BEIJING: The U.S. Department of Commerce on October 7 announced a sweeping set of export controls on technologies, including unprecedented steps to limit the sale of advanced computer chips to China, on the grounds of so-called national security concerns. Washington’s ban on hi-tech exports to China marks a huge gambit for economic supremacy for the next decades, with the Chinese Government referring to the move as “typical sci-tech hegemony.”
The U.S. has been strictly limiting the Chinese semiconductor industry’s access to key technologies, such as high-performance computing chips and chip-making equipment, plus the Entity List featuring 260 Chinese entities consisting of mainly companies and research institutions involved in 5G, artificial intelligence (AI) and other advanced technologies. It intends to curb China’s upward momentum in AI and supercomputing development.
The U.S. is simply trying everything possible to trip up China’s sci-tech progress. Last month, U.S. Congress passed the CHIPS and Science Act, meaning U.S. semiconductor companies that accept incentives as part of the $280-billion act will be barred from investing in China.
These practices reflect a gloomy American state of mind, one unwilling to see others make sci-tech progress and always attempting to preserve its supremacy by knocking any potential challengers off course. Its abuse of export controls goes against both the principle of fair competition as well as international trading rules, and will inevitably disrupt the global semiconductor supply chain as well as international trade on the whole.
–The Daily Mail-Beijing review news exchange item
