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The U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, chaired by Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), has confirmed that four major chip manufacturing companies — AMD, Analog Devices, Intel, and Texas Instruments — have deliberately ignored U.S. legal requirements aimed at preventing the use of their technologies by Russia in its war against Ukraine, as The Insider has frequently reported.
A Sept. 10 report released by the subcommittee, titled “The U.S. Technology Fueling Russia’s War in Ukraine,” identified several issues within the American semiconductor industry:
- The semiconductor manufacturing industry has not increased its compliance efforts effectively or fast enough to combat Russian diversion efforts.
- Exports from AMD, Analog Devices, Intel, and Texas Instruments to multiple countries with entities identified as assisting in Russian diversion efforts were significantly elevated in 2023 when compared to exports prior to Russia’s full-scale war in Ukraine.
- Since the start of 2024, these companies have each identified and blocked sales to entities potentially involved in Russian diversion. However, these sales could have been identified and blocked earlier and faster with a more proactive compliance regime.
- Export controls compliance policies at these companies fail to meet best practices and recommendations from the Department of Commerce and non-governmental organizations. All (except for AMD) have failed to respond in a timely manner to external tracing efforts, and each presently lacks sufficient internal auditing and distributor auditing related to export controls compliance.
- The report singled out Texas Instruments as an example, noting that in some cases, their compliance “procedure” was limited to buyers simply checking a box on an online form, asking an individual to confirm that they are not a military end user, or that the product is not for military end use.
The report also notes that Texas Instruments and Intel, despite warnings of potential illegal activity, did not block deals with suspicious companies involved in circumventing sanctions.
The Senate pointed out that “evidence of the conscious disregard of facts” or the “wilful avoidance of facts” — such as ignoring the potential re-export of chips and semiconductors to Russia — could itself constitute a violation of U.S. law. The report also urged AMD, Analog Devices, Intel, and Texas Instruments to “enhance their compliance” with U.S. export controls and prevent semiconductor supplies from being used for Russian military purposes.
Despite sanctions, semiconductors from the U.S. have continued to reach Russia through indirect channels even after Moscow unleashed its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022. Third-party countries such as Turkey, Kazakhstan, Armenia, and China have become key transit points for re-exporting chips, while shell companies and fronts are regularly used to conceal the shipments’ true destination. Russia also utilizes “parallel import” schemes, acquiring goods through gray market channels without the original manufacturers' approval.
U.S. semiconductors remain a critical component for Russia’s military-industrial complex, which uses them to manufacture missiles such as the Kh-101, which Russia used to strike Kyiv’s largest children’s hospital on July 8, 2024.