A quick thread on today's big new additions to the @CommerceGov entity list, why they may backfire, and why will be hard to roll back: 1/n
The main firms that can now no longer buy US tech or goods are SMIC (China's main semiconductor manufacturer)--but only for the most advanced semi tech, DJI (world-leading drone company), a big state construction and shipbuilding company, some in biotech, and universities 2/n
Commerce argues that all are acting against US broadly defined nat sec/foreign policy interests, from Civ/Mil fusion and Xinjiang to South China Sea. You can see the whole list and rationales here public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2020-28031.pdf 3/n
Esp. w/massive carve out for SMIC >10nm, not likely that will have serious impact on entities or change CN foreign/domestic behavior, except to double (triple?) down on avoiding dependence on US tech. No matter how good the listing case is, this is a serious cost to incur. 4/n
Listings are very hard to reverse. Like Trump admin quietly did w/Huawei, can selectively grant licenses to buy US tech, but cumbersome and slow. Adding to entity list requires majority among Commerce, State, Energy, Defense, and poss. Treasury. Removing requires unanimity. 
Adding this insightful take from @danwwang, on how these moves will benefit Chinese tech development in the long term by leading even private firms to take short term costs to indigenize their supply chains...
https://twitter.com/danwwang/status/1339949311765823488
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