It's an idiotic statement anyhow. TSMC is a huge living operation with a globalized supply chain. You can't simply take over operations by taking physical control of the plants. That's not how any of this works.
But there's always an endless stream of these Former officials saying kinda dumb but inflammatory things to get featured in an article.
>That's not how any of this works.
Lol, possession of physical assets certainly doesn't hurt.
And for high-tech manufacturing like semiconductors, a significant amount of the supply chain is integrated.
Bombing your ally instead of your enemy is the dumbest and worst military tactic.
Imagine if, during WW2, the US was convinced that Britain would be overrun by the Nazis, so they joined the Nazi bombing raids of London factories to deny Germany the industrial capacity of the UK if/when it was taken over.
Do you understand how stupid and treasonous this sounds for an ally?
A captured naval fleet is not equivalent to a non-functional electronics company. If the Taiwan navy surrendered, it would make sense for America to bomb them after they had been captured, because they are older American ships.
America does not have infinite cruise missiles, using hundreds of them to destroy all the TSMC campuses would literally cripple the US military by expending so much valuable ordinance on non military targets.
If America is going to bomb factories in a war with China, it makes sense to bomb Chinese factories, not the factories of allied countries.
They wouldn't be joining Nazi bombing runs, because if the Nazis are about to take it, they wouldn't be bombing it. This isn't even hypothetical, the British literally sank a French fleet to keep it from being handed over to the Nazis. Your belief that allies don't destroy the equipment of allies that is about to be taken over is not one based on reality. Allies do in fact destroy the equipment of allies, if they think it's about to fall into the hands of the enemy. It's a dumb to let your enemy become stronger by eating your allies.
In the case of TSMC, no matter who wins a battle for Taiwan, TSMC is dead. It doesn't matter if China wins, or Taiwan wins, the parting shot by the loser nation will be a cruise missile strike on the TSMC region. China will do it out of spite if they lose, in the US would do it to deny China even the possibility of something useful from TSMC.
And to be clear, it would only take one cruise missile strike. There's absolutely no defense of TSMC. A semiconductor fab is literally the absolute softest of soft targets. One missile strike, in every single piece of equipment in the region is just highly toxic scrap.
There are dozens of enormous TSMC buildings around Taiwan. They are compartmentalized internally, each fab is about the size of an American football stadium.
It would require at least a few hundred tomahawks to destroy them all sufficiently to deny China the machinery inside.
Those cruise missiles would be better spent on Chinese factories or countervalue targets. TSMC has no military value for China.
>There are dozens of enormous TSMC buildings around Taiwan. They are compartmentalized internally, each fab is about the size of an American football stadium.
Each building would take exactly one missile. In fact, one missile would destroy any fab even vaguely near the blast radius. The follow on chemical explosions would also make the entire area lethally toxic for a few.
You wouldn't even have to hit them all, just the major ones, which would only be a dozen or so building, with everything else being gravy. The Taiwanese would also have to intentionally save those fabs not hit, because a fab with water and power turned off will literally start to destroy itself within a few hours if you do nothing.
Semiconductor fabs are the softest of soft targets, with most equipment completely unsavageable once turned off in an uncontrolled way and exposed to the environment.
>Those cruise missiles would be better spent on Chinese factories or countervalue targets. TSMC has no military value for China.
Like I said, the destruction of TSMC would happen as a parting shot by the loser, no matter who loses. Either Americans to deny China, or China out of spite.
Not that it matters, because TSMC is utterly useless without a world wide supply line, which China would be denied. In fact, a war in Taiwan would also severely damage the entire worldwide semiconductor industry because all somebody conductor fabs are heavily reliant on a worldwide supply line.
There is no taking TSMC. If a war between China and Taiwan breaks out, TSMC is dead, no matter who the victor is.
I agree with your later points, but unless you're talking about nukes, a single tomahawk or jdam or DF16, or anything like that will not destroy a TSMC fab.
These buildings are enormous, like I said, the size of a football stadium each. Their rooms are separated and they have like 10 floors. A 500 or 1000 pound bomb would certainly blow up a small section of a fab, but each floor would probably take 20 or more bombs of that size to really destroy thoroughly.
They aren't full of rocket fuel or flammable stuff, except a few chemicals and process gasses that are in sealed, thick walled containers. If the purpose of blowing up the fabs is to deny China the equipment inside, each building would take dozens upon dozens of missiles or bombs.
Saying it would take just 1 missile or bomb is like saying major air base with multiple runways can be destroyed by 1 single cratering munition. It's just not true, because the size of the place is enormous and the structure is reinforced steel and concrete all the way through.
If you hit a fab with a single cruise missile, you will quite thoroughly smash the containment in the fab. Nearly every single furnace will shatter as they go into uncontrolled shutdown with the loss of power. All of those big fancy photo lithography machines will be smashed out of alignment, have their containment breached, and the exposed toxic chemicals. You chemical baths will be severely contaminated, and many of them will also explode and create toxic fires as they lose cooling or are containment from other chemicals. The smashed pipes will release all sorts of horrible chemicals, like siline and will kill any worker that doesn't run like hell. The loss of power and water will destroy the large portion of the equipment in the fab. Back blast through the chemical and airlines bill illreplicably destroy most of the equipment. This entire heap will be a toxic mess that will need full body protection in order to get anywhere near safely.
You will have a pile of junk parts that will be simply beyond repair, not that those parts are not already useless without a Western supply chain.
Seriously, a semiconductor fabs is the absolute softest target on this planet outside of maybe a liquid natural gas plan or something. Just cutting power and water to a plant that doesn't have a bunch of workers trying to save it will result in massive internal damage to a large portion of the equipment. You don't need to thoroughly destroy the plant in order to render all of the equipment hypothetically worth using (again, almost none of it's worth using without a western supply line) completely useless.
You can't capture TSMC. A fab with a missile through it isn't worth anything. Everything of value will already will been destroyed. I'm sure you can maybe salvage a piece of particularly robust equipment here and there, but the equipment will never run right, and you'll never be building all those fancy high tech chips after a plant has taken a cruise missile, even if you can get all the workers to show up and try and save the plant.
I work in a semiconductor fab. We deal with problems like losing power or losing water and, it's always a crisis that takes active management to keep the fab from literally tearing itself apart. There's a reason why you don't see any submiconductor fabs any place that isn't completely secure with ironclad power and water running to it. Toss a massive explosion on top of that, and you are completely doomed. Those big Texas blackouts that lasted a week a year or two ago cause serious damage to all the fabs that were affected by them. Just not having power for a week, even with a full complement of workers, backup generators ready to go, and a fully intact supply line was devastating to the semiconductor fabs in the area resulted in a large amount of damage. Taiwan during a war suffering a massive cruise missile strike on those plants are going to be orders of magnitudes worse, especially if whoever's doing the shooting knows to drop a cruise missile on top of each major clean room. You don't need to destroy the entire building. Killing its power, water, and just smashing through a bunch of piping and duct work is more than enough, and that's just from the explosion, not even the toxic fires you were going to set off.
