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The Trump China Policy Thread
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The Trump China Policy Thread
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(01-30-2018 08:47 PM)GlobalMan Wrote: ...
The mere fact that 900+ U.S. military bases exist overseas exclusively by mutual consent with the host country should tell you that the majority of the world does not fear the USA the most- in fact they obviously view us as their defense against your 24%.
![[Image: McCain-ISIS.jpg]](http://45eq7vmb9bj1ratu11zv1p19.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/McCain-ISIS.jpg)
(01-30-2018 10:28 PM)Fortis Wrote: People point to 900+ American military bases and say we're trying to rule the world, but give China 900 Military bases and we'd have a massive world war within weeks.You guys should be thanking your lucky stars that it was USA who created the first nuclear bomb and not China.
(01-31-2018 02:33 AM)911 Wrote:(01-30-2018 08:47 PM)GlobalMan Wrote: ...
The mere fact that 900+ U.S. military bases exist overseas exclusively by mutual consent with the host country should tell you that the majority of the world does not fear the USA the most- in fact they obviously view us as their defense against your 24%.
That's a pretty naive take there GMan. The great majority of people from the 130 countries with US military bases view that military presence negatively, more often than not this presence has been imposed by their government.
(01-31-2018 07:17 AM)GlobalMan Wrote:(01-31-2018 02:33 AM)911 Wrote:(01-30-2018 08:47 PM)GlobalMan Wrote: ...
The mere fact that 900+ U.S. military bases exist overseas exclusively by mutual consent with the host country should tell you that the majority of the world does not fear the USA the most- in fact they obviously view us as their defense against your 24%.
That's a pretty naive take there GMan. The great majority of people from the 130 countries with US military bases view that military presence negatively, more often than not this presence has been imposed by their government.
So in other words- the bases exist by mutual consent with the host country, as I said. Clearly those 130 countries (their governments) do not view the U.S. as "the greatest threat to world peace" or anything close to that as was claimed, or else we wouldn't be in them. I did not claim that all the citizens of such countries agree with their governments determination, maybe they don't, wouldn't surprise me- though that is far from a certainty which you just fabricated.
I think calling everyone who you don't agree with "naive" is getting old- even more so given that you are in fact confirming what I stated, not refuting it. You are pulling a TigerMandingo here man.
(01-30-2018 10:43 AM)TigerMandingo Wrote:(01-30-2018 10:39 AM)Suits Wrote: That's actually close to being true. The US has consistently demonstrated an interest in the balance of power, ever since WWII, not pure power and hegemony.
The people over at the State Department disagree with you. The US govt. has and continues to operate under the context of "Full Spectrum Dominance".
Why do you think the US has being lashing out over the last decade or so? It's power is waning, although it is still top dog by far.
(02-02-2018 12:51 PM)The Beast1 Wrote: No, if the US disappeared overnight there would be a huge power void that will be filled with either regional entities or worse, a large one like China.
(02-01-2018 09:10 PM)Suits Wrote:(01-30-2018 10:43 AM)TigerMandingo Wrote:(01-30-2018 10:39 AM)Suits Wrote: That's actually close to being true. The US has consistently demonstrated an interest in the balance of power, ever since WWII, not pure power and hegemony.
The people over at the State Department disagree with you. The US govt. has and continues to operate under the context of "Full Spectrum Dominance".
Why do you think the US has being lashing out over the last decade or so? It's power is waning, although it is still top dog by far.
The US (like all super-powers) has done some fucked up things. The CIA's undermining of democratically elected governments to attempt the installation of puppet states is indefensible and the part that US-based actors have played in instability in resource rich regions of Africa should lead to people being investigated and placed in jail.
Many of the corrupt political types in the US system are no better than their Chinese counterparts.
But what analysis of the worst of US behavior as a hegemonic state fails to take into account is how beneficial the US' role is for a great deal of the world.
The US' many military bases abroad has been mentioned here, but what I didn't see discussed is the reason for these bases. Piracy has been a problem as long as seagoing trade has occurred. The US does the world a major service by patrolling its oceans.
