I am not sure why everyone is taking this as something Apple “wanted” or “chose” to do.
There can’t be any real justification for this decision at this time other than arm-twisting by stinking China. China has Apple by the short-hairs with the production they already control.
This is how China operates. They have to have it all. It seems to escape everyone that China is not correcting its transgressions, but is, instead, becoming increasingly belligerent.
Well, poor little Apple.
There is one person trying to correct those transgressions. I don’t know how he keeps it up.