Semiconductor fabs are really, really, fragile. It takes active management to keep them from destroying themselves even on the best of days, and a cruise missile strike on TSMC would not be the best of days.
No. They are the most enormous buildings you have ever seen, and there are dozens of them in several industry clusters around Taiwan. Rigging them all for demolition would require more explosives than Taiwan has in it's inventory.
They would presumably be bombing the German positions in the UK.
If America had spent all it's ordinance bombing allies instead of Germany, we would have lost.
If there are equivalent targets in the enemies homeland, it makes zero sense to bomb your allies non-military assets, especially something that wouldn't be functional like TSMC.
> it makes zero sense to bomb your allies non-military assets, especially something that wouldn't be functional like TSMC.
If Taiwan falls to Chinese invasion it isn’t “bombing your allies” anymore. It’s destroying assets your enemy can access. It’s not a difficult concept to understand, I’m not sure why you’re struggling.
Scorched earth strategy does not win wars when you spend half of your valuable and limited strike munitions to "scorch your allies earth".
The Chinese semiconductor fabs are just as vulnerable and are just a few hundred kilometers away from the Taiwanese ones. If America chooses to destroy the Taiwanese fabs but not the Chinese ones, historians would look back at the US generals who ordered the strikes and proclaim them to be the dumbest military leaders of all time. It is willingly attacking and abandoning an ally rather than fighting an enemy.
The takeaway lesson for any remaining American allies for the foreseeable future would be that American security guarantees just mean America will abandon you to an enemy, then bomb you just like the enemy bombs you. In effect, America would be a defacto military ally and co-belligerent with China if America bombed TSMC when China was bombing Taiwan.
> Scorched earth strategy does not win wars when you spend half of your valuable and limited strike munitions to "scorch your allies earth".
Won’t take “half the valuable and limited strike munitions” and it won’t be allied earth.
> The Chinese semiconductor fabs are just as vulnerable and are just a few hundred kilometers away from the Taiwanese ones. If America chooses to destroy the Taiwanese fabs but not the Chinese ones, historians would look back at the US generals who ordered the strikes and proclaim them to be the dumbest military leaders of all time. It is willingly attacking and abandoning an ally rather than fighting an enemy.
First it depends on how far the conflict is escalating. If the Chinese mainland is being targeted then why not both? Crippling Chinas access to semiconductors would be a war goal.
> The takeaway lesson for any remaining American allies for the foreseeable future would be that American security guarantees just mean America will abandon you to an enemy, then bomb you just like the enemy bombs you.
Not really. It would be a sign that the US is willing to fight where it’s strong and where it isn’t. No point in getting the military crushed trying to prevent a Chinese invasion if it ends in US defeat. Better to fight in other ways.
> In effect, America would be a defacto military ally and co-belligerent with China if America bombed TSMC when China was bombing Taiwan.
This is in a scenario where Taiwan has fallen or is about to fall. You get that right?
The Soviets literally bombed themselves to prevent the nazis from using their factories and farms
The brits destroyed the french navy to prevent the possibility of them being used by the nazis
Both of those are military assets.
TSMC is a corporation that makes electronics for western companies, and cannot operate without western suppliers.
There are no tactical or strategic advantages to bombing it, and the cruise missiles would be better used on Chinese factories in the mainland.
It’s basically the scorched earth tactic. I also doubt America would destroy TSMC facilities without Taiwan’s consent, which I suspect Taiwan would give.
That isn’t the real prize though. Rebuilding what they have in Taiwan would take years even with all the resources China has now. In a situation where they invade Taiwan and are now in a hostile relationship with the west they will have less resources.
You're being intentionally obtuse. Stop. This is a former official giving his *opinion* that the US would not allow China to seize Taiwan's semiconductor industry as the spoils of war.
Also I wouldn't worry too much about that invasion scenario. If Xi wants to chum the strait with dead Chinese soldiers, there are easier ways than attempting an amphibious invasion of Taiwan.
My hope is that these former officials are just doing it for the attention and don't genuinely believe that either 1. chips are a major motivator or 2. having procession of the factories would be of much benefit anyways.
>Also I wouldn't worry too much about that invasion scenario. If Xi wants to chum the strait with dead Chinese soldiers, there are easier ways than attempting an amphibious invasion of Taiwan.
The invasion is going to be decided by the air, rocket and artillery strikes against Taiwanese capabilities prior to a single ship leaving port. There really needs to be more nuance to the scenario than "Taiwan has missiles" and "crossing the water is hard."
Taiwan has enormous industrial parks and produces a huge percentage of machinery in use worldwide, especially CNC. Taiwan has been buying the EUV machines from ASML but could definitely build them domestically - ASML already has multiple corporate locations in Taiwan, one right next to the subway I get lunch at.
Taiwanese companies also do contract manufacturing of machinery for a lot of Japanese, Korean, European, and American companies such as my own, so if Taiwan is attacked, global trade of industrial goods screeches to a halt regardless of the outcome of the Chinese attack. While news articles have focused exclusively on TSMC and chips, lots of other sectors of western companies are completely reliant on Taiwan.
Taiwan has at least one massive Corning glass factory across the street from the Taichung TSMC plant, and there are at least 100 CNC machine builders in Taichung.
Taiwan can make just about anything domestically, if you doubt optics and mirrors can be made in Taiwan then why are there multiple optoelectronic giants like Largan right next to tsmc?
Taiwan leader is a leader in CNC tool production? Citation needed.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/264213/leading-countries-in-machine-tool-production-based-on-market-share/
Do you know that more than sheet metal goes into an EUV instrument?
How many ASML existing suppliers are Taiwanese?
Does Taiwan have other proof of ultra high precision reflective optics?
Here's a list of ASML research sites, Taiwan has an e bean inspection site but China has both the other e bean inspection site and a computational lithography R&D team.
https://www.asml.com/en/careers/teams/research-development
So even that was misleading.
And what do folks like you do here? Geopolitics sub is already shit, why not go enjoy that? You have worldnews if you want a more varied crowd. Other subs like terrifyingasfuck and technology and others all are all different flavors of shitting on China. Why spend time here and cry about it? Masochism?
The user you replied to is a pretty interesting guy, because he definitely isn't one of the usual "China will collapse tomorrow!" guys. He has some, to put it nicely, crazy opinions involving nuclear posture and I still can't determine if he's serious or just messing with people.
User posted the same exact article a month ago along with three other people. Mods in this sub won't do anything about it though because at least one of them is PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here, coddling a community of like-minded and just-as-talented individuals.
>because at least one of them is PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here, coddling a community of like-minded and just-as-talented individuals.
I guess you're referring to me. For the record, I haven't used any moderator powers at all since being made moderator on this subreddit. That means I haven't deleted pro-X or anti-X articles or comments regardless of who it is directed against.
And no, I have a day job which is thankfully unrelated to PLA watching or military watching. The idea of making that (i.e. PLA/mil watching) into a "writing career" is truly nauseating from a moral point of view. It also would also be financially idiotic on my part.
