I'm sure that the US still has many edges over China in high-end technology. I remember I read a research article back in 2012/2013 which listed all fields that China were lagging behind, including pharma, computer chips and some other stuffs. It's a fairly long list. I'm sure China managed to catch up in some of the fields but I doubt all of them.
The US pre-WW1 was an isolationist nation with few I'd any exports, not the global manufacturing powerhouse it became afterwards.
Things change and always change.
https://www.aspi.org.au/report/aspis-two-decade-critical-tec...
China leads in 57 of 64 technologies but the US leads in only 7?
It ranks China far ahead of the US on aircraft engines, of which, China can’t even produce its own right now. What?
(and they are now producing their own engines, as seen on their new fighters, though they aren't believed to be ahead yet.)
They do lead in many areas now. They have a lot of engineers, hands-on manufacturing heft at scale (inc. a lot of internal competition), and a government that has been pumping and subsidising physical industries for many years.
Will China eventually catch up? Absolutely.
But I’d temper any fear of China pulling ahead in research when they can’t even put today’s technology into full production.
And if you could guarantee that they'll never catch up in the others, we'd all feel a bit better about the permanency of American superiority.
Absent that guarantee, we need to bench test those scenarios and be prepared with plans that best serve American interests should those scenarios come to fruition.