Western governments don’t really have a coherent view on how to engage China on trade, and how could they? They vacillate between intimate economic cooperation and antagonistic bluster, depending on the issue and the day, and there is very little in terms of a united front that connects all the various countries that comprise ‘the West’.
Meanwhile, Western businesses are, if anything, worse — and again, how could we expect otherwise? While we’re all quite sick of talking about Elon Musk, the admiration for him in the Western tech world is a perfect example. Consider that an entire defense tech boom built largely around SpaceX alumni and, more broadly, Musk admirers, is being built up in no small part thanks to fear-mongering about Chinese hegemony. Meanwhile, Musk owes the foundation for much of his entire fortune on Chinese manufacturing supply chains.
There’s no way to spin that into a logical position, so everyone more or less just ignores it, and that’s fair enough. The US is involved in a trade war with China while simultaneously dependent on China for the supply of a countless number of strategic goods, so perhaps there’s no need to be logical.
I, for one, think there’s very little difference between the US and China on the world stage, in the sense that China is acting precisely how the US acted when it still had the credibility to dictate terms to the rest of the world. China is simply following that blueprint on a scale that reflects the demographic scale of China, and is working with a toolbox tailored to the cutting-edge of the 21st century. Let’s say you picked out some member of the American governing elite known for having the harshest possible views on China: perhaps I’m mistaken, but I think if that person could snap his or her fingers and instantly transform the US into an American version of China, that is what would happen.
So, when you delve into Western views on China, you are bound to tread in the muddiest of waters. On the other hand, there is mounting evidence that this could be in the process of changing: that a dividing line is being drawn. Interestingly enough, shifting national policies on additive manufacturing (AM) are one of the pieces of evidence of that.
The 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) prohibits DoD from owning or operating 3D printers and 3D printing software from a list of covered countries, the most notable of which is China. DoD also cannot own or operate machines that connect to networks based in those countries. This applies to new contracts entered into a year after the bill’s passage. There are exceptions, including 3D printers used for intelligence purposes, research, training, and electronic warfare, which at least in part seems to be a way to ensure DoD stays apprised of the latest Chinese technology.
However, US defense contractors still aren’t banned from using 3D printing technology from the covered countries, which is a pretty important caveat. If contractors are using restricted 3D printers, they must be completely air gapped, though we may well find out at some point soon that this measure isn’t sufficiently effective, and I think it’s likely that an eventual ban on buying parts made with restricted equipment is inevitable.
Soldiers assigned to Hunter Army Airfield Innovation Center, 3rd Combat Aviation Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, Savannah, Ga., work with subject matter experts to assemble drones made from parts that were 3D-printed using the Expeditionary Manufacturing Cell. Image courtesy of Army 1st Lt. Decean Brown, 3rd Infantry Division.
Meanwhile, the FCC also banned last year the purchase of new drones from covered countries:
“As specified below, today’s decision does not impact a consumer’s ability to continue using drones they previously purchased or acquired. Nor does today’s decision prevent retailers from continuing to sell, import, or market device models approved earlier this year or previously through the FCC’s equipment authorization process. By operation of the FCC’s Covered List rules, the restrictions imposed by today’s decision apply to new device models.”
As Joris Peels noted in his post on the topic, this is a playbook that was originally used for network equipment providers like Huawei and ZTE, and I think the same can be said about the ban on 3D printing technology. That ban also started out in piecemeal fashion and evolved into a blanket prohibition, a once extraordinary step that seems to have gradually become more commonplace.
The drone ban and the ban on 3D printing technology, of course, aren’t unrelated. With drones being one of the product categories most likely to be made with inexpensive Chinese 3D printers, restricting both simultaneously helps incentivize the buildup of domestic US drone production capacity, which is one of the principal strategic objectives of current US industrial policy.
Finally, there has also been a developing trend of state-by-state bans on 3D printed firearms. This doesn’t explicitly target Chinese 3D printers but, because of the specific nature of the market, makers of inexpensive 3D printers from China are the most negatively impacted by the trend. While there isn’t a federal ban yet, it’s not impossible for me to imagine that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) has leaned on state governments to address the problem. It’s also a useful way for all parties involved to appear that they’re cracking down on guns without actually doing so.
Collectively, then, it is becoming more difficult to use products originating in the Chinese AM ecosystem in the US. That is the stick, and the carrot comes in the form of increased federal spending on preferred AM technologies. To my earlier points about US stakeholders attempting to create an American version of China, all of these actions are along the lines of things that Western nations used to love when they dominated international manufacturing supply chains, and only grew to dislike after they’d relocated those supply chains to China. Thus it is not the actions themselves that anyone seems to dislike; rather, it is the source of the actions that anyone protesting has a problem with.
All of this could certainly come to nothing, and the US and China could reach some arrangement, which has tended to be the pattern over the last couple of years. But that’s not guaranteed, and an important date to keep in mind is November 10 of this year, when the pause on China’s expanded rare earth controls is set to end. As I’ve noted before, this seems to be the unspoken catalyst for all the geopolitical tensions that seemingly arose out of nowhere in 2026.
The thing to think about is, which nation has more to lose? If the answer is the US, I think we should only expect further changes in the direction of decoupling US and Chinese strategic sectors.
Featured image courtesy of Stratasys