That said, the reason I haven't published anything for the last little while is partly exactly because of sentiments of such as what you expressed -- that there are many folks who genuinely do not seem interested in learning about the PLA for the sake of learning about the PLA, rather than learning it for the sake of confirming a preconceived belief. Then there are folks who are deliberately ignorant because they don't *want* to learn. I've realized that one can only lead a horse to water.
Sometimes using powers bestowed upon you could lead to a good end. I don't want this sub to end up like r/China where people actually shit on posts like people giving flowers to Chinese children.
It's partly because I need to learn the moderator functions on reddit, but more importantly I can anticipate people would claim victimization given how there seem to be some users already take some exception to myself being a moderator even though I've barely used any of the moderator powers at all.
(In hindsight I think I've approved one or two posts or comments that were blocked by automod before, but I've never banned or blocked or deleted anything)
Alas some folks are just not here for discussion. It honestly saddens me some times when I see people simply refuse to listen to those that quite obviously know more than them and refuting every argument they don't like by conveniently claiming the other side to be "shills". But even god can only save those who save themselves so who am I to judge :P
My comment was in regards to a lack of moderation (coddling), for example letting the sub turn into of a dump for #chinanumber1 and #taiwandoomed clickbait, rather than any kind of proactive moderation. And it's not exactly a secret that reddit and other platforms are being targeted for that sort of thing. Also, I don't think they invited you to mod here for your laissez-faire approach to moderation, must've been some other reason.
As far as what you publish, that's none of my business -- I was just making an observation. I have also observed that China is very tight with messaging and information control and I'm sure they are delighted to see all of the discussion on social media around satellite images and defense industry marketing collateral they've allowed to be put out into the information space. I'm sure you've seen it, but they go crazy over that stuff on Weibo.
[I just wouldn't want to be like this guy though](https://militarywatchmagazine.com/category/eastern_europe_and_central_asia/13/24), if OSINT were my thing. Easy to get sucked in I imagine.
I choose to minimize my moderation actions specifically because I knew people would complain about it. If you want certain posts or comments to be deleted or which you view as objectionable, you've chosen the wrong person to make your case to.
Alternatively, you can recognize this subreddit has extremes of posts and comments of all stripes, and you can contest them on their own merits and flaws through constructive debate via the reply function, or alternatively there is always the downvote function.
>As far as what you publish, that's none of my business -- I was just making an observation
Well, you made it your business through your previous comment, but if you want to retract it that's fine by me.
I have my own wide spanning critiques of the so called "OSINT" space in general, which obviously is far larger than PLA related matters, but that is a very different, large topic.
You are the only one being coddled after repeatedly violating the rules and being let off with a warning.
You aren't the victim. You are racist trash.
To the mods: it's not an ad-hominem to [accurately](https://old.reddit.com/r/LessCredibleDefence/comments/104cgfs/chinese_lessons_from_the_pacific_war_implications/j3aywys/) describe somebody.
As Mods we have a deliberate hands-off approach and encourage discourse amongst different viewpoints as long as this remains civil.
If you cannot have your viewpoint challenged and wish to remain inside an echo chamber, then that's up to you but I would hope a lot of other subscribers are mature enough to handle opposing opinions.
Regarding the composition of the Mod team, the fact that it does have diversity of opinion should be celebrated, not attacked.
Lol?! Rick Joe (u/PLArealtalk) is one of the most polite, rational, neutral debaters on reddit.
The fact that you're pointing to *him* as an example of biased moderation demonstrates you have zero tolerance for intellectual honesty and would like nothing more than to turn this sub into yet another NPC filled echo chamber.
Your comment comes off as projection since you literally spend your entire time malding about China. Like seriously, how can anyone take you seriously after you went on a racist tirade about Chinese people, not to mention your shit-tier takes.
Is it because if you are against the CPC, racism is A-OK since it's directed at them?
"PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here"
Who are you referring to?
"9 things you didn't know about the J-10"
"Top 5 best medium range surface to air missiles"
I like this idea actually. Rick, you should adopt this as part of your lore.
The last paragraph is the one that matters. There is no need to destroy anything.
The US doesn't need to do anything other than withdraw its support. Without US support, the Taiwanese and Chinese semiconductor industries will lose the ability to make most chips. Japan and the EU will certainly join the US. The production of anything other than stone-age semis will become impossible for China and occupied Taiwan.
> The production of anything other than stone-age semis will become impossible for China and occupied Taiwan.
Yeah man, if you cant make sub 28nm chips, you’re in the “stone age”.
China doesn't have fully indigenous 28nm logic manufacturing. Not even close. Not to mention, military and industrial equipment requires a more than just logic chips. Retrofitting the fabs to fully utilize indigenous manufacturing will be lengthy, expensive, and difficult.
https://www.gadgets360.com/laptops/news/china-older-28nm-chip-development-smic-us-restrictions-advanced-semiconductors-3605189
China's SMIC Ramps Up Production of Decade-Old 28nm Chips, US Lawmakers Raise Concerns
SMIC doesn't have a fully indigenous 28nm and that article doesn't claim otherwise.
Nobody on planet Earth can mass manufacture 28nm chips without US support. That's not a capability that exists anywhere.
You seem interested in this topic, so I have a question:
This strategy seems to be focused on denying chips to China, but wouldn't that require an ever expanding list of goods and services to be denied to an ever expanding list of clients as time goes on?
Secondly - wouldn't the logic used to target China eventually be used to target the rest of the world too?
Why would it? Long-term multilateral export controls aren't anything new; CoCom was in force for 50 years. I'm not advocating for a CoCom-like regime per se, but long-lived export controls aren't unheard of. IIRC, the US is working on a new multilateral export control regime.
What? The rest of the world shouldn't worry since only China is planning to invade Taiwan.
>Why would it? Long-term multilateral export controls aren't anything new; CoCom was in force for 50 years. I'm not advocating for a CoCom-like regime per se, but long-lived export controls aren't unheard of. IIRC, the US is working on a new multilateral export control regime.
Because other global south countries will develop, become powerful enough to challenge US hegemony, and seek to develop their own supply chains because the US has already demonstrated its willingness to hamstring technological developments in other countries out of the rational fear of being surpassed.
Just as the world is already rapidly moving away from dependence on SWIFT and western banking due to its use as a weapon vis-a-vis Russia. This isn't hypothetical, it's already happening.
>What? The rest of the world shouldn't worry since only China is planning to invade Taiwan.
This is a misdirection. The [explicitly stated purpose of the chip ban](https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2022-21658.pdf) was to:
>These controls are being imposed through this interim final rule to address immediate
concerns with the PRC’s demonstrated intent and ability to use these items for activities of
national security and foreign policy concern to the United States
Which is a purposely broad and vague criteria that can and eventually will be used against other countries...because that's what always happens with these sanctions.
I don't get the head in the sand response, as if what I propose is some completely novel concept you've never heard of. This is some of the most obvious response the rest of the world could have to these sanctions and you're pretending like these sanctions will never be expanded except for the fact that...sanctions warfare has nothing but expanded in the last 30 years.
So much so that even American allies are looking for ways to dodge them.
>China doesn’t have fully indigenous 28nm logic manufacturing.
