Chairman Mast Delivers Opening Remarks at Hearing on Winning the AI Arms Race
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast delivered opening remarks at a full committee hearing titled "Winning the AI Arms Race against the Chinese Communist Party".
Winning the AI arms race is key to America's national security and our economic security. The outcome of this race, it directly affects military competitiveness of the United States of America versus China. It is that black and white. And because AI works to improve other AI, this is a very unique race where the further you get ahead, the further you get ahead.
This committee worked hard to get smart on all things AI, otherwise known as the AI stack. We've heard from those who make chips, those who make the machines that make chips, those that model chips, those that use chips. And that will continue through the next year. It is a fact that the AI arms race directly impacts our military competitiveness with China. That cannot be disputed among many capabilities, advanced AI enables military command and control, AI powers intelligence, AI powers surveillance. It powers cyber operations, AI powers analysis and data crunching. It powers autonomous weapons and nuclear modernization.
AI dominance can decide who sees first, who decides first, and who strikes first. Those are some of the stakes. The United States of America is in the lead. We have an advantage over China. We know the pitfalls, if China has an advantage over us. But in this circumstance, we have a clear advantage. That advantage did not happen by accident. America has amazingly creative people in amazing companies that innovate and continue to further advance the capabilities within our borders and beyond in AI and a thousand other spaces.
Right now, America is ahead. Right now, chips made by American companies are the best in the world right now. Right now, America's cloud companies power AI worldwide. Right now, our models dominate global markets. That dominance is because of our nation's inventors and thinkers and entrepreneurs. But that dominance cannot be taken for granted as China tries to catch up. Why? Because these chips, they're not just kids playing video games on an Xbox, playing war games. They affect real wars, real weapons, real war powers, and they will be a part of bringing about real casualties. If anything, this is the highest of compliments.
Nvidia has made such good chips that if they were sold freely to the CCP, the CCP would likely overtake us in the AI arms race. Nvidia's chips are so much better than what China can make themselves that Chinese AI labs desperately want as many of these chips as they can get their hands on. That's a quantifiable fact, and XI Jinping hates how badly that they need our chips. The evidence is already clear. When president trump first imposed export controls back in 2019 by blocking the most advanced chip making tools to China, our lead grew. Why? Because China cannot produce cutting edge AI chips at scale. They can't do that. What does that mean? It means, number one, their chips are crappy compared to what Jensen Huang makes. And number two, if they try to make 100 of them, they're lucky if they get 30 of them to work. China is doing everything that they can to catch up and dominate us. So instead of our cloud companies dominating global markets, it would be China.
Make no mistake, if China buys a chip, they are buying it so they can take it from an American company, or they're buying it to put a Chinese company ahead of an American company, or they are buying it to make the Chinese military better than the United States military. That is their goal. Instead of the US military having the AI advantage, the Chinese military would have the AI advantage.
Just this month, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced the Department of War's AI strategy that said point blank AI will redefine the character of war over the next decade. Our secretary demands 21st century technological supremacy in AI, hyper sonics and drones. Our oversight needs to keep pace with the challenge we are facing.
That is why I wrote a bill called AI overwatch that ensures our cutting-edge AI chips cannot be used by the Chinese military. It is modeled after what we already do on foreign military sales. The principle is the same when an export shifts America's military advantage. Congress has a role to play. Advanced chips absolutely shift military advantage. AI overwatch would include chips with those same guardrails and those in future advanced chips.
As Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, I have to review all military sales when it comes to who we sell a fighter jet to, or who we might sell a fighter jet engine to, or a missile that would go on the wing of a fighter jet, or the avionics for a fighter jet. We review all of those things. If there is a potential sale of a military enabling chip to anybody, congress needs to have oversight of that. When we are talking about what's going on with AI chip dominance, cloud dominance, model dominance, we're talking about private companies in places like China that are purchasing chips for applications that will ultimately assist militaries of our foreign adversaries. Not every chip sale is a military sale. Many of them are. When we're talking about chip sales, we're talking about private companies. In many cases, like deep seek or Alibaba or Tencent, among others, that are direct contractors working for the Chinese communist party, working to advance military dominance, working for the Chinese military, working to make their military more dominant by buying our chips.
It's not complicated. It's that simple. Should Congress have oversight when selling missiles to other countries? Yes, the same should be said for chips. We want to enable the greatest AI capabilities for the United States. The secretary of war laid it out plain for AI acceleration in the 21st century. 21st century technological supremacy. That is what AI overwatch is about. That is what this hearing is about. AI acceleration strategy for America, for the 21st century, for supremacy, for America. I want to thank our witnesses for joining us today. Your insights will help us fight this fight, and I look forward to today's discussion.
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