Having access to advanced technology or being well integrated into the ecosystem doesn't really matter much if you don't have a large enough market to sell into. That's why EVs have been possible in a way that AI and semiconductors probably won't be. The US simply doesn't dominate the EV industry the way they do in chips and advanced AI, so there's more room for others to conduct business. For example, VinFast can source components and sub-assemblies from China, assemble them, and export without running into the same kind of hard barriers. But I don't see that model working for AI or semiconductors. And last time I checked, China mostly buys agricultural products and raw natural resources from other countries, while your own industries tend to hollow out or bankrupt competitors in higher-value sectors. So the real question is how much actual demand, and for what kinds of products, can China realistically create for Vietnam? And countries like South Korea and Japan have every reason to want the US to stay dominant in these critical technologies because they themselves are deeply leveraged on American tech platforms and standards.