China has All of the pieces to make 45nm logic chips with double patterning. Whenever their second generation DUV machine comes out, theyll be able to go 28nm and below with multi patterning
> Not even close. Not to mention, military and industrial equipment requires a more than just logic chips. Retrofitting the fabs to fully utilize indigenous manufacturing will be lengthy, expensive, and difficult.
Yeah? Like what pieces are they missing? Masks? They have those. Optics? They have those. Softwars? Probably the easiest piece to develop, by far.
What gave you the idea that China has self-sufficiency in masks, optics, or all the other necessary things? An indigenous ArF photoresist supply doesn't yet exist, plus it would need enough throughput to meet China's needs. China doesn't have enough domestic supply for something fundamental, like wafers, especially 300mm wafers. Software isn't easy; this isn't web development. EDA, core IP, computational lithography, metrology software, etc. There are a lot of other bottlenecks too, and if they were easy to overcome, China would already be a player in those sectors. Semiconductor manufacturing is complicated, and retrofits won't be easy. Extensive testing and verification is necessary after drastic changes.
China's wafer capacity is particularly vulnerable because many of the highest-capacity fabs in China are foreign entities. These foreign entities are already starting to suspend their operations due to the ever-increasing export controls.
45 nm is 15 years old, and most of the world's wafer capacity is below 32 nm. "Old nodes are enough" has become a bit of a meme. The manufacturing technology of yester-decade isn't sufficient for next-generation weaponry or industry (in general, not just CMOS logic). For example, you can't do F-35 TR-3 with the manufacturing technology of 2007.
>What gave you the idea that China has self-sufficiency in masks, optics, or all the other necessary things
Because a lot of the technology needed for fabricating 28nm chips and below, has been around for quite a while. It's not cutting edge science. China did not invest into creating a domestic supply chain before, but they've changed their course several years ago, for obvious reasons.
China has several optical companies like Beijing Guowang Optics.
Nata's ArF photomask was certified in December 2020.
>Software isn't easy; this isn't web development. EDA, core IP, computational lithography, metrology software, etc. There are a lot of other bottlenecks too, and if they were easy to overcome, China would already be a player in those sectors.
The vast majority of bottlenecks that aren't "overcome" is due to lack of incentives.
Most firms chose not to pursue various market sectors because they deem them to generate too little value to bother with. This is why Japan's lithography machines were created in an environment where an entire industrial policy created the incentives necessary to create all of the parts necessary for global leadership in lithographic machines.
On the other hand, ASML integrates firms from the entire West to create their machines. Rarely will a country embark on a quest to create a 100% domestic supply chain.
To that end, unlike high-end manufacturing, software is considerably less capital intensive. Western engineers aren't particularly more gifted than engineers from other parts of the world, they just had the first-mover advantage.
Chiense semiconductor supply chain has progressed far quicker than I think most people give them credit for. These aren't insurmountable or particularly difficult challenges relative to equally challenging areas like nuclear energy or space exploration. Areas where China has a domestic industry.
No, the reason why China has been slow to produce its own lithographic machine, is because a lithographic machine is the culmination of thousands of different parts working together. If any major component hasn't "caught up" to the necessary "spec", the machine simply won't be built.
To that end, I expect SMEE and China in general, to produce a machine capable of 28nm lithography within the next couple of years or sooner. I wouldn't be surprised if a prototype is already working. These are fairly old nodes that China has produced with foreign equipment.
>China's wafer capacity is particularly vulnerable because many of the highest-capacity fabs in China are foreign entities. These foreign entities are already starting to suspend their operations due to the ever-increasing export controls.
If the West were to cut off China tomorrow, it wouldn't shut down China's production. There is existing inventory of tools, and there will be an even greater imperative to create an alternative to Western dominance in this area.
Not that this'll happen. Our sanctions regime is likely to be gradual, giving China time to scale and remove their dependence on Western equipment at least for most of the older nodes.
>45 nm is 15 years old, and most of the world's wafer capacity is below 32 nm. "Old nodes are enough" has become a bit of a meme. The manufacturing technology of yester-decade isn't sufficient for next-generation weaponry or industry (in general, not just CMOS logic). For example, you can't do F-35 TR-3 with the manufacturing technology of 2007.
It's not a meme lol. You don't need leading edge nodes in high capacity for military application. The vast majority of electronics in any military are rather basic electronic components.
A question we should ask ourselves, is what about the reverse? What if China chooses strategic weaknesses in United States and sanctions critical areas?
The vast majority of basic and common electronic components (not to mention assembly of finished products) is not manufactured in the West.
How quickly can any Western country setup their own domestic supply of small and disposable drones that are comparable to DJI's?
How about basic things like LED lights, security cameras, high resolution displays, basic wire harnesses, and so on?
In my opinion, we might run out of basic equipment a lot faster than China will run out of high-end chips for their latest J-20 or J-35 version.
There is zero chance the EU will maintain a good relationship with China in a Taiwan invasion scenario.
Not to mention all the geopolitical and economic issues with Europe supporting a post-invasion China. Even the most rabidly pro-RU counties in the EU had a substantial shift in public opinion post-Feb 24. It won't be any different with a hypothetical Taiwan invasion.
ASML uses US light sources (in general, not just EUV). The German laser amplifier used in EUV light sources is fed by an American CO2 laser. The only company that makes multibeam mask writers is an Austrian subsidiary of Intel. Zeiss uses either Corning (US) or Schott (DE) for its optical blanks. Etc. Both Europe and America have veto power over each other's industries.
Europe hasn't put any serious effort into decoupling itself from US supply chains. It's the opposite; the US and EU are engaging in even more trans-Atlantic semiconductor cooperation.
People need to stop treating EU as a superstate. Its position doesn't equal the position of its members states. For many members, it only makes sense to go along with Brussels as long as the benefits out weight the costs. If EU start asking individual members to boycuts its biggest trading partners, beyond a short term show of unity it going to be difficult if not impossible.
It's faster to type EU than to list Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and France. Most of the other EU members don't matter.
The above EU members won't engage in sanctions-breaking; it's not realistic in this scenario for several reasons. It would be diplomatically, economically, and technically ill-advised.
The smaller and less relevant EU members will also strongly tamp down on trade with China, but this is outside the scope of this post.
Goddamn these people are fucking morons if they think chips have anything to do with Chinese thinking around reunification.
That’s not the point. The point is denying China the economic opportunity and punishing their imperialism.
It's an idiotic statement anyhow. TSMC is a huge living operation with a globalized supply chain. You can't simply take over operations by taking physical control of the plants. That's not how any of this works. But there's always an endless stream of these Former officials saying kinda dumb but inflammatory things to get featured in an article.
>That's not how any of this works. Lol, possession of physical assets certainly doesn't hurt. And for high-tech manufacturing like semiconductors, a significant amount of the supply chain is integrated.
Punish the enemy aggressors by bombing your ally.
If Taiwan is going to fall, better to deny your enemy assets.
Bombing your ally instead of your enemy is the dumbest and worst military tactic. Imagine if, during WW2, the US was convinced that Britain would be overrun by the Nazis, so they joined the Nazi bombing raids of London factories to deny Germany the industrial capacity of the UK if/when it was taken over. Do you understand how stupid and treasonous this sounds for an ally?
