No Evidence That China Can Make Advanced Chips 'at Scale,' US Says (bloomberg.com) 112
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said she was "upset" when China's Huawei released a new phone with an advanced chip during her visit to the country last month but noted that the US has no evidence China can make those components "at scale." From a report: "We are trying to use every single tool at our disposal to deny the Chinese the ability to advance their technology in ways that can hurt us," Raimondo testified at a congressional hearing Tuesday. The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security this month opened an investigation into Huawei's phone and the "purported" 7-nanometer chip, made by China's Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp, which was discovered in a teardown of the handset that TechInsights conducted for Bloomberg News. It is unclear whether SMIC has approval from Commerce to supply Huawei, which has been blacklisted by the US. Raimondo said she won't comment on any active investigations, but that the Commerce Department will investigate every time it appears a company may have violated US export controls.
Good on China (Score:2, Troll)
Let the americans believe stuff...
Re:Good on China (Score:4, Informative)
Let the americans believe stuff...
There's also no evidence the USA can make advanced chips at scale (by themselves).
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Fair but the USA also doesn't have a knowledge or partnership problem. TSMC and others are more than happy to build fabs here, there are no meaningful restrictions on the USA , chip designers like Apple, Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, NVidia are all USA based and important suppliers like ASML are free to sell to companies in the USA.
Given a lack of restrictions I would safely imagine China would also have no real issues either but in the case of USA the only things that would stop chipmaking at scale is political w
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Fair but the USA also doesn't have a knowledge or partnership problem.
It should be noted that the US is a latecomer to the game of placing restrictions and embargoes on Chinese chip making. Taiwan has been wary of China for decades already and has long had many rules about what TSMC and other Taiwanese companies can and cannot do in China in an attempt to keep leading edge technology away from China. Unfortunately for Taiwan and TSMC, rules about bribery and enticement are easier to legislate than to enforce. China doesn't have a lot of friends, but it has a lot of money,
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add to that China's education system is far from being the worst in the world, they sprout hundred of thousands of high level engineers every year...
Re: Good on China (Score:1)
The PRC has no shortage of friends, actually.
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Technically the US can make advanced chips and at massive scale, but we don't have a way to package them. We put them on a boat and ship them to Taiwan to be packaged.
I feel like China maybe isn't capable of manufacturing these chips in 2023. But I think 18 months or less is all it would take if they are serious about acquiring the capability. Perhaps less if a convenient opportunity to invade Taiwan presents itself.
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Re:Good on China (Score:4, Interesting)
But I think 18 months or less is all it would take if they are serious about acquiring the capability. Perhaps less if a convenient opportunity to invade Taiwan presents itself.
Then you would think wrong. With current technology, it requires using EUV machines which only one company in the world makes, ASML. Before sanctions, China secured two machines. It remains to be seen the existing working condition of those machines with no assistance or parts from ASML. TSMC has dozens of ASML EUV machines per node by comparison. Acquiring enough EUV without sanctions would have been difficult as there is a long waiting list.
China has touted that they can use exiting and older DUV technology to make chips; however, those were for comparatively simpler chips. Adapting DUV to make 3nm and smaller would require years of R&D at a minimum. 18 months for research and implementation of research is not likely.
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If money is no object, the answer is a definite yes, we can.
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Let the americans believe stuff...
What else can Raimondo say? "The sanctions placed on my watch were completely useless and now had the opposite effect"? Or "That was my most shameful moment in my life, we lost"? Not unless she did not mind losing her job.
I think the projected sales of the new Huawei Mate60 is something like 30-40 million in the first year? If a few dozen million chips a year is still not "at scale", I am not sure where in the world can produce chips "at scale".
"Cool" said the Ostrich (Score:1, Troll)
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as it buried its head back in the sand.
The fact that people still believe that they do this just shows how gullible they are.
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I doubt the commenter meant it literally.
What's really wild about human behavior is it is not hard to run into people who swear to have personally seen an ostrich do this.
