Robert O’Brien, Donald Trump’s former National Security Advisor, has said that the US would destroy Taiwan’s advanced semiconductor manufacturing facilities if China launched a successful invasion of the island.
“The United States and its allies are never going to let those factories fall into Chinese hands,” O’Brien told Semafor.
O’Brien, who served as National Security Advisor from 2019-2021, drew a comparison to the British bombing of the French naval fleet off the coast of Algeria in 1940 to prevent the ships from coming under Nazi Germany’s control. The British bombardment killed nearly 1,300 French sailors.
“The Brits didn’t allow the French fleet to remain intact so that it could have potentially gone to the Germans and changed the balance of power for the battle of the Atlantic,” he said.
O’Brien said because Taiwan is home to most of the world’s advanced microchip factories, if China took control, it would make them “like the new OPEC of silicon chips” and give Beijing more control over the world’s economy. He said he couldn’t “imagine” the factories would “remain intact” if China took the island.
O’Brien is not the first to float the idea of the US bombing Taiwan’s chip factories in the event of a Chinese invasion. A paper published in 2021 by the US Army War College suggested the US and Taiwan should plan “scorched-earth” tactics that could render Taiwan “not just unattractive if ever seized by force, but positively costly to maintain.”
The paper said the tactic could be done “most effectively by threatening to destroy facilities belonging to the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the most important chipmaker in the world and China’s most important supplier.”
Bloomberg reported in October 2022 that there are “some former officials with ties to the Pentagon want the Biden administration to devise” a plan to destroy Taiwan’s chip factories.
The Biden administration has been taking action against China’s semiconductor industry by blocking exports of advanced technology needed to produce advanced chips. The US is also rallying allies to join in on the sanctions and got the Netherlands also to restrict exports of semiconductor technology.
With a friend like this…
My immediate thought as well…
Riight. Save Taiwan by killing off its main product.
Taiwan is of use to the US because it makes cutting edge semi-conductors. Biden wants American companies to monopolize that market, and he doesn’t care who gets hurt to make that happen. Stealing the technology is easy, but it takes time. The CHIPS act provided funding, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is very pleased to begin producing 3 nm chips in Arizona by 2026. Until that happens, the US would be shooting itself in the foot by destroying a TSMC factory in Taiwan.
China isn’t the only economic competitor that Biden is attempting to crush. The world leader in 3 nanometer chips manufacturing is ASML in the Netherlands. Their CEO has already said that the US prohibition on selling their best equipment to their best customer (China) is a thinly veiled effort to provide an unfair advantage to US companies at the expense of ASML.
Will the US care about Taiwan after 2026? Will the KMT party make a comeback over the DPP party when American strangers bearing gifts no longer need Taiwanese silicon chips? Will the efforts to radicalize politics in Taiwan be cast out as voters there recognize that they have far more in common with the mainland, and far more to gain from its trade relationships with the mainland than with the US.
Sounds like 2026 will be when we send some missiles over to take out a competitor.
Quite honestly I’m tired of this constant state of war to protect corporate overseas business interests and shipping lanes so international businesses can safely ship us stuff like computer chips and petroleum to make maximum profits.
Yes, now they’re saying these things out loud it should be clear to the entire world that American capitalist pursuit of profit knows no “rules”, no bounds -a genocidal and ecocidal mania that needs to be defanged.
You are describing international trade as conducted by every nation.
War is the result of others wanting another’s stuff (cheaper resources for the businessman don’t ya know;-) and that isn’t just a US activity nor even a singular western idea/activity.
Never on such an apocalyptic scale. The US is unique in its recurrence to indiscriminate all-out war.
We are the Globalist’s kid who can be convinced to do the fighting for the grownups in Europe/UN/NATO/etc.
Look at Libya/Quaddafi; he wanted to Natonalize his oil feilds and send his oil to North Africa instead of the Brits and French. Hillary solves the problem as we always do for the Brits and the French (you can add in the rest of the EU too).
To put it into mafia parlence; we are the foot soldier for the progressive globalists who quite honestly seem to be following “The Doctrine of Fascism” as their governing manifesto.
Yes & no: big business, police state, and glorification of military, Yes; but, charismatic leader, race -myth, and socialist component, No.