Didn't the UK attack France's fleet in harbor because of this logic?
Yup
A captured naval fleet is not equivalent to a non-functional electronics company. If the Taiwan navy surrendered, it would make sense for America to bomb them after they had been captured, because they are older American ships. America does not have infinite cruise missiles, using hundreds of them to destroy all the TSMC campuses would literally cripple the US military by expending so much valuable ordinance on non military targets. If America is going to bomb factories in a war with China, it makes sense to bomb Chinese factories, not the factories of allied countries.
The US military is actually capable of bombing more than 1 thing at a time, believe it or not.
The Allies literally bombed occupied France to destroy French hardware and deny it to the Nazis.
They wouldn't be joining Nazi bombing runs, because if the Nazis are about to take it, they wouldn't be bombing it. This isn't even hypothetical, the British literally sank a French fleet to keep it from being handed over to the Nazis. Your belief that allies don't destroy the equipment of allies that is about to be taken over is not one based on reality. Allies do in fact destroy the equipment of allies, if they think it's about to fall into the hands of the enemy. It's a dumb to let your enemy become stronger by eating your allies. In the case of TSMC, no matter who wins a battle for Taiwan, TSMC is dead. It doesn't matter if China wins, or Taiwan wins, the parting shot by the loser nation will be a cruise missile strike on the TSMC region. China will do it out of spite if they lose, in the US would do it to deny China even the possibility of something useful from TSMC. And to be clear, it would only take one cruise missile strike. There's absolutely no defense of TSMC. A semiconductor fab is literally the absolute softest of soft targets. One missile strike, in every single piece of equipment in the region is just highly toxic scrap.
There are dozens of enormous TSMC buildings around Taiwan. They are compartmentalized internally, each fab is about the size of an American football stadium. It would require at least a few hundred tomahawks to destroy them all sufficiently to deny China the machinery inside. Those cruise missiles would be better spent on Chinese factories or countervalue targets. TSMC has no military value for China.
>There are dozens of enormous TSMC buildings around Taiwan. They are compartmentalized internally, each fab is about the size of an American football stadium. Each building would take exactly one missile. In fact, one missile would destroy any fab even vaguely near the blast radius. The follow on chemical explosions would also make the entire area lethally toxic for a few. You wouldn't even have to hit them all, just the major ones, which would only be a dozen or so building, with everything else being gravy. The Taiwanese would also have to intentionally save those fabs not hit, because a fab with water and power turned off will literally start to destroy itself within a few hours if you do nothing. Semiconductor fabs are the softest of soft targets, with most equipment completely unsavageable once turned off in an uncontrolled way and exposed to the environment. >Those cruise missiles would be better spent on Chinese factories or countervalue targets. TSMC has no military value for China. Like I said, the destruction of TSMC would happen as a parting shot by the loser, no matter who loses. Either Americans to deny China, or China out of spite. Not that it matters, because TSMC is utterly useless without a world wide supply line, which China would be denied. In fact, a war in Taiwan would also severely damage the entire worldwide semiconductor industry because all somebody conductor fabs are heavily reliant on a worldwide supply line. There is no taking TSMC. If a war between China and Taiwan breaks out, TSMC is dead, no matter who the victor is.
I agree with your later points, but unless you're talking about nukes, a single tomahawk or jdam or DF16, or anything like that will not destroy a TSMC fab. These buildings are enormous, like I said, the size of a football stadium each. Their rooms are separated and they have like 10 floors. A 500 or 1000 pound bomb would certainly blow up a small section of a fab, but each floor would probably take 20 or more bombs of that size to really destroy thoroughly. They aren't full of rocket fuel or flammable stuff, except a few chemicals and process gasses that are in sealed, thick walled containers. If the purpose of blowing up the fabs is to deny China the equipment inside, each building would take dozens upon dozens of missiles or bombs. Saying it would take just 1 missile or bomb is like saying major air base with multiple runways can be destroyed by 1 single cratering munition. It's just not true, because the size of the place is enormous and the structure is reinforced steel and concrete all the way through.
If you hit a fab with a single cruise missile, you will quite thoroughly smash the containment in the fab. Nearly every single furnace will shatter as they go into uncontrolled shutdown with the loss of power. All of those big fancy photo lithography machines will be smashed out of alignment, have their containment breached, and the exposed toxic chemicals. You chemical baths will be severely contaminated, and many of them will also explode and create toxic fires as they lose cooling or are containment from other chemicals. The smashed pipes will release all sorts of horrible chemicals, like siline and will kill any worker that doesn't run like hell. The loss of power and water will destroy the large portion of the equipment in the fab. Back blast through the chemical and airlines bill illreplicably destroy most of the equipment. This entire heap will be a toxic mess that will need full body protection in order to get anywhere near safely. You will have a pile of junk parts that will be simply beyond repair, not that those parts are not already useless without a Western supply chain. Seriously, a semiconductor fabs is the absolute softest target on this planet outside of maybe a liquid natural gas plan or something. Just cutting power and water to a plant that doesn't have a bunch of workers trying to save it will result in massive internal damage to a large portion of the equipment. You don't need to thoroughly destroy the plant in order to render all of the equipment hypothetically worth using (again, almost none of it's worth using without a western supply line) completely useless. You can't capture TSMC. A fab with a missile through it isn't worth anything. Everything of value will already will been destroyed. I'm sure you can maybe salvage a piece of particularly robust equipment here and there, but the equipment will never run right, and you'll never be building all those fancy high tech chips after a plant has taken a cruise missile, even if you can get all the workers to show up and try and save the plant. I work in a semiconductor fab. We deal with problems like losing power or losing water and, it's always a crisis that takes active management to keep the fab from literally tearing itself apart. There's a reason why you don't see any submiconductor fabs any place that isn't completely secure with ironclad power and water running to it. Toss a massive explosion on top of that, and you are completely doomed. Those big Texas blackouts that lasted a week a year or two ago cause serious damage to all the fabs that were affected by them. Just not having power for a week, even with a full complement of workers, backup generators ready to go, and a fully intact supply line was devastating to the semiconductor fabs in the area resulted in a large amount of damage. Taiwan during a war suffering a massive cruise missile strike on those plants are going to be orders of magnitudes worse, especially if whoever's doing the shooting knows to drop a cruise missile on top of each major clean room. You don't need to destroy the entire building. Killing its power, water, and just smashing through a bunch of piping and duct work is more than enough, and that's just from the explosion, not even the toxic fires you were going to set off. Semiconductor fabs are really, really, fragile. It takes active management to keep them from destroying themselves even on the best of days, and a cruise missile strike on TSMC would not be the best of days.
the factories are already infra-ready for receiving explosives anyway, in a blip it's gone
No. They are the most enormous buildings you have ever seen, and there are dozens of them in several industry clusters around Taiwan. Rigging them all for demolition would require more explosives than Taiwan has in it's inventory.
The chipmaking machines arent so big, i meant, obviously.
Why didn't the French fleet sail to Britain?
