Source: CultureZongheng

Introduction

On January 20, 2025, Trump was officially sworn in as President of the United States. Trump's return to the White House has once again cast doubt on the competition between China and the United States over technology. Will Trump continue the technological containment during the Biden era? Or will it bring a turning point in the technological competition between China and the United States? At a time when technological competition has become a key global issue, China's technology in the Trump 2.0 era will profoundly affect the future world structure. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍

This article is a prediction and outlook on technology in the Trump 2.0 era. This article puts forward three key predictions: first, Trump’s second term is likely to continue and escalate the technology war against China; second, there is room for negotiation between China and the United States on the issue of technology restrictions; third, if China and the United States cannot reach an agreement on A compromise is reached on technology issues, and Trump may adopt more severe restrictive measures. On the one hand, there are indeed many security hawks and technology hawks around Trump who hope to continue the technology sanctions against China; but on the other hand, compared with Biden’s repeated emphasis on China’s technology restrictions as “non-negotiable”, Trump’s administration On the contrary, there is a greater possibility of negotiation during the period.

This article points out that due to Trump’s character and ambitions for his second term, the Sino-US technology war will not be his top priority goal, but may instead hinder his international agenda. At the same time, Trump’s guiding strategy for China’s technology competition in his second term may not be as overly focused as Biden’s on how to restrict it, but will focus more on how to make American technology companies “strong and strong.” To this end, Trump will likely focus on "deregulating" the U.S. technology industry and appropriately relaxing export controls on some less advanced AI chips and semiconductor manufacturing equipment to ensure that relevant companies can continue to make money from the market and invest in research and development. At the same time, Trump will actively use tariff tools to force high-tech manufacturing to return, and may even introduce so-called "component tariffs", which tax products based on their internal components rather than the place of assembly.

However, China and the United States can "negotiate" on the issue of technological war, but this does not mean that "negotiation can be concluded." If the Sino-U.S. technology war escalates further, Trump’s “America First” and unilateralist tendencies will make it easier for him to aggressively use extraterritorial jurisdiction tools such as foreign direct product rules and minimum content rules to force allies to cooperate, rather than like Biden. The main thing is to exert pressure through diplomatic channels. In the short term, this will make life more difficult for the semiconductor industry, which will be unable to maintain and expand advanced chip production capacity. But in the long term, this may also force American allied companies such as ASML to more actively exclude American technology from their equipment. In addition, Trump may further weaponize the foreign investment review mechanism.

In the technology war between China and the United States, although they are on the defensive, they are by no means without cards to fight. However, whether we can have the confidence to fight this technology war with the United States in the future, the progress of domestic substitution of semiconductors is still the most important determining factor. In the face of problems such as the peaking of Moore's Law and the Law of Scale that may arise in new technologies, we also need to take precautions. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍普

The Sino -US science and technology war in Trump's 2.0 era

U.S. scientific and technological suppression has become one of the core issues in relations between the two countries. From the perspective of China, this involves its own "right development rights", and the United States advocates that this is an irreversible security issue. During his tenure, the right scientific and technological war was upgraded, and a series of restrictions represented by large -scale semiconductor export control were introduced. On January 20th, Trump officially opened his second term and what strategy will we adopt in China ’s scientific and technological warfare will continue Biden and introduce more severe measures. Sanctions?

Trump's second term may continue or even upgrade to China Science and Technology War.

At present, the mainstream view is that Trump is unlikely to relax the right high -tech restrictions in the second term. Trump nominated by traditional security hawks such as Qing Rubio and Security Consultant Waltz will even take more tough. Recently, Biden's "Indian Tsar Emperor" and executive deputy Campbell revealed that in the work transfer of his and Trump's transition team, Trump felt that Trump would continue Biden's technology to China. He specifically mentioned that the standpoint of Ren Qing Lubero is aligned with the Biden team in this regard. Axel Rhoder, an assistant minister of the Ministry of Commerce, who is about to leave, also believes that Trump will continue to implement high -tech export control.

The founder of Palantir, the founder of National Defense Contractor Palantir, is also encouraging the continuation of the right scientific and technological war. Former SCALE AI executives, Michael Clazoos, who has just been nominated by Trump ’s White House Science and Technology Office, and Anderson Horovz, investor investor in national defense technology companies, have a strong influence on the next session. These American entrepreneurs and their control companies have followed the big cakes of defense budgets, hoping to sell technology and services to the military, and share a share from the old military fire commercial bowls such as Thor. To this end, they constantly incite the atmosphere of Sino -US science and technology confrontation, trying to promote the national defense budget to tilt more towards "national defense technology". In order to get more support, OpenAI and Anthropic moved out of the old set of "technical ideology" routines, emphasizing that artificial intelligence in the United States is democratic, artificial intelligence in the oriental powers is autocracy, democracy and autocratic water and fire are incomparable. The United States wants the United States. Ensure that the American artificial intelligence company representing democracy has won competition.

