Deconstructing JD Vance’s speech on AI

We live in interesting times and none more so than those following in the wake of the US Vice President’s recent visit to Europe and the speeches and interviews he gave in Munich and Paris. In Munich, Vance used his first major overseas address as US Vice President to criticise European politicians, claiming they were controlling free speech, losing authority on immigration, and ignoring religious freedom.

Tough talk, plus a dose of ‘History 101’

Similarly tough declarations and messages were threaded throughout Vance’s earlier speech at the AI Action Summit in Paris on 11 February 2025, with a principal focus on the opportunities AI presents and a strongly-worded admonishment about being overly cautious about safety. Vance noted that AI is a revolutionary technology with applications in economic innovation, job creation, national security and healthcare. Excessive regulation could stifle innovation and benefit incumbents. The Trump administration advocates, he said, for pro-growth AI policies and AI should remain free from ideological bias and not be used for authoritarian censorship.

The Vice President’s speech took an agreeable detour, referencing Vance’s recent visit to Les Invalides where the Marquis de Lafayette’s sword was on display.

“It got me thinking of this country, France, and, of course, of my own country, and of the beautiful civilisation that we have built together with weapons like that sabre,” said Vance. “Weapons that are dangerous in the wrong hands, but are incredible tools for liberty and prosperity in the right hands.”

The modern-day symbolism of the iron fist in a velvet glove of Lafayette’s sword - Lafayette, the French nobleman and military officer who volunteered in the Continental Army, serving under General George Washington - is perhaps of too great allegorical importance to US history to ignore, but more of that later on.

Shock and awe

Setting history aside for the moment, the Trump-Vance narrative on AI was clearly meant to awaken a sense of shock and awe. There were at first assurances, “AI will facilitate, and make people more productive. It is not going to replace human beings. It will never replace human beings. And I think too many of the leaders in the AI industry when they talk about this fear of replacing workers, I think they really missed the point. AI, we believe, is going to make us more productive, more prosperous, and more free.”

All very noble and encouraging, but the awe was yet to come: “The United States of America is the leader in AI, and our administration plans to keep it that way. The US possesses all components across the full AI stack, including advanced semiconductor design, frontier algorithms, and, of course, transformational applications,” said Vance to an audience made up of leading business and political figures, including Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing, signalling Beijing’s deep interest in shaping global AI standards.

The shock (or possibly the reveal of the iron fist) part of Vance’s speech came about in a beguiling enough manner. “Just because we’re the leader doesn’t mean we want to or need to go it alone, of course. And let me be emphatic about this point. America wants to partner with all of you, and we want to embark on the AI revolution before us with the spirit of openness and collaboration.”

But then, perhaps drawing on memories of his visit to Les Invalides, Layfette’s sword flashed decisively, “But to create that kind of trust, we need international regulatory regimes that foster the creation of AI technology rather than strangle it. And we need our European friends in particular to look to this new frontier with optimism rather than trepidation.”

What followed proved to be a paradigm of Silicon Valley logic. Laws will be in place in the US, Vance said, but they will be there to keep big tech, little tech, and other developers on a “level playing field” (no strangling!). An “AI action plan” was being developed that took note of “some foreign governments” and their plans to “tighten the screws on US tech companies with international footprints”. “Now America cannot and will not accept that, and we think it’s a terrible mistake, not just for the United States of America, but for your own countries.”

U-turn? Some countries are for turning

More shock was to follow, and on Monday 17 February, the media were full of stark warnings to the UK government. “Tech giants Google and Elon Musk’s X have warned that Britain’s new online safety laws could force global companies to reconsider their UK presence due to high compliance costs and regulatory overreach,” reported Yahoo!Finance, referring to the Online Safety Act, which was passed under Rishi Sunak’s government and which imposed strict rules requiring major platforms to introduce age verification and stop harmful content.

Whether one might label these tactics The Art of the Deal, or The Art of War, the tough rhetoric from Vance produced a speedy response from the UK government, which now reports that the UK may be open to modifying the law if it becomes a sticking point in trade talks. UK plc and the UK Government clearly listened to Vance. The UK’s science and tech ministry said that its AI Safety Institute, the world’s first, would focus on “serious AI risks with security implications” and change its name.

Britain is not the only country pressed into making a volte-face. The US Vice President’s speech produced an equally swift response in China. On Monday 17 February, Chinese President Xi Jinping met some of the country’s top entrepreneurs, including Alibaba’s Jack Ma as Beijing looked to reinvigorate private business and drive stronger economic growth.

Ma was a most prominent victim of Beijing’s tech crackdown from several years ago, and his attendance at the recent summit marked a clear signal that China’s most famous entrepreneur had been rehabilitated after four years in the political wilderness. Moreover, Xi is signalling a desire for business leaders such as Ma to once again take firm hold of the reigns of China’s tech powerhouse that has, over the past decade, produced leading companies such as TikTok and the WeChat platform.

Lessons from recent history

Vance would be acutely aware of the fact that China is in the global top three for venture capital investment in key technologies associated with AI and machine learning. The speed and relatively low-cost development of DeepSeek’s latest large language AI model, which has achieved comparable performance to the US rival OpenAI, has taken the world by storm and wiped billions off market valuations for companies such as Nvidia.

For most Americans, and perhaps for Vance too, there is a belief that US leadership in advanced technologies is so entrenched that it is unassailable. However, America only has to look at its corporate history to be reminded of the lessons of the jungle. For example, one of the most expensive mistakes in tech history came about when Intel rejected the original iPhone on the basis that they thought it wouldn’t be profitable and the price was too low. When Apple went on to sell 2.3 billion iPhones, Intel was left watching from the side-lines, clutching its heaving sides in grief.

Focus is important

Vance concluded his Paris speech by exhorting the audience to focus, and to “catch lightning in a bottle”, reminding everyone, rather self-interestedly it has to be said, “that the very future of ‘the project’ that Lafayette and the American founders set off to create” was at stake.

And Vance is right of course, focus is important. But there was one essential element missing from the US Vice President’s speech – ‘competition’. Of course, the threat of competition strongly resonated throughout Vance’s speech, but the notion that the US is the leader in AI, possessing all components across the “full AI stack”, suggests an elementary mistake might be about to be made. If DeepSeek can appear from nowhere, and China is fast taking leadership positions in fields as diverse as chemicals, electric vehicles, and pharma, then its leadership in AI can be but a step away.

To borrow from the lexicon of Silicon Valley, the USA’s position on AI is ‘nontrivial’ but perhaps more ‘antifragile’than perennially dominant and resilient.So let us see what happens in the era of Trump 2.0 and Vance: will their confidence carry the day, or will more technology-inspired black swans betray their convictions.

Let’s watch that Lafayette sword flash some more!

An award-winning teacher and scholar and one of the world’s foremost thought leaders in entrepreneurship, John Mullins , Associate Professor of Management Practice in Marketing and Entrepreneurship at London Business School, brings to his teaching and research 20 years of executive experience in high-growth retailing firms, including two ventures he founded and one he took public. He is the author of several best-selling books with his most recent, Break the Rules! The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs that Can Help Anyone Change the World, delving into the mindsets that enable world-class entrepreneurs to challenge assumptions, overcome obstacles, mitigate risk, and sometimes change the world.

This article was first published in Forbes magazine on 23^rd February 2025.