I don't know why this isn't the crux of our current geopolitical spat.

Surely it would be cheaper and easier for the CCP to develop their own chipmaking capacity than going to war in the Taiwan strait?

China doesn't want Taiwan for the chip making plants, but because they consider its existence to be an ongoing armed rebellion against the "rightful" rulers. Getting the fabs intact would be nice, but it's not the main objective.

The USA doesn't want to lose Taiwan because of the chip making plants, and a little bit because it is beneficial to surround their geopolitical enemies with a giant ring of allies.

> China doesn't want Taiwan for the chip making plants, but because they consider its existence to be an ongoing armed rebellion against the "rightful" rulers.

that is what the CCP tells you and its own people.

the truth is taiwan is just the symbol of US presence in western pacific. getting taiwan back means the permanent withdrawal of US influence in the western pacific region and the offical end of US global dominance.

CCP doesn't care the island of taiwan, they care about their historical positioning.

I think that is basically what I said already? What is ensuring historical positioning if not the righting of (perceived) old wrongs?

In any case it's clear that it is not the fabs that China cares about when it is talking about (re)conquering Taiwan.

A problem they face in building their own capacity is that ASML isn't allowed to export their newest machines to China. The US has even pressured them to stop servicing some machines already in China. They've been working on getting their own ASML competitor for decades, but so far unsuccessfully.

This is just a question of time. They can afford to wait, since the US is currently in the process of destroying itself.

If I were China I’d be more worried about the other up and coming world power in India.

Indeed, once western governments finally get the message about Indian migrants they are going to have to go somewhere else.

> A problem they face in building their own capacity is that ASML isn't allowed to export their newest machines to China.

building their own capacity means building everything in China, that is the entire semiconductor ecosystem. just look at the mobile phones and EVs built by Chinese companies.

US will intervene militarily to stop China from taking control of TSMC if Taiwan isn't pressured by US to destroy the plants themselves, so I don't think taking Taiwan is a viable path to leading in silica only lowering US ability but given the current gap in GPUs it's not clear how helpful this is to China. So all in all I don't think China views taking Taiwan as beneficial in the AI race at all.

> US will intervene militarily

with a reality tv show dude being the commander in chief and a news reporter being the defense secretary.

life is tough in america, man.

> US will intervene militarily to stop China from taking control of TSMC if Taiwan isn't pressured by US to destroy the plants themselves

No, they will not. Most war games show that the U.S. would lose the war (also read official reports done for congress). You can't win against the world's leading producer of goods by trying to attack them from the sea when they can reach you with rockets from their own territory.

I didn't say the goal would be to stop China from taking Taiwan, only TSMC. I don't think it's impossible US launches its own attacks on TSMC fabs if TSMC doesn't destroy their production line voluntarily.

China will not go to war in or over Taiwan sort of the USA doing its common narcissistic psychopathic thing of instigating, orchestrating, and agitating for aggression. It seems though that some parts of the world have started understanding how to defuse and counter the narcissistic, psychopathic abusive cabal that controls the USA and is constantly agitating for war, destruction, and world domination due to some schizophrenic messianic self-fulfilling prophecies.

That’s some solid whataboutism. USA certainly has its leadership issues right now. I won’t argue that for a moment. But China was running military exercises off Taiwan and building artificial islands to lie about their territorial waters for years without being able to blame the US for it.

You should understand what “whataboutism” is before you make accusations of it.

Yeah, and Putin will definitely never invade Ukraine! Any suggestion to the contrary is just blatant American warmongering.

They are not the same situation. I won’t list all the reasons, but in broad strokes; Taiwan is a Pacific Ocean away from the warmongering USA (in American, btw, and a life long member of the war machine), Taiwan is not culturally inclined as Ukraine, Taiwan is not led by an alien group, China has time on their side, China has proximity on their side, China’s has dependency on its side, China has civilizational momentum on its side, China can see what has been done to the USA by a parasitic group from within. I could make a list that is several pages long, but it all amounts to the fact that at this point China really only has to be patient and offer some carrots, which Taiwan can already clearly see itself.

America is a society and component of a civilization that has never really understood itself or its place in the world and history. We peaked in the industrial warfare of WWII, and then bumbled our way through trying to rely on our past self-involved achievement.

China has wanted reunification since before the invention of the transistor.

"The hardware is the easiest part." - AMD probably