>Actively disrespecting other countries who worked hard on developing such capabilities and assuming European nations should be on the "big boys table" is what is so jarring.

Maybe there's a misunderstanding here, as there was no disrespecting anyone there with my comment, and I basically agree with your point.

That doesn't change that people here want those cutting edge manufacturing and job opportunities the US has. They don't want to be stuck competition with China in commodity widgets like cars or low margin 16nm-65nm microcontrollers.

There's a limited market for ASML machines, Siemens gas turbines, and Airbus planes which can't support economic growth of the entire block.

>Nothing stopped European nations like from continuing to invest in domestic capacity 20 years ago, but most of their IP is now developed in American, Indian, or other Asian subsidiaries or JVs.

They're developed outside of Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, etc since private businesses care most about prioritizing shareholder returns, not national sovereignty. And with Western EUs high labor costs, high taxes, high bureaucracy, strong unions, private companies slowly moved jobs elsewhere where it's cheaper to do business, no unions, less environmentalism, less labor protections, etc. Everyone with basic business know-how could have seen this coming but people still thought they could have their cake and eat it too in the globally cutthroat "free market" economy.

Case in point, Nokia just announced it is closing Infinera's Munich office and moving all operations to the US.