How many times has it been emphasised that Poland is one of the USA's most important allies? How many words have been said in the context of the special relationship between the two countries? How much, after all, have we as a country invested in buying military equipment from Washington? As it turned out, however, this did not prevent the US administration from placing painful restrictions on Poland.
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Poland in the second league
What exactly is at stake? About importing the latest NVIDIA chips. The US has imposed very strong restrictions on a number of countries in this regard, including Poland. The Americans have decided to keep only 18 countries in the ‘top league’, including virtually all of what is known as Western Europe.
The restrictions did not affect countries such as Germany, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain or, going beyond the area of the Old Continent, Canada, Australia or New Zealand. Poland, in turn, found itself excluded, along with the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary or countries from Africa, the Middle East or South America.
The end of opportunities for development
What do all these restrictions mean? Only that Poland will have to contend with a restriction on imports of NVIDIA chips to 50,000 chips a year. This pool may still rise to 100,000, but even at these values it means a serious problem for our country and its development.
Professor Piotr Sankowski, former president of the NCBR's IDEAS institute, put it quite emphatically. - Based on a decision by the Joe Biden administration, Poland is subject to restrictions on imports of the latest NVIDIA chips - he wrote on the ‘X’ platform.
- The rules at first glance look perhaps not very scary, as the limit of 50,000 cards that Poland got may sound like a lot for us, and may still be raised to 100,000. However, as someone who knows what is going on in AI development and that now the for-profit is struggling to create a superintelligence, the overtones of this document are clear - yellow countries should forget about developing their own superintelligence - he added.
An incomprehensible decision
Piotr Sankowski cannot believe that Poland, as a country whose stature and geopolitical importance have been emphasised so many times in successive statements and gestures, has suddenly been treated as an inferior country that has not earned the use of the latest technologies and should not have the chance to develop faster in the context of AI.
- Limits are supposed to be enough for them only for ordinary AI applications because ‘this limit ensures that US technology is available to serve foreign governments, medical providers and other local businesses’. That is, God forbid we should think about some global AI. It is regrettable that this blog post is so negative, but I personally don't understand how we ended up in the second category of countries in this whole geopolitical configuration - he concluded.
The US administration's decision has once again shown that the politics of gestures, smiles for the cameras and handshakes is one thing, but when it comes to making the most important decisions - and this is one - Poland has little leverage.
How will all this affect the development and capabilities of our country? Well, at a time when the development of artificial intelligence or super-intelligence will be indicative of a country's strength, the door has just been closed for us to take a step forward.
