> History has shown that withholding technology from China does not significantly stop them and they'll achieve it (or better) in a small number of years.

Really? How long has China been attempting to build their own jet engines? How long have they been attempting to build competitive CPUs?

History has shown withholding tech successfully keeps them at least a generation behind the west.

In some fields like CPUs they “make up for it” by just building larger clusters, but ultimately history does not show what you’re claiming. The only thing it shows is that we need to be even more diligent in protecting IP because a large portion of their catching up is a direct result of stealing the tech they were cut off from.