For some reason, I don't think it's coincidence that Guangzhou Supercomputer Center got put on the US Technology “Denial List” and Argonne awarded Cray a 180 Petaflop sale.
That said, I doubt it comes as a surprise to the Chinese government, but it's kind of an ironic stick in the eye given what the DOE's mission is (and what the supercomputer at LLNL is used for). I suppose I don't blame the US government as I'm guessing the law prevents US companies from exporting devices used for nuclear weapons, but it's definitely a dick move.
The single biggest consumer of Supercomputing cycles is the DOE for Fusion^H^H^H^H^HSuperNova simulations. They'll chew this up in no time. At least this is being located at the LCF, so it will be open to all sorts of academic usage, too.
[ added ] Teach me not to read the news earlier. Not a bright move, cutting off the Chinese from Xeons and the like will only drive them to develop all the tech themselves. While I do not believe we should be handing them tech on a silver platter, it is actually worse to cut them off.