The United States Has an Industrial Problem in the Indo-Pacific
The text states that US discussion of China's military power focuses on weapons while paying less attention to the industrial capacity behind them, and that China has built a manufacturing base at a scale the United States cannot easily match. It cites the Navy's Arsenal-2 project with Anduril Industries, announced October 6, a planned $6.6 billion manufacturing facility at Tradepoint Atlantic in Maryland, with Anduril investing $3.7 billion and the Navy potentially providing up to $2.9 billion, intended to make components and large assemblies for Virginia-class submarines, initially torpedo tubes. The text notes initial operations are not expected until 2030 and that the manufacturing methods still have to be developed and validated, raising the question of how quickly the United States can create industrial capacity that can be relied upon in a crisis.
Why it matters: The Arsenal-2 case shows that the defense-industrial base is a central element of strategic competition with Beijing, because the United States must build production capacity that can be relied upon in a prolonged Indo-Pacific crisis.