The United States and China are locked in an economic war. They have raised Tit tariffs for other, and there are few detention signs.
President Donald Trump said in a statement on Tuesday that “The ball is on China’s court. China needs to make a deal with us. We don’t have to deal with them. “
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce of China said at the beginning of the week that the United States needs to “take a big step to correct their mistakes, completely Cancel the incorrect practice of ‘reciprocal rates’ and return to the right route of mutual respect. “
My colleague Miles Bryan recently produced an episode of Today, explained That is about China’s response to Trump’s rates, so I asked about the dead point we are seeing and what all this means for China. Our conversation, edited by length and clarity, is below.
So, thousands, we are in a commercial war with China at this time, right? What is happening?
Well, he is changing his leg almost every day. Therefore, it could change for when this is published, but things really touch a turn 2, when President Trump announced his initial tariffs of 10 percent of the “day of release” in all countries, with Henh countries in Manythrocal.
That led to chaos days, changes in the stock market, bond market problems and President Trump deciding to stop those reciprocal rates.
However, he left great tariffs about China. When talking on Tuesday, they are in 145 percent for most articles, which is just a massive and massive blow to trade between the United States and China.
In recent days, the administration has traveled a little the scope of its tariffs on China, pausing in many consumer electronic products, things like the iPhone, thought Trump says that tariffs on those goods are returning to the line.
China tasks some counterattacks. Tuesday, he announced that he was halfway Delivery of some orders that I had with BoeingThe Jet Company. He has stopped a little Rare Earth Mineral Exports To the United States. And it has a fairly wide rate of 125 percent for most American products.
So, what we have left is a commercial war in the world that is a child or in suspended animation, but a commercial war against China that is very real.
I understand. Now, many countries are, at least agree with Trump, trying Negotiate tariffsBut China, in any case, seems to be taking an aggressive posture, even antagonist. Why is that?
China is not going back.
And they are children of the puncture of the administration. The state media, the users of Chinese social networks and the Chinese embassy in the United States have been drawing all these funny cultural reports and memes, things like Videos or Mao ZedongYou know, playing beligentant in the early 50s, when the Chinese fought against the United States in the Korean war; Pieces about how Trump dependent is in China for its merchandise; And equally strange Videos generated by AI showing the fatan AmericanSewing Nikes together in an American factory that looks sad.
It is things designed to hit us where it hurts in terms of stereotypes, but also to point out the inanity of our apparent attempt to rebuild things like shoe and t -shirt factories.
And that is only in the front of culture.
Correct, China is really digging their heels in general, and I think that’s for some reasons.
The first is the preparation of China’s leg for years.
Trump put tariffs on China during his first administration, and the experts and journalists I spoke said that China was not particularly prepared for that. But Chinese leaders learned from that, and since then, they have leg preparation, hardening their markets and building relations with other countries.
Two, feel that this is an existential question for China and for the legitimacy of the Communist Party of China, which is an authoritarian country. Both want to show China’s strength and believe there are no advantages to try to work with Trump.
Come how Trump treats the countries they accept. They look how Trump treats the allies of the United States. They look how he tried Zenskyy in the Oval Office. And they say that That son of contempt is unacceptableSo they do not see any other course but to stand firm.
Three, the experts with whom I talked told me that Chinese leaders only think they can tolerate pain in a much higher degree than the United States. During the last decade, China has really made a concerted effort to develop its economy and its industrial base around the technologies of the future. We all know that China does many things for the world, but now it also manufactures some of the best electric cars in the world, some of the most advanced robotics, some of the best EV battery technologies: these are things if the will or other places.
There are the elections in China in the way we think of the elections. The means and voices of disgust are suppressed very effective. They simply have the ability to get this in a way that they think that the United States does not, and there are evidence that supports that belief: Trump receded the reciprocal tariff Tarike tarike. Xi Jinping to call it. They have many reasons, good reasons, to think that they will be the one that can smile and endure it for a longer time.
Can China win something in this way that the United States does not?
China’s leadership says, and the experts I talked to agree with, that no one wins a commercial war. This will damage Chinese exhibitors. He will damage the Chinese economy, which he has been suffering in recent years due to a real estate crisis, and because Chinese consumers host the leg and money spending.
The Chinese economy is an anemic son, and this will probably worsen it.
That said, a commercial war will also cost US consumers a lot of money, and it will harm US manufacturers who end up obtaining pieces from China, even if they join them here.
Ironically, the USA. Uu. Putting large tariffs on low -value items such as shoes and t -shirts, but stopping tariffs, at least for now on things like electronics, only encourages China to focus more on the advanced manufacture of the future, what a future technological ahead.
The people with whom I talked to this episode suggested that in the medium and long term, China could get out of this as the most stable couple. The Chinese president, Xi Jinping, has been in Vietnam and has made proposals to the European Union recently, saying, as, Hey, we are the standard carriers for normality and stability, they work with us. That scope could really increase their position and boost their commercial relations outside the United States.
When I went on informing this story, I thought that the commercial war would put China in a position to dominate the world, and the war was going to be good for China. But I heard again and again that this will make everyone not just because, but more dangerous.
I learned that trade between the United States and China is a stabilizing force in our relationship. And the experts with whom I spoke mentioned themes mentioned as Taiwan’s sovereignty as things that could become much more uncertain if there is no trade that ties the United States and continental China. Without trade, China has less reasons not to act unilaterally and invade or block, or do other things that we do not want to happen.
So we are not necessarily looking at a future in which China is in charge?
My reports suggested that the commercial war could have accelerated the movement towards a more multipolar world, one in which China does not replace the United States as the global cultural and economic hegemon, but perhaps the United States loses that position. China and the United States can both spheres of influence and spheres of trade, coexisting, but in a tense, potentially explosive way.
This piece was originally executed in The Today, explained the bulletin. For more stories like this Register here.
