Counter-point: All of that changes if their economy weakens or becomes toxic. This could, and probably will, happen in a number of ways. They are blatantly exp

Counter-point: All of that changes if their economy weakens or becomes toxic. This could, and probably will, happen in a number of ways. They are blatantly expansionist; asserting control over HK was a mildly toxic event, but a move into Taiwan would be beyond reproach. They have a growing population that is overwhelmingly lower-class, by western standards. They hold a Tremendous amount of foreign-denominated debt (~$1.3T USD just from the USG) (holding a mortgage gives the bank power over you; holding sovereign debt gives the sovereign power over you), while issuing most of their debt internally, with very poor bookkeeping practices. They have very few notable Allies, and none won out of an emotion beside fear. The US has positioned itself for the next decades to aggressively improve at-home manufacturing & infrastructure. These are just public statements by American executives; they mean nothing, and they don't represent the exertion any Real Power. No one is lying to themselves about China; but the shit hasn't hit the fan yet. Until it does, western companies extract and export Tremendous value from China, effectively weakening their natural resource reserves and domestic corporations while increasing their reliance on western technology. When that changes, western economies will take a hit; but China will be decimated. China doesn't export any real culture (their top grossing film was a poorly made war propaganda film? lol Disney can puke out the sixteenth spiderman movie and make more. and No Way Home hasn't been released in China yet). They don't meaningfully export technology or intellectual property (ok: Tik Tok). One thing they do export: their children, to western universities. And you talk to many of these kids who have grown up in the west, and they don't want to leave. They buy houses here, build families, drink with their white, black, and brown friends, work in American companies... It's Just Better Here. And sure; they export Influence; its the echoes of an untapped market with really cheap manufacturing. My western value systems says Intel should be more harsh with China; that they shouldn't mince words. But simultaneously, when speaking about global power dynamics: Why? Profiting from slave labor is horrible, but that's exactly what Intel is doing: Profiting. I wish they wouldn't, but doing so doesn't meaningfully make China stronger. If anything, it further striates their already overwhelmingly lower-class population; unrest can't just happen in authoritarian countries, it tends to. And while all-out war is unlikely; if that happens, everyone will be decimated. We can drum all we want, but global military tech has react the status of Perfect Killing Machine. War, in the past, was a tool countries used to assert influence and escape dire economic situations. The tools have changed; you can't assert influence if there's no one left to have influence over, and your dire economic situation will just be made worse after coastal population center bombardment and grain field irradiation. We'll just kill each other off, and most war is rational somewhere in the reasoning matrix.