This is precisely what makes Firefox so important. It's basically the only other open and independent implementation of the web stack. If Firefox goes away then the web becomes whatever Chrome is doing just how it was in the days when IE was the only game in town.

This will also make Google the gatekeeper for the Internet, and there's a pretty big conflict with an ads company controlling how people consume content online. We've already seen how Google keeps trying to make API changes in the engine that kneecap adblockers.

Of course, people could fork Chrome into a separate project, but maintaining a fork is a herculean effort, and it would basically need the funding and infrastructure that Mozilla already has.