Let us get something straight right out of the gate. We cannot stop innovation. Not now, not ever. The world is not slowing down, and we are certainly not going to hold hands, sing songs, and politely wait for Mainland China, Russia, or North Korea to catch up. We are in a race, we are in a war, and anyone pretending otherwise is the kind of person who would bring a salad to a barbecue and call it a contribution. This is serious business.
China has stolen more than it has ever created on its own. That is not hyperbole. That is not political spin. That is the accepted reality inside every intelligence and defense agency worth its salt. They steal code, they steal chips, they steal designs, and then act shocked — shocked — when we point it out. Meanwhile, the United States, under Donald Trump’s leadership, pulled the Department of War mindset back into national strategy. Compete. Build. Advance. Win. You know, the basic things a superpower is supposed to do.
Artificial intelligence is just the modern battlefield. It is no different than the Cold War race for rockets, satellites, nuclear weapons, and advanced computing. Back then it was the Soviet Union. Today it is the Chinese Communist Party. And just like before, two superpowers are sprinting to control the next technology that will define everything — money, power, military dominance, communications, medicine, manufacturing, and yes, national survival.
When OpenAI unleashed ChatGPT, the entire world jolted. For China, it was a Sputnik moment. They had been pouring their energy into surveillance tech and facial recognition — because nothing warms the heart of a totalitarian regime more than tracking every citizen from birth to death. But when ChatGPT hit the scene, Beijing suddenly realized, uh oh, the Americans have just opened a brand new frontier.
From that moment on, the Communist Party turned every dial in its arsenal to maximum pressure. Schools, corporations, government agencies, state-run labs — all ordered to “go faster.” They threw subsidies, money, mandates, propaganda campaigns, and enough bureaucratic pep talks to make even a Soviet commissar blush. They even copied our Silicon Valley hustle culture, minus the kombucha and the hoodies.
Then DeepSeek appeared. Built by a Chinese team mostly running on hedge-fund money — not the usual state megaproject — and suddenly China had a model that nearly matched America’s best. They trained it with fewer chips, less cash, and surprising efficiency. Wall Street panicked so badly the NASDAQ dropped. That tells you how fragile the market knows this race is.
But here is the truth. The only reason China got that close is because they stole the playbook, the diagrams, the screws, the bolts, the glue, and the table the playbook was sitting on. And even then, they still hit the same wall they always hit: advanced chips.
China can build ten million cheap chips and bolt them together into a Frankenstein swarm. Meanwhile, the United States — with Trump pushing “America First” industrial policy — is rebuilding the capacity to produce the finest chips in the world. Precision. Power. Reliability. Everything China cannot replicate no matter how many coal-powered chip factories they build behind the Great Firewall.
Now, here is where the bureaucratic insanity comes in. While our enemies steal, copy, and accelerate, the green-energy climate crowd still thinks the biggest threat to America is a plastic straw. The woke bureaucrats still think the job of government is to micromanage pronouns instead of building missile defenses. And the elite class still thinks China is a valued “partner.” Partner in what? Theft?
This is where Trump was right from day one. America should not depend on China for chips, supply chains, military components, raw materials, pharmaceuticals, or the foundational technologies that keep a nation alive. Japan gets it. South Korea gets it. They understand the stakes. They live close enough to the dragon to feel its breath. They are partners we can trust. They innovate, they create, they do not steal.
Meanwhile, communists steal everything that is not welded down.
Here is the bottom line. Artificial intelligence is not a toy. It is not a novelty. It is the next arms race. The next space race. The next economic race. Whoever leads in AI will lead the world. That is why Trump pushed America to re-industrialize and rebuild a real Department-of-War mindset. Not a Department of Feelings. Not a Department of Climate Panic. A department built to protect American citizens and American interests first.
Innovation will not slow down. We cannot stop it. And if we try, China will not politely tap the brakes with us. They will pass us, laugh at us, and use our mistakes against us. This is a race we must win, because the alternative is letting communists, tyrants, and criminals shape the future while America debates whether two plus two equals four or whatever number keeps the activists happy.
If you want to win the future, you have to act like a nation that intends to win. And that, my friend, is exactly what America First has always been about.
