I guess the central point here is that many view this as a race and one in which if you are ahead the competitor can undercut you and being in the lead doesn't matter and instead cost matters - China's model can do XYZ at X% the cost of Claude!! So doomed! But if that's true for the United States it's of course true for China too. In other words, if American companies stopped investing they would have to stop investing too otherwise they would wind up in the same situation, it's like a game of hot potato. I don't buy it because it doesn't make sense. I think the 6-12 month lead time for American companies actually matters and China doesn't have a great hand to play here. At best they can catch up, if they pull ahead then American companies can just play the same hand that China seems to be playing.

They're trying to (and other commentators are as well) look at this like a manufacturing play where you flood the market with low-cost goods but I think that's not just simplistic but wrong too.