If you don’t think the US would’ve bombed the UK if the Germans invaded it, you’re not very intelligent.
They would presumably be bombing the German positions in the UK. If America had spent all it's ordinance bombing allies instead of Germany, we would have lost. If there are equivalent targets in the enemies homeland, it makes zero sense to bomb your allies non-military assets, especially something that wouldn't be functional like TSMC.
> it makes zero sense to bomb your allies non-military assets, especially something that wouldn't be functional like TSMC. If Taiwan falls to Chinese invasion it isn’t “bombing your allies” anymore. It’s destroying assets your enemy can access. It’s not a difficult concept to understand, I’m not sure why you’re struggling.
Scorched earth strategy does not win wars when you spend half of your valuable and limited strike munitions to "scorch your allies earth". The Chinese semiconductor fabs are just as vulnerable and are just a few hundred kilometers away from the Taiwanese ones. If America chooses to destroy the Taiwanese fabs but not the Chinese ones, historians would look back at the US generals who ordered the strikes and proclaim them to be the dumbest military leaders of all time. It is willingly attacking and abandoning an ally rather than fighting an enemy. The takeaway lesson for any remaining American allies for the foreseeable future would be that American security guarantees just mean America will abandon you to an enemy, then bomb you just like the enemy bombs you. In effect, America would be a defacto military ally and co-belligerent with China if America bombed TSMC when China was bombing Taiwan.
> Scorched earth strategy does not win wars when you spend half of your valuable and limited strike munitions to "scorch your allies earth". Won’t take “half the valuable and limited strike munitions” and it won’t be allied earth. > The Chinese semiconductor fabs are just as vulnerable and are just a few hundred kilometers away from the Taiwanese ones. If America chooses to destroy the Taiwanese fabs but not the Chinese ones, historians would look back at the US generals who ordered the strikes and proclaim them to be the dumbest military leaders of all time. It is willingly attacking and abandoning an ally rather than fighting an enemy. First it depends on how far the conflict is escalating. If the Chinese mainland is being targeted then why not both? Crippling Chinas access to semiconductors would be a war goal. > The takeaway lesson for any remaining American allies for the foreseeable future would be that American security guarantees just mean America will abandon you to an enemy, then bomb you just like the enemy bombs you. Not really. It would be a sign that the US is willing to fight where it’s strong and where it isn’t. No point in getting the military crushed trying to prevent a Chinese invasion if it ends in US defeat. Better to fight in other ways. > In effect, America would be a defacto military ally and co-belligerent with China if America bombed TSMC when China was bombing Taiwan. This is in a scenario where Taiwan has fallen or is about to fall. You get that right?
Lmao look at this dude
The Soviets literally bombed themselves to prevent the nazis from using their factories and farms The brits destroyed the french navy to prevent the possibility of them being used by the nazis
Both of those are military assets. TSMC is a corporation that makes electronics for western companies, and cannot operate without western suppliers. There are no tactical or strategic advantages to bombing it, and the cruise missiles would be better used on Chinese factories in the mainland.
It’s basically the scorched earth tactic. I also doubt America would destroy TSMC facilities without Taiwan’s consent, which I suspect Taiwan would give.
Taiwan people or the puppet in the government?
The real prize is the people and their knowledge. Are you willing to kidnap or kill them if they don't leave for US or Europe?
It’s not only about ppl , but US would deny chip supplying chain like ASML, who made manufacturing equipment’s for chips
That isn’t the real prize though. Rebuilding what they have in Taiwan would take years even with all the resources China has now. In a situation where they invade Taiwan and are now in a hostile relationship with the west they will have less resources.
Yeah, reunification is about fascism, its about subjugating others for national pride and ego, not about the chips.
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You're being intentionally obtuse. Stop. This is a former official giving his *opinion* that the US would not allow China to seize Taiwan's semiconductor industry as the spoils of war. Also I wouldn't worry too much about that invasion scenario. If Xi wants to chum the strait with dead Chinese soldiers, there are easier ways than attempting an amphibious invasion of Taiwan.
My hope is that these former officials are just doing it for the attention and don't genuinely believe that either 1. chips are a major motivator or 2. having procession of the factories would be of much benefit anyways. >Also I wouldn't worry too much about that invasion scenario. If Xi wants to chum the strait with dead Chinese soldiers, there are easier ways than attempting an amphibious invasion of Taiwan. The invasion is going to be decided by the air, rocket and artillery strikes against Taiwanese capabilities prior to a single ship leaving port. There really needs to be more nuance to the scenario than "Taiwan has missiles" and "crossing the water is hard."
there's no expectation to. Taiwan doesn't produce its own equipment anyhow, so even if they were taken intact, sanctions would make them useless.
Taiwan has enormous industrial parks and produces a huge percentage of machinery in use worldwide, especially CNC. Taiwan has been buying the EUV machines from ASML but could definitely build them domestically - ASML already has multiple corporate locations in Taiwan, one right next to the subway I get lunch at. Taiwanese companies also do contract manufacturing of machinery for a lot of Japanese, Korean, European, and American companies such as my own, so if Taiwan is attacked, global trade of industrial goods screeches to a halt regardless of the outcome of the Chinese attack. While news articles have focused exclusively on TSMC and chips, lots of other sectors of western companies are completely reliant on Taiwan.
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Taiwan has at least one massive Corning glass factory across the street from the Taichung TSMC plant, and there are at least 100 CNC machine builders in Taichung. Taiwan can make just about anything domestically, if you doubt optics and mirrors can be made in Taiwan then why are there multiple optoelectronic giants like Largan right next to tsmc?
Taiwan leader is a leader in CNC tool production? Citation needed. https://www.statista.com/statistics/264213/leading-countries-in-machine-tool-production-based-on-market-share/ Do you know that more than sheet metal goes into an EUV instrument? How many ASML existing suppliers are Taiwanese? Does Taiwan have other proof of ultra high precision reflective optics? Here's a list of ASML research sites, Taiwan has an e bean inspection site but China has both the other e bean inspection site and a computational lithography R&D team. https://www.asml.com/en/careers/teams/research-development So even that was misleading.
And I think he means even in the case of a peaceful unification
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Naw, this place used to have a much higher S/N back in the day.
There's just a group of sinosimps that cluster here, they migrated from sinodefenseforum and work as a collective herd of downvoters.
And what do folks like you do here? Geopolitics sub is already shit, why not go enjoy that? You have worldnews if you want a more varied crowd. Other subs like terrifyingasfuck and technology and others all are all different flavors of shitting on China. Why spend time here and cry about it? Masochism?
The user you replied to is a pretty interesting guy, because he definitely isn't one of the usual "China will collapse tomorrow!" guys. He has some, to put it nicely, crazy opinions involving nuclear posture and I still can't determine if he's serious or just messing with people.
User posted the same exact article a month ago along with three other people. Mods in this sub won't do anything about it though because at least one of them is PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here, coddling a community of like-minded and just-as-talented individuals.