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All the ostriches I've run into have all glared at me with a "step out of line and I'll kill you" look, even the supposedly tame ones. I can only imagine that the idea they were timid came from someone that's never seen one up close.
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Sounds like typical dinosaur behavior. Geese and swans also have little black hearts filled with murderous intent. Geese are less dangerous theoretically, but the psychologically the amount of malice they radiate should not be underestimated.
These "indigenous" chips are licensed from USA (Score:2)
These so-called "indigenous" chips are all licensed from USA firms like MIPS (Longsoon), VIA (Zhaoxin), and AMD (Hygon).
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Note that VIA's two architectures are from USA firms.
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note that China doesn't really give a hoot about imaginary property
Re: These "indigenous" chips are licensed from USA (Score:2)
Re:These "indigenous" chips are licensed from USA (Score:4, Funny)
AMD started by licencing Intel designs, Intel currently licences AMD64.
Everyone licences ARM.
China does have home grown designs. Not just CPUs, they have GPUs as well. Gamers Nexus reviewed them recently. They are very much a first generation product, only play certain games that are popular in China properly, but they are improving fast too.
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You can also get unlicensed ARM and MIPS in China. RISC-V is potentially an attractive architecture when it comes to licensing. But that architecture is not going to be displacing anything "advanced" any time soon.
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AMD started by licencing Intel designs, Intel currently licences AMD64.
Everyone licences ARM.
China does have home grown designs. Not just CPUs, they have GPUs as well. Gamers Nexus reviewed them recently. They are very much a first generation product, only play certain games that are popular in China properly, but they are improving fast too.
I suspect like many of China's other "home grown" high tech industries they are highly dependent on importing huge parts of it in from the west. The C919 airliner is largely using US and European components (I.E. Honeywell, Thales, GE/Safran/RR for engines) and assembled in China, their high speed trains are European and imported in CKD (Complete Knock Down) kit.
The idea that China is going to overtake the west is as ludicrous as the notion that the US is the bestest at everything.
Russia has tried for
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Keep telling yourself that. Meanwhile, here's Huawei's self driving car coping well with chaotic Chinese traffic and blocked intersections: https://youtu.be/yGfpi7TOZ78 [youtu.be]
I'm sure it was all stolen from Waymo/Tesla, despite somehow being better than their tech. Note that it's not just the self driving software, they have low cost, high performance LIDAR that they developed too.
Peter Zeihan on this (Score:1)
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That may be true (Score:2)
but why listen to the Commerce Secretary? There are industry sources that are better-able to comment on the situation than her.
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But she's the official spokescritter for the US government, she could never be wrong, could she? /sarcasm
No evidence _YET_! (Score:2, Funny)
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Yeah, they're stealing technology so fast that Huawei somehow was able to implement 5G networks first in the world.
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easy, first you steal the schematics for the time machine, then you just download everything else from the future.
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Your meme is a bit outdated. China graduated more engineers and scientists last year than the rest of the world combined, and they also filed more patents than any other country. The days when China copied foreign firms are rapidly passing, the US is soon going to be copying Chinese designs.
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China graduated more engineers and scientists last year than the rest of the world combined
Hmm, I'm not sure that is true. It's hard to find consistent numbers, but India also produces a large number of college graduates each year. China and India each produce more college graduates each year than the US. However, it's not clear how well China and India are able to utilize those graduates and how much those graduates contribute toward each country's economy and scientific advancement. China has been having great challenges finding employment for its most recent graduates, and India's economy
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the main issue is that the US population is pretty badly educated, and half of them can't read something somewhat complicated as explained in https://www.snopes.com/news/20... [snopes.com]
see the full study here https://www.barbarabush.org/wp... [barbarabush.org]
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Re: No evidence _YET_! (Score:2)
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Just another example (Score:2)
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"One thing that we learn from history is that our leaders rarely learn anything from history." - historian Barbara Tuchman in 'The March of Folly'
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the government is just a tool for a bunch of hyper rich motherfuckers that run this planet. once you realize that simple fact, a lot of really weird stuff suddenly makes a lot of sense. it's a miracle we aren't extinct already. or a curse, not sure.
