President Donald Trump — take the win on tariffs.
Get a few big new trade deals under your belt while they’re still on the table to serve our economic goals while building new or renewing old US alliances.
The disruption of the last two weeks will have been well worth it, even as you restore other countries’ belief that the United States is a good trading partner. More accords will surely follow soon after.
That would be a much more powerful play than to simply have Uncle Sam collect the cash from the import tax, continue to roil the bond market and alienate our traditional trading friends.
One thing’s for sure: Beijing would love Trump to stick to the current chaotic course, as it’ll make Xi Jinping far more popular than he is now at home and abroad.
Xi is right now on a short tour of Southeast Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia), locking in both trade and security deals.
While that trip was planned before Trump’s “Liberation Day” surprise, Xi surely now has his staff setting up swings through Africa, Europe and South America.
Yes, many nations have learned from experience to be suspicious of China, especially since its “Belt and Road Initiative” has been revealed to be a Trojan Horse to extend Beijing’s influence at the price of leaving “beneficiary” countries hopelessly deep in debt.
Yet if Washington won’t strike deals now, many world leaders feeling the shock of Trump’s actions will feel they have no choice but to fall into Xi’s clutches: Tellingly, Xi’s pitch in Vietnam is that he runs the “responsible” superpower, sniffing, “There are no winners in a trade war, or a tariff war.”
As we’ve said before, we’re all-in on untangling the US economy from China’s — but Washington can’t do it all at once.
Which means Team Trump needs to cut some eye-catching deals fast — not just country by country, but sector by sector.
For example, make Japan take some of our farm products; the European Union and Britain, some of our beef or chicken.
The United States is and has been the leader of Western civilization; now it needs to choose the right path so it can continue leading in the future.