If one country (and the one that arguably has the most to gain or at least has had the most to gain in the past from safe sailing seas) doesn't step, what you end up with is a crisis where no country wants to bite the bullet and spend their tax dollars on big enough navies to protect their area of the world. This can be mitigated somewhat by treaties, but that still leaves the possibility of countries not fulfilling their obligations, resulting in a situation where the other countries spend their share on protecting trade routes, without getting the full coverage needed due to another nation fucking them over by refusing to honour their own treaty obligations.
Thus, it's a very reasonable trade off for most countries to simply let the US have a base in their country to reduce their logistical challenges as they patrol the global ocean trade routes for everyone's benefit. No one is being bullied here.
And do you think that the money the US gives other countries in foreign aid is out of the goodness of their hearts? They know the money will be stolen by corrupt officials. That's the whole point. These are essentially payments to buy allies.
Now, back to China. The US might pull some asshole moves when it comes to countries that are attempting to upset the balance of power as it is, but countries that are on board with global trade and choose to ally with the US, rather than oppose it don't have a history of being fucked with by the US. Sure, it's not a completely just system, but it's not like Canada has to worry about the US invading.
The over-riding philosophy behind many US actions is that trade and peace are good. The US is more than happy to have other countries sell their products in their country and to have people who start companies in the US if they invest a sizeable amount of money in the process and can become residents and citizens by doing so. The US doesn't stop legally earned money from leaving its borders and has no problem with its allies becoming wealthy and even offering a better standard of living than it can within its own country.
China, on the other hand, doesn't have the same over-riding philosophy. The Chinese philosophy is that the only thing that matters in life is winning and that there can only be one winner. This occurs within their own country, with the powerful essentially doing their best to prevent the less powerful from achieving more power than they are born with, but when it comes to China vs other countries, everyone in China is very nationalistic to an extreme.
The Chinese game plan is simply. To systematically and strategically extract all the value in the world and bring it to China and then keep it there.
This has been the game plan for hundreds of years if not thousands. The UK's solution of forcibly importing opium in China prior to the First Opium War and after is regrettable and indefensible, but it was a response to a trade situation not that different from the one occurring today.
The Chinese had a very simply trade policy at the time. It worked like this. Bring us gold and we will allow you to buy silk and porcelain, but you can't sell anything in China. Prior to the decision to resolve the trade in-balance, China had been sucking Europe dry of gold for many years.
China's back at it again today. With increasingly strict currency controls in place that leave most Chinese millionaires spending the majority of their time trying to get their money out of the country and someplace where the Rule of Law applies.
Every year they introduce new laws making it harder for non-Chinese entities to sell products in China and do trade in China. They allow a certain amount of token trade to occur when it is to their long term benefit, but as more intellectual property is absorbed by the Chinese machine, their desire to do so diminishes.
As China gains global power, they won't encourage trade -- their motto will be to squash all trade not controlled directly by The Party. They are already doing this within their borders obviously, but keep in mind that when the Chinese do an infrastructure development deal in Africa, they stipulate that they will own the completed project, they will build the completed project with their own workers (who will take the wages they earn back to China when they are finished to ensure that no money actually leaves China, other than what is spent on construction materials and operations), they will operate the finished project for their own profit and it's probably only a matter of time before they start using these projects as a justification to place their troops in dozens on economically weak nations.
If you don't believe me about the way they think, just come to China and try to cross the street on a green walk signal. These folks are such strong believers in zero-sum games that they'll do everything in their power to prevent pedestrians from going first and if you do manage to cross in front of them as they make a right or left turn, they'll literally stop within their bumper inches from your knees.
The only thing that is understood in China is power, winning and losing. Given the choice between a hegemonic China and a hegemonic USA, it's an easy call in my books.
Quote:Trump Readies Sweeping Tariffs and Investment Restrictions on China
WASHINGTON — The dust has yet to settle on President Trump’s decision to impose sweeping tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, but the White House is preparing another major trade measure, this time aimed squarely at China.
Mr. Trump and his top trade advisers are readying a raft of actions to penalize China’s theft of American intellectual property, including tariffs on at least $30 billion of annual Chinese imports, people familiar with the discussions said.