US Security (Score:2)
How is 7nm Chinese chip is going to hurt USA? But 10nm will not?
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It hurts our feelings.
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You might want to buy a phone with a 7 nm chip in it, but you'd probably choose a competitor over one with a 10 nm chip.
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Most people don't buy flagship phones. The market for the non-bleeding edge is pretty big, and pretty lucrative for a rising country like China.
Yes, the US seems to be determined to deny China not only the high end market but also the middle. Or maybe they just want everyone to have no choice but to use American or Korean phones. For reasons.
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Lol. I'm not going to go and look up CPU processes by phone to find you examples. Google "Samsung S20" (one of your examples) and you'll find lots for sale.
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Lol. I'm not going to go and look up CPU processes by phone to find you examples.
So you made a statement and will not provide evidence when asked. Got it.
Google "Samsung S20" (one of your examples) and you'll find lots for sale.
And I can find the original iPhone (2007) for sale online too if your criteria is to ignore sales of NEW phones. By that criteria, can alter your statement like this: "You might want to buy a phone with a 7 nm chip in it, but you'd probably choose a competitor over one with a 90 nm chip."
Excuses and rationalizations are not a strategy. (Score:2)
We know that, but sources like Gloomberg love undermining their alleged audience.
Bloomberg reports not trustworthy (Score:1)
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Are you sure you weren't thinking of this [theregister.com]?
Or maybe this? [theguardian.com]
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Seems about right. I'm sure China is doing some of this stuff, but they seem to be much better at it since the evidence usually amounts to "secret intelligence assessment says." On the other hand, the US and American companies get caught red handed over and over.
Again, saying the quiet part out loud. (Score:2, Insightful)
"We are trying to use every single tool at our disposal to deny the Chinese the ability to advance their technology in ways that can hurt us,"
Concerns about human rights, industrial espionage, etc are just a sideshow. The REAL goal is simply to keep Chinese people down.
Let that be a warning to India, and upstart African countries. The US will intentionally cripple you if you dare try to improve to unacceptably high living standards.
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In the US, there were the Tulsa riots, where lazy whites were jealous of the success of the nearby black neighbourhood, so they destroyed their neighbourhood.
In Australia, there were the Lambing Flats riots where lazy whites were angry that Chinese miners worked a bit harder, and had success finding gold in the mines that lazy whites left behind. Then Australia instituted the White Australia Policy, to safeguard white laziness.
For all the
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Idiot (Score:2)
She is an idiot. Or at least a liar.
Common man (Score:2)
Common man will love China as long as it produces High Quality@Reasonable Price https://archive.is/tiqb8 [archive.is]
Re:If there is ONE thing I still donâ(TM)t ge (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:If there is ONE thing I still donâ(TM)t ge (Score:5, Insightful)
Many north-americans have been raised to believe that they "own the world", that they "are the best and smartest on the planet", etc and etc. And then they become enraged when the real world shows them that they are not all that they think they are.
I'm not sure why this got marked troll. It's 100% true. I was raised during one of those generations where we were told, constantly, that America is best at everything, always, and nobody could ever compete with us. If you still believe that rah-rah bullshit by the time you got to high school you were never very inquisitive to begin with. And I graduated right before the Internet became a common thing. It was still impossible to ignore how utterly ludicrous the idea was if you studied any aspect of history, any aspect of where the rest of the world was at the time, or investigated, even a tiny little bit, the claims of our superiority.
The only people that still believe America is bestest of the bestest at everything and absolutely owns the world are either completely disconnected from reality (a shocking number of people alive today), trolling, or extremely misinformed. Which, past a certain age now, is absolutely a personal choice. A personal choice I don't understand, but a choice some people make.
