Trump

[dinny_g]

[nuttinnew]

The only surprise is it isn't in black and white.

[Beany]

Todays fun thought. The Netherlands are included in the tariff threat, right?

The Netherlands is where a company called ASML is based. OK, so what, you might ask?

ASML provides tech to TSMC, the chipmaker, who contracts out their production to other companies - most famously AMD, who (very briefly to save getting into needless detail) used to have their own chip fabs, but sold them off/spun them out and started using TSMC instead. It's what made them competive, as if you aren't having to maintain your own fabs, you can spend that money on R&D of the chips themselves, not the hardware to make them. So far, so normal. So normal that even Intel is doing it with TSMC and ASMLs latest tech because Intel can't do it themselves.

ASML provide Extreme UV lithography tech, which TSMC uses to make the bleeding edge of chips at extremely small lithography levels. When you hear about 7nm, 5nm, 3nm chips in your phone, which makes it more powerul and last longer on the same battery size etc - it's ASML tech being used by TSMC that enables that, and those machines require constant recalibration and tweeking to be usable. It's being used by TSMC for companies like Nvidia, to make their bleeding edge AI chips at the moment.

That would be the same Nvidia, who along with the other AI players who rely on their chips, are almost single handedly propping up the US economy and masking the recession they're basically already in by every other important measure other than GDP.

With one stroke of a pen saying "no service to clients who are servicing US corporations", those little silly people in the land of stroopwafel and cafes with funny cigarettes, could bring down the entire US economy.

Also, no new iPhone. Intel, AMD, Apple, basically every major tech company on earth literally relies on ASML to make their products sellable. Who's gonna spend £1000 on an iPhone or Pixel phone that's literally no better than last years model?

And it's not like they've not done it before - an earlier process node ASML was supporting was killed in China at the US's behest a few years back on the grounds of "US national security".

ASML has the opportunity to do the funniest thing here...

(current word is that the Dutch government have said that all options are on the table to deal with this 'economic blackmail' so this really is a realistic option, and the EU is meeting today to discuss putting anti-coercion rules into effect - rules that include denying service to belligerent states like Russia, China...and the US...)

[DeskJockey]

The irony would be delicious if they decided to cut them off.

[Mito Man]

Interesting scenario on the whole and applies to many industries. Boeing, Airbus etc. We could end up down that route naturally as a result of imposing sanctions on each other. I guess at that point each country would just do what Russia did and seize assets belonging to hostile states. So in the case of the AMSL factory in America it would be seized but not sure how easy it would be to maintain operations without getting any prerequisite components from NL.

Probably an all round shit show that would set us all back for a good 30 years though.

[integrale_evo]

I guess it depends how their facility runs. Completely different industry, but all of our work systems are on remote desktops, if the uk IT system goes down we usually only have a couple of hours before everything grinds to a halt. Can’t plan any work, can’t produce anything in the machines. Whether UK IT is able to ‘switch off’ foreign plants I don’t know but I imagine they could.

Surely AMSL make a shit load of money selling their tech / production and going to be reluctant to switch off without being able to fill that hole.

[jamcg]

They can seize it if they like, once the current calibration is out of spec their machines will be useless.

One thing china is really famous for is stripping things down, working them out and reverse engineering them and making new machines ignore all international copyright and intellectual property laws

China couldn’t do it with the chip making machines. They’ve thrown millions at it and still can’t do it. Not much chance of the USA managing

[Beany]

I mean, the ASML gear is all command and controlled from the Netherlands, so they could hold the local staff in the US at gunpoint, and they still wouldn't be able to make it work. And I'd put good money on their equipment running a custom Unix variant OS - you'd literally have to rewrite the OS from scratch to even make the systems boot up, and even then the local staff won't have access to the massive library of knowledge ASML have built up over the decades that's required to make such delicate equipment actually work to a degree that's viable.

