Loading
TO DONALD TRUMPUSNSANSAYour browser does not support the element., the current world order is a criminally bad deal for America. He is ready to play good cop and bad cop to fix this. Public enemy number one is China’s economic model, which he has called a conspiracy to steal wealth and manufacturing jobs from America. But allies are prime suspects, too, accused of cheating America in trade while doing too little for America’s national security. Allies from Europe to North America and Asia can expect to meet both the smiling and snarling versions of President Trump, all too soon.Your columnist is in Washington, where he attended a closed-door gathering of serving and former government officials from America and Europe, joined by business bosses and experts on trade and security, as well as scholars from China. This writer has attended these biannual gatherings—known as the Stockholm China Forum, and co-hosted by the Swedish foreign ministry and the German Marshall Fund, a think-tank—since 2008. The latest forum stood out for its hard-boiled, grimly serious mood.Mr Trump’s good cop, bad cop swagger is “how he thinks about diplomacy”, said a participant with first-hand knowledge of the next president’s negotiating style. Mr Trump, in his first administration, praised Xi Jinping as brilliant, and Vladimir Putin as smart, while slapping trade tariffs and export controls on China and harsh sanctions on Russia. That same disconcerting approach is about to return, as Mr Trump prepares to announce fresh tariffs and other arm-twisting moves on Day One in the Oval Office, targeting adversaries and allies alike. His aim is not to reform Mr Xi or other foreign leaders: Mr Trump has little interest in changing other men’s souls. In a wicked world, his interest is in cutting deals to secure America’s jobs, borders and security interests.The dealmaking starts with -China trade. Mr Trump is not by instinct scandalised by China’s use of subsidies or coercive transfers of technology. Indeed, early in his first presidency, aides often struggled to alert him to the security implications of this or that Chinese ploy to buy American technology, or geopolitical move on the far side of the world. Mr Trump was focused on the trade balance with China, believing “viscerally” that America is a loser when it buys more from than it sells to another country, in the words of a former official. His alarm about China as a security threat deepened, notably after he concluded that Mr Xi lied to him about the covid-19 pandemic, triggering a crisis that cost him the 2020 election. Chinese officials fret that Mr Trump bears a grudge and might “re-politicise” the pandemic. They are right.Even now, Mr Trump believes that the foreign-policy establishment has its priorities backwards. To him, foreign-policy grandees focus on shows of military might or diplomacy with allies rather than on the task that—in his view—underpins all other sources of strength, namely making America’s economy great again.Like a cop with a new Taser, Mr Trump seems to see tariffs as a way to inflict non-lethal but instructive pain. Early evidence came on November 25th, when he threatened 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, and an extra 10% on Chinese imports, as a prod to do more to stop flows of migrants and drugs.More shocks are inevitable. The forum debated the influence of “traders”, meaning tycoons and Wall Street financiers with Chinese business interests and whose counsel Mr Trump heeds. On past form, if tariffs were to spook markets, that would also weigh on Mr Trump’s thinking. Such voices of restraint will compete with “tariffers” working on trade policy for Mr Trump.There are big questions, too, about whether Mr Trump sees tariffs as a means or an end. His defenders insist that tariffs are a negotiating gambit. Yet in Washington, those same levies are starting to sound worryingly permanent. Republicans in Congress are enthusiastic about using revenues from tariffs to “pay for” cuts to taxes on income or corporate profits, the forum heard. Advocates argue that the first Trump administration carefully imposed preventive tariffs on industries in which American firms still have an edge, but which China has in its sights. The Biden administration’s industrial policies may live on, though Mr Trump is less keen on subsidies for green technologies, and more gung-ho about tasks like reviving American shipbuilding to counter China on the high seas. He is equally keen on supplying factories with cheap fossil fuels. Controls to stop Chinese components entering American markets via third countries will be tightened. If Chinese exporters respond by diverting trade flows to Europe or emerging markets, wreaking havoc outside America, Mr Trump will not greatly care.Differences over policy extend to the security realm, too. Mr Trump’s choice for national security adviser (), Mike Waltz, is a fierce China hawk. So are his picks for deputy , Alex Wong, and for secretary of state, Marco Rubio. For all that, nobody can exclude that Mr Trump sees national security as a realm for unsentimental dealmaking with China. His first weeks in office may prove revealing, given his pledges to end the war in Ukraine quickly. The forum heard about Chinese offers to play peacemaker in Ukraine and to rebuild its shattered cities. That was too much for some Europeans. Ukraine’s cities need repair because Chinese firms are helping Russia build the drones and missiles now destroying them, they growled. There were accounts of European governments telling Chinese leaders that China’s enabling of Russia’s war machine is gravely damaging their country’s image in Europe. But indignant Europeans also know that Mr Trump is an unsqueamish man, who might just welcome Chinese help as he imposes a messy peace on Ukraine. Like the star of a gritty crime drama, Mr Trump is not one for niceties.
