With US President Donald Trump’s new tariffs set to take effect in the coming days, academics yesterday said the move aims to pressure countries into negotiations to reduce trade deficits, while security ties with allies would remain unaffected.
Trump on Wednesday announced sweeping “reciprocal tariffs” on dozens of countries, including Taiwan, whose exports to the US are to face an import duty of 32 percent.
National Taiwan University Department of Political Science associate professor Chen Shih-min (陳世民) said that the tariffs were not the main focus, but rather a tool to pressure other countries into negotiations.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
Trump’s primary goal is to reduce the US trade deficit, as reflected in the formula used to calculate the upcoming tariffs, which divided the US goods trade deficit with a country by that country’s exports to the US, converting the result into a percentage, and then halving it, Chen said.
Taiwan’s trade surplus with the US stood at just more than US$20 billion during Trump’s first term, but had grown to more than US$70 billion last year, he said.
Such growth was largely driven by the rise of artificial intelligence and the surge in semiconductor exports from companies such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, he added.
“For Taiwan, the problem is not difficult to solve,” he said, adding that to reduce its trade surplus with the US, Taiwan could increase its procurement of US goods.
Chen cited as an example was CPC Corp’s recent signing of a letter of intent for trade and investment with Alaska last week for liquid natural gas and agreeing to purchase gas.
Taiwan lacks domestic energy resources such as natural gas and oil, and shifting energy purchases from the Middle East or Africa to the US could help reduce the trade surplus, he said.
National Sun Yat-sen University Institute of China and Asia-Pacific Studies chair Kuo Yu-jen (郭育仁) said that countries such as Taiwan, Japan and South Korea were likely to pursue negotiations with the US and adjust their trade models accordingly.
Such approaches would differ from that of China, which is to take countermeasures by imposing broad-based tariffs on US goods, and the EU, which might respond more mildly by targeting specific products with symbolic tariffs, Kuo said.
As for the impact on the US’ security ties with its allies, Kuo said they would remain unaffected.
Unlike Trump’s decision to withdraw the US from multilateral organizations such as the WHO, he is now maintaining the “minilateral” security frameworks established during former US president Joe Biden’s tenure, Kuo said, citing the AUKUS (Australia-UK-US) security partnership as an example.
The US, Japan and South Korea had just conducted a joint naval exercise last week near South Korea’s Jeju Island, with the “Balikatan” joint military exercises between the US and the Philippines set to take place later this month, Kuo said.
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