[totalZero]

I don't think they're worried about China's military so much as China's independence from the rest of the semiconductor supply chain. When you give China a machine, it's only a matter of time before they reverse engineer it and make something slightly worse but much cheaper. This kind of theft is backed by the government. So the expectation that they will remain forever dependent upon ASML is wishful thinking.

[Taniwha]

But surely that should be ASML's choice?

[someperson]

ASML machines include a large amount of technology from the US, and so can be controlled under US export control laws.

A country is free to develop all those technologies locally and not face US export control, but that's such a difficult task that nobody has achieved it.

[anonuser123456]

_Every_ country is subject to US technology transfer laws if they want to retain access to the global banking system.

The US can simply put an offending company on a black list and every financial institution will drop them.

[Taniwha]

ASML is a Dutch company that doesn't export from the US

[Slikey]

That doesn't matter. If they want to export TO the US they are subject to US export laws. The US has a history of their economical and political power forcing companies that have no business with the US to do their bidding to stay in business. Just look at the Iran sanctions.

[Spooky23]

History has demonstrated that public companies aren’t going to make the right choice from a Western POV.

Short term gain always beats strategic defeat.

[blackrock]

> When you give China a machine, it's only a matter of time before they reverse engineer it and make something slightly worse but much cheaper

> This kind of theft

You called what they did “reverse engineering.” But then you next called it theft.

Why?

Reverse Engineering is not theft. It’s a follower route, where you build the same thing that someone else had built. You don’t even need their blueprints. You can just work off of their output, and work backwards.

One famous reverse engineering company was Compaq, which reverse engineered the IBM PC, with the nod from Microsoft to make their own PC compatible clone. Was this also theft? And was this also a crime in your worldview?

Another example is the atomic bomb. Once America proved that a nuclear fission bomb was possible, then it was only a matter of time before another country reproduced it.

[someperson]

Compaq did a clean room reverse engineering effort of the IBM BIOS for interoperability. Under US law this is completely legitimate.

China can and should do clean room reverse engineering for whatever technology they want to, and sell the resultant work back to the US (contingent on other IP restrictions of course)

And the US and Netherlands are well within their rights to block equipment equipment to China on grounds that it will be used by a unfriendly military.

The atomic bomb example is not just about "the principle has been proven", it was also a story of Soviet Union spies within the Manhattan Project.