Naval: In 10-20 years, Taiwan will eventually be unified, and the US and China do not need to go to war.

Within a single week, two Silicon Valley podcasts coincidentally put Taiwan at the core of their discussions. One insists that the U.S. cannot defend Taiwan and will ultimately be unified with it; the other estimates that there is more than a 90% chance that the status quo across the Taiwan Strait will change within the next ten years, and is pouring heavy resources into preparing for war. The two stances are completely opposite, but on the point that the “status quo is running out of time,” both sides agree without dissent. This article is compiled from Naval Ravikant’s eponymous show and Jack Altman’s Uncapped Podcast.
(Background recap: The Trump administration plans to take an equity stake in a U.S. drone company: UMAC surges 70%, and the company held by Donald Trump Jr. is included.)
(Background supplement: Naval’s deathbed prophecy: Apple is dead—SaaS is next.)

Table of Contents

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• Defending Taiwan, minute 54
• Aircraft carriers are scrap metal in the face of missiles
• Over 90%, Anduril bets on the opposite side
• The relatively easy half

Key Takeaways

• Naval Ravikant says the U.S. missile stockpile could be down to 7 days, and aircraft carriers would be useless against land-based missiles
• Trae Stephens estimates a probability of change in the Taiwan Strait of over 90%, and Anduril’s valuation has reached $61 billion
• Trump is traveling to Beijing in May for a summit, and Xi Jinping calls Taiwan the most important issue between China and the U.S.

In the first week of July, Silicon Valley delivered—rarely—two podcast episodes in seven days with Taiwan as the main course. There was no prior coordination and no shared theme. The recording dates of the two shows were only two days apart, yet both discussions circled back to the same place.

One episode is from Naval Ravikant’s namesake show; the other is from Uncapped hosted by Jack Altman. The guests each side invited conveniently represent two different Silicon Valley postures when facing the China question.

One side wants the U.S. to recognize reality and let go; the other wants the U.S. to step up preparations for war.

Defending Taiwan, minute 54

Naval Ravikant’s reputation doesn’t need much introduction. He is the co-founder of AngelList and an early investor in Twitter and Uber. His quote collection, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, has made him one of the most frequently cited investors in Silicon Valley.

His show has always been a casual, freewheeling long-form conversation with no script—topics go wherever the conversation takes them. In the episode that went live on July 2, he brought in three entrepreneurs to chat while drinking:

• Garry Tan, CEO of Y Combinator
• Daniel Francis, founder of Abel, which automatically converts police body-cam footage into reports
• Farbood Nivi, founder of the health app A-LIST

At 54 minutes and 5 seconds into the episode, the discussion shifted to the segment on “defending Taiwan.”

What follows is entirely Naval Ravikant’s own remarks.

He says the Taiwanese people he knows don’t want to fight; he says wealthy people avoid conscription by sending their children abroad for a certain number of days each year; he says the (in his words) second-largest party (the Kuomintang) is pro-China; he says the script most Taiwanese people expect is to follow the Hong Kong model—make money first, and after one or two generations, become assimilated.

He doesn’t cite any research or data. He’s talking about the impressions left on him by the circles he has personally encountered—maybe totally different from some Taiwanese people’s views (or maybe completely the same).

Aircraft carriers are scrap metal in the face of missiles

On the military level, Naval Ravikant’s position is even more direct: the U.S. simply cannot defend Taiwan. He says aircraft carriers are effectively written off in the face of China’s land-based missiles. He says DJI is actually the world’s largest defense contractor. He also mentions that the U.S. has just fought a round against Iran, and based on the same intensity of attrition, he estimates the U.S. missile stockpile would be depleted in seven days.

Written-off aircraft carriers and a missile stockpile down to seven days—that’s the two figures Naval Ravikant provides.

He also uses an analogy: it’s like China trying to defend the Florida Keys from the U.S. In his view, the whole concept is absurd—going across the ocean to defend a place that isn’t even at your doorstep, at a cost that’s wildly disproportionate. He also concedes that companies like Anduril and Saronic are rebuilding the U.S. manufacturing base, but “far water can’t put out close fire.”

His conclusion is that over the next 10 to 20 years, Taiwan will be slowly unified by China as everyone goes through the process of saving face with one another, and between the U.S. and China, there simply isn’t any reason that makes war unavoidable. This, too, is Naval Ravikant’s own line of reasoning.

Over 90%, Anduril bets on the opposite side

If Naval Ravikant’s episode felt like a casual drinking get-together, Jack Altman’s episode is more like internal communication within the same circle. Uncapped Episode 35, released on June 30, is hosted by Jack Altman. He is the younger brother of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, a co-founder of the HR software company Lattice, and now does venture capital full-time.

