Trump’s acknowledgment that Beijing is not helping the US with North Korea is just the beginning of the diplomatic fallout we may see from his trade war, writes YJ Fischer.
On Thursday, as trade talks between American and Chinese officials failed to make any progress, the Trump administration’s tariffs on $16 billion worth of Chinese goods went into effect. China retaliated in kind with its own tariffs on a similar amount of US goods. Trump has threatened to impose another round of tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports and Beijing is ready to keep the cycle going.
Trump still seems to think that this trade war is going to lead to an easy win. Earlier this week, Trump boasted at a rally: „When I came we were heading in a certain direction that was going to allow China to be bigger than us in a very short period of time. That’s not going to happen anymore.“ Trump’s attitude is being interpreted in Beijing as a sign that Trump doesn’t just want to equalize a trade imbalance, but instead wants to stop China’s growth altogether. That has rankled Beijing, with some likening it to the start of a new Cold War.
So it’s no surprise that we’re seeing the diplomatic consequences of our deteriorating relationship with China. The cancellation of Pompeo’s visit to North Korea shows that Trump may be beginning to grasp just how significant a problem this could be for US national security.
Pyongyang has a long history of promising to denuclearize and subsequently failing to follow through.
