Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology

by Chris Miller

One tiny speck of Chinese territory escaped the horrors of the Cultural Revolution. Thanks to a quirk of colonialism, Hong Kong was still governed temporarily by the British. As most Chinese were meticulously memorizing the quotations of their crazed chairman, Hong Kong workers were diligently assembling silicon components at Fairchild’s plant overlooking Kowloon Bay. A couple hundred miles away in Taiwan, multiple U.S. chip firms had facilities employing thousands of workers in jobs that were low-paying by California’s standards but far better than peasant farming. Just as Mao was sending China’s small set of skilled workers to the countryside for socialist reeducation, the chip industry in Taiwan, South Korea, and across Southeast Asia was pulling peasants from the countryside and giving them good jobs at manufacturing plants.