No-one is hot-wiring a UEV litho machine that gets recalibrated at a sub-nanometre level every few seconds. It's just not a thing you can do. It's not even a thing Intel can do, which is why they bought this expertise in.

Basically, they'd have seized a double decker sized paperweight.

[KiwiDave]

I read a Medium article last week where they claimed China have just hired all the senior ASML staff, just to throw another geopolitical bomb into that mix

[DeskJockey]

This could be an interesting plot twist.

https://bsky.app/profile/katie0martin.f ... psqmprjx25

Imagine what could happen if they decided enough was enough. Won't pretend to understand the nuances, but $8 trillion is a rather big number. If they decided to start calling in those loans or selling off the equities, that's going to have an impact.

[Beany]

Fuckin' rich it's Deutsche Bank saying that, given they were one of the biggest enablers of Trumps historic fraud - constantly letting him off for defaulting on loans, lying about his worth, etc as I recall.

[RobYob]

Almost completely off topic but Veritasium did a tour of ASML in a video a few weeks ago. The tech is mind bending.

I hope to see the Danish PM in fatigues do PR from Greenland, maybe demonstrate something Trump is incapable of, like a sit-up, or not shitting themselves.

[jamcg]

There’s an unverified report circulating on threads saying that France and Ukraine have fed USA some false intel and that has found its way into Russian knowledge. I’m assuming made up to try and damage trump at the moment but it’s one of those things that would not surprise me in the slightest if it turns out true

[240PP]

Isn’t that basically how Coleen Rooney caught out Rebecca Vardy

[unzippy]

Isn’t that basically how Coleen Rooney caught out Rebecca Vardy

The Canary Trap.

[DaveE]

Almost completely off topic but Veritasium did a tour of ASML in a video a few weeks ago. The tech is mind bending.

I hope to see the Danish PM in fatigues do PR from Greenland, maybe demonstrate something Trump is incapable of, like a sit-up, or not shitting themselves.

Yeah that was a fascinating video

The engineering, chemistry and physics involved is insane

And just so we can doomscroll AI slop

[DaveE]

There’s an unverified report circulating on threads saying that France and Ukraine have fed USA some false intel and that has found its way into Russian knowledge. I’m assuming made up to try and damage trump at the moment but it’s one of those things that would not surprise me in the slightest if it turns out true

Got any links/sources for this story?

[Beany]

I've only seen it talked about on social media with no sources listed, so I'm dubious.

But the theory is
Tell the UK that ammo dump is located at Town A
Tell the US that ammo dump is located at Town B
Tell the French that ammo dump is located at Town C

If Russian forces - troops, drones etc - head to town B then you suspect you have a leak.

Do that five more times with different intel to confirm it.

Again though, seen no primary sources to back it up so it sounds a bit dodgy to me.

Edit: Macron has said that France is providing two thirds of UA intel these days (this time last year it was US 80% or so, but since Trump started using withholding of data for political gain, UA diversified) but I can't find anything to confirm the above canary trap stuff.

Sounds like shit being made up to back up the (true) change in intelligence sources. The fact that under Trump and Hegseth, it's kind of believable as opposed to something that can be immediately dismissed out of hand really says a lot about the US as it stands.

[Mito Man]

You probably have Vance messaging Hegseth about it over on TikTok

[Beany]

Again, not something you could immediately dismiss any more....

Edit - just seen this: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cx2k7gv0znmt

Earlier, we mentioned that Trump had reportedly drawn a link between his threats towards Greenland and the fact he had not been given the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize.

The BBC's US partner CBS News has now confirmed the contents of the letter in which he draws the link, which was sent to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store.

The letter reportedly says: "Dear Jonas: Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America."

The Nobel Peace Prize is not awarded by Norway itself, but instead by a committee, whose members are appointed by the Norwegian parliament. The 2025 award was given to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado.

In the letter to Store, Trump also claims: "The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland."

What a sad little pissbaby.