There is a room for negotiations on the issue of scientific and technological restrictions on China and the United States. Trump, who is about to usher in the second term, has stronger control and greater flexibility than the first term. The above is a close friend to him.

In the dialogue with China, Biden emphasized that the issue of technology restrictions on China is "irreversible", but it may not be necessary in Trump's second term. Trump's first term, security adviser Bolton, in his memoir "The Room WHERE IT HAPPENED) pointed out that Trump has always wanted to take the Huawei issue as a trade negotiation chip, and clearly stated that Huawei can become a part of the Sino -US trade agreement when talking with leaders. During the 2018 Golden Group Leader Summit, he even promised to "immediately allow" Qualcomm and other American companies to continue to supply Huawei during his meeting with the leaders. Bolton recalled that if it was not for himself and other inside hard -to -China hardliners, China and the United States may have copied ZTE's case and reached an agreement on the Huawei issue. Recently, Trump's nominated business minister, Howe Lutnick, also said that Trump actually "wants to achieve a transaction", and tariffs are the tools for his goal.

Trump's personality characteristics and ambition to the second term determine that the scientific and technological warfare will not be his most concerned. Trump is essentially self -centered, which is reflected in many aspects. Long -term follow -up reported that his "New York Times" reporter Jonathan Carl's new book "Tired of Winning" mentioned several old things from Trump. On the "September 11" day in 2001, when the passenger plane hijacked by terrorists hit the WTO twin tower, Trump's first reaction after seeing the news on TV turned out: "Trump Tower is finally the tallest building in New York "On January 6, 2021, Congress Mountain riots, Trump did not care about the death and injury of the people caused by the riots, and repeatedly encouraged overthrowing the election results. During the first term, many of his, how to ensure that he was re -elected. In the second term, he did not have the pressure of re -election. The focus will shift to how to win the Nobel Peace Prize, and how to serve as one of the greatest American presidents such as Washington and Lincoln, which can be included in the history book and won the behind -the -name name.

Therefore, to the outside world, he will strive to promote the resolution of two wars in Russia and Ukraine and the Middle East, and this requires the assistance of China. Internally, he will focus on the core issues of MAGA, focus on reform, on the one hand to solve the problem of trade imbalances facing the United States, attract manufacturing backflow, and create more employment positions; on the other hand, focus on supervising and tax reduction force. Although it is important for the China Science and Technology War to the Safety Eagle, it is far from Trump's priority, and even hinders his agenda, so he may not have much interest. A simple observation indicator is that Trump ’s limited statements about chips have been rare about continuing or upgrading the Chinese science and technology war compared with problems such as trade, tariffs, and fentanyl.

Based on the above factors, Trump and Biden's guidance strategy for the Chinese science and technology war may be largely different. Biden wants to decide with technology, but in order to take care of the commercial interests of American companies, it can only be advanced in order, so the movement is very contradictory and twisted. For example, some conservative think tank experts believe that the domestic semiconductor is independent as a puzzle that is puzzled. Biden's semiconductor export control is only one or two pieces in the puzzle, so that the concentrated power to attack the two pieces of those two pieces The lack of puzzle, the result is the technology that has not been stoppedProgress has harmed the interests of American companies.

Recently, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Raimondo reviewed Biden’s experience and gains and losses in the technology war against China and concluded that it is futile to only rely on bans and sanctions to prevent technological progress. The United States should invest more in defeating the Technological innovation. Trump’s guiding strategy for China’s technology competition in his second term may not be as overly focused as Biden’s on how to restrict it. Instead, it will focus more on how to make American technology companies “strong and strong” and how to gain what the United States does not have or has lost. return.

In order to achieve "the strong will always be strong", Trump will focus on "deregulating" the U.S. technology industry, especially removing various federal and state-level environmental protection regulations that restrict the construction of U.S. data centers and power plants. and other regulations, promote the "Manhattan Project" of artificial intelligence, and provide sufficient computing power, energy, and financial support for the early realization of general artificial intelligence in the United States.

In the past two years, U.S. semiconductor companies have continuously complained that Biden’s export controls have made it cheaper for allies and competitors, but have caused U.S. companies to fall into a “death spiral” due to lost revenue and no money to invest in research and development. Trump may respond to these complaints by appropriately relaxing export controls on some less advanced AI chips and semiconductor manufacturing equipment, allowing these companies to continue to make money to support their R&D investment. After all, the goal of semiconductor export controls is to delay as much as possible and ensure U.S. technological superiority. Export control is only one part of the combined strategy to contain the computing power supply chain, and the tightness and tightness of the scale can be adjusted.