Anybody thinking me noticing we aren't the superior country in the world means I hate America? Piss off. I wish we were. I'd work to make it happen if I had any idea how to fight against the status-quoers who seem convinced that where we are is the best we can be. Their holding us back, but seem to think holding us back is the best we can do. More's the pity.
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I'm not sure why this got marked troll.
really? with your id? this is a classic. there has always been a small but dedicated portion of /. users that moderates any inconvenient truth as "troll". it's a knee jerk reaction much in line with precisely the sub-topic in discussion, as they are a hilarious but grim metaphor of the us elite reacting to a changing world. the comparisons of the us with the roman empire never were so apt. it's called decadence. now you know.
Re:If there is ONE thing I still donâ(TM)t ge (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not sure why this got marked troll.
really? with your id? this is a classic. there has always been a small but dedicated portion of /. users that moderates any inconvenient truth as "troll". it's a knee jerk reaction much in line with precisely the sub-topic in discussion, as they are a hilarious but grim metaphor of the us elite reacting to a changing world. the comparisons of the us with the roman empire never were so apt. it's called decadence. now you know.
I've often heard America described as the only country in the history of the world that went right from barbarism to decadence with no attempt at civilization in between. Having lived through some of the transitory period, I'd say that's pretty apt.
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I've often heard America described as the only country in the history of the world that went right from barbarism to decadence with no attempt at civilization in between. Having lived through some of the transitory period, I'd say that's pretty apt.
Given the prevalence of states with a death penalty, it's debatable whether or not America ever left barbarism.
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I've often heard America described as the only country in the history of the world that went right from barbarism to decadence with no attempt at civilization in between. Having lived through some of the transitory period, I'd say that's pretty apt.
Given the prevalence of states with a death penalty, it's debatable whether or not America ever left barbarism.
Decadence can look a lot like barbarism if you squint a bit.
Kill or be killed - barbarism.
Kill because FUCK YEAH! - decadence.
Having watched a few death penalty trials happen at one point, there's a rather loud minority that are obsessed with killing folks that break the law. Yeah, some of these people have done some horrible shit, but a civilized country would at least try to figure out why, or maybe, gods forbid, try to rehabilitate them. But here, you hear a lot of shit like, "That scum isn't worth savin
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Yeah, some of these people have done some horrible shit, but a civilized country would at least try to figure out why, or maybe, gods forbid, try to rehabilitate them.
Rehabilitation is out of reach for literal psychopaths, but I'm anti-death penalty simply because I know the "justice" system is fallible and death is inconveniently irreversible. Our society is rich enough to warehouse a few psychopaths for their lifetimes to avoid permanent mistakes. Gandalf spoke true, as usual.
I'm nearly fifty. I just never quite "matured" into the hatred and bigotry most seem to think makes up "being conservative" like we're "supposed" to do as we age.
There's a theory that we don't get more conservative as we age. Instead we stay in one place while society trends more and more liberal around us.
As with all rules about human social behavior,
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The only people that still believe America is bestest of the bestest at everything and absolutely owns the world are either completely disconnected from reality (a shocking number of people alive today), trolling, or extremely misinformed.
Unfortunately, the majority of Americans are in the above category.
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The only people that still believe America is bestest of the bestest at everything and absolutely owns the world are either completely disconnected from reality (a shocking number of people alive today), trolling, or extremely misinformed.
Unfortunately, the majority of Americans are in the above category.
What's truly unfortunate is the number of folks who seem to do it as a deliberate choice, rather than out of ignorance. Fantasy is so much more fun than reality.
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Possibility 1: Some American didn't like the implication that it's not true.
Possibility 2: Someone from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean or Greenland didn't like being lumped in with the Americans.
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It's how they control people. They have to be convinced that the US is best, and therefore every other social and economic system is inferior. Weak worker's rights, healthcare dependent on your employer, minimal social safety nets, individuals not unions, a political system of elites - none of it can be improved upon. You might not like it, but everywhere else is worse.