The measures, which could be announced as early as next week, may also include investment restrictions, caps on visas for Chinese researchers and challenges to China’s trade practices at the World Trade Organization. Those familiar with the planning cautioned that the timing could be delayed, and that such measures are likely to be introduced in stages.
The rapid pace of White House trade measures is no accident and comes at the president’s request. At a White House meeting last week, Robert Lighthizer, the United States trade representative, presented Mr. Trump with a plan to target $30 billion a year in Chinese imports.
That amount is equal to the cost that Mr. Lighthizer’s office estimates Chinese policies aimed at acquiring American technology impose on American companies annually. In August, Mr. Lighthizer officially began an investigation into those practices, which include digital warfare as well as requiring companies to hand over trade secrets and form joint ventures with Chinese partners to gain access to certain markets.
Mr. Trump — surrounded by his commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, his trade adviser Peter Navarro and others — asked for a figure beyond $30 billion and for the plan to be officially announced in the coming weeks, according to two people familiar with the exchange.
The administration is devising the measure to broadly counter a Chinese strategy known as the Made in China 2025 plan. China introduced a comprehensive initiative in 2015 to upgrade Chinese industry over the next decade and dominate sectors of the future, including advanced information technology, new energy vehicles and aerospace equipment.
Unlike the steel and aluminum measure, which divided the president’s advisers and his own party, the idea of targeting China has broad support among a number of officials who believe China is cheating in global trade.
Gary D. Cohn, a top economic adviser who resigned over the steel and aluminum tariffs, had approved of action against China, the people familiar with the discussions said. Orrin G. Hatch, the chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, and Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, Republicans who criticized those tariffs, have also endorsed a tough approach toward China.
Congress is also weighing legislation that would strengthen national security checks on Chinese investment. In a House hearing on Thursday, Heath P. Tarbert, an assistant secretary of the Treasury Department, said the current system for assessing investment is riddled with loopholes that allowed Chinese companies to evade such checks.
Concern over China’s practices picked up speed at the end of the Obama administration and has only increased since. Last year, a technology-focused unit in the Defense Department issued a report arguing that rising Chinese investment in Silicon Valley was giving China unprecedented access to the military technologies of the future, and increasing Chinese ownership of supply chains that service the United States military.
In recent months, China’s political apparatus has exerted even greater control over the nation’s economy. Business leaders and politicians of both parties now widely say that Washington’s past strategy of offering Beijing economic incentives to liberalize its market has failed. On Sunday, China officially ended term limits on the presidency, clearing the way for President Xi Jinping to stay in power indefinitely.
Administration officials say that past failure to rein in China warrants a much tougher approach. Mr. Trump took one step toward this in his national security strategy, which identified China as an economic aggressor. When a top Chinese economic envoy visited in late February, the administration asked China to shave $100 billion off its $375.2 billion trade surplus with the United States, two people close to the talks said. And while the steel and aluminum tariffs will hit many countries, they are primarily aimed at combating overcapacity in Chinese metals, including those that are routed through other nations.
The next step, advisers say, is to more aggressively focus on trade with China.
The United States is expected to impose tariffs on Chinese imports of high-technology goods specified in the Made in China 2025 plan, including semiconductors and new energy vehicles. But they could go beyond that to target more mundane products, including consumer electronics, apparel and even shoes. The breadth of the tariffs remains a contentious topic in the business sector and the White House, with some industries fretting about retaliation and increased costs to American companies and consumers.
Thomas J. Donohue, the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said on Wednesday that while the administration was right to focus on China’s unfair trade practices, his group strongly disagreed with sweeping tariffs.
“Simply put, tariffs are damaging taxes on American consumers,” he said. “Tariffs of $30 billion a year would wipe out over a third of the savings American families received from the doubling of the standard deduction in tax reform.”
Hun Quach, the vice president for international trade at the Retail Industry Leaders Association, said that tariffs on apparel, shoes and electronics would hit American families most. “Is the best response to make American consumers pay for China’s violations? We don’t think so,” she said.
Although there is wide support for taking action against unfair trade practices by China, business groups and economists still say the measure could be risky. The United States and China maintain the world’s largest trading relationship, and the tariffs could easily provoke a backlash.