We have now returned to the preww2 populist vs progressism/facsism kerfuffle. I know the Progressives get their panties in a twist over their inclusion with the Fascists but it is historically acurrate and simple definition of government being married to business and trade unionism (we are in service to the state) is where the modern progressives are at. Heck, Mussilini’s Doctrine of Fascism reads like a Democratic party platform and little of would be voted down atvtheir party convention if put to a vote.
China has always wanted to bring Taiwan ‘back home’, long before computer chips were a thing. By becoming a center of production for those, Taiwan literally put an extra target on its own back.
“White House insiders leak to Garland Nixon when Biden asked if there could be any greater disaster than the neocon Ukraine project? Biden said: ‘wait until you see our plan for the destruction of Taiwan.'” When Garland Nixon tweeted the above, he was called a “liar.”
What’s really interesting is that Garland meant it as sarcasm when he tweeted it.
I need to hear more opinions of Ex Trump Officials to validate this one. Lol.
Your man, Trump, is not going to be POTUS IN 2024.Get it??
Inmates …. Asylum …. takeover……….
Maybe we can send land sharks strapped with C4 onto the island….
Creative thinking OB1! Very Bond-esque.
Wow, next thing they’re going to be threatening to bomb vital energy infrastructure of “allies”.
Step back and contemplate the striking absurdity of keeping the world’s manufacturing powerhouse China from manufacturing anything. These people are power crazed nitwits. And without googling it I’m going to go ahead and coin the term vandal economics.
It works for me TC!
Preposterous…! And Taiwan is just gonna sit on its butt and let US do that…! Same for China…they can strike Intel facilities in nearby countries almost immediately…!
Yes, this makes Taiwan feel real good!
They are all mad as a box of rocks! This “most avanced”. seniconductor blah, blah. — how is China at all affected by US pressure on Taiwan to stop manufacturing for China? All it did is errode Taiwan’s economy! This panicis du to the factt that US has no such manufacturing capacities and feels vulnerable.
How in the least is China affected in successfuly installing Huawei 5g networks world wide? From Mexoci to UAE, or Turkey. In faact. the latest industry show in Barcelona featured Turkey’s modernization using Huawei.
Did the absence of these newest density chips slow down China’s rapid rise in AI? Which in turn boisted use of Big Data and Internet of Things in the revolution of robotics? Taiwan factories used to produce China DESIGNED microchips. Nothing changes except China had to ramp up donestic capacities. Inna normal open economy there is no need to produce everything if you can buy. If forced, China will just ramp up.
There is a technoligical infantilism hapoeningbin out political circles. If only we can prevent China from using any tool made in the West, any software, wny component they will be unable to prooduce the most advanced microchips — this thwarting their future! We tried this with banning our ooerating systems, and what happened? China has a better one, more versatile in industrial and military uses.
We can bimb Taiwan and destroy their livelihood. This will nit affect China at all. Just the opposite. It will get all the human capital from Taiwan to work in China. It is already hapoening. Hundreds of engineers from Taiwan work in China since Taiwan lost Chinese customers due to US ban. We are so naive to think that Russia for example needs Western technology and will have mto cave in to our demand! Forgetting this is the country that invented satelites, build two space stations.? We none. Rusdia is not competing for world markets in technoligy. But it has focused on research and develooment for their needs. Their military technoligy advances are a testament to that. Until today, we and everybody else used Russian scientific breakthroughs in magnetic field contsinmentc of high temperatures. We are still to my knowledge using Russian rocket engine to kauchbour Atlas rockets.
All Trmp did was miscalculate and it is unforgivabke for a businessman he is. Buden happily continues with the delusion. By introducing massive tarrifs and bans in oroducts we have hit cinsumer by fueling inflation. This infllatiin cannot be stopped by high interest rates. We can inly undermine already fragile economy and hurt consumer hard.
Since our infantile leaders cannot accept that they made a mistake and rectify them — they dig the hole deeper. They are determined to squash inflation by raising interest rates eveb if it bring massive unemployment and the destruction of assets and livelihoods.
