey, that is the price to unite China. Under the ideal condition that they could capture Taiwan in short amount of time and it would be too late for US to intervene.

CCP didn't have any deed to justify their value to their people but a promise in MCGA (instead of MAGA). Kuomintang, not CCP was the main force to fight against Japan. CCP later won the civil war and Chinese people support by the promising of land reform and telling people that Kuomintang was corrupted. At first ROC China  in Taiwan claimed ownership of China and suppressed local Taiwanese but now they no longer want that ownership anymore and try to embrace local culture to separate from China, as an independent country.

Secondly, too many risks and CCP knew these themselves:

-China military is strong on land only, where they can do "zergling" with heavy artillery support, in Korean War and border skirmish with India and Vietnam. With one child policy, soldier lives are not cheap anymore. And unlike military conscription in small countries and unlike the US join Military for  cheap education, with a huge population, China have to select soldiers with good family background. China is big and people join Military is not for expansion or protect China but for political careers.

-Their navy are built and training for landing purpose. Landing has never been easy, the Normandy landing was supported by superior navy and air strength, which Nazi lacked off. Chinese navy or air didn't have much real experience working together. Take aircraft carrier (AC) as an example, not all AC were built equal. The designs, skills and technology to put as many aircraft on air as possible in short amount of time and multiple landing needs lots of skills from design, communication pilot off and landing skills,  and technologies., but AC is another story as I don't think they matter much in South East China sea. 

-After landing then what? They need strong air and sea logistic to protect supply for inland battles. Taiwan's allies don't want a total war in China mainland but cutting for supplies for battle field on sea is another story. How can China make sure other countries will not  interfere?

About chip or any high tech R&D, like any currency, CNY is bound by USD. Their unlimited spending in anything  is based on constant supplies source of USD, which is from exporting and investment. So if the USD supply cut off from no export or investment, even if China has top of the lines in high tech products, they cannot sustain it for long with only domestic market.

The idea of China to be top of the world in tech or GDP is based on the assumption that  all Western countries keep doing exactly what they did in the past decades and before Covid19 or trade war. Trade war with increase import tax or withdrawing investment is a way to cut off China USD & capital goods with a sacrifice in Consumer good. Investment in Capital goods and sacrifice consumer goods will make USD stronger, less trade deficit and a sustainably lead  in technologies and may even reduce Government's debt. 

The Western countries government (and maybe the people) were arrogant after the Soviet Union collapsed and thought China would open its economy which lead to democracy and the collapse of CCP, a big happy ending. The western governments have  no intermediate threat so they are getting more and more bureaucracy and overlook the rise China or human rights or national interest.

 

Please review my comments about McMasters state visit to China.  A few years ago Indonesia banned exports of Nickel, as they have the largest known Nickel deposits, this can be an issue. This happened the same time a giant Chinese Stainless Steel smelter in Indonesia came on line. Nickel is necessary to produce Stainless Steel and countries will have to come begging to China for supplies if the CCP gets it way. The CCP may not want to "take over" the world, they are seeking to make the nations of the world dependent, helpless vassal states who cannot question the CCP without having critical supplies withheld.

Edited May 22, 2020 by Strangelovesurfing