Pax Silica is presented by the US State Department as its flagship initiative on AI and supply-chain security; the FT reports the EU, Germany, the Netherlands and Greece have joined the US-led initiative.
It is hard to know whether this is merely the geopolitical equivalent of FIFA giving Donald Trump a Peace Prize, whereby EU's regret has already been scheduled.
The defining move is the shift from digital sovereignty to “innovation sovereignty”. Join the American stack, rely on American compute, capital and frontier firms, and call the result sovereignty. In a competitive account, innovation should unsettle monopoly. Here, it's the alibi for the US to preserve it.
Having watched the EU make odd moves in digital policy for decades, I often assumed there was a sensible plan I was failing to see. It turned out it was rather the German (car, mostly) industry, opportunistic national politicians, and/or plain stupidity. Is this time different?
