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> Is the Taiwanese government not going to evacuate TSMC's personnel outside of the country That makes defending Taiwan less desirable strategically speaking.
by ElectricalUnion 3y ago
> Is the Taiwanese government not going to evacuate TSMC's personnel outside of the country
That makes defending Taiwan less desirable strategically speaking.
> and launch some artillery on the facilities?
You just need to contaminate the facilities with impure outside air and they're most likely ruined for months if not forever; no need to mobilize precious troops to do this.
- waste_monk 3y agoI have heard that the TSMC fab is considered a strategic asset and has demolition charges that Taiwan gov can use if required, but that was just internet scuttlebutt and cannot be considered reliable. That said, I would be very surprised if the fab didn't attract a missile strike from western interests if it did look like China was going to be able overrun Taiwan and capture the fab intact. I would much rather be sure the equipment is destroyed beyond repair (and that ASML cannot provide replacements or repairs) than risk a contaminated fab be put back into service. I'm sure the Chinese gov would be willing to throw a lot of resources at it if it was "only" contaminated and the chance of repair existed.
- ElectricalUnion 3y ago> risk a contaminated fab be put back into service You actually most likely can't afford the risk of running a contaminated fab. You just can't get economically viable yields under contamination; if you could, why would all those fabs care about keeping a very clean environment in the first place?
- waste_monk 3y agoSure, I get that. I meant that China has ~1.4 billion people and one of the largest economies in the world. If they really wanted to get a contaminated fab back into operational condition they could throw effectively unlimited manpower and resources into cleaning it up. Thus it would be better to blow the place up and not have to worry about it.