Europe controls a chipmaking bottleneck that could slow an AI existential threat, strengthen military safeguards, and give regulators and citizens greater oversight, although technology companies and defense startups could lose development speed, investment, talent, contracts, and global momentum in return.
The European Union (EU) holds an advantage through Dutch chip equipment producer Advanced Semiconductor Materials Lithography (ASML), with its extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines manufacturing most advanced semiconductors. Restricting exports could slow AI expansion while governments decide how military systems should be controlled.
Europe Holds All Chip Cards
Concern that AI is an existential threat is no longer limited to campaigners. Political leaders, researchers, and technology executives increasingly accept that uncontrolled development could bring unemployment, surveillance, cyberattacks, autonomous weapons, environmental pressure, and systems acting against human wellbeing.
The warning that AI a threat to humanity deserves action, rests on a weakness in the global supply chain. ASML builds machines that place tiny patterns on silicon, enabling chips used in advanced models and data centers.
That dependence gives Europe leverage over an industry led by the United States and China. The US already uses export controls to prevent ASML’s most advanced equipment from reaching China, hoping to limit Beijing’s chipmaking capacity.
The argument that AI greatest threat to humanity requires collective restraint faces one problem: every country fears dependence on whoever moves fastest. Governments keep competing. A European hardware restriction could impose the pause that voluntary promises have not been delivered.
“If someone had a credible plan for slowing down AI advances globally, I would likely support it,” said Bill Gates.
The Guardian’s Alexander Hurst argues that industry self-restraint cannot work because pressure to beat competitors remains stronger than promises of caution.
Seeing AI humanity threat through chip supply changes who holds power. Regulators would gain time to update copyright, labor, tax, safety, and competition rules. Developers, however, would face fewer chips, slower training, weaker returns, and delayed products.
Responding to AI existential threat carries costs. Washington could block ASML from American suppliers, while China and the United States would increase efforts to copy its technology. The leverage may weaken as more machines leave Europe.
Still, treating AI existential threat as a supply chain issue gives policymakers a practical intervention. Software crosses border quickly, but frontier chipmaking machines are difficult to reproduce. Controlling equipment may work better than asking competing laboratories to slow themselves.
Military Innovation Meets Oversight
The AI existential threat enters security policy as Munich becomes a defense technology center. Dedicated defense startups around the German city have doubled to about 60, supported by engineering talent, universities, government interest, and demand created by Russia’s war in Ukraine.
For these developers, AI arms race spending brings contracts for drones, counter-drone systems, robotics, and battlefield software. Quantum Systems has supplied drones to Ukraine and other militaries, while Tytan Technologies is expanding drone interception tools.
“This provides fertile ground for many innovative ideas,” said Munich Mayor Dominik Krause.
The belief that AI is an existential threat complicates certain growth, where slower access to advanced chips could delay autonomous systems and reduce investment, even as governments seek faster defense production. Startups already face slow approvals, security clearances, and budgets centered on traditional weapons.
Describing an AI a threat to humanity does not mean rejecting every military use. Carnegie Europe says AI can improve logistics, cybersecurity, surveillance, targeting, and decision support. It can also fail, misidentify people, compound errors, or operate too quickly for meaningful human control.
Former director of the United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Jen Easterly, called AI the “most powerful weapon of our time.”
That description explains why an AI calamity cannot be separated from defense policy. Systems offering military advantage could weaken accountability over lethal decisions.
The claim that AI greatest threat to humanity becomes urgent because military AI remains outside the EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act. It leaves an oversight gap around autonomous weapons and dual-use systems moving between civilian and battlefield roles.
Carnegie Europe argues that the EU should lead international standards and preserve meaningful human control. Hardware leverage could support that role by linking access to advanced computing with safety conditions, testing, transparency, and clear responsibility for decisions involving force.
Such controls would confirm that the AI humanity threat is also a democratic question. Regulators and citizens gain time, information, and influence; developers lose speed. Defense startups may receive less investment, but military safeguards could grow stronger before automated systems spread further.
Europe must decide whether near-term growth outweighs long-term control. The warning that the AI arms race is coming is already outdated, and competition is knocking on the doors.
ASML gives Europe a temporary card to slow it, strengthen military rules, and confront the AI existential threat before others reproduce the technology.
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