‘Winning The AI Race' Is Not About Outpacing. It's About Outlasting

Forbes

4 days ago

The headlines around America's sweeping new AI Action Plan trumpet a message of urgency—outbuilding, out-innovating, and "outpacing" global rivals (read China) in the pursuit of technological supremacy. But as the world settles into what some call a new Great Power rivalry defined by artificial intelligence, the real contest is not about who crosses the finish line first, but rather who can endure, adapt, and thrive—the nation that can truly outlast.
Racing for Control, Not Just Speed
The White House's newly unveiled strategy encapsulates American determination to "achieve and maintain unquestioned and unchallenged global technological dominance." Its vision is saturated with Cold War echoes: a national mobilization for new chip foundries, data centers, and power infrastructure; tighter controls on AI-enabling exports; and a policy drive to preempt rivals from setting international standards. The rhetoric abounds with metaphors of sprints and space races—a clear signal that America intends to lead the digital century.
Yet beneath the bravado, critical voices argue that this winner-take-all model may not secure lasting advantage in a world where technologies diffuse quickly, value chains globalize, and societal resilience is as valuable as technological brute force.
Lessons from the Fast Followers
History shows that first mover advantage is far less robust than policymakers often imagine. The digital landscape is littered with pioneers who stumbled while their more adaptable rivals flourished: Spotify eclipsed Pandora, and Samsung outshined Blackberry. China has internalized this lesson.
While the U.S. pours resources into frontier model development and industrial megaprojects, China steadily wires AI into everyday reality—integrating smart logistics, education, and healthcare on a scale that eclipses any Western pilot program.
China's AI strategy leverages a whole-of-society approach: mass digital literacy campaigns, tight government-industry partnerships, and a relentless drive to close the hardware gap. While the U.S. may win the sprint, China is positioning for the marathon—prioritizing widespread deployment over mere invention.
America's Endurance Gap: Social and Civic Infrastructure
For the U.S., the risk is becoming so committed to velocity that it neglects the foundations that ensure victory in a long-distance race. True leadership in the 21st century's defining technology will depend less on the rapid unveiling of the next breakthrough than on preparing society to absorb, adapt to, and guide the onrush of change.
America's new plan is bold on physical infrastructure and regulatory streamlining, but not as aggressive when it comes to the "soft" fundamentals: building a digitally proficient workforce, retraining at a systemic scale, fortifying trust, and ensuring that communities left behind by globalization do not simply get displaced again. These are not sideshows. They are the sinews of national power and economic durability.
Redefining Strength: From Dominance to Resilience
As power competition with China intensifies, policymakers should pause to ask: What does it mean to win? If domination in parameter counts and patents comes at the price of worker displacement, community fracture, and deepening mistrust, what has really been gained?
The true durable advantage lies in resilience, which in this AI era includes first the ability for a population to reskill quickly and confidently. Second, broad, inclusive access to AI's benefits across the economic spectrum, not just among tech elite. Third, a robust, secure digital infrastructure that is trusted by allies and citizens alike. And finally, systems that anticipate inevitable shocks, from automation to cybersecurity, and absorb them with grace rather than rupture.
Such endurance requires both ambitious investment and humility: a willingness to learn from global peers, a pragmatic commitment to steady deployment over mere first-mover laurels, and a new era of cross-border collaboration (even with competitors) on safety, ethics, and shared standards.
The Choice: A Sprint or a Marathon?
America stands at a crossroads. It can continue to measure success in the raw speed of technological achievement or in the relentless pursuit of domination. Or it can recognize that the true measure of leadership is found in what endures: an economic system, a society, and a global order that remains dynamic, free, and hopeful even after the initial race is run.
The ultimate victor will not be who launches the fastest model or fields the largest dataset, but who remains upright—trusted and adaptive—at the century's end.
The AI era rewards not the sprinter, but the marathoner. For America, lasting leadership demands not just outpacing China, but outlasting by continuously investing in the resilience, dignity, and cohesion of its own society, and by shaping a global ecosystem where everyone has a stake in the intelligent world we are building together.