China Has Mass. Can America Catch Up?
The Ben & Marc Show
Intro
Hosts introduce the topic: U.S. defense production gap, guests Brian Schimpf and Chris Power, and episode framing.
Ben, Marc, and Erik Torenberg are joined by Brian Schimpf, Cofounder & CEO of Anduril, and Chris Power, Founder & CEO of Hadrian. Together, they dig into America’s defense production gap: why the U.S. can out-innovate but not out-produce—and what it will take to turn that around.
They discuss why U.S. war games show we run out of munitions in a week, the myth of “exquisite-only” systems, how to rebuild industrial capacity with software-led automation, financing factories like data centers, and what it takes to create real deterrence in a Taiwan scenario.
Timecodes:
0:00 Introduction
0:54 The Myth of Technical Superiority
3:31 Erosion of US Manufacturing
6:50 Challenges in Rebuilding Industrial Capacity
8:31 The Skilled Labor Crisis
15:01 Automation and the Future of Manufacturing
17:57 Supply Chain Vulnerabilities
26:05 Regulatory and Policy Barriers
36:49 Financial Engineering vs. Industrial Policy
46:15 US vs. China: Strategic Competition
46:55 The Taiwan Scenario & War Gaming
52:55 Demographics, Economics, and CCP Strategy
Resources:
Find Chris on X: https://x.com/chris_power
Find Brian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bschimpf/
Marc on X: https://x.com/pmarca
Marc’s Substack: https://pmarca.substack.com/
Ben on X: https://x.com/bhorowitz
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