They are sly however. By raising rates they are expecting greedy glibal capital to be parked here to enjoy high rates. A miscalculation. Where is the glibal capital to be coming from? Tempt them away from our European partners? Perhaps. But we are not likely to get much from anywhere else. Everybody knows the lesdon of the legal theft of Russiian state reserves deposited in goid faith in Western banks. Lesson kearned,
What happened in UAE, when we cinditioned thevsale of F-16 by demanding UAE drop Huawei provider of networks, UAE cancelled the purchase and bought Frenchh Raffale.
The absolutely crazed abd zealotic nuts runningvour White House. State Department, Treasury and the slew of other agencies are in the state of rage. Ukraine gamble, European destruction of industry, a stampede of countries rushing to join Russia-China led SCO and BRIKS is tellung the tale of our bullying that ran its course
Countries are networking and trading in domestic currencies, and within BRIKS+ schemes are considered for a common exchange virtual currency. We alredy do not have insight into much of global trade as they are not in dollars or ieuros.
Much of our problems lie in the simple fact that we alliw ethnic based politics to influence this nation’s conduct in the world. The crazed hatred of Russia comes from a very narrow, well defined historic ethniic prejudice harbored by soecific ethnic revanshism,
In the past it may have been cute — as we were able to indulge in such whims. Now, we are putting our security and wellbeing at risk.
Yet, change is not on the horison, Trump has appointed the same rabbid circles to run his foreign policy, His revival ofvantiinterventionist policy in soeaches rings hollow, He had his chance, As no serious, credible and experienced candidate is likely to emerbevfrom
Republican field — democrats and their crazies will continue pushing, gambling with our country until ruined.
The inly thing that can stop them are some bank failures, a clear indication that interest rate hiking is causing systemic damage. Either way, poor us. Time forcsome sympathy for thousands layed of from texh industry — suppisedly the crown jewel of our glibal leadership.
Time for commin sense. If one can find it in an increasingly infintile, bickering, vulgar and vane ruling circles.
” Forgetting this is the country that invented satelites, build two space stations.? We none.”
Not sure who the “we” here is. If you’re referring to the US, it launched, orbited and manned at least one (Skylab) that the public knows of.
Of course I know. But it was occupied for 24 weeks. It quicky started to lose orbit. Russia’s Mir space station was the first one capable of long term habitation. It stayed in space for 25 years. It was deliberately brought down due to Internatiinal Space Station coming into operation.
My point is not to ever disparage US achievements in space, many magnificent.
My point is to draw attention to our near instinctive dismissal of other people and their achievements. Especially Russia, When we do that we are in danger of underestimating other human beings and overestimating our own strength. Not good.
This behaviour is infantile, arrogant, cocky. Assuming that without our technological provesse and our ingenuity the dunces of this world would curl up and die, The kind of rubbish information we daily spread with glee on Russia is laughable.
I remind myself once in a while how dangerous this is for our own mental hygiene not to mention our wellbeing. We have to remind ourselves that we are fortunate and that recklessly underestimating other countries’. strengths while insulting them on daily basis — is high octane Hubris.
“infantile, arrogant, cocky”… you left off stupid and wrong. And you left off Gagarin, a major Russian first. And the core of the ISS is Russian. Speaking as an engineer, the idea that the Russians and Chinese can’t do things without US technology is ridiculous, and the idea that the US government could keep a given technology secret is more ridiculous still, but then most politicians couldn’t convert English to metric with a gun to their head.
Perhaps Robert O’Brien needs to read Chris Miller’s Chip War. According to that book, TSMC itself has built mechanisms into their factories to destroy critical (and irreplaceable) machinery in the event of a Chinese invasion. But as the book makes clear, TSMC relies on many other nations for critical infrastructure to manufacture advanced chips. In reality it’s a multi-national effort to manufacture those chips. Even if China seized the plants outright, undamaged, they wouldn’t get far with further manufacturing due to the fragility of the technology and the interdependence of many foreign players in the manufacturing process. O’Brien sounds like a knuckle head.
Take that Taiwan! We must strangle your economy before we let your kind get their hands on it.
No concern for the people of Taiwan at all.
Just like Afghanistan. If we cannot have it then destroy it. We have absolutely no concern about civilian infrastructure, hey, let’s bomb the Pyramids while we are at it.