I'd have to go digging for the article, but one of the more interesting arguments I've heard for why the US won the Cold War is because of our superior manufacturing in-house. Similarly, think of China's advantage today in producing electronics and goods, and how they're so entrenched it's difficult for high security government projects to find parts that are considered safe. I think our slow decline in manufacturing over the previous decades would be what would cause the US to lose.

I am not entirely convinced. At first I thought robotics were still a little far off in all industry ( Apart from Cars ), for many task, they are not as fast as a human worker, at least those in Foxconn who are now trained themselves to muscle memory speed. But now I believe Apple's Dasiy, the disassemble machine, are basically the testing phase of how to do iPhone assembly all by machines, and doing so quickly. Dasiy is already 4x faster than the original Liam, and I believe the threshold os robotics replacing manufacturing may reach a critical point where it makes sense to move back to US, and with ease.

I don't know when will we reach that critical points, as with everything in life, the last 20% always takes the same amount of time as the first 80%. But once it does, China is looking at a potential job lost of 5 - 50M or more.

You're thinking at the assembly plant level (which I do not completely agree with), but think about it at the chip level. How often do you hear stories of Chinese spyware being discovered in electronics? The real question is how much more widespread is it than we realize because of all the spyware we haven't found yet.

Apart from that, I'd argue supply chain logistics for raw materials is better for China after years of investing in Africa.

Although honestly as I type this, I'm realizing just how little I know, so I could be persuaded otherwise. But to me it just feels like America's time in the sunlight is coming to an end.