How China reduces the technology gap

·         Cyber espionage. The blueprints of our top weapons and jets have been stolen. Hackers are criminals here but professionals there. They are also stolen from our allies such as Germany, France and Britain.

·         Old-fashion spying.

·         Buy direct such as jets from Russia. Buy high-tech products such as jet engines from foreign companies.

·         Reverse engineering.

·         Chinese are buying foreign companies with the technologies they need.

·         A growing number of scientific experts (foreign and returning Chinese students) work in China.

·         Transfer technology at the lure of huge China’s market.

·         Force technology transfer for most major contracts.

·         Government support and funding for research and education.

·         Government invests for long-term projects at the expense of improving living standard.

·         Less spending on wars. No costly wars since Vietnam era.

·         Stable government. No major protests after the Tiananmen incident.

·         More professionals and students returned home from US and the West.

·         The government spends a lot on education and the parents spend a lot too.

·         Huge internal market. It attracts foreign companies and offers profitable returns for China’s investing (both government and corporations) in both research, acquiring foreign companies, products and licenses.

·         Supported by commercial products that are developed and made in China that can be “dual use”.

Some of the above point are also relevant on the rise of China’s economy. Economy is usually tied with the support of high tech development including weapons.

Defending China

The following are more from China’s viewpoints. I bet we do not agree with the explanation. In any case, we have to protect our intelligent properties. If we cannot protect from hackers, we should not save them in the web to start.

Industrial espionage and reverse engineering are quite common and in many cases are legal. Most Microsoft’s products have similar products before, so are Apple’s products.

Copying is not ‘stealing’ as the US still has the property. However, ‘sharing intelligent properties without consent’ is the more appropriate phrase. We’re guilty to less extent of not providing security to our intelligent properties. It is similar to a beautiful girl jogging in a high-crime area in the middle of the night. She and the rapist are both guilty but one should go to jail.

If you were China, most likely you will do the same. It would take too long to develop the state-of-the-art fighter jets and you cannot buy them from US. Germany did the same to Britain and we did the same to Germany (particularly on missile technology after WW2) and Europe.

China has mastered most middle technologies and has been heading to the high end. It also makes many technologies commodities so the developing countries can afford to buy. Typically, a military drone costs about half the cost of ours at slightly less features. It should be good for the world. If you need a drug to cure a life-threatening disease, do you care which country it comes from?

Links:  1