“They know our system inside out,” said Jim McGregor, the chairman of the greater China region for APCO Worldwide. He added, referring to the House speaker and the Senate majority leader: “They know what companies are important to Paul Ryan. They know what companies are important to Mitch McConnell. They know which trade associations and political groups have a big voice in Washington.”
Scott Kennedy, a China expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that while China deserved a tough response, he feared the consequences of the administration’s actions had not been well considered. “You really have to be smart,” he said. “The Chinese aren’t just going to fold over on this.”
Mr. Kennedy compared China to a bully that had stolen America’s lunch money. "You want to teach them a lesson,” he said. “But it’s not as simple as going up in the playground and punching them on the nose.”
Quote:Beijing ‘strongly dissatisfied’ as Trump signs Taiwan Travel Act
Mainland says move, which allows US representatives to meet officials from self-ruled island, will hurt bilateral relations
PUBLISHED : Saturday, 17 March, 2018, 8:59am
Laura Zhou
Trump’s endorsement of the Taiwan Travel Act comes as Beijing and Washington are in a stand-off over trade and Beijing’s attempts to boost its influence worldwide, with the US House of Representatives proposing that China’s cultural outposts in the US be registered as foreign agents.
The Chinese embassy in Washington said in a statement on Saturday that China was “strongly dissatisfied with” the travel act and firmly opposed it.
“The relevant clauses of the Taiwan Travel Act severely violate the one-China principle,” a statement from the Chinese embassy in Washington said.
The statement said the US should stop pursuing any official ties with Taiwan or improving its current relations with Taiwan in any substantive way.
The White House said the bill would pave the way for more official exchanges with Taipei.
The bill said it should be the policy of the United States to allow officials at all levels of the government to travel to Taiwan to meet their counterparts.
It also said the government should allow high-level Taiwanese officials to enter the United States under conditions of appropriate respect, and to meet their US counterparts.
Taiwan cheered the signing of the act, expressing gratitude for US support for the island.
A statement released by its Foreign Affairs Ministry said it would continue to maintain close contacts with the US and deepen bilateral partnerships at all levels.
“The relationship between Taiwan and the US is close, and has been consolidated after efforts by both sides in recent years,” it said. “The US executive branch has sent more senior officials to Taiwan since Trump has come to office.”
The US travel bill, introduced by Steve Chabot, a Republican congressman from Ohio, had earlier won approval from the House and Senate.
Taiwan has been self-governed since the end of China’s civil war in 1949, but Beijing has always considered it a renegade province awaiting reunification, by force if necessary.
Before his inauguration, Trump angered Beijing by speaking over the phone to Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen and suggesting he might use the so-called one-China policy as a bargaining chip to advance US interests in trade, currency and strategic issues, such as the disputed South China Sea.
In December, diplomat Li Kexin warned that Beijing would seize Taiwan by force if US warships visited Taiwan.
But contacts between Taiwan and the US are ongoing despite Beijing’s opposition. A US-Taiwan defence industry conference will be held in Taiwan in May to discuss arms sales.
Shi Yinghong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing, said Trump’s signing of the act was a “serious setback” in Sino-US relations.
“The Taiwan Travel Act has offered the possibility that officials, even high-level officials, from the US and Taiwan could conduct consultations on any issues. This is a setback in the one-China policy with a severe negative impact on bilateral relations, and could send a misleading signal to the pro-independence force in Taiwan.
“China’s basic strategy with the Trump administration is to be patient, trying not to make major counter-US moves ... Trump’s signing of [this act] could mean that China’s strategy in the past year has failed to meet its goal.”
Lu Xiang, a US specialist with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Beijing still needed to be cautious.
“But I think [the signing of the act] is not a total surprise to Beijing, given its high level of support in the US Congress. However, even though Beijing can do little about the signing of the act now, it is ready for measures to respond [to any tangible moves from the US] if necessary.”
China and the United States are already locking horns over other issues. US congressman for South Carolina Joe Wilson said he was drafting a bill that would put foreign funding at US universities, including programs organized by the Confucius Institute, under closer scrutiny.
