Countering Communist Cyborgs: China’s Dystopian AI Ambitions and the Robotics Race
U.S.-China rivalry in AI robotics will shape global norms, values, and power. The U.S. must act fast to protect chokepoints, deploy tech, and deny China strategic advantage.
Sources
Hudson (25.07.15)
Key Takeaways
The intensifying competition between the United States and China in artificial intelligence—particularly in embodied AI, where software is integrated into physical machines—has profound economic, military, and ideological stakes. Leadership in this domain will not only determine which country sets the pace for innovation and deployment, but also which political values become embedded in global AI systems. The technologies involved are already operational, not speculative, and the trajectory of their adoption will shape both the battlefield and the factory floor.
Artificial intelligence functions as a general-purpose technology comparable to electricity or the internet. Its applications will vary across industries and countries, but whoever advances first and scales effectively will shape global norms and standards. Democratic societies face the challenge of ensuring AI is aligned with human rights and transparency, while authoritarian systems are embedding AI in tools of control. China has adopted a strategic approach to AI, viewing it as essential to overcoming past technological inferiority and achieving national revitalization. Its deployment of AI in surveillance, censorship, and automated repression—especially in Xinjiang—demonstrates the regime's commitment to building a techno-authoritarian governance model.
The United States maintains key advantages in foundational research, semiconductor design, high-performance computing, and talent concentration. China, by contrast, has demonstrated superior capacity to integrate robotics into industrial settings, supported by state coordination, consumer acceptance, and dominance in raw materials such as rare earth elements and lithium-ion battery inputs. While U.S. firms lead in developing high-end robotics, Chinese firms are outpacing deployment, often offering cheaper alternatives, creating pressure on global market competition and adoption norms.
Strategic competition is also playing out in third-party countries. Some U.S. partners are simultaneously expanding cooperation with China on robotics and AI infrastructure. The United Arab Emirates, for example, has sought both American compute partnerships and Chinese robotics technologies. This dual alignment highlights the need for U.S. policymakers to use economic statecraft, incentives, and strategic guardrails to secure technology partnerships and reduce Chinese influence in allied states' digital ecosystems.
China’s military AI infrastructure is growing rapidly, with hundreds of specialized data centers aligned with defense objectives. These include small-scale but strategically located facilities—many in Xinjiang—designed to support militarized AI models. In contrast, U.S. efforts to build domestic AI infrastructure are constrained by permitting and regulatory delays. The gap in deployment speed, rather than research quality, could prove decisive. Structural reforms to accelerate domestic data center construction and energy access are essential to counter China’s scaling advantage.
Several critical dependencies still constrain China’s robotics capabilities, such as reliance on Western sensors and ball screws. However, these are not deeply complex components, and that lead may only last another two to three years unless preserved through proactive policy. Past precedents in semiconductor equipment illustrate how quickly China can close capability gaps once focused. The U.S. cannot afford to treat current chokepoints as durable without investing in enforcement and long-term advantage.
Export controls, particularly on advanced semiconductors, remain a vital tool. However, inconsistent application—such as authorizing renewed sales of Nvidia’s H20 chips to Chinese firms—undermines both strategic credibility and allied coordination. U.S. leadership depends on maintaining a clear and consistent posture, not only in denying critical technologies to adversaries but in persuading allies to do the same.
Intellectual property theft, algorithmic manipulation, and platform-based data extraction by Chinese firms pose major challenges. Permissive approaches to data and model openness in the name of innovation risk accelerating China's AI development through backdoor access to U.S. systems. Protecting domestic innovation must therefore include strong safeguards around data, software licensing, and training inputs.
Many disruptive breakthroughs in AI have come from unexpected directions—GPUs repurposed for machine learning, large language models that emerged from marginal research projects. A forward-looking strategy requires not only protection of known chokepoints but vigilance toward emerging ones. The competitive landscape will continue to evolve unpredictably, and both denial and promotion strategies must be flexible enough to adapt to those changes in real time.
Full AI Summary
I. Embodied AI as the Next Frontier of Competition
The primary arena of U.S.-China strategic rivalry has shifted from nuclear or conventional arms races to artificial intelligence—especially its integration into physical machines (embodied AI).
Robotics powered by AI is already operational in both countries’ militaries and economies (e.g. robotic dogs with rifles in China; humanoids in U.S. factories).
Leadership in embodied AI will determine not just military and economic outcomes but also the normative architecture of how AI is embedded in society.
II. Strategic Importance of AI and Norm-Setting
AI is a general-purpose technology akin to electricity or the internet, with transformative potential across industries and societies.
Technological dominance will allow the leading country to set global usage norms—values embedded in AI systems will reflect the regime of origin (liberal-democratic vs. authoritarian).
The U.S. must lead both in AI development and in establishing ethical, legal, and operational norms, particularly in military and surveillance applications.
III. Chinese Communist Party’s View of AI
The CCP views AI through a historical lens of national rejuvenation, linking its rise to overcoming the “century of humiliation” and achieving tech parity with the West.
AI is central to the CCP’s strategy for national strength, domestic control, and global leadership.
Unlike democratic societies, China is not reactive but proactive in shaping technology use, aligning state goals with AI deployment across surveillance, policing, and governance.
Xinjiang is a key case study in techno-authoritarianism: AI-enabled surveillance, facial recognition, biometric databases, and behavior prediction are used to control ethnic minorities.