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the word you're looking for is "hubris"
https://www.merriam-webster.co... [merriam-webster.com]
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It's just plain old propaganda. The same concept as Russia bombing the crap out of Ukrainian cities then yelling terrorism when Ukraine hits Moscow or their fleet with some drones. The goal is to promote conflict: every offensive move your side makes is good and virtuous while anything offensive the other guys do is evil.
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speaking of ... did you know (do you read the ny times, that chinese-soviet-imperialist-puitn-lover propaganda machine?) that the missile that blew up that market in ukraine in which 16 civilians died and prompted zelensky's enraged condemnation of putin as a "terrorist" and genocidal madman ... was actually launched by ukraine and missed the target?
what's that ... aficionado level terrorism?
Re:If there is ONE thing I still donâ(TM)t ge (Score:4, Informative)
And the bigger issue is that China is devolving politically into a cult of personality-dictatorship, which are very risky for global security. If this was an actual democratically elected government that had no designs on taking over it's neighbors militarily [cnn.com] and actually produced it's technology domestically rather than legally allowing Chinese manufacturers to copy foreign products and compete with their customers [harrisbricken.com] or even just outright pretend to be another company by ripping off your brand [daxueconsulting.com], then the US wouldn't really have a problem. But that's just not the way the CCP has chosen to do business.
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that's called sharing knowledge, it's the most basic way humanity advances.
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You have a strange way of viewing history.
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All the usual innuendo. If you follow your very first link, for example, you will note that the reactor is not a copy. It was developed from a licenced design, with paid help from Westinghouse. The Chinese design is improved, taking output from 1,000MW to 1,400MW. That's a completely normal thing to do, and the original was based on some Japanese technology from parent company Toshiba, which itself got some of the tech from Mitsubishi and Hitachi.
By the way, copyright and Western licences are enforceable in
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Americans are the most propagandized people in the world. It's quite amazing the things that they can be made to believe, but that's the magic of the advertising industry I suppose.
I remember when I was in college in the '90s that China wanted to update it's ancient creaking telecom system, there was extensive discussion in the industry whether they could raise the $4 billion in foreign exchange to accomplish it. My how things change . . .
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Like it or lump it but the USA has a definite preference for nations that are both liberal democracies and generally participating in the global trade marketplace of capitalism. If China doesn't do things such as continually threating Taiwan, getting into island land disputes with other regional nations, going through with their early takeover of Hong Kong is such public fashion, effectively electing Xi "for life", partaking in a little bit of light genocide with the Uyghurs, provoking the US and other nav
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Yeah I'm not gonna argue that HK was ever going to be, or even should be independent but HK was supposed to retain autonomy over itself for another 50, so 2047 and China went around that (from what i've read, don't know if this was ever treatified so maybe they had every right).
That said the way HK protested and the way China effectively put down dissent was what I would classify as not a great look to other countries in the region or US/EU in general. From Chinas POV they basically won though, they got wh
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What do you think the Federal Gov't would do if any US state began agitating for "independence" from the union? There is a historical precedent of that actually happening in the US you know.
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Kind of depends on whether there was an agreement to said autonomy for an agreed upon period beforehand, that's the contention here, not that HK should secede from China.
Lot's of US states were also territories with quite a bit of autonomy but still part of the US here, I think that might be a more accurate descriptor here.
Also no matter what the terms are something like the US Civil War did and should give other nations concern and pause about how they should interact with the US. Not a great look
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You people aren't even grasping why there was a treaty to negotiate the handover of Hong Kong to China. After all, the UK only "leased" Hong Kong, not actually claimed "sovereignty". The UK is essentially a bigoted, if not racist state. They didn't want to have millions of Hong Kong residents "fleeing" to the UK before the lease expired. Coincidentally, the Chinese didn't want Hong Kong residents to flee to the UK either, given that HK was the banking capital of Asia at the time, and China needed the we
Re:If there is ONE thing I still donâ(TM)t ge (Score:4, Interesting)
Taiwan fought for their independence, it was not a lease.