Recently, the review of high-tech investment in China pushed by Congress and Biden has been stuffed into "must-pass" bills such as the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act and the Short-term Spending Act, but was ultimately rejected by Trump and Ma Skiff put pressure to remove it, essentially because the relevant review directly cut off the channels for American capital represented by Wall Street to make money. Trump also recently forwarded an article on social media "Perdue's appointment as ambassador to China will boost the confidence of Chinese and American investors", which also hinted that he may pay more attention to economic gains and pragmatism in relations with China. Boiled down to a conceptual level, overly strict export controls and reverse investment reviews are a strong intervention in the economic activities of enterprises. They are directly contrary to the economic liberalization concepts of Trump, Musk and others, and are also targets of "deregulation."

In order to get back what the United States does not have or has lost, Trump will actively use tariff tools to force the return of high-tech manufacturing. Regarding electric vehicles, Biden has formulated security review rules for connected vehicle software and hardware, hoping to completely cut off the Sino-US electric vehicle industry. But Trump has publicly expressed his welcome to invest in and set up factories for electric vehicles in the United States. This is because Trump sees the technological advantages and job creation value of electric vehicles, and hopes to use tariffs to guide car companies to invest in the United States and achieve a certain level of technology transfer and job creation.

Trump dismissed Biden's industries represented by the "Chip Act" and "Inflation Cutting Act", calling them "terrible" plans and believing that tariffs can encourage production more than industrial subsidies. and the reshoring of advanced manufacturing. Recently, Biden has launched a campaign to matureThe 301 survey of the process chip paved the way for Trump's next step to the mature process chip. Trump may introduce the so -called "component tariff", that is, according to the internal component of the product instead of the assembly site, as long as the chip produced, no matter where the final assembly location is, high tariffs must be imposed. This move can not only hedge the price advantage of industrial subsidies and mature process chips, but also helps more domestic chip production capacity to the United States. After Biden launched the 301 investigation, it is rumored that SK Hynix and Samsung have begun to gradually transfer production capacity. Regarding the chip manufacturing of advanced processes, Trump has accused Taiwan of stealing the chip industry in the United States. A TSMC Arizona Factory can no longer satisfy his appetite. The binding of military aid "protection fees" forced TSMC to further transfer advanced chips to the United States.

If China and the United States cannot reach compromise on scientific and technological issues, Trump may take more severe restrictions

Sino -US "can talk" on the issue of scientific and technological warfare, but it does not mean "can talk about". Now that China has raised the problem to the height of "development rights", Trump will inevitably propose a higher asking price, and even directly linked to the problem of unbalanced bilateral trade. If the negotiations between China and the United States fail, the security hawks such as Rubio will get a momentum again and will further upgrade the relevant restrictions. For example, put more technology companies into the entity list, or expand restricted areas from advanced semiconductors, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence to more extensive areas such as electric vehicles and power batteries.

In order to strengthen the implementation of semiconductor export control, Trump may also strengthen pressure on the Dutch, Japan, and South Korea. The chip war has been played now, and there are fewer ammunition in the United States, and it is urgent to cooperate with allies such as the Netherlands, Japan, and South Korea. Although the lotus, Japan and South Korea have basically coordinated the US requirements for a period of time, they also opened their eyes and closed their eyes. They must take into account the relationship and the business interests of the company, and it is impossible to completely cooperate with the United States' control without conditions. Through the unilateral visa -free from the Dutch and South Korean citizens to China to come to China, it is unilaterally visa -free, restore some high -level exchanges and dialogues with Japan, and recently stabilized or improved the relationship with these, and objectively underwent the pressure of the United States.

Trump's "U.S. Priority" and unilateralist tendencies make him easier to use foreign direct product rules and minimum content rules such as external jurisdictions to force allies to cooperate, instead of being like Biden. Mainly pressure through diplomatic channels. Because the United States' monopoly in a specific technical link in the semiconductor supply chain (such as ASML still relies heavily on US light sources, electron beams, software and high -purity semiconductor materials), ASML, Tokyo Electronics, Samsung and SK Hynix and other American allies will have to have to have to have to have Swallowing bitter fruit. In the short term, this will make the days in the semiconductor industry more difficult and cannot maintain and expand the capacity of advanced chip. But in the long run, this may also force American allies such as ASML to more actively eliminate American technology in equipment.

