The Netherlands has officially joined the Pax Silica alliance, a coalition of nations coordinating semiconductor export controls and supply chain security policy, according to IO+. Dutch Foreign Trade Minister Sjoerd Sjoerdsma announced the country’s participation during a high-profile diplomatic visit to Washington, D.C., where he met with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Deputy Treasury Secretary Francis Brooke.
The decision aligns The Hague more closely with the US-led effort to restrict China’s access to advanced chipmaking technology and marks a significant escalation in the ongoing dispute over the export of ASML equipment, the Dutch company that manufactures the world’s most advanced lithography machines.
Pax Silica, which includes the United States, Japan, South Korea, the European Commission, Germany, and Greece, with Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Kazakhstan, and Panama also joining this week, is designed to establish a unified approach to semiconductor policy, balancing national security concerns with the need for resilient global supply chains. The United States has established a $250 million Pax Silica Fund to support infrastructure and critical minerals, though participation is based on a non-binding declaration rather than a rigid treaty.
The Netherlands’ entry signals a willingness to coordinate more closely with Washington on export controls, potentially leading to further restrictions on ASML’s sales to Chinese customers beyond those already in place.
The ASML Export Control Dispute
The dispute over ASML’s exports to China has been one of the most contentious issues in the US-China tech war. ASML is the sole manufacturer of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines, which are essential for producing chips at the most advanced nodes, below 7 nanometers. The US has pressed the Netherlands to prevent ASML from selling these machines to Chinese chipmakers since 2019, and the Dutch government complied by declining to renew ASML’s export license for EUV systems to China.
The current dispute centers on deep ultraviolet (DUV) lithography machines, which are less advanced than EUV systems but still capable of producing chips at nodes that China cannot currently manufacture domestically. The US has pushed for restrictions on DUV exports as well, arguing that Chinese chipmakers can use multiple DUV exposures to approximate the capabilities of EUV lithography, a technique known as multi-patterning. The Netherlands has been more reluctant to restrict DUV exports, given the significant revenue implications for ASML, for which China remains one of its most important markets.
The Netherlands’ decision to join Pax Silica suggests that the Dutch government has concluded that the long-term security and diplomatic benefits of alignment with its allies outweigh the short-term economic costs of further ASML restrictions. The decision likely reflects pressure from Washington, but also a broader Dutch assessment that the geopolitical environment has shifted sufficiently to make continued DUV sales to China politically untenable.
What Pax Silica Membership Means in Practice
Joining Pax Silica does not automatically impose specific export restrictions. The alliance is a coordination mechanism rather than a binding treaty. But membership creates institutional pressure to align national export control policies with those of other members, and it establishes a framework for information sharing and joint enforcement that makes unilateral deviations more visible and politically costly.
For ASML, the practical implications will depend on what specific commitments the Netherlands makes as part of its Pax Silica membership. The company has already been operating under significant restrictions on its China business, and further tightening could accelerate the shift in its revenue mix toward customers in the US, South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan. ASML has been investing in expanding its manufacturing capacity in the Netherlands and the US in anticipation of sustained demand from these markets.
For China, the Netherlands’ entry into Pax Silica closes another avenue for accessing advanced lithography technology. China’s semiconductor industry has been working to develop domestic alternatives to ASML’s equipment, including a new photonics lab designed to power AI with light, but the technology gap remains substantial. The STAR Market listing of CXMT and the expansion of SMIC’s capacity demonstrate that China can manufacture competitive chips at mature nodes, but the path to leading-edge production without EUV — or even advanced DUV, equipment is technically challenging.
The Broader Semiconductor Alliance Architecture
The Pax Silica alliance is part of a broader architecture of semiconductor-focused multilateral initiatives that has developed rapidly since 2022. The US has used the CHIPS and Science Act, the Wassenaar Arrangement, and bilateral agreements with Japan, the Netherlands, and South Korea to build a coordinated, progressively more comprehensive export control regime.
US proposals for new export restrictions on ASML and chipmaking equipment to China have been a recurring feature of this effort, and the Netherlands’ Pax Silica membership suggests that those proposals are finding more receptive audiences in European capitals than they did two years ago. The shift reflects both the hardening of European geopolitical attitudes toward China and the growing recognition that semiconductor supply chain security is a genuine national security issue, not merely a US political priority.
China has strongly opposed the export controls, arguing that they violate international trade rules and disrupt global supply chains. Beijing has responded with its own export controls on critical minerals, including gallium, germanium, and rare earth processing technologies, that are essential inputs for semiconductor manufacturing. The MOFCOM whistleblower program announced this week is the latest expression of this counter-pressure strategy, designed to make China’s export control enforcement as credible as the restrictions it faces from its adversaries.
The Netherlands’ entry into Pax Silica will further strain relations between The Hague and Beijing. It also raises questions about the future of ASML’s China business and the timeline for China’s domestic lithography development. The semiconductor supply chain is becoming more fragmented, more politicized, and more difficult to navigate for companies caught between competing national interests, and ASML is at the center of that tension.