During a House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing today, witnesses cautioned lawmakers that permitting China to buy advanced U. S. artificial intelligence (AI) chips would pose significant national security threats. The hearing was prompted by recent comments from President Trump, who stated he would permit NVIDIA to export its H200 chips to “approved customers” in China and other nations, provided the U. S. receives 25% of the profits. Trump emphasized that these sales would happen “under conditions that allow for continued strong National Security” and mentioned that Chinese President Xi Jinping responded favorably. Former Deputy U. S. National Security Adviser Matt Pottinger stressed to lawmakers that this decision should not be regarded as a routine commercial matter. “Imagine if the question before you were whether to sell China the propulsion systems that make our nuclear submarines stealthy, ” Pottinger remarked. “We don’t laugh at the premise that there’s nothing to debate. ” He warned that selling NVIDIA’s advanced chips would “supercharge Beijing’s military modernization, ” boosting capabilities in areas such as nuclear weapons, cyber warfare, autonomous drones, biological warfare, and intelligence operations. “America still holds the high ground, ” Pottinger asserted, highlighting that U. S.

firms lead in advanced chip design and global cloud infrastructure. He urged Congress to overturn the decision to sell advanced AI chips to China, implement safeguards to block similar moves in the future, and push allies like the Netherlands and Japan to fully align their export controls with those of the U. S. Former Principal Deputy U. S. National Security Adviser Jon Finer noted that China began a sustained effort more than a decade ago to dominate emerging technologies and their supply chains. He credited both the first Trump administration and the Biden administration for prioritizing strategic competition with China, especially regarding military and critical technology sectors. Finer pointed out China’s main weakness in the AI race remains its computing power. “Currently, China can only produce about 1% to 3% of the computing power that the Western, democratic ecosystem can generate, ” he said. He added, “I can’t think of any good reason why we should allow them to fill that gap, ” given AI’s crucial role in military systems, intelligence, biotechnology, and cyber operations. Oren Cass, founder and chief economist at American Compass, a conservative think tank, emphasized that computational power is increasingly synonymous with national capability. “The total computational power available within a country is rapidly becoming its technological strength for both economic and military objectives, ” he said. Cass noted that export controls initiated during the first Trump administration and extended under President Biden helped the U. S. establish a “high-margin advantage in total computational capacity. ” He cautioned that channeling scarce chip supplies to China would undermine the U. S. amid a surge in AI investment. “Due to shortsighted policies by both lawmakers and corporations, the United States has already ceded leadership in key technologies and supply chains to China, ” Cass stated.