US President Donald Trump created some consternation in Taiwan last week when he told a news conference that a successful trade deal with China would help with “unification.”
Although the People’s Republic of China has never ruled Taiwan, Trump’s language struck a raw nerve in Taiwan given his open siding with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression seeking to “reunify” Ukraine and Russia. On earlier occasions, Trump has criticized Taiwan for “stealing” the US’ chip industry and for relying too much on the US for defense, ominously presaging a weakening of US support for Taiwan. However, further examination of Trump’s remarks in their full context indicates that he was actually referring not to China and Taiwan, but to China-US cooperation and “unity” that he had discussed at length in a prior interview.
Yet, Trump said something else in last week’s news conference that was potentially far more momentous, but whose significance has gone entirely unnoticed, although almost certainly not in Beijing.
“Look, China — and I don’t like this. I’m not happy about this. China’s getting killed right now. They’re getting absolutely destroyed. Their factories are closing. Their unemployment is going through the roof. I’m not looking to do that to China. Now, at the same time, I’m not looking to have China make hundreds of billions of dollars, and build more ships and more army tanks and more airplanes,” he said.
The comment was apparently the first time Trump had linked China’s economic power with its military threat.
In a subsequent interview, Trump said: “The relationship is very good. We’re not looking to hurt China. China is being hurt very badly — they were closing up factories, they were having a lot of unrest and they were very happy to be able to do something with us. The relationship is very, very good. I’ll speak to President Xi [Jinping (習近平)] maybe at the end of the week. We have some other things we’re doing.”
That the impact of Trump’s tariffs could generate such internal ferment in such a short period of time demonstrates that in the economic realm of US-China competition, China — using Trump’s harsh formulation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy — ”does not have the cards.”
Trump does have the cards if he is willing to play them against Xi, his Chinese “friend.” Domestic legitimacy in a communist or other authoritarian state is always the regime’s Achilles heel, hence the panicked Tiananmen Square Massacre under “great reformer” Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平).
As the trade-off for suppressing the political rights of Chinese, Beijing has promised relative economic prosperity and stability. Any sustained economic downturn — whether caused by leadership mismanagement or by externally-imposed tariffs — threatens the political and security bargain Beijing has struck with Chinese and gives Trump enormous leverage to accomplish something genuinely historic.
Trump eventually realized that Xi deceived him about the COVID-19 crisis that killed 1 million Americans and contributed to his 2020 re-election defeat. He should have no qualms about using every weapon at his disposal to gain the strategic advantage over China, whether it hurts Xi’s feelings or not. Trump should be as relentless in seeking peaceful “retribution” against the US’ real and existential enemies as he has been vengeful against perceived slights from domestic political rivals.
If Trump can muster the political wisdom and moral courage to seize the unique opportunity created by his tariffs and China’s economic and political vulnerability, he has the prospect of inducing the substantive change in China that former US president Richard Nixon sought, but failed to achieve in his historic opening.
Ending all US sanctions could be a significant added incentive, with Syria as a recent model. After regime change with former Syrian president Bashir al-Assad’s forced departure, Trump lifted economic sanctions and promised US support for a reformed government.
To enhance the domestic political pressure for political change in China, Trump’s hand would be greatly strengthened by the economic aid and development activities of the Agency for International Development (USAID), and the informational prowess of Radio Free Asia (RFA), which was created in response to the Tiananmen Square Massacre, and Voice of America (VOA), which helped win the Cold War. Unfortunately, the potential international impact of each of those agencies of soft power has been drastically diminished by the Trump administration’s governmental reorganizations, but Trump has shown a willingness to reverse course and make selective adjustments when they advance his agenda, and he could profitably enlist the support of USAID, RFA and VOA in the titanic project to change the Chinese Communist Party for the benefit of Chinese and Americans, and world peace. Such a development would seriously advance Trump’s prospects for a Nobel Peace Prize and possible enshrinement on Mount Rushmore.
Joseph Bosco served as China country director for the US secretary of defense from 2005 to 2006, and as Asia-Pacific director of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief from 2009 to 2010.
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