As Concern Grows Over China’s Invasion Threat To Taiwan the U.S. Military Wants TSMC To Move Some Chip Capacity

And some thought I'd gone mad talking of chips and China and the island formerly known as Formosa (at least to the Portuguese).
p.s. can I start attending the Thursday soirées again? Please.

Today, a little pink, a little blue.
First up, a deep dive (The Big Read) from the Financial Times, January 8: 

Taiwan: concern grows over China’s invasion threat
Beijing is ramping up its firepower and rhetoric, making defence central to Saturday’s election

There was a funfair atmosphere when Tainan Air Base in south Taiwan opened its doors to the public one Saturday morning in October. Multicoloured banners fluttered in the breeze, children pushed to get a front row spot and a “flying tigers” team of pilots looped their planes overhead. But the motivation behind the display is deadly serious. Concerns are building in both Taipei and in the US — the unofficial guarantor of the island’s security — that China could be moving closer to launching the attack which it has been threatening for 70 years.

 “Militarily, the other side has been doing [its] homework for a couple of decades. The threat is real,” says Enoch Wu, a Taiwanese former special forces officer who is running for parliament in Saturday’s election. “The [People’s Liberation Army] will achieve a certain credible capability to give that option to Beijing and say, here is that button you can push.” While US officials do not yet consider it likely that China would use military force, they say the prospect is becoming less remote. In the past decade, the PLA has dramatically expanded its presence and capabilities, undermining the US military’s freedom to operate in Asian waters and airspace. This has been accompanied by more aggressive rhetoric from Beijing. 

The issue has taken centre stage in Taiwan’s election. Tsai Ing-wen, the incumbent president who has been more focused on defence than any of her predecessors over the past 30 years, is framing the race as a battle to defend Taiwan’s sovereignty and democracy against its authoritarian neighbour. Washington is keen to bolster Taiwan’s defences to a level that would act as a strong deterrent. But beyond Taiwan’s shores, the tilt in the balance of power in the region underscores the growing competition between the US and China. Defence experts in both countries see Taiwan as the most likely point over which the two might one day clash militarily.

Ni Lexiong, a defence expert at Shanghai University of Political Science and Law, says China would not rule out the possibility of a protracted war with the US. “No one has the answer of how to avoid this, which is why I think there have not yet been open hostilities,” he adds. “It is to a large extent an issue of psychological warfare. What risks are the two sides willing to take and do they dare end in mutual destruction?”

Beijing outspends Taipei on defence by a factor of 15 — Taiwan’s budget is expected to hit $11.9bn in 2020. Over the past decade, China has built and deployed intermediate-range missiles with which it could target US aircraft carriers and military bases in Japan and Guam, the two locations the US would be most likely to use if it intervened in any conflict.....MUCH MORE  

And from the FT's venerable owner, Nikkei Asian Review, January 15: 
Exclusive: Washington pressures TSMC to make chips in US
Pentagon fears Chinese interference in Taiwan's semiconductor giant

TAIPEI -- Washington has upped the pressure on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. to produce its military-use chips in the U.S., in order to ensure that the world's biggest contract chipmaker can manufacture the high-security components free from potential Chinese interference, sources have told the Nikkei Asian Review.

TSMC, which makes computer chips used in American F-35 fighter jets and serves as a key supplier to Apple as well as Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies, has sidestepped similar U.S. security requests before.

But as Beijing and Washington jostle for technological and military supremacy, the company faces growing American pressure to make a firm decision about producing in the U.S. or offering another security-compatible solution before the U.S. presidential election in November.

Though Washington and Beijing are due to sign the first phase of a trade deal this week, easing two years of bilateral tensions, the pressure on TSMC shows that global tech supply chains are still decoupling as security hawks in the U.S. administration continue to press the White House to act over China's technological and military buildup.

"The U.S. government wants chips that go into military projects to be built on American soil," a senior Taiwanese government official, who was briefed about Washington's approaches to TSMC given the company's strategic and technological importance, told Nikkei. "That's for national security concerns, and they [the U.S.] don't plan to back off on that."

TSMC, which holds a 50% share of the world's chip foundry business, supplies computer chips to Huawei and American tech giants such as Google, Qualcomm and Intel. The Taiwanese company also supplies high-performance chips for U.S. military suppliers such as Xilinx, which in turn makes components for American F-35 fighter jets and satellites....

....MUCH MORE

A couple posts from last summer. Frirst up, the intro to July 3's "China to Narrow Chip Gap With Taiwan Invasion"

Did I say invade? I meant trade.
I must have been thinking of China's Defense Minister last month saying "China must be and will be reunited".
With the Taiwanese elections coming up it's probably as good a time as any for Beijing to make some sort of move. Probably not invasion though. China will want to test its military somewhere, our guess is Vietnam, before tackling Taiwan. So probably some sort of fifth column action, cyber, electrical grid etc. And the people to do it are already on the island, I mean if the Chinese could get one of their spies into Dianne Feinstein's office while she was Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee (2009 - 2015), the guy was her San Francisco office manager, not, as reported, the chauffeur, if they could do that there is no doubt they have assets in Teipei.
So where was I?

Chips. For all their technological wizardry the Chinese are still having trouble making chips. Some of our links on that after the jump....

And August 28:
Chips: How China Is Still Paying the Price For Squandering Its Chance To Build a Home-grown Semiconductor Industry 
Should China ever invade Taiwan the TSMC fabs would be quite a prize.
We've looked at this oddity a few times, some links below....

Intel is known in some circles as Chipzilla but, truth be told, the appellation might more accurately belong to TSMC.