> If I was in Musk’s position I would simply threaten to pack up everything and take all Starship development over to China. I bet a lot of the “essential” pape

> If I was in Musk’s position I would simply threaten to pack up everything and take all Starship development over to China. I bet a lot of the “essential” paperwork would magically be made to go away. Yeah good luck with that one. ITAR doesn't work that way. The worst threat they could realistically make is to make their IP 100% public domain (in the ITAR sense which is a bit different from the copyright/patent sense) and the US probably would not care in the slightest since that would be a massive whale fall for the domestic launch system industry.