China is exporting these capabilities abroad, aiming to shape global norms around surveillance and authoritarian governance models.
IV. Comparative Strengths and Weaknesses in the Robotics Race
U.S. Advantages
Semiconductors: The U.S. leads in compute power and GPU manufacturing, essential for training and deploying AI models.
R&D Ecosystem: Strong national labs, elite universities, and basic science investments provide foundational innovation.
Talent: American institutions still attract top AI researchers globally.
Chinese Advantages
Industrial Integration: China is more effective at integrating robotics into industrial sectors (e.g., manufacturing, oil rigs, logistics).
Rare Earths & Batteries: Dominance in critical minerals, lithium-ion battery production, and key supply chains (even for Japanese and Korean firms).
Market Conditioning: Chinese consumers and industry embrace robotic and AI applications more readily, creating favorable domestic demand and economies of scale.
Cost Advantage: Chinese robotics are often cheaper, potentially undercutting Western alternatives as seen with Huawei.
V. Industrial and Military Deployment Gaps
The U.S. lags behind in deploying industrial robotics across manufacturing sectors such as shipbuilding and automotive.
Reshoring manufacturing is only feasible if robotics and automation close labor cost gaps—especially given a U.S. labor shortage in some sectors.
In military robotics, comparisons are difficult because superiority may only become evident in actual kinetic conflict—an outcome all seek to avoid.
VI. Strategic Vulnerabilities and Dependencies
U.S. Dependence on China
Rare earths, battery-grade lithium, and select precision components remain critical dependencies.
U.S. industry has underinvested in domestic extraction and refining capacity, relying heavily on Chinese supply chains.
China’s Dependence on the West
Chinese robotics firms remain dependent on imported ball screws and advanced sensors—components not easily replaced but not deeply complex.
This dependency is expected to last only 2–3 years unless policy action extends it.
Example: In semiconductors, Chinese firms built domestic capability in under 6 years despite barriers; a similar trajectory is possible in robotics components.
VII. Export Controls and Policy Instruments
The U.S. has implemented export controls on high-end semiconductors (e.g., Nvidia’s H100 and H20 chips) to prevent China from achieving compute parity.
The Chip Security Act aims to track semiconductor exports and detect post-export diversion, including smuggling and illegal re-routing to Chinese firms.
The legislation emphasizes location verification and incident reporting without requiring hardware redesign or kill-switches.
Enforcement challenges remain: unilateral action (e.g., rollback of controls for trade deals) undermines U.S. credibility when asking allies (e.g., Netherlands, Japan) to adopt matching restrictions.
VIII. Competing in Third-Party Countries
Countries like the UAE simultaneously pursue partnerships with both U.S. and Chinese tech firms.
Example: UAE building AI data centers with the U.S. while expressing interest in Chinese law enforcement robots.
UAE understands AI as the next “oil” and wants to control “exports of intelligence” by hosting major data infrastructure.
The U.S. faces a dilemma: promote U.S. tech to allies while insisting on alignment against Chinese AI systems—especially in sensitive sectors like security and governance.
U.S. policy must balance incentives (e.g., compute infrastructure, co-investment deals) with enforcement (e.g., prohibiting dual-alignment with China on AI).
IX. U.S. Strategic Industrial Policy Recommendations
Accelerated adoption of robotics in domestic industries: Offer incentives for automation in sectors like shipbuilding (e.g., via the SHIPS for America Act).
Leapfrog technologies: Invest in innovations that eliminate critical dependencies (e.g., rare-earth-free magnets, solid-state batteries).
Advanced materials and AI-specific hardware: Support startups and research efforts that develop alternatives to Chinese-controlled inputs.
Build more U.S. data centers: Reduce permitting delays and expand domestic compute capacity to avoid offshoring sensitive AI workloads.
X. Huawei Parallel and Time-Sensitive Warnings
The U.S. is not yet at the “Huawei moment” in robotics—there’s still time to prevent Chinese companies from cornering global markets.
Price competition and bundling by Chinese firms could soon make Western alternatives non-viable, especially in emerging markets.
The U.S. must act now to protect remaining chokepoints and establish competitive industrial ecosystems before Chinese robotics become dominant.
XI. Norms, Algorithms, and IP Protection
China cannot be trusted to co-author AI governance norms due to its record on human rights and systemic IP theft.
The U.S. must not permit its IP, data, and algorithms to be scraped or reverse-engineered—especially through platforms like TikTok or exploitative interpretations of fair use.
U.S. AI companies may unintentionally enable Chinese AI growth if legal and regulatory protections are not enforced on data, software, and models.
XII. Unknowns and the Need for Adaptive Governance
Many critical advances (e.g. GPUs as AI engines, large language models) emerged unpredictably from unrelated domains (gaming, open-source research).
The U.S. needs agile, forward-looking policy that can anticipate and control unknown unknowns—emerging tools, methods, or hardware that might dramatically accelerate AI capability.
Continuous reevaluation of chokepoints, export controls, and alliances is required to prevent surprise breakthroughs by China or other adversaries.
Speakers
Congressman Bill Huizenga (United States Representative, Fourth District of Michigan)
Martijn Rasser (Senior Director for Economy, Special Competitive Studies Project)
Divyansh Kaushik (Vice President, Beacon Global Strategies)
Bill Drexel (Fellow)
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