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OpinionWorld Opinion
Terry Su
Opinion
Terry Su