In addition to export control tools, Trump will further weapon foreign investment review mechanisms. During the first term of Trump, Parliament promoted Congress to introduce the "FIRRMA" (Firrma), which significantly expanded the jurisdiction of the Foreign Investment Council (CFIUS). Security and data security have become the key concerns of CFIUS review to the US M & A transactions. Since then, many Chinese -funded M & A involved in data security or sensitive personal information has been rejected or required to take relief measures, such as Ant Financial acquisition of Sudi Huijin and GRINDR for Kunlun Wanwei. A study in 2020 showed that during Trump's tenure, the overall pass rate of the CFIUS review of investment transactions was not more than 60%(the transaction pass rate of Obama during the administration of Obama exceeded 95%).

Recently, Trump has publicly opposed the acquisition of American Iron and Steel Corporation. This is still the case for Japanese companies, let alone mergers and acquisitions from. At present, technology companies have encountered great obstacles to U.S. investment, but Trump's second term may adopt similar export control "presumption of rejection" to handle all from scientific and technological investment, veto most of the mergers and acquisitions transactions, or at least demand more harsh. Relief measures, even if related investment does not involve cutting -edge technology. Although Trump's nominated Treasurer Barst was born hedge fund, he always believed that economy and security were inseparable. Trump may also retain the reverse investment censorship rules passed during the Biden period and implement it in actual implementation, strictly control the investment of US capital on advanced semiconductors, quantum computing and artificial intelligence.

China's response to the opponent's strategy

For the scientific and technological restrictions of the United States, China has countermeasured the corresponding degree. In fact, although China has been in the current scientific and technological war in the past few years, it is by no means unlicensed. After Biden announced on December 2, 2024, after a new round of export control over China semiconductor, China quickly announced that in principle, the two -purpose item related to 镓, 锗, 锑, and super hard materials exported to the United States, and another critical raw materials were on another critical raw material. Graphite has implemented stricter end users and final use review. China also launched the "foreign direct product rules" and "minimum content rules" of Article 49 of the "Export Control Regulations" for this purpose. Even if the above items have been exported abroad, they need to sell to American companies. Using key metal reserves and output advantages, as well as leading smelting and solvent extraction technology, it has made great difficulties for the United States to acquire a lot of key technologies for semiconductor and weapon manufacturing. U.S. Defense Software Corporation Govini recently pointed out that the above -mentioned ban on China has affected most of the US military departments and more than 20,000 components that are very important for their weapons, involving more than 1,000 weapon systems. In addition, it also uses network security review and antitrust censorship to pressure the business of American semiconductor companies such as Micron and Intel, which is widely considered by the outside world to be countermeasures against American scientific and technological warfare. If Trump's second term upgrade against China, China may implement more key metals with a more resolute attitude, and even furtherCut off the export of rare earth elements to the United States. U.S. technology companies in China will also face more risks of Chinese countermeasures.

But whether we can have the confidence to fight this technology war with the United States in the future, the progress of domestic substitution of semiconductors is the most important determining factor. The field of chip design has gradually caught up. Breaking the U.S. technical blockade on semiconductor manufacturing equipment as soon as possible is the most critical next step, because no matter how good the design drawings are, it will be difficult to transform them into advanced chips without equipment. Trump may be able to relax the export of finished chips to China, but he should not relax controls on semiconductor manufacturing equipment. This is because ensuring that China cannot produce AI chips that can compete with the United States is extremely important to keeping American companies “strong and strong” and ensuring that the United States is the first to reach general artificial intelligence. In this field, we can only hope to achieve domestic breakthroughs as soon as possible.

In recent years, there has been increasing discussion about the peak of Moore's Law and the Law of Scaling. If chip manufacturing approaches the physical limit, model training hits the data wall, and the speed of related technology iterations slows down, it will have a negative impact on the industry. The pursuit will be a godsend. We must also plan ahead, start studying other technical routes as early as possible, and strive to explore opportunities for overtaking on corners in the future.

As Tsinghua University professor Yan Xuetong said in a recent article in "Foreign Affairs": The competition between the United States and the United States will not be based on ideology like the Cold War with the Soviet Union, but will be based on technology. In the digital age, security and prosperity depend largely on technological advancement. China and the United States will compete around innovation in areas such as artificial intelligence, and compete in markets and high-tech supply chains. The game between China and the United States in the high-tech field will become a more important issue in bilateral relations during Trump's second term. Based on Trump’s personal characteristics and policy priorities in his second term, the United States’ next technology war strategy against China will have more room for negotiation than during the Biden period. When the president met with Biden in Lima, he emphasized that China and the United States should lengthen the list of cooperation, make the cooperation pie bigger, and achieve win-win cooperation. Trump also recently said that China and the United States can solve all the problems in the world by joining forces. While striving to promote self-sufficiency in advanced science and technology and get rid of external dependence, we should be good at using wisdom to seize fleeting negotiation opportunities and gain more time and space for the technology industry.

This article was originally published in the 2025 Issue 1 of "Culture Perspective" and was originally titled "China-US Technology War in the Trump 2.0 Era".