Wilson said the move would let the American people know that the Chinese programs were disseminating propaganda.
Beijing has rejected suggestions that it runs a political infiltration campaign overseas, saying it has never used the Chinese diaspora to interfere in another nation’s affairs.
Quote:China and the United States are already locking horns over other issues. US congressman for South Carolina Joe Wilson said he was drafting a bill that would put foreign funding at US universities, including programs organized by the Confucius Institute, under closer scrutiny.
Wilson said the move would let the American people know that the Chinese programs were disseminating propaganda.
Beijing has rejected suggestions that it runs a political infiltration campaign overseas, saying it has never used the Chinese diaspora to interfere in another nation’s affairs.
(03-18-2018 01:37 PM)Enigma Wrote: ^ What concessions has China made to the US since Trump has been president?
You say they know they're screwing countries on trade; then why did Trump have to pass tariffs after a year of negotiation?
Has China made any concessions in the South China Sea since Trump has been president?
My perspective is that Trump put tariffs and Taiwan, among other things, on the table immediately after getting elected, and then backed off in the hopes of negotiating with China. As China fails to make concessions regarding the economy and South China Sea, tariffs and Taiwan have been put back on the table.
We both agree that China is a major threat. Would you not agree that one of the biggest reasons for that is that they do NOT appear to be a good faith actor? Or, as others have put it, that they are a "gamma" nation?
How long do you feel the US and China's neighbors should attempt to negotiate in good faith with a country that does not seem capable of good faith negotiations?
As you've said, a push back against China is long overdue; it's only logical that they'd try to stall, whether that's through failed negotiations or temper tantrums. Because stalling benefits them, not the US or China's neighbors.
By the way, I want to bring attention to this gem buried at the bottom of that article:
Quote:China and the United States are already locking horns over other issues. US congressman for South Carolina Joe Wilson said he was drafting a bill that would put foreign funding at US universities, including programs organized by the Confucius Institute, under closer scrutiny.
Wilson said the move would let the American people know that the Chinese programs were disseminating propaganda.
Beijing has rejected suggestions that it runs a political infiltration campaign overseas, saying it has never used the Chinese diaspora to interfere in another nation’s affairs.
Amazing move. Now if we can just get other (((foreign))), anti-West propaganda out of American universities.
(03-17-2018 12:00 AM)Fortis Wrote: Agreed with Arado that it should have happened decades ago, but i'm glad it's happening now and not never.Xi Jinping has crushed a lot of the existing and potential opposition to his power (mostly by diminishing the concept of "collective rule" that western observers love so much because to them things like that and "term limits" sound like reform), but he's indeed got enemies with influence. If the economy tanks, or if his infrastructure project backfires too much, Xi could be in physical trouble. He could get sent on vacation or have an accident. At the same time, he has vested a lot of power in his own person. Removing Xi suddenly would leave a power vacuum and who knows what would happen then.
Lunostrelki, actually funny that you should mention the CCP imploding. According to a few chinese friends, XJP's bigger fear now is a military coup. He's been promising more and more benefits to the military to try and keep things clean, though. I hope we don't get a coup down here.
(03-19-2018 01:20 PM)Lunostrelki Wrote:(03-17-2018 12:00 AM)Fortis Wrote: Agreed with Arado that it should have happened decades ago, but i'm glad it's happening now and not never.Xi Jinping has crushed a lot of the existing and potential opposition to his power (mostly by diminishing the concept of "collective rule" that western observers love so much because to them things like that and "term limits" sound like reform), but he's indeed got enemies with influence. If the economy tanks, or if his infrastructure project backfires too much, Xi could be in physical trouble. He could get sent on vacation or have an accident. At the same time, he has vested a lot of power in his own person. Removing Xi suddenly would leave a power vacuum and who knows what would happen then.
Lunostrelki, actually funny that you should mention the CCP imploding. According to a few chinese friends, XJP's bigger fear now is a military coup. He's been promising more and more benefits to the military to try and keep things clean, though. I hope we don't get a coup down here.
