You are right that China is going on in on RISC-V in part because of Western sanctions. It is yet another reason why RISC-V has so much momentum. It is in China's interest to destroy Intel's and ARM's competitive advantages and it is pouring money and people into it.
An architecture that's developed in public that anyone can implement is a funny way to achieve that. Particularly given that western firms do largely follow the IP rules, if China wanted an ecosystem they controlled, surely they'd develop their own proprietary one (or worst case, buy out one of the western also-rans).
The point being that the west has already accepted it and is building tooling for it, yet it’s free. So they can’t be embargoed, but they can embrace, extend, and extinguish with massive subsidies and incentive.
