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I don't think it matters if they get an ASML machine. What they need is the support contract, and that is part of what is unavailable to "Chinese military companies".
To put it another way, if someone gave you (and generously, your friends) a space shuttle and all the relevant infrastructure, would you be able to launch it within five years? There's going to be some critical knowledge of the cockpit or the refueling system or the inspections process that you can't figure out.
With ASML, we're talking about machines the size of a shipping container, with mechanical parts that are calibrated to move wafers at the nanoscale, but which otherwise dampen vibrations, high-performance lasers that won't even work in a standard atmosphere, which require a continuous flow of high-purity chemicals only made in one or two countries, and all depend on proprietary software which probably gets custom modules built and delivered based on the needs of the customer whose fab it sits in. If the servos or beam-line or vacuum gets misaligned, or get slightly over-spec on dust, or some chemical formula changes slightly, or some part burns out prematurely, then it's not going to get the 5 nm resolution which it was sold for.
So yeah, I think this is the end of Xi's China. They can go through a trade war, their economy can sputter along, but China's industrial development is doomed to go the way of the USSR: pulling off epic feats of engineering and brainpower just to keep their existing (high-speed) trains running, while the West gets to start reaping the benefits of software eating the world.
Well, of course the West will still come up with 50 different philosophical and political reasons to justify shooting itself in the foot, but when it does its gun will be equipped with computer-controlled sights.
How is it bad that the Chinese are pulling off epic feats of engineering, creating a bigger high speed rail network than the rest of the world combined (and using their own companies to do so)? Being able to do mega-engineering is good actually - it compares very well to the American experience. A NYT article went viral the other day describing the French companies working in Cali who gave up and decided to move somewhere less politically dysfunctional - like North Africa.
I only link breitbart because the NYT is paywalled:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/10/09/french-rail-company-quit-california-for-less-dysfunctional-north-africa/
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