You’ve probably heard of BYD.

你可能听说过比亚迪(BYD)。

A middling player in the auto industry just a few years ago, the Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer BYD surpassed Tesla last year to become the world’s top-selling E.V. brand and is expected to pull even with the world’s biggest carmakers, Toyota and Volkswagen, by 2030.

几年前，比亚迪还是汽车行业一个平平无奇的参与者，但在去年，这家中国电动汽车制造商超越特斯拉，成为全球最畅销的电动车品牌，而且预计到2030年，它将与全球最大车企丰田和大众并驾齐驱。

Yet most Americans have never even seen a BYD and probably won’t anytime soon.

然而，大多数美国人从未见过比亚迪汽车，而且短期内恐怕也不会见到。

BYD, which stands for “Build Your Dreams,” is essentially banned from American roads by tariffs, imposed to protect U.S. automakers, that double the price of imported Chinese plug-ins. Erecting tariff walls may buy the domestic auto industry some time, but it ultimately won't insulate American manufacturers from BYD or the bigger threat that it represents.

由于关税，这个以英文“Build Your Dreams”（成就梦想）的缩写为名的品牌相当于被禁止驶上美国的道路，这些关税是为了保护美国汽车制造商而设，使进口的中国插电式汽车的价格翻倍。筑起关税壁垒或许能为本国汽车行业争取到一些时间，但最终并不能使美国制造商免受比亚迪——以及它所代表的更大威胁——的冲击。

The company embodies a Chinese industrial model that is leaving America in the dust. This model, which combines government financial support, methodical long-term planning and aggressive innovation, has enabled China to achieve global dominance in a range of high-tech industries, from batteries to robotics to drones. Losing those markets to Chinese companies was bad enough. If the same happens in auto manufacturing, the impact would be far worse for America because of the industry’s size and its economic, political and strategic importance.

比亚迪代表着一种让美国望尘莫及的中国产业模式。这种模式结合了政府财政支持、有条不紊的长期规划以及积极的创新，使中国得以在从电池到机器人再到无人机的一系列高科技行业实现全球主导地位。将这些市场让给中国企业已经够糟糕了。如果汽车制造业也发生同样的情况，对美国的影响将严重得多，因为该行业的规模及其经济、政治和战略重要性都举足轻重。

The success of BYD and several other upstart Chinese car brands should be a warning for U.S. auto manufacturing and our industrial sector as a whole. We need the courage to recognize how badly we are falling behind, shake off complacency and adopt an urgent government-led effort — think of a Manhattan Project but for cars — to restore U.S. competitiveness.

比亚迪和其他几家中国新兴汽车品牌的成功应该给美国汽车制造业乃至我们整个工业领域敲响警钟。我们需要有勇气承认自己已经严重落后，并摆脱自满情绪，发起由政府主导的紧急行动——想像一个汽车业的曼哈顿计划——以恢复美国的竞争力。

When I opened my automotive business in Beijing in 1992, cars produced by China’s then-fledgling auto industry were terrible. Shoddily designed and made from cheap materials, they were quick to break down, befitting the country’s reputation at the time as a factory for inferior knockoffs. BYD, a battery manufacturer that began making cars in 2003, was no exception. For years, its cars were notorious in China as clunkers.

1992年我在北京开始我的汽车业务时，刚起步的中国汽车工业生产的车相当差。设计蹩脚，用料低廉，开不了多久就会坏，这很符合当时中国作为劣质仿制品工厂的名声。2003年开始制造汽车的电池制造商比亚迪也不例外。多年来，它的车在中国是出了名的破烂货。

Those days are long gone. I’ve driven nearly every BYD model, and they are now as good as other top brands like Tesla in terms of design, features, advanced technologies and overall quality. The company’s Blade battery is among the safest and most cost-efficient in the world, so good that Toyota and Tesla have used it in some of their cars. Most worrying for its competitors, BYDs are affordable: Its least expensive models sell in China for under $10,000, a third of the price of the most affordable electric vehicles available in the U.S. market.

但那是老黄历了。我开过比亚迪几乎所有车型，如今它们在设计、功能、先进技术和整体质量方面已经和特斯拉等其他顶级品牌不相上下。该公司的刀片电池是世界上最安全、最具成本效益的电池之一，质量好到丰田和特斯拉都在它们生产的部分汽车中使用了它。最令竞争对手担忧的是，比亚迪汽车价格实惠：最便宜的车型在中国售价不到1万美元，是美国市场最便宜的电动车价格的三分之一。

How did BYD pull this off? “Government subsidies!” Western critics will cry, and that’s of course part of the story. Chinese automakers such as BYD are believed to have received billions of dollars’ worth of state support over the years. This is state capitalism at work. Americans can complain about it all they want, but China isn’t going to scrap this model just because we don’t like it.

比亚迪是如何做到这一点的？“政府补贴！”西方的批评者会这样大喊，这当然是部分原因。据信，比亚迪等中国车企多年来获得了数十亿美元的国家补贴。这是国家资本主义在发挥作用。美国人可以尽情抱怨，但中国不会仅仅因为我们不喜欢就抛弃这种模式。

It’s also not the only reason for BYD’s success. It can build cars inexpensively thanks to what’s known as vertical integration. While most major carmakers source many important parts from outside suppliers, BYD makes almost all of its key components in-house, including batteries, semiconductors, motors and tablet screens, which saves costs and enhances quality control. It developed its cars’ operating software, has stakes in mines and mining companies that produce the minerals for its batteries and transports its vehicles around the world aboard its fleet of specially designed car-carrier ships.

