I've seen papers from back in the cold war documenting a study regarding east german IP theft. The conclusion was stealing IP actually put them behind. You stea

I've seen papers from back in the cold war documenting a study regarding east german IP theft. The conclusion was stealing IP actually put them behind. You steal the IP, then have to learn how to make it without the context. So you end up only learning how to reverse engineer production processes - which takes longer without the context, and don't build the skills needed to create the technologies in the first place. It's like being handed the answers to your calculus class then being asked to move on. It doesn't help.