Taiwan never fought for independence, and that's the tragedy of Taiwan's current dilemma. Taiwan was occupied by the Japanese from 1895 to 1945. Then it was occupied by the Nationalists from 1949 to the 90's or so when democracy was introduced.
Chiang Kai-shek could have fought for Taiwanese independence in the 60's and 70's, but he didn't because he wasn't Taiwanese and couldn't care less about the Taiwanese people. That's why he imposed martial law and massacred Taiwanese people. And that's why he staunchly advocated Taiwan's place as a small province in the Chinese empire. And that's why he didn't want Taiwanese independence and dreamed of abandoning his temporary retreat and retaking his homeland. Imagine how much less tension there would be in that part of the world if Chiang had asked for independence and Nixon had championed that as a condition of normalizing relations with China.
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While what you said are mostly true, you're still biased toward the western stance. Taiwanese were from Fujian and other southeastern China area, has been governed by Chinese government [wikipedia.org] since at least 1171, and rescued by [wikipedia.org] the mainland government many times. If that doesn't proved it is part of China, what would? How does that history compared to that of Hawaii, Guam, Texas, California, and, ooops, the whole USA?
And you are totally wrong here:
Nixon had championed that as a condition of normalizing relations with China.
He didn't and couldn't because Taiwan is just a pawn of the USA [wikipedia.org] in
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While what you said are mostly true, you're still biased toward the western stance. Taiwanese were from Fujian and other southeastern China area, has been governed by Chinese government [wikipedia.org] since at least 1171, and rescued by [wikipedia.org] the mainland government many times. If that doesn't proved it is part of China, what would?
The current Taiwanese Han mostly trace back 400 years to the beginning of the substantial migration from Fujian. However, aside from speaking a common Hokkien dialect, there is essentially no cultural association with Fujian, as most Taiwanese simply view Fujian as just another mainland province. Historically, even the Ming didn't care much about Taiwan, and it was treated more like an outpost or minor colony than a province. The Ming owned Taiwan more than they governed it. The Qing continued that indi
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Taiwan never fought for independence
That is a very bizarre way of expressing history. Apparently, you're unaware of the battles of Matsu and Kimoy. The nationalist Chinese gov't fought to retain possession of those islands from the communist CCP. You are correct that the Chiang Kai-shek didn't give a rats ass about what the local Taiwanese wanted, thus the repressive occupation.
Chiang Kai-shek won that "war" by default; the CCP couldn't mount an offensive that required moving armies across a 99 mile moat. Hell, the PLA couldn't even conqu
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The latter certainly. The former, not really. The US counts as close allies some of the most repressive authoritarian regimes still existing in the world. They've also been responsible for installing a number of distinctly illiberal non-democracies.
Moral anchor (Score:2, Troll)
Like, are Americans actually lacking an essential part of the normal psyche which would allow for a coherent perception of how humans operate?
Pretty much.
The moral anchor here is genocide. There's no longer any doubt about what the Chinese have been doing to the Uyghurs, and it's not something that the good guys do. China is the baddies [youtube.com].
(And no, the fact that the US committed genocide 100 years in the past is not relevant, nor is having slavery 150 years in the past. We've evolved, we've decided that humans have inalienable rights, and the rest of the Western world is in agreement.)
Any normal psyche considers people of a different tribe as non-pe
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and the US have been committing genocide much more recenty...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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there's a whole wikipedia page for this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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I used to think this is just complete lack of self-awareness, egotism, or something along those lines. But now I am starting to think it is mental illness to be this oblivious.
As a matter of practicality how does China acquire technology like EUV that is so difficult that only one company in the world makes. The Dutch company, ASML, is the only company that makes EUV machines. The Americans fell behind on the lithography race decades ago. And the Japanese conceded their lead to ASML. Those countries were not under sanctions.