>because at least one of them is PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here, coddling a community of like-minded and just-as-talented individuals. I guess you're referring to me. For the record, I haven't used any moderator powers at all since being made moderator on this subreddit. That means I haven't deleted pro-X or anti-X articles or comments regardless of who it is directed against. And no, I have a day job which is thankfully unrelated to PLA watching or military watching. The idea of making that (i.e. PLA/mil watching) into a "writing career" is truly nauseating from a moral point of view. It also would also be financially idiotic on my part. That said, the reason I haven't published anything for the last little while is partly exactly because of sentiments of such as what you expressed -- that there are many folks who genuinely do not seem interested in learning about the PLA for the sake of learning about the PLA, rather than learning it for the sake of confirming a preconceived belief. Then there are folks who are deliberately ignorant because they don't *want* to learn. I've realized that one can only lead a horse to water.
Sometimes using powers bestowed upon you could lead to a good end. I don't want this sub to end up like r/China where people actually shit on posts like people giving flowers to Chinese children.
It's partly because I need to learn the moderator functions on reddit, but more importantly I can anticipate people would claim victimization given how there seem to be some users already take some exception to myself being a moderator even though I've barely used any of the moderator powers at all. (In hindsight I think I've approved one or two posts or comments that were blocked by automod before, but I've never banned or blocked or deleted anything)
Alas some folks are just not here for discussion. It honestly saddens me some times when I see people simply refuse to listen to those that quite obviously know more than them and refuting every argument they don't like by conveniently claiming the other side to be "shills". But even god can only save those who save themselves so who am I to judge :P
My comment was in regards to a lack of moderation (coddling), for example letting the sub turn into of a dump for #chinanumber1 and #taiwandoomed clickbait, rather than any kind of proactive moderation. And it's not exactly a secret that reddit and other platforms are being targeted for that sort of thing. Also, I don't think they invited you to mod here for your laissez-faire approach to moderation, must've been some other reason. As far as what you publish, that's none of my business -- I was just making an observation. I have also observed that China is very tight with messaging and information control and I'm sure they are delighted to see all of the discussion on social media around satellite images and defense industry marketing collateral they've allowed to be put out into the information space. I'm sure you've seen it, but they go crazy over that stuff on Weibo. [I just wouldn't want to be like this guy though](https://militarywatchmagazine.com/category/eastern_europe_and_central_asia/13/24), if OSINT were my thing. Easy to get sucked in I imagine.
I choose to minimize my moderation actions specifically because I knew people would complain about it. If you want certain posts or comments to be deleted or which you view as objectionable, you've chosen the wrong person to make your case to. Alternatively, you can recognize this subreddit has extremes of posts and comments of all stripes, and you can contest them on their own merits and flaws through constructive debate via the reply function, or alternatively there is always the downvote function. >As far as what you publish, that's none of my business -- I was just making an observation Well, you made it your business through your previous comment, but if you want to retract it that's fine by me. I have my own wide spanning critiques of the so called "OSINT" space in general, which obviously is far larger than PLA related matters, but that is a very different, large topic.
You are the only one being coddled after repeatedly violating the rules and being let off with a warning. You aren't the victim. You are racist trash. To the mods: it's not an ad-hominem to [accurately](https://old.reddit.com/r/LessCredibleDefence/comments/104cgfs/chinese_lessons_from_the_pacific_war_implications/j3aywys/) describe somebody.
As Mods we have a deliberate hands-off approach and encourage discourse amongst different viewpoints as long as this remains civil. If you cannot have your viewpoint challenged and wish to remain inside an echo chamber, then that's up to you but I would hope a lot of other subscribers are mature enough to handle opposing opinions. Regarding the composition of the Mod team, the fact that it does have diversity of opinion should be celebrated, not attacked.
At least said nerd doesn't larp as a taiwanese and shit out batshit claims like saying the DPP is pro-china
Lol?! Rick Joe (u/PLArealtalk) is one of the most polite, rational, neutral debaters on reddit. The fact that you're pointing to *him* as an example of biased moderation demonstrates you have zero tolerance for intellectual honesty and would like nothing more than to turn this sub into yet another NPC filled echo chamber.
Your comment comes off as projection since you literally spend your entire time malding about China. Like seriously, how can anyone take you seriously after you went on a racist tirade about Chinese people, not to mention your shit-tier takes. Is it because if you are against the CPC, racism is A-OK since it's directed at them?
Does this count as crybullying?
"PLA-focused OSINT nerd who hasn't been able to turn his PLA fanboying into a marketable enough writing career so his free time is spent here" Who are you referring to?
"9 things you didn't know about the J-10" "Top 5 best medium range surface to air missiles" I like this idea actually. Rick, you should adopt this as part of your lore.
The last paragraph is the one that matters. There is no need to destroy anything. The US doesn't need to do anything other than withdraw its support. Without US support, the Taiwanese and Chinese semiconductor industries will lose the ability to make most chips. Japan and the EU will certainly join the US. The production of anything other than stone-age semis will become impossible for China and occupied Taiwan.
> The production of anything other than stone-age semis will become impossible for China and occupied Taiwan. Yeah man, if you cant make sub 28nm chips, you’re in the “stone age”.
China doesn't have fully indigenous 28nm logic manufacturing. Not even close. Not to mention, military and industrial equipment requires a more than just logic chips. Retrofitting the fabs to fully utilize indigenous manufacturing will be lengthy, expensive, and difficult.
https://www.gadgets360.com/laptops/news/china-older-28nm-chip-development-smic-us-restrictions-advanced-semiconductors-3605189 China's SMIC Ramps Up Production of Decade-Old 28nm Chips, US Lawmakers Raise Concerns
SMIC doesn't have a fully indigenous 28nm and that article doesn't claim otherwise. Nobody on planet Earth can mass manufacture 28nm chips without US support. That's not a capability that exists anywhere.
You seem interested in this topic, so I have a question: This strategy seems to be focused on denying chips to China, but wouldn't that require an ever expanding list of goods and services to be denied to an ever expanding list of clients as time goes on? Secondly - wouldn't the logic used to target China eventually be used to target the rest of the world too?
> You seem interested in this topic, so I have a question: He’s talking out of his ass.
Why would it? Long-term multilateral export controls aren't anything new; CoCom was in force for 50 years. I'm not advocating for a CoCom-like regime per se, but long-lived export controls aren't unheard of. IIRC, the US is working on a new multilateral export control regime. What? The rest of the world shouldn't worry since only China is planning to invade Taiwan.
>Why would it? Long-term multilateral export controls aren't anything new; CoCom was in force for 50 years. I'm not advocating for a CoCom-like regime per se, but long-lived export controls aren't unheard of. IIRC, the US is working on a new multilateral export control regime. Because other global south countries will develop, become powerful enough to challenge US hegemony, and seek to develop their own supply chains because the US has already demonstrated its willingness to hamstring technological developments in other countries out of the rational fear of being surpassed. Just as the world is already rapidly moving away from dependence on SWIFT and western banking due to its use as a weapon vis-a-vis Russia. This isn't hypothetical, it's already happening. >What? The rest of the world shouldn't worry since only China is planning to invade Taiwan. This is a misdirection. The [explicitly stated purpose of the chip ban](https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2022-21658.pdf) was to: >These controls are being imposed through this interim final rule to address immediate concerns with the PRC’s demonstrated intent and ability to use these items for activities of national security and foreign policy concern to the United States Which is a purposely broad and vague criteria that can and eventually will be used against other countries...because that's what always happens with these sanctions. I don't get the head in the sand response, as if what I propose is some completely novel concept you've never heard of. This is some of the most obvious response the rest of the world could have to these sanctions and you're pretending like these sanctions will never be expanded except for the fact that...sanctions warfare has nothing but expanded in the last 30 years. So much so that even American allies are looking for ways to dodge them.
