China just made its civilian AI industry a legal military reserve. The first defence-mobilisation law revision in 16 years turns AI, drones, and data into wartime assets on demand — weeks before the Trump-Xi summit.
America’s AI security scares were supposed to prove open models are too dangerous. Instead they strengthened China’s hand — because a fearful world values self-custody over a vendor’s promise of safety. The Trump-Xi summit is the reckoning.
The weights are still free to download — but no longer free to build a fortune on. Alibaba and Moonshot now want a share of your revenue. China’s open-source giants are quietly rebuilding “free” into a royalty business.
For a year, China’s weapon was radically cheap AI. Now DeepSeek charges peak-hour rates like an Uber at rush hour — up 355%. The monetisation reckoning watchchina.ai predicted has quietly begun.
Unitree soared 460%, then crashed 45% — $30 billion gone in days. The robots are real, but the valuation was fantasy. watchchina.ai on the gap between China’s robot demonstrations and actual deployment.