This is a story that has been reported by the media in bits and pieces with not enough follow through in my opinion. This country is living in very precarious times and has been blindsided by supply chain economic sabotage by China and to a lesser extent Russia. It is widespread, pervasive, and much like a metastatic cancer that has spread through the body. It has - in my opinion- been going on over the last 20 years or so.
In my professional opinion, China has managed to weaponize their commercial supply chain of COTS Electronics to the United States. Counterfeit COTS parts have been infiltrating into the DOD / military supply chain in all probability for over 20 years or so. China’s government has been setting this trap for many years and the United States fell into it because we placed profit and cost over national security and self-reliance into the hands of a known adversary.
Our situational reality is that when not if The United States becomes involved in a kinetic war with China. China will cut our microelectronics supply line. This places our nation in a very grave situation because the military in my opinion does not know nor will it know to what extent quantitively how many types of electronic semiconductors, boards, circuit cards and other ubiquitous COTS were integrated into what military types of hardware / systems that are authentic or whose electronics have been compromised. I am not even addressing Chinese made semiconductor clones under American brand names made their way into the supply chain and have been incorporated as well.
Wonder why there is an initiative to fabricate semiconductor fabrication centers in United States again? Probably because of the strategic risk our nation faces of having to rely on our adversary to provide our supply chain with much needed COTS parts to rum our military war machine. The infiltration and proliferation of counterfeit parts and semiconductors and other integrated circuits in my opinion has been going on for at least 20 years in this country.
Furthermore, China has an extensive network of approximately 20,000 or so shell companies that they have established to try and circumvent our ability to mitigate the infiltration. Infiltration is not limited to the United States but also to other countries that need microchip technology including Russia. Microchips run the world without them. Nothing will work in modern society without them.
I know this because of my professional experience and knowledge as a former federal DOD employee for a military branch that managed an engineering team whose task was to mitigate counterfeit, microelectronics, as well as test these parts through failure analysis in a government laboratory. I served as a Supervisory Program Manager for the Microelectronics Assurance Branch for 10 years. The branch was devoted to the identification, verification, and mitigation of threats to the critical design, manufacturing, and distribution infrastructure of DOD Microelectronics. The branch had 2 main focus areas: 1) Counterfeit Identification and Avoidance, 2) Supply Chain Risk Management.
The back story goes like this: The U.S. lost its capability to fabricate semiconductors and microelectronics over the past several decades due to a variety of factors.
Cost Considerations - Manufacturing microelectronics in the U.S. became more expensive due to factors such as governmental policies and regulations, environmental constraints, safety constraints, wages, and taxes. This led to a shift in manufacturing overseas, where costs were lower. Globalization of Supply Chains - The globalization of supply chains meant that many components, including microelectronics, were being produced in countries where manufacturing costs were lower, including. Technological Advancements: China has made significant advancements in technology, including in the field of microelectronics. This has led to an increased reliance on Chinese-made electronics. China has been importing enormous amounts of e-waste from the United States since the 1970s. This was primarily due to lower labor costs and lax environmental standards, which made it cheaper to process the waste in China than in the countries where it was generated.
Then in 2011, The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) began applying the “just in time” supply chain management approach to increase reliability and reduce its logistics footprint. This approach, originated in the private sector, involved synchronizing each element of the supply chain with enterprise-wide management of inventories, effective demand planning, and essential asset visibility. The problem with this approach was that DOD became reliant on electronics from China over the past several decades due to a variety of factors:
During my tenure as a military branch manager in microelectronics engineering, my branch conducted open information research into China's subterfuge in obfuscating Chinese electronic companies involved in selling COTS to American brokers and vendors over the internet. This is primarily due to the reliance on and usage of Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS). COTS are commercial products that are used in military applications, often with modifications to meet military requirements. COTS systems offer many benefits, including cost reduction, supply chain diversification, design flexibility, and the ability to meet size, weight, and power (SWaP) requirements.
COTS are purchased by the military supply chain through vendors and integrated into existing military hardware and systems. It is not unusual for maintainers to scour the internet including eBay, google etc. to purchase electronics for older pieces of hardware and systems still currently in use. Legacy military systems are often those that were designed and initially produced decades ago, and in many cases, date back to the late Cold War. These systems often require older electronic parts due to their design and the challenges of modernization. Examples are Communication Systems, Aircraft and Vehicles, Software, Unmanned Air Systems, etc.
These systems often pose challenges due to obsolescence and the widespread counterfeiting of electronics and components. Many military systems are 40 years old or older, making replacement parts difficult to find. This leads to a reliance on gray markets and unauthorized replacements. The issue of obsolescence and counterfeiting is not limited to the military but affects all users. Legacy does not solely depend on the age of the system, but also on its relevance and adaptability to modern warfare and technology. For example, a system’s ability to host alternative payloads, perform alternative missions, and absorb new software and technology are all factors that determine whether a system is considered "legacy".
Through our research my branch discovered counterfeit parts which affect reliability and a number of different platforms and systems as mentioned previously. These parts are so ubiquitous that it is impossible to evaluate them unless you have the capability to use component failure analysis laboratories. My team completed a number analysis for customers by open internet research over the last 10 years.
Navy and Air Force customers funded my branch to research specific parts for a determination of authenticity prior to or after purchase before integration into military hardware. My branch also developed and created a supply chain provenance process that identified and mapped every piece of material that was used to construct a semiconductor chip and where that material came from, what countries were involved and connections to companies doing business with Chinese affiliated electronics companies. If determined that further investigation was needed, onsite failure analysis laboratory conducted testing to further determine authenticity either by visual or destructive testing, and yes non-authenticate chips were discovered from companies purchasing Chinese made electronics with stamping and logos of international American semiconductor manufacturers.
The upshot of all of this is a very real concern that if The United States and its allies get into a shooting war with China, China will cut our microelectronics supply line. The situation presents a precarious and grave concern due to the fact that DOD in my opinion has no idea to what quantifiable extent or how pervasive, military hardware and systems have been kitted-out with counterfeit parts with unknown reliability and the realization that our military supply chain is dependent on our adversary, China. Comprised weapons systems embedded with Chinese parts present high probabilities of potential high failure rates that will fail in combat. The United States government is aware of this and has been quietly going around trying to mitigate as much as possible, but unfortunately, it is so widespread that it is impossible to really have any success.
The United States still does not have the manufacturing capacity to meet the demand if a shooting war where to break out. We would not be able to sustain, any sort of activity with our ships with aircraft with our guns etc. we would Be helpless and would only have our nuclear capability to protect our nation. On the military side, think commercial electronics purchased from China that have been integrated into IT hardware, routers etc., non-nuclear missile guidance systems, threat detection systems for ground, air, and sea.
