When you say AI will be powerful, what do you mean? Like in terms of national power, will AI let the US fight and win a war against China despite China's size, manufacturing base and possession of nuclear weapons? Will AI let the US beat the Chinese in manufacturing costs and scale despite China's greater adoption of industrial robots and larger number of skilled workers? Or will AI just be really good at writing software?

Because if the AI is just really good at writing software, I am not sure why China has to "catch up". Seems to me China can just treat AI like other technologies. Let the US pay most of the R&D costs, then come after and treat the technology as a commodity. Sell it better and cheaper and at scale.

I am not sure why it's a big deal for China if China is a few months behind the US in terms of the very frontier AI. Just like I'm not sure if it's a big deal which country has the biggest super computer in the world.