From a historical perspective, the tariff war initiated by the administration of US President Donald Trump will prove to be a major strategic blunder, supplying a golden opportunity to accelerate China’s rise. Given that the United States launched this “showdown war” specifically to stall China’s rise, the result will be the complete opposite.
Indeed, China will inevitably suffer significant economic losses and pain due to the bullying and malice of the US. Still, because the White House made a serious strategic misjudgment of the balance of power between the two countries, China has gained the upper hand or at least remains impregnable in a war without gunpowder, and further strengthens itself and promotes its development.
After the US launched a trade war in the first Trump term, China has prepared various policies and measures to counter such a threat. When the US launched exorbitant tariffs again this year, China could quickly take countermeasures and punish the US. In the past, China formulated a series of laws and regulations to deal with economic containment and blackmail by the US and the West, strengthening the legal system’s combat readiness and effectiveness. These laws and regulations include the Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law, the Anti-Monopoly Law, and the unreliable-entity list. The shrewd practical application of these laws and regulations allows China to legally impose hefty tariffs on American goods, restrict the export of rare earths and other key minerals, punish American companies that misbehave, take various other countermeasures against American bullying, and make the US pay a heavy and increasingly unbearable price.
The tariff war launched by the US blatantly trampled on the so-called “liberal international order” and free trade rules it had built since World War II. The tariff war has seriously damaged other countries’ economic interests and caused the US’ reputation, credibility, reliability, and “soft power” to crumble. Because of limited national strength or high dependence on the US in trade and security, many countries, although furious in their hearts, must bear the humiliation and entreat the US to show mercy by trying to comply with its unreasonable and brutal demands. However, this kind of compromise will only encourage more arrogance, contempt, and extortion from the US. However China has taken quick, decisive, robust, and effective countermeasures and retaliatory actions against the US, demonstrating courage, determination, strength, and resilience. China has singlehandedly confronted the US, defended the multilateral free trade system, and upheld justice and righteousness.
One of the prime goals of the US-initiated tariff war is to coerce other countries to cut off their economic and trade ties with China or impose sanctions on it, thereby severely damaging its economy and hopefully triggering political turmoil. However, China is the world’s largest and fastest-growing trading nation; many more countries have China as their primary trading partner rather than the US, and many countries are also highly dependent on manufactured goods and raw materials from China. It is not wise for many countries to abandon China and go to the US, nor is it in their long-term interest. In recent months, more and more countries have promoted strengthening economic and trade cooperation and ties with China, including the US’ allies such as the European Union, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, and South Korea.
China will play a greater leading role in reshaping the international order, thus injecting more impetus to accelerate China’s rise. Today, the US has lost the ability, momentum, and credibility to lead the world. Countries worldwide hope to build a new international order that is fairer, more just, reasonable, and inclusive than the current order. It is meant to facilitate common development by reforming the existing international order and international organizations
More importantly, China’s leadership role in the international arena has grown. The Trump administration has destroyed the global political and economic order, plunging the world into a state of extreme disorder, chaos, and turmoil. Countries worldwide are worried and hope to rebuild a fairer and reasonable international order without the US.
Just like China’s entry into the World Trade Organization 24 years ago, the US-initiated “showdown war” spurred China to accelerate the pace of reform and opening-up. However, even without the US-initiated “showdown war” to transform its development model to cope with changes in the internal and external environment, China has long been determined to accelerate the pace of reform and opening-up, and these measures in turn have strengthened China’s ability to take on the US. In July last year, the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China had already decided to comprehensively deepen reform and promote Chinese-style modernization. Many of the decisions have strengthened China’s response to the challenges of the large-scale trade war launched by the US, especially in increasing domestic demand, raising residents’ income, boosting the development of new quality productive forces, supporting private enterprises, attracting foreign investments, accelerating the internationalization of the renminbi, and expanding China’s international economic space.
Before the White House launched the tariff war in early April, Premier Li Qiang’s Government Work Report issued in early March proposed a series of measures to deepen reform and opening-up to implement the decisions of the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the CPC. To a certain extent, these measures can cushion the effect of the US-initiated tariff war on China. After the tariff war broke out, to effectively respond, the central government further accelerated reform and opening-up. On April 25, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held a meeting to coordinate domestic economic work and international economic and trade struggles in response to complex and severe external challenges. The meeting first proposed the “four stabilities” policy (stabilizing employment, enterprises, markets, and expectations) as the focus of the next step of economic work. The “four stabilities” approach is closely linked to propelling overall economic development.
In the past few years, through continuous cultivation of “internal strength”, the resilience and vigor of China’s economy have magnified remarkably, especially in new productivity such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing, new energy vehicles, chip design and manufacturing, and innovative military technology, which has given China greater determination, strength and endurance to fight against the economic bullying of the US and remain invincible. After the outbreak of the US-initiated tariff war, more and more countries’ confidence in the US, the US dollar, and US dollar assets has declined significantly, leading to a decline in the prices of US bonds, and US stocks, thereby accelerating the pace of renminbi internationalization. The recent accelerated increase in the use of renminbi, especially the digital yuan, in international trade is proof of this.
Under the strong leadership of the central government, China has encouraged and united its people to effectively fight back against the US-initiated tariff war, which has greatly boosted confidence in the nation’s political system, its distinctive political theory to support the system, and the appreciation of Chinese culture. The Chinese people’s vision to the country’s future has been boosted and the cohesion of the Chinese nation enhanced. The trade war allows the Chinese people to understand, with objectiveness and accuracy, the deficiencies of the American political system and its value system. The Chinese have started to realize the hard facts of politics in the US and they appreciate their country more than ever. A vigilant, proud, and confident Chinese nation will be capable of promoting national development and rejuvenation with a fighting spirit.
To cope with the US-initiated tariff war, China will accelerate its opening-up process, with the influx of foreign investment for opportunities. China is improving its business environment to attract foreign investment. Indeed, Premier Li’s report encouraged foreign investors. The main measures include steadily promoting the opening-up of the service sector, effectively guaranteeing the national treatment of foreign enterprises, strengthening the service guarantee for foreign enterprises, and giving full play to the role of various open platforms (free trade pilot zones, national economic development zones, comprehensive bonded areas). China will promote the high-quality joint construction of the Belt and Road and deepen multilateral, bilateral, and regional economic cooperation.
Finally, China will play a greater leading role in reshaping the international order, thus injecting more impetus to accelerate China’s rise. Today, the US has lost the ability, momentum, and credibility to lead the world. Countries worldwide hope to build a new international order that is fairer, more just, reasonable, and inclusive than the current order. It is meant to facilitate common development by reforming the existing international order and international organizations.
Regarding the prototype of the new international order, President Xi Jinping has put forward many applicable concepts, especially the “community of shared future for mankind” and other global initiatives. In this process, China, as the second-largest economy in the world, will lead countries worldwide in exploring and designing a new international order, and many countries concur that only China can shoulder this responsibility. Compared with the US, China represents “certainty”, “reliability”, “predictability”, and “inclusiveness”, and the country is more willing to share the fruits of economic development with other countries. China is going to play an indispensable leadership role in global development — new, solid evidence of its inevitable rise.
The author is a professor emeritus of sociology, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and a consultant for the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macao Studies.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
