If a cure for cancer were discovered, wouldn’t it be a cause for celebration? Not if China discovered it. At least that’s the view of the congressionally appointed US-China Economic and Security Review Commission.

“Imagine they [the Chinese] cure cancer. A shock would go through the system as we’ve never seen – our approach would have failed,” Commissioner Leland Miller told a public forum earlier this year.

“We want someone to cure cancer, but we don’t want China to control the pipeline for that cure. If China has enormous success in AI, quantum, and biotech, it shows we are failing on the national security side. I’m not against cooperation, and obviously, everyone wants cancer cured. But if there’s going to be a winner in that race, US industry – which funds enormous R&D – should be it.”

So a Chinese cancer discovery would be a threat to US national security. Any Chinese success, no matter the obvious public benefits it would bring, automatically means an American failure.