A cartography of the world's most concentrated industry
Eighty miles of open water.
By 2024, roughly 90% of the world's leading-edge logic chips were fabricated in three locations on a single island. Those three locations sit within easy range of any cruise missile launched from the Chinese mainland eighty miles to the west.
PLA missile envelopes · TSMC fab locations · ADIZ extent
Plate Key
TSMC fab cluster (leading-edge logic)
PLA Eastern Theater base
SRBM envelope (DF-15/16) ~600–1,000 km
MRBM envelope (DF-21/26) ~1,500–4,000 km
Scale (km)
0100200
The 90 / 80
90% of the world's leading-edge logic, fabricated 80 miles from the world's largest standing army.
// I.
Hsinchu
Northwest plain · ~80 km from Taipei
Park area4 sq mi
Companies500+
Direct employment~160,000
TSMC presenceHQ + Fab 12
Distance to PRC coast~180 km
"Every leading-node TSMC process was first proven here before being scaled out to other locations."
// II.
Taichung
Central Taiwan · 100 km south of Hsinchu
Primary fabFab 15
Process node28 nm
Footprint"Small airport"
DesignationGigafab
Distance to PRC coast~190 km
A workhorse mature-node site — same west-coast strip, same threat envelope.
// III.
Tainan
Southwest alluvial flats · former rice paddies
Primary fabFab 18
Phases8
Floor area>950,000 m²
Process nodes5nm · 3nm
N3 volume startDec 29, 2022
"Every advanced TSMC node still under volume manufacture in 2024 — from N5 to N3 — runs on Taiwanese soil."
// PLATE II — THE EXERCISE PATTERNEach iteration was rehearsed faster, with less notice, over a wider arc.
The PLA stopped asking permission.
The median line of the Taiwan Strait — the unofficial center-of-the-channel boundary that PLA aircraft had crossed only sporadically before 2020 — is now crossed routinely. The exercise pattern improvised for Pelosi became a template.
Aug 2022
Pelosi visit
Eleven Dongfeng ballistic missiles fired in waves toward the waters off northern, southern and eastern Taiwan.
4 missiles overflew the island
~450 aircraft entered ADIZ in August — record
Apr 2023
Joint Sword
Called in response to a Tsai Ing-wen transit through Los Angeles. Used many of the same maritime zones.
3-day encirclement drill
42 aircraft / day average
May 2024
Joint Sword 2024A
Called the day after William Lai's inauguration. Coast Guard cutters put into Taiwan's offshore waters.
111 aircraft / 46 naval vessels
2 day exercise
Oct 2024
Joint Sword 2024B
Called after Lai's National Day speech. Single-day records set in two categories.
Record ADIZ incursions, single day
Record PLA ships around Taiwan
// THESIS I — THE SILICON SHIELD
Concentration deters.
Taiwan's chip dominance makes any war the United States cannot afford to lose, because losing means the loss of a strategic resource without which contemporary military and economic life is impossible. Therefore, the United States will defend Taiwan. Therefore, China will not attack.
CONVENTIONAL WASHINGTON FRAMING · 1990s–2010s
// THESIS II — THE VULNERABILITY
Concentration tempts.
Taiwan's chip dominance makes the island a higher-value target, narrows the strategic options of all sides, and crowds out the diplomatic flexibility cross-strait management has historically required. Both theses agree on the facts. They differ on whether concentration produces deterrence or temptation.
REVISIONIST FRAMING · CHIEN-HUEI WU · LEV NACHMAN · OTHERS