That’s right about not being over dependent on an unfriendly nation, and we’ve certainly slipped from what America used to produce. Even if we had the skilled workers, right now this country doesn’t have the factories to meet the industrial challenge of World War 2.
But if you read about how humiliated and exploited China was by Japan …
That’s right about not being over dependent on an unfriendly nation, and we’ve certainly slipped from what America used to produce. Even if we had the skilled workers, right now this country doesn’t have the factories to meet the industrial challenge of World War 2.
But if you read about how humiliated and exploited China was by Japan and the West it’s understandable why this country wants to flex its military and economic muscles. Visiting there I loved seeing the thousands of years of history, and yet one can’t forget that while from 1800 to 1950 the West was industrializing, the average Chinese was also becoming poorer. A reaction to those abusive years is normal, though China is certainly pushing out hard, such as the “9 Dash Line” showing what it wants to control in the sea east of it, massive construction and trade projects around the world, and very overtly spreading its influence across the Indian Ocean. Their strategy is smart, planning decades ahead and unlike the U.S. sending in business rather than military people. And they certainly don’t rile local regimes by saying they should be democracies with civil rights.
But the situation is complicated because a lot of those Taiwanese chips are sent to mainland China for processing into devices like phones and computers. So it’s just not a matter of making chips here, but actually being able to do something with them. That means recreating a manufacturing base, with presumably decent wages (and hopefully energetic unions) as well as doing environmental controls right this time. And to make this work an educated workforce with decent transportation to reach the factories is also needed. Of course all this will cost a lot of money and what is produced will be more expensive than what we’re now buying. So those are real political concerns too.
Of course no one knows where they future is going to go, though we can steer things a bit. Having grown up with periodic war scares when China threatened to invade Taiwan I’d hate to go back to the bad old days. After reneging on the same promises to Hong Kong, nobody is buying Beijing’s offer to make Taiwan a self-governing part of the People’s Republic. One thing is clear though, like oil and other critical commodities, being over dependent for them from a shaky part of the world is not good for any country.
That’s right about not being over dependent on an unfriendly nation, and we’ve certainly slipped from what America used to produce. Even if we had the skilled workers, right now this country doesn’t have the factories to meet the industrial challenge of World War 2.
But if you read about how humiliated and exploited China was by Japan and the West it’s understandable why this country wants to flex its military and economic muscles. Visiting there I loved seeing the thousands of years of history, and yet one can’t forget that while from 1800 to 1950 the West was industrializing, the average Chinese was also becoming poorer. A reaction to those abusive years is normal, though China is certainly pushing out hard, such as the “9 Dash Line” showing what it wants to control in the sea east of it, massive construction and trade projects around the world, and very overtly spreading its influence across the Indian Ocean. Their strategy is smart, planning decades ahead and unlike the U.S. sending in business rather than military people. And they certainly don’t rile local regimes by saying they should be democracies with civil rights.
But the situation is complicated because a lot of those Taiwanese chips are sent to mainland China for processing into devices like phones and computers. So it’s just not a matter of making chips here, but actually being able to do something with them. That means recreating a manufacturing base, with presumably decent wages (and hopefully energetic unions) as well as doing environmental controls right this time. And to make this work an educated workforce with decent transportation to reach the factories is also needed. Of course all this will cost a lot of money and what is produced will be more expensive than what we’re now buying. So those are real political concerns too.
Of course no one knows where they future is going to go, though we can steer things a bit. Having grown up with periodic war scares when China threatened to invade Taiwan I’d hate to go back to the bad old days. After reneging on the same promises to Hong Kong, nobody is buying Beijing’s offer to make Taiwan a self-governing part of the People’s Republic. One thing is clear though, like oil and other critical commodities, being over dependent for them from a shaky part of the world is not good for any country.