In this episode, he invited people from Founders Fund all at once, with Trae Stephens as the main figure. Stephens comes from an early Palantir background; later he co-founded Anduril and is now the current Executive Chairman. Also on the lineup were two other key figures: Delian Asparouhov, co-founder of the space pharmaceutical company Varda; and Everett Randle, who previously worked at Founders Fund and is now at Benchmark.

All four come from the same venture-capital lineage. Their backgrounds span defense, space, and venture capital—none of them are outsiders.

Anduril is a defense technology company co-founded in 2017 by Palmer Luckey, Trae Stephens, and others. On May 13, 2026, Anduril completed a $5 billion Series H fundraise, doubling its valuation to $61 billion, led by Thrive Capital and a16z. In just a few years, going from a startup to a $61 billion valuation, the weight of Trae Stephens’s words has risen alongside the valuation.

When the host asks, how high is the probability that Taiwan will be blockaded or that the status quo will change within the next decade?

Trae Stephens’s answer is over 90%. He lays out three possible scenarios:

• Going the Hong Kong route: make money first, then be assimilated
• The U.S. trades key supply chains for concessions with China
• China launches a full-scale invasion, forcing the U.S. to make difficult decisions

His answer is completely the opposite of Naval Ravikant’s.

Trae Stephens says what Anduril is doing is to build credible deterrence for the scenario of a full-scale invasion. The cost is also real—Anduril and its founder Palmer Luckey have already been added to China’s sanctions list.

On December 26, 2025, China sanctioned 20 U.S. defense companies and 10 senior executives, citing U.S. arms sales to Taiwan exceeding $10 billion. Anduril and Palmer Luckey were both on the list. The concrete outcome of betting on deterrence is the sanctions list.

Palmer Luckey publicly responded, saying it is an award he is very proud to have won.

Inside Anduril, there is a “China 2027” strategy. Founder Palmer Luckey judges that China could block or invade Taiwan as early as 2027, and this assessment drives all of the company’s investment and R&D directions.

The relatively easy half

Compared with the Taiwan Strait timeline, Trae Stephens is actually more urgent about semiconductors. He says decades ago the U.S. let chip manufacturing go, and now all the capital is flowing to design—that’s “the relatively easy half.” The design side is neither short on money nor talent, and valuations keep rising. What’s hard is manufacturing. If that half isn’t solved, nothing else holds— including all of his reasoning on the Taiwan issue.

Based on the chess pieces everyone has on the board today, by 2030, the U.S. still won’t have large-scale advanced-process wafer fabs.

He estimates that building one from scratch would require a founder on the level of a Musk figure, plus hundreds of billions of dollars. The U.S. government would also need to step in to get you to the front of the ASML lithography equipment supply queue. All three conditions are indispensable, and the difficulty of putting them together isn’t much lower than the difficulty of deterring a Chinese invasion.

He uses a baseball analogy for chip-design companies: everyone is running bases for someone else, everyone is great at stealing; the problem is that no one can hit the ball. The bases are loaded with runners, but the scoreboard shows nothing.

On May 14 to 15 this year, Trump made a state visit to Beijing. In the talks, Xi Jinping listed Taiwan as the “most important issue” between China and the U.S., warning that if handled improperly, the two countries could end up in conflict and even confrontation. Trump said he hopes to maintain the status quo and also said they’ve been discussing this issue all night. After a whole night of talk, it was condensed into a single set-piece line from each side.

Trae Stephens says these words should be taken seriously. The West is used to understanding political commitments through an election cycle that comes once every four years: say it and forget it, and when the next administration comes in, it’s like a reboot. But authoritarian leaders stake their personal credibility on commitments. They have to deliver; otherwise they won’t be able to keep power.

When Silicon Valley—from investors to arms dealers—starts pricing the Taiwan Strait, their answers differ, but it’s impossible for them not to do the calculation.

(This article is a compilation and observation of two Podcast episodes. The content reflects the personal views of the interviewees and does not represent BlockTempo’s position, nor does it constitute investment advice.)

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Naval Ravikant, and why is his view on Taiwan drawing attention?

Naval Ravikant is the co-founder of AngelList, an early investor in Twitter and Uber. His quote collection The Almanack of Naval Ravikant has made him one of the most cited investors in Silicon Valley. In this program, he shares his personal views on Taiwan’s defense and unification scenario.

What is Anduril, and why is it sanctioned by China?

Anduril is a defense technology company co-founded by Trae Stephens, Palmer Luckey, and others. In May 2026, its valuation doubled to $61 billion. Because of U.S. arms sales to Taiwan, it was placed on China’s sanctions list in December 2025, and the founders are also on the list.