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China’s New Strategy for Trump: Punch Hard, Concede Little- WSJwww.wsj.com/world/china/china-trump-strategy-06841606?
36 sats \ 3 comments \ @Solomonsatoshi 24 Oct Politics_And_Law
'During his first term, President Trump often frustrated Xi Jinping with his freewheeling mix of threats and bonhomie. This time, the Chinese leader believes he has cracked the code.
Xi has thrown out China’s traditional diplomatic playbook and tailored a new one specifically for Trump, said people close to Chinese policymakers, who describe Xi as appearing confident and emboldened. The new strategy, these people said, embraces Trump’s self-image as a master dealmaker, offering concessions on high-visibility issues he personally cares about, such as the fate of popular video-sharing app TikTok.
But when the Trump administration hits China, Xi has decided to hit back even harder, in a bid to gain leverage over Trump while projecting strength and unpredictability—qualities he believes the U.S. president admires, the people said. The two leaders are set to meet next Thursday in South Korea.
Xi’s strategic evolution takes a page from Trump’s own “maximum pressure” playbook of using the threat of overwhelming economic sanctions to get his way against adversaries and friends alike. According to those familiar with Beijing’s thinking, while China’s reactions to U.S. trade assaults were often proportional in the past, its countermeasures now are designed to be more severe.'
China has Trump over a barrel with the rare earths. Without rare earths the US military industrial combine is fucked.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Angie 24 Oct
China siempre fue un imperio que salió adelante, es difícil un mundo sin made in china, en serio la producción mundial proviene de china que aporte tiene Trump para creer que subiendo los aranceles gané más si por cada restricción china se fortalece
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi OP 24 Oct
Xi’s new doctrine is that the U.S. must adapt to a reality of Chinese power, these people said. In rare earths, they said, Xi is convinced that China holds an undisputed trump card that allows it to demand substantial U.S. concessions.
“Beijing believes it has maximum leverage and is not afraid of using it,” said Jimmy Goodrich, a China and technology expert at the University of California Institute of Global Conflict and Cooperation in San Diego.
Still, Xi risks a strategic backfire. His tactics provide ammunition to hawks in Washington pushing to break America’s economic dependency on China. U.S. allies in Europe and Asia, who rely on these minerals for their own industries, were also unsettled by Beijing’s heavy-handed display, reinforcing worries that China is becoming an increasingly unpredictable actor on the world stage. The U.S. and Australia this week announced plans to invest $3 billion in critical minerals aimed at eroding China’s hegemony.
A first sign of Xi’s playbook appeared in April, when Trump unleashed his global “Liberation Day” tariffs. China, already weathering Biden-era restrictions, was hit hard, with U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods eventually skyrocketing to 145%. And Beijing’s retaliation was swift: It cut off rare-earth magnets to American companies, temporarily forcing some U.S. automobile factories to shut down.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi OP 24 Oct
“During Trump’s first term, China was constantly put off balance by his pressure tactics,” said Kurt Campbell, former deputy secretary of state under President Joe Biden and now chairman of the Asia Group, an advisory firm in Washington. “This time, Xi wanted to be prepared. He knows Trump wants a good relationship with him and respects strength, not concessions.”
The most powerful example of the new strategy came early this month when Washington and Beijing were trying to finalize the South Korea summit. Just when relations seemed on the mend, Xi dropped a bombshell: He directed his government to hit back at a recent U.S. export-control action—and do so with unprecedented force, according to the people close to Beijing.
On Oct. 9, China’s Ministry of Commerce unveiled broad restrictions on exports of rare-earth materials that threaten to upend global production of everything from phones, laptops and cars to missiles. China produces around 90% of the world’s refined rare earths.
Publicly, Chinese officials said the move was simply a tit-for-tat response to a new U.S. rule extending restrictions on tech sales to any companies at least half-owned by an already blacklisted Chinese entity. In reality, the people close to Beijing said, it was also Xi’s attempt to gain leverage before meeting Trump, who has shown a desire to strike a broad economic deal with China.
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