Taiwan chip production disruption to cause economic crisis: Blinken
The United States stresses how dangerous the situation surrounding semiconductors is for its national security.
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A Chinese microchip is seen through a microscope set up at the booth for the state-controlled Tsinghua Unigroup project which is driving China's semiconductor ambitions during the 21st China Beijing International High-tech Expo in Beijing, China, on May 17, 2018 (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
If semiconductor production in Taiwan is disrupted, the world would be thrown into a global economic crisis, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday.
"If Taiwanese production were disrupted as a result of a crisis, you would have an economic crisis around the world," Blinken said during remarks at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, California.
Blinken highlighted how Washington, alongside other countries around the world, have been allegedly hard at work at preserving "peace and stability" in Taiwan and the Taiwan Strait.
The US, according to Blinken, hopes that China does not try and force Taiwan into things it does not want by coercing Taipei.
Taiwanese Minister for Economic Affairs Wang Mei-Hua underlined that Taiwan will uphold its relationship with the US and other nations on expanding semiconductor manufacturing in the face of worries regarding the global supply chain and increased tensions in the Indo-Pacific area.
"Taiwan will continue to work closely with our global partners, especially the United States, to engage in the development of advanced semiconductor manufacturing," Wang said during an interview at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
The announcement followed heightened rivalry between Washington and Beijing in the Indo-Pacific region and across the semiconductor sector. In an effort to match Chinese gains in the field, US President Joe Biden signed legislation in August providing $52 billion in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacture.
US officials have previously warned that the situation concerning Taiwan, the sole source of advanced semiconductor microchips, jeopardizes US national security.
Due to the global microchip shortage, the US economy lost last year $240 billion, and a war over Taiwan would be even more catastrophic for the US due to its reliance on one single supplier, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC).
The US crackdown on the sale of technology to China has already begun to have an impact, with the US chip designer Nvidia disclosing last week that it had been told by US officials to stop exporting two top computing chips for artificial intelligence work to China.
Global shortages of computer chips, prompted by the coronavirus pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine, have caused production delays on a global scale for technology companies and other manufacturers.
In addition, the industry has gained increased geopolitical prominence as China accused the bill of threatening global supply chains and hampering international trade.