I think if worse comes to worse, Xi will simply suspend the authority of the Party organization and set up a parallel command structure that answers to him only, similar to how Mao "bombarded the headquarters" in the Cultural Revolution. The Chinese are no strangers to totalitarianism, and the government would rather give up its recent prosperity than lose power. There's a book about this, "China Alone," which posits that China is ending a 30-year period of relative economic and social freedom and returning to a period of isolation and totalitarianism as a stability mechanism. I should have another look at it.
Quote:Just days after Beijing officially launched Yuan-denominated crude oil futures (with a bang, as shown in the chart below, surpassing Brent trading volume) which are expected to quickly become the third global price benchmark along Brent and WTI, China took the next major step in the challenging the Dollar's supremacy as global reserve currency (and internationalizing the Yuan) when on Thursday Reuters reported that China took the first steps to paying for crude oil imports in its own currency instead of the US Dollars.
A pilot program for yuan payment could be launched as soon as the second half of the year and regulators have already asked some financial institutions to "prepare for pricing crude imports in the yuan", Reuters sourcesreveal.
According to the proposed plan, Beijing would start with purchases from Russia and Angola, two nations which, like China, are keen to break the dollar’s global dominance. They are also two of the top suppliers of crude oil to China, along with Saudi Arabia.
A change in the default crude oil transactional currency - which for decades has been the "Petrodollar", blessing the US with global reserve currency status - would have monumental consequences for capital allocations and trade flows, not to mention geopolitics: as Reuters notes, a shift in just a small part of global oil trade into the yuan is potentially huge. "Oil is the world’s most traded commodity, with an annual trade value of around $14 trillion, roughly equivalent to China’s gross domestic product last year." Currently, virtually all global crude oil trading is in dollars, barring an estimated 1 per cent in other currencies. This is the basis of US dominance in the world economy.
Quote:China on Monday imposed tariffs of up to 25 per cent on 128 US imports worth US$3 billion a year, including fruits and pork, in retaliation to US duties on steel and aluminium, fuelling fears of a trade war.
Beijing’s move, which the Xinhua news agency said was decided by the custom tariffs commission of the State Council, follows weeks of heated rhetoric and threats between the world’s two biggest economies.
US President Donald Trump has repeatedly railed against China’s massive trade surplus over the United States, promising during the US election campaign to slash the US deficit.
China’s Ministry of Commerce said it was suspending its obligations to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to reduce tariffs on 120 US goods, including fruit. The tariff on the products will be raised to 15 per cent.
Another eight products, including pork, will now be subject to tariffs of 25 per cent, it said, with the measures effective from April 2.
Beijing had warned last month that it was considering the tariffs of 15 per cent and 25 per cent on a range of products that also include wine, nuts and aluminium scrap. The tariffs came into force on Monday, Xinhua said, citing a finance ministry statement.
The levies are in response to tariffs of 10 per cent on aluminium and 25 per cent on steel that have also angered US allies.
Trump, however, has temporarily suspended the tariffs for the European Union as well as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico and South Korea.
The US leader has also unveiled plans to impose new tariffs on some US$60 billion of Chinese imports over the “theft” of intellectual property.
China has called on the United States to stop its “economic intimidation” and warned it was ready to hit back.
But Beijing has so far held fire against major agricultural products such as soybeans or major industries such as aerospace giant Boeing – items that state-run daily Global Times suggests should be targeted.
The nationalistic newspaper said in an editorial last week that China has “nearly completed its list of retaliatory tariffs on US products and will release it soon.”
“The list will involve major Chinese imports from the US,” the newspaper wrote, without saying which items were on the document.
“This will deal a heavy blow to Washington that aggressively wields the stick of trade war and will make the US pay a price for its radical trade policy toward China,” the Global Times wrote.
Despite the rhetoric, US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Thursday suggested the new measures on intellectual property were a “prelude to a set of negotiations”.
The United States ran a US$375.2 billion trading deficit with China last year.
But the Global Times, without revealing sources, said the United States had made “some unreasonable demands in an attempt to coerce China into a compromise.
“This was naive. With strong trading power, China held its ground.”
(04-02-2018 10:34 AM)Arado Wrote: China has decided to retaliate against U.S. tariffs.
Your move, Mr. President.
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