IAN BREMMER
US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, managed to keep US-China tensions contained in 2024. But when Donald Trump returns to the White House this month, he will end this fragile stability, drive an unmanaged decoupling of the world’s most important geopolitical relationship, and increase the risk of global economic disruption and crisis.
Trump will begin his second term by announcing fresh tariffs on Chinese goods, with the goal of forcing a new economic agreement on China. Though the new tariffs won’t reach the across-the-board 60% rate that he threatened during the campaign, the top rate on all Chinese imports is likely to double, to about 25% by the end of 2025. In the meantime, China’s leaders will respond more forcefully and offer fewer concessions than they did during Trump’s first term, despite the Chinese economy’s continuing weakness.
After all, Chinese leaders fear that a conciliatory approach will be perceived as accepting national humiliation, which would further stoke already-rising public anger within China. If a more constructive approach toward the United States in 2024 only brought the return of “Tariff Man,” why stick to that path? Trump’s threats are merely the latest aggressive gesture by the US, confirming Chinese suspicions that American policymakers are intent on containing China’s emergence as a great power.
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