broadsword
Brigadier
In the Huawei case, USA has the perfect alibi.
Trade War with China
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In the Huawei case, USA has the perfect alibi.
If US goes after TSMC and they cave, and a rare earth ban doesn't work, Chinese government could offer Taiwan independence in exchange for transfer of ownership of TSMC and all tech know how to mainland China.
This is not realistic. The best thing China can do is become self-sufficient in terms of machine tools and fund SMIC.
Everyone who knows the sector knows that in the end, because of the increasing machine tools costs, driving up fab cost, only someone with a lot of capital can win. The most likely winners will be foundries. Even Intel is feeling the squeeze now. They can't fully use their fabs to pay them up. So they bought an FPGA vendor to drive volume up. Still not enough. Someone like Samsung can prevail because memory has huge volumes. That is one reason why Intel tried going back to the memory space after leaving it for decades but they simply don't have the stomach to compete at razor thin margins like Samsung.
The process technology itself can always be acquired, just like SMIC did, by headhunting experts from the competition to catch up.
UMC also used to do this in Taiwan.
manqiangrexue
Brigadier
BULLLLL. SHIIEETT!!
Others have already said so, but I think the scale of such a suggestion warrants some more emphasis:
Taiwan's status is not something to be negotiated over or away.
So you agree it would be a deal so good that the Taiwan could not turn it down? Many in the intel committee concur the real reason why US doesn't actually want Taiwan independence is not because it would cross any CCP 'red lines' but because America is using Taiwan as a pawn to hedge its bets. In that if one day the CCP fell from grace and China (mainland) collapsed, it would immediately install Taiwan as the puppet government of all of China. By Taiwan going independent, it prevents anything like that from happening.
One strategic point of contention has always been Taiwan blocks China's access to the sea since it is a vassal of the USA. But Xi's BRI will make this much less of an issue. Once BRI is built, the days of naval blockades of economically cripple China /trade will be a thing of the past. Just like aircraft cariers are getting increasingly useless and becoming symbolic power projections when in the era of kinetic kill and hypersonic missiles.
By "giving up" Taiwan it takes a lot of pressure off Beijing's plate, and at the same time it prevents the US from using Taiwan as a constant thorn in Beijings side. If this trade/deal allows China to instantly overnight catch up to the rest of the world in terms of chip manufacturing then long term it could be a good strategic move for China. It is all about moving up the tech value chain, the first to AI dominance will win forever. There is no second place.
manqiangrexue
Brigadier
I don't agree with shit. We can all throw nukes and keep fighting in hell before we even talk about an independent Taiwan. Any Chinese who talks about giving Taiwan independence has lost my respect forever.
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I would recommend you stop this track of argument before you inflame things further.
You might be new to Chinese historical, cultural, and strategic rationale, or you may be not. But I want to put this simply: the idea of "giving up" Taiwan for something like TSMC is simply ludicrous.
There are obviously strategic reasons for why China will not give up on its desire to reunify with Taiwan. But perhaps the core reason is because of Chinese history and the desire to correct the aberration of history which China today perceives and to seek justice and correction of the various territorial, security, economic and sovereign losses China experienced in the 19th and 20th century, of which the Taiwan issue is a continuation of.
It is not something to be traded away, but Taiwan is instead something that China is willing to go to hell for if it comes to conflict and will seek to demonstrate that it is willing to take anyone to hell with them if they seek otherwise.
I hope you recognize the severity of your suggestion and stop it there, lest you end up getting even more people piling atop you on this matter.
So if TSMC gets pressured into blocking all of China, and US tells Intel and AMD to cut all relationship with all Chinese companies... what do people suggest be done? Short of hoping US gets stuck in Iran/Venezula allowing China to invade Taiwan and take over TSMC and other companies by force, I don't see a good outcome for China here. US has taken drastic action, and so far Xi hasn't even done a rare earth export ban yet.
Well China's certainly not going to talk about giving Taiwan independence, for one, so let's take that idea off the table, burn it in the fireplace, and flush the ashes down the toilet first.
If your suggestion occurs, the result will be that China will have to resort to its own domestic foundries instead. Not an optimal solution, but with demand comes opportunity and motivation. Even if it means a significant lag in technology of ICs for a number of years, the result will be one where China will be forced to become self sufficient and competitive in this industry or not.
Various other means can be made to try and bring in technology from foreign companies to expedite the process or to avoid US pressure as well, to find and create holes in the blockade.
All of those options are sensible and logical.
But I really don't know in what universe it would make sense for someone to think that a logical move for China should be to give Taiwan independence for TSMC???
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