Ships, Not Chips, Could Offer China an Edge
The US should be pragmatic when it comes to rebuilding its maritime capacity, and look to friendly nations like Korea and Japan for help.
Supply-chain diplomacy.
Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/BloombergChina’s growing shipbuilding industry has captured the attention of US labor unions, who last week called on the government to step in and save their jobs. Beijing, the petitioners allege, has undertaken “unreasonable and discriminatory acts” to control the maritime, logistics and shipbuilding sectors and hurt the US economy.
To add a sense of urgency to their cause, the unions played the national security card. An ability to make merchant vessels, used to carry everything from coal to couches, impacts a nation’s capacity to produce warships. In the case of China, analysts have long worried that its expanding commercial fleet also has military uses.