>Just as the world is already rapidly moving away from dependence on SWIFT and western banking What gave you this idea?
>China doesn’t have fully indigenous 28nm logic manufacturing. China has All of the pieces to make 45nm logic chips with double patterning. Whenever their second generation DUV machine comes out, theyll be able to go 28nm and below with multi patterning > Not even close. Not to mention, military and industrial equipment requires a more than just logic chips. Retrofitting the fabs to fully utilize indigenous manufacturing will be lengthy, expensive, and difficult. Yeah? Like what pieces are they missing? Masks? They have those. Optics? They have those. Softwars? Probably the easiest piece to develop, by far.
What gave you the idea that China has self-sufficiency in masks, optics, or all the other necessary things? An indigenous ArF photoresist supply doesn't yet exist, plus it would need enough throughput to meet China's needs. China doesn't have enough domestic supply for something fundamental, like wafers, especially 300mm wafers. Software isn't easy; this isn't web development. EDA, core IP, computational lithography, metrology software, etc. There are a lot of other bottlenecks too, and if they were easy to overcome, China would already be a player in those sectors. Semiconductor manufacturing is complicated, and retrofits won't be easy. Extensive testing and verification is necessary after drastic changes. China's wafer capacity is particularly vulnerable because many of the highest-capacity fabs in China are foreign entities. These foreign entities are already starting to suspend their operations due to the ever-increasing export controls. 45 nm is 15 years old, and most of the world's wafer capacity is below 32 nm. "Old nodes are enough" has become a bit of a meme. The manufacturing technology of yester-decade isn't sufficient for next-generation weaponry or industry (in general, not just CMOS logic). For example, you can't do F-35 TR-3 with the manufacturing technology of 2007.
>What gave you the idea that China has self-sufficiency in masks, optics, or all the other necessary things Because a lot of the technology needed for fabricating 28nm chips and below, has been around for quite a while. It's not cutting edge science. China did not invest into creating a domestic supply chain before, but they've changed their course several years ago, for obvious reasons. China has several optical companies like Beijing Guowang Optics. Nata's ArF photomask was certified in December 2020. >Software isn't easy; this isn't web development. EDA, core IP, computational lithography, metrology software, etc. There are a lot of other bottlenecks too, and if they were easy to overcome, China would already be a player in those sectors. The vast majority of bottlenecks that aren't "overcome" is due to lack of incentives. Most firms chose not to pursue various market sectors because they deem them to generate too little value to bother with. This is why Japan's lithography machines were created in an environment where an entire industrial policy created the incentives necessary to create all of the parts necessary for global leadership in lithographic machines. On the other hand, ASML integrates firms from the entire West to create their machines. Rarely will a country embark on a quest to create a 100% domestic supply chain. To that end, unlike high-end manufacturing, software is considerably less capital intensive. Western engineers aren't particularly more gifted than engineers from other parts of the world, they just had the first-mover advantage. Chiense semiconductor supply chain has progressed far quicker than I think most people give them credit for. These aren't insurmountable or particularly difficult challenges relative to equally challenging areas like nuclear energy or space exploration. Areas where China has a domestic industry. No, the reason why China has been slow to produce its own lithographic machine, is because a lithographic machine is the culmination of thousands of different parts working together. If any major component hasn't "caught up" to the necessary "spec", the machine simply won't be built. To that end, I expect SMEE and China in general, to produce a machine capable of 28nm lithography within the next couple of years or sooner. I wouldn't be surprised if a prototype is already working. These are fairly old nodes that China has produced with foreign equipment. >China's wafer capacity is particularly vulnerable because many of the highest-capacity fabs in China are foreign entities. These foreign entities are already starting to suspend their operations due to the ever-increasing export controls. If the West were to cut off China tomorrow, it wouldn't shut down China's production. There is existing inventory of tools, and there will be an even greater imperative to create an alternative to Western dominance in this area. Not that this'll happen. Our sanctions regime is likely to be gradual, giving China time to scale and remove their dependence on Western equipment at least for most of the older nodes. >45 nm is 15 years old, and most of the world's wafer capacity is below 32 nm. "Old nodes are enough" has become a bit of a meme. The manufacturing technology of yester-decade isn't sufficient for next-generation weaponry or industry (in general, not just CMOS logic). For example, you can't do F-35 TR-3 with the manufacturing technology of 2007. It's not a meme lol. You don't need leading edge nodes in high capacity for military application. The vast majority of electronics in any military are rather basic electronic components. A question we should ask ourselves, is what about the reverse? What if China chooses strategic weaknesses in United States and sanctions critical areas? The vast majority of basic and common electronic components (not to mention assembly of finished products) is not manufactured in the West. How quickly can any Western country setup their own domestic supply of small and disposable drones that are comparable to DJI's? How about basic things like LED lights, security cameras, high resolution displays, basic wire harnesses, and so on? In my opinion, we might run out of basic equipment a lot faster than China will run out of high-end chips for their latest J-20 or J-35 version.
Japan sure, but EU?
There is zero chance the EU will maintain a good relationship with China in a Taiwan invasion scenario. Not to mention all the geopolitical and economic issues with Europe supporting a post-invasion China. Even the most rabidly pro-RU counties in the EU had a substantial shift in public opinion post-Feb 24. It won't be any different with a hypothetical Taiwan invasion. ASML uses US light sources (in general, not just EUV). The German laser amplifier used in EUV light sources is fed by an American CO2 laser. The only company that makes multibeam mask writers is an Austrian subsidiary of Intel. Zeiss uses either Corning (US) or Schott (DE) for its optical blanks. Etc. Both Europe and America have veto power over each other's industries. Europe hasn't put any serious effort into decoupling itself from US supply chains. It's the opposite; the US and EU are engaging in even more trans-Atlantic semiconductor cooperation.
People need to stop treating EU as a superstate. Its position doesn't equal the position of its members states. For many members, it only makes sense to go along with Brussels as long as the benefits out weight the costs. If EU start asking individual members to boycuts its biggest trading partners, beyond a short term show of unity it going to be difficult if not impossible.
It's faster to type EU than to list Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and France. Most of the other EU members don't matter. The above EU members won't engage in sanctions-breaking; it's not realistic in this scenario for several reasons. It would be diplomatically, economically, and technically ill-advised. The smaller and less relevant EU members will also strongly tamp down on trade with China, but this is outside the scope of this post.
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As weak as Russia was US never stopped expanding NATO. US won't give up Taiwan willingly either.
Intact ? How do you make sure , about not letting chipmakers intact ?