I think it's more nuanced. Left to develop it on their own, they might not succeed with a catch up effort in 5 years. Or 10. But in 20 years probably. 30 years certainly.
Everything in competition is about time and effort. No one cares if they figure it out 20 years down the road. It literally won't matter at that point, because the US will have much better by then. The world may be a different place, etc. It's all about the now.
>The world may be a different place, etc. It's all about the now.
And that new world could be dominated by a new technology. Truth is that yes, with enough resources they can catch up technologically as many nations have in the past. That's no big surprise really, being able to produce ones own chips is so useful for defense you'd expect China and India to have that on a priority list somewhere. It wouldn't give them any advantage over other world powers
exactly - i think making commercially viable versions available for import into the country do more to disrupt their indigenous industry than banning the tech!
I don't think so. It's a little too convenient for the West to think this way, so there's a duty of skepticism. I think you can look at military stuff (fighter jets, spacecrafts, aircraft carriers), or civilian stuff like EVs, 5G network equipment, and see a clear ability to develop competitive and innovative indigenous technology when the sustained political will is there. It's bootstrapped off of imported platforms for sure but goes beyond what most other countries are able to produce.
Eh, this, and probably others in your list (Nortel breach with 5G is a candidate), weren't really independently developed [1]:
> When the Soviets refused to part with their Su-33 design secrets, China purchased an Su-33 prototype aircraft from Ukraine, dubbed the T-10K-3, and quickly set about reverse engineering it.
> The J-20, ... America’s F-22 Raptor. Plans ... were stolen by a Chinese national named Su Bin, who was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison for his crime.
> Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter was also compromised by Su Bin, leading to China’s J-31 program
I think it will take some time to see if they can become independent. Or, maybe independence doesn't matter! Copy and improve may end up being a successful strategy.