DeepSeek raises fear of a cold war powered by accessible AI

Chinese hi-tech start-up DeepSeek recently shocked the world by releasing a new generative artificial intelligence (AI) model that, it claims, rivals US company OpenAI’s ChatGPT in performance while blowing it away in cost efficiency. The announcement was a boon to China’s confidence in its technological self-reliance and a blow to Washington’s conviction that it could contain China’s emergence as a superpower.

Talk of a “Sputnik moment” resounded in the US media. Yet the Cold War analogy missed a key point: Sputnik came during the early years of a protracted, high-stakes conflict that the world managed to survive. The timeline for an AI-powered Cold War 2.0 would not be nearly so forgiving.

Regardless of whether the fanfare about DeepSeek is true – and that’s still a big if – Washington must reconsider its failed, heavy-handed sanctioning of China and seek a more constructive approach to dealing with what is already the world’s second superpower. Put more simply, it’s time for the United States and China to talk.

Industry experts contest DeepSeek’s assertions that its AI model was built on relatively few lower-grade Nvidia chips for a mere US$6 million, in contrast to the hundreds of millions spent by Western companies. Testing has reportedly shown that the Chinese model may potentially be a copy of ChatGPT. Still, DeepSeek exists, and it is already changing how we use, deploy and apply AI models.