America, despite what the defeatists say, has the tools to dominate AI. Chip sales are critical. China’s Moonshot AI had to limit subscriptions of its popular Kimi K3 model in July because of a lack of compute.
The Trump administration — unfortunately — has decided to help China out on that. President Donald Trump has given export permits for chip sales to that regime. Chinese companies have reportedly ordered $35 billion in semi-advanced Nvidia microchips. China can compete with the U.S. on AI only if it has access to American chips.
Why are we selling them to the Chinese? Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in July 2025 said the administration wanted to keep China addicted to the American technology stack.
All America is doing by selling chips now is to help the Chinese bridge a critical gap. Why would we want to do that?
Xi has to know that he cannot win a contest with a determined America. He is counting on America not to fight back.
No. Let’s start fighting back!
China’s Ministry of Commerce on October 16 proposed export controls on 23 artificial intelligence technologies. The proposed rules are part of a larger package covering 40 technologies in the AI, biomedicine, and photovoltaics sectors, prohibiting the exports of some and adding restrictions to others.
The potentially comprehensive Chinese rules look like Xi Jinping’s latest shot in the AI wars. As is often said, whichever country dominates AI dominates the century.
China’s frontier AI models, just months behind America’s in sophistication, are popular with users. “By making advanced AI models easily available, Chinese companies have turned open access into one of China’s most powerful advantages in its rivalry with the United States to shape the future of the technology,” reports the New York Times. Users can download and customize China’s open-weight models as they wish. The proprietary models of Anthropic and other American developers cannot be modified.
China understands that the stakes in this contest are extraordinarily high. “Open source vs closed source,” wrote Chen Deli, a senior researcher for Chinese AI developer DeepSeek. “A decisive battle between two futures, two destinies for humanity.”
“However long they want to fight, we’ll fight,” Chen also wrote. “Until total victory.”
Chen’s assertive comments come as DeepSeek released DeepInfer, a tool to help AI models run more efficiently.
The Chinese regime is hoping to create a bloc. In July, China and 28 other countries formed the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai. Since then, nine others, including Iran, have joined.
WAICO, as the Chinese-led grouping is now known, is seen as a rival to Washington’s Pax Silica initiative, which boasts 24 members and others that have endorsed its principles and objectives. Only one nation, Kazakhstan, is a member of both the American and Chinese coalitions.
The world is dividing into two AI camps, one led by Beijing and the other by Washington, with each side wanting the world to adopt its models. To prevail, the U.S. is now beginning to prevent the use of Chinese AI models domestically. On October 19, the Department of Homeland Security ordered the removal of DeepSeek products from all federal civilian information technology systems and procurements. Last year, the Commerce Department prohibited DeepSeek on government devices and the U.S. Navy ordered all personnel to not use that company’s products.
The Trump administration in 2026 has been weighing banning Chinese AI from the U.S. for national security reasons, but so far has not done so in the face of vigorous industry opposition.
China is far more determined than America. On April 27, the powerful National Development and Reform Commission announced it had blocked the acquisition of Manus by Meta Platforms, which had agreed to acquire the Chinese AI startup for more than $2 billion. In March, the two Manus co-founders were barred from leaving China.
Since then, China has required government approval for international travel for top AI researchers and executives and their family members.
The Trump administration is moving in the right direction, but it needs to fight back harder and faster.
America, despite what the defeatists say, has the tools to dominate AI. Chip sales are critical. China’s Moonshot AI had to limit subscriptions of its popular Kimi K3 model in July because of a lack of compute.
The Trump administration — unfortunately — has decided to help China out on that. President Donald Trump has given export permits for chip sales to that regime. Chinese companies have reportedly ordered $35 billion in semi-advanced Nvidia microchips. China can compete with the U.S. on AI only if it has access to American chips.
Why are we selling them to China? Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in July 2025 said the administration wanted to keep China addicted to the American technology stack.
This, as a practical matter, is an unattainable goal. Xi is determined to make China the world’s chip leader. For instance, his Made in China 2025 initiative identified microchips as one of his regime’s core priorities.
All America is doing by selling chips now is helping the Chinese bridge a critical gap. Why would we want to do that?
“There are, as of now, two visions for artificial intelligence development in the world, one China’s and the other America’s,” Brandon Weichert, senior national security editor of 19FortyFive.com, told Gatestone at the time of the Manus reversal. He called the reversal of the merger “part of a large geopolitical picture.”
Xi has to know that he cannot win a contest with a determined America. He is counting on America not to fight back.
No. Let’s start fighting back!
egretnewseditor@gmail.comÂ