政府支持也不是比亚迪成功的唯一原因。它能够降低造车成本，得益于所谓的垂直整合。虽然大多数主要汽车制造商的重要零部件都来自外部供应商，但比亚迪几乎所有的关键零部件都自己生产，包括电池、半导体、电机和平板屏幕，这节省了成本并加强了质量控制。汽车的操作系统也是自己开发的，他们还持有生产电池矿物的矿山和矿业公司的股份，并用专门设计的汽车运输船队将生产的汽车运往世界各地。

BYD is also rapidly innovating. This year it unveiled an autonomous driving system that may be as good as Tesla’s, if not better, and technology that BYD says can charge cars in just five minutes — as quickly as filling a gas tank. Its top-end models include the YangWang U8, a luxury S.U.V. that can rotate 360 degrees in place and operate in water like a boat over short distances.

比亚迪也在快速创新。今年，它发布了一项或许可以跟特斯拉媲美甚至更优的自动驾驶系统，以及据其称可以在短短五分钟内为汽车充好电的技术——就跟给油箱加满油一样快。其高端车型包括仰望U8，这是一款豪华SUV，可以原地掉头，并能像船一样在水中短距离行驶。

There’s an argument to be made that we should just let BYD into the U.S. market. It would give American consumers more bang for their buck and U.S. manufacturers a chance to learn from the company.

有人会说，我们应该让比亚迪进入美国市场。这将为美国消费者提供高性价比的产品，并为美国制造商提供向该公司学习的机会。

But BYD now has such overwhelming advantages in costs and battery technologies that it could end up destroying its U.S. competitors, endangering a critical American industry and hundreds of thousands of jobs. This is why Ford’s chief executive, Jim Farley, last year called Chinese electric vehicles an existential threat and why Elon Musk said they will “demolish” the competition without trade barriers.

但比亚迪目前在成本和电池技术方面拥有如此压倒性的优势，最终可能会摧毁其美国竞争对手，危及美国的关键产业和数十万个工作岗位。这就是为什么福特首席执行官吉姆·法利去年称中国电动车是生存威胁，以及为什么埃隆·马斯克说如果没有贸易壁垒，它们将“摧毁”竞争对手。

We can coddle American companies with tariffs, but it won’t change the fact that we are losing badly. China is, far and away, the world’s largest producer and exporter of all types of cars, including electrics. BYD and its Chinese peers may be shut out of the United States, but they are seizing control of the fast-growing global E.V. industry. Unable to compete abroad, U.S. automakers will have to retreat into the narrow space where they remain strong: the domestic market for gas-guzzling trucks and S.U.V.s.

我们可以用关税来呵护美国车企，但这改变不了我们正在惨败的事实。中国无疑是当今世界上各类汽车的最大生产国和出口国，其中包括电动车。比亚迪及其他的中国车企也许被美国拒之门外了，但它们正在拿下快速增长的全球电动汽车产业的控制权。由于无法在国外竞争，美国汽车制造商将不得不退守到它们依然强大的狭小领域：国内高油耗卡车和SUV市场。

America must take a page from China’s playbook. Ten years ago, Chinese leaders created a blueprint for domination of next-generation technologies, funneling huge sums of money into the project, knowing it would take years to pay off. BYD is just one of many examples of how this is now bearing fruit. Following China’s lead, with its heavy state involvement, would be a tough sell to many in Washington. But America has never confronted an industrial competitor like China.

美国必须借鉴中国的经验。十年前，中国领导人制定了主导下一代技术的蓝图，并为此投入巨额资金，而且他们深知这需要多年才能获得回报。比亚迪只是这一计划如今正在开花结果的众多例子之一。效仿中国这种政府深度参与的模式对华盛顿的许多人来说会难以接受。但美国在历史上还从未面对过像中国这样的产业竞争对手。

And this isn’t only about electric vehicles. A strong auto sector has important implications for national defense. Technologies developed by the automotive industry such as batteries, sensors and motors are often later adapted for use in military equipment.

而且这不仅关乎电动车。强大的汽车行业对国防具有重要意义。汽车行业开发的种种技术，如电池、传感器和电机等，后来常常会被应用于军事装备。

China’s control of supply chains for batteries and rare earth minerals used in electric vehicles is also a potential national security threat, one that we glimpsed recently when Beijing retaliated against U.S. trade tariffs by halting exports of rare earths and the magnets made from them.

中国对电动汽车所需电池和稀土矿产供应链的控制也是一个潜在的国家安全威胁，北京通过停止稀土和稀土磁铁的出口来报复美国贸易关税，让我们已经瞥见了这一点。

Led by its national champion BYD, China has overtaken Detroit as the center of the global auto industry. America can embark on an all-out push to rebuild world-class manufacturing and supply chains, or our carmakers can hide behind tariffs, continue making gas-powered trucks and S.U.V.s and fade into irrelevance.

在比亚迪这样的民族企业带领下，中国已经取代了底特律，成为全球汽车工业的中心。美国可以发起一场全面攻势，重建世界级的制造业和供应链，也可以让我们的车企躲在关税背后，继续生产燃油卡车和SUV，并最终变得无足轻重。