Times can change quickly and unpredictably. It was not too long ago that Dresden, where this plant is located, was under the oppressive East German regime.

Important to note though that Dresden was already the semiconductor "hotspot" of East Germany (along with Carl Zeiss in Jena which produced the manufacturing equipment).

AMD also had a fab until around 2008 in Dresden.

The fab is still there. Just not AMDs anymore, but Global Foundries instead.

Dunno I wouldn't call 32 years all that recent either

Reporter: "What do you think the long-term consequences of the French Revolution will be?"

Zhou Enlai: "I believe it is too early to tell."

(This quote, while authentic, is too good to be true - the quote harks from 1972, and in context it is evident they are discussing the 1968 student unrest, not the 1789 revolution. Still...)

Indeed, takes a while for these things to unfold. For example, what we're seeing today is the result of the unfolding of the liberal program initiated centuries earlier. However, not only is taking time to unfold different from predictability, but specific predictions are not the same as general predictions.

It isn't always impossible to make good general predictions. For example, some papal encyclicals have predicted with spot on accuracy the general character of how things will develop long before they did if certain things aren't sorted out. These sorts of predictions, in part, benefit from concerning the unfolding of philosophical (and theological) beliefs, beliefs which contains within themselves their own logical entailments. So these encyclicals weren't predicting particularities like "what will be the stock price of Amazon in 2030" or "who will win the presidency in 2030 and will this president like ham", but rather the general prevailing conditions, attitudes, etc. characterizing future generations and the resulting social order, for example.

As my grandmother once said (sometime around her 85th birthday), "You know, in school, in history class, 100 years seems like a long time. It's not really."

As the adage goes, the Church thinks in centuries. Who remembers the Arian crisis today? Things seem bad now? Wait a century or two.

Hm, have they though. It seems like they're awfully reliant on TSMC still. And at least some of our planners probably like the tripwire aspect of it because it bolsters Taiwan's geopolitical importance.

1) China rattles the sabre until everyone is uncomfortable with the world depending on TSMC, increasing economic uncertainty

2) Other countries build chip foundries to capitalize on the uncertainty

3) The risk of China provoking world war by reclaiming control over Taiwan reduces to an acceptable level, and they take over

4) No one cares because the supply of iPhones and Alexas is not disrupted

I don't doubt they will see that as a sort of consolation prize, but world discomfort isn't just with chip fabs. I don't think China would deliberately allow this course of action only for Taiwan. That's not much to get in exchange for being the power of being world's industrial bottle neck.

My guess is that they see this sort of diversification from reliance on China as inevitable. They resist it of course (see 5G equipment in Europe) but their investments throughout the rest of the world paint a picture of supporting developing nations economically to the point that as they grow & prosper, they grow into client states of China.

4D Chess moves.

Yes, they have: TSMC is expanding fabs to outside of China's geographic sphere of influence. Even just having one coming into the US should be enough for European China hawks to feel they have a little breathing room, but from that perspective it also won't be enough. As a result, Europe is in fact working right now with TSMC & Samsung to discuss options for advanced fabs.

This actually presents a bit of peril though. China is not going to be thrilled that its industrial influence is on the decline, and the question is "How will they respond?"

We already know part of the response: We can see it play out in the contentious situation regarding adoption of 5G equipment in Europe. There is also the fact that China is investing enormous sums of money in foreign ventures and areas of the developing world, e.g., parts of Africa. These areas may effectively become client states to China.

It is, in some ways, a very interesting response to the failed methods employed by the Soviet Union. There, client states were obtained & held largely through military means. That was done either with the threat of force to client states to keep in line, or military support for regimes or regime change, for example North Vietnam.

Especially having some experience with those endeavors, China has moved on to non-military methods-- economic development. That is probably preferable to the threat massive global conflict, or even just lots of smaller ones, but if you worry about China expanding their values throughout the world, in being more effective it is also more worrying.

Probably about the best thing we can do is the path we have started on: diversification from reliance on China, and our own support in equal or greater measures of the developing world.

I should be clear though: when I talk of expanding China's values as a negative, I always mean that in the political sense of the repressive Chinese government, not the people themselves.

As a German, I think a European policy analogue to what we did under Brandt and following would be optimal. Reliance usually isn't one-sided, China needs us as much as we need them. On strategic issues, we should certainly strive for self-sufficiency, but it simply isn't smart for us to "join a camp".

In contrast to smaller nations, the EU as a whole is too large to ignore even if we aren't following the line of the cold war superpowers. We can do our own thing and cooperate where it suits us.

On another note, your example of Vietnam is pretty ridiculous, as the situation was the other way around - the US invaded and committed genocide in what was originally a one-sided civil war, in the name of "holding the red wave".

Vietnam wasn't a shining example of human rights, but US policy in this case was abysmal and led to the death of millions of people. And the fact that the US stil does not not accept that they committed a genocide speaks volumes about the moral integrity defenders of the Trans-Atlantic alliance like to bring up.

> Hm, have they though. It seems like they're awfully reliant on TSMC still.

Well just for your information, they are not. The so called chip shortage is because a Renesas factory which produces microcontrollers burned down. To put this into perspective is like Intel using one of his fabs: you have the motherboard but no processor. Usually changing a component is no big deal but in this case is like a complete redesign.

So i do not see any link here between Bosch and TSMC.( except that they both make "chips").

Do you mean specifically about them or for all microcontroller? STmicro are awfully hard to come by currently.