New York Times ChineseJun 29, 2026, 10:37 UTC+8

Can the U.S. Avoid Its Own 'Jack Ma Moment'?

美国能避免出现“马云时刻”吗

Dan Wang and Julian Gewirtz argue the U.S. is sliding toward its own 'Jack Ma moment' after export controls blocked access to Anthropic's Fable 5 model. They trace the Trump administration's swing from laissez-faire to heavy-handed control, including the Pentagon designating Anthropic a supply-chain risk. The piece warns that government-vs.-lab conflict now poses a bigger threat to U.S. AI leadership than Chinese competition. The article does not disclose Fable 5's technical specs or how the standoff will ultimately resolve.

Why it matters: NYT opinion piece draws a provocative parallel between US export controls on Anthropic's Fable 5 and China's 2020 crackdown on Jack Ma. Strong historical framing with concrete timeline and capability details. Docked slightly because it's commentary, not primary reporting, and ...

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Take

This piece connects several recent events into a clean narrative: Anthropic's Fable 5 got blocked three days after launch, the Pentagon had already labeled Anthropic a supply-chain risk, and the Trump administration swung from hands-off to heavy-handed. The authors use China's 2020 crackdown on Jack Ma and Ant Group as a warning that the US is now hurting itself.

I'd discount this a bit — it's an op-ed, not investigative reporting, and a lot of the details are secondhand from public coverage. The post doesn't spell out Fable 5's technical specs, the specific jailbreak evidence, or what the actual sticking points in the negotiation are. But the core argument holds: when you turn export controls on your own leading AI company without clear explanation, you erode trust with both talent and allies. The article flags that foreign researchers are reconsidering their career plans and allies are questioning whether they can rely on US models — those two threads matter more than any single access block.

Don't read this as 'the US is doomed.' The authors themselves note that US legal protections and deep capital markets make an Alibaba-style two-thirds market cap wipeout unlikely. The more useful take: trust between the government and labs is burning down fast, and rebuilding it is a lot harder than signing an executive order.

Source: New York Times Chinese · cn.nytimes.com
Published: Jun 29, 2026, 10:37 UTC+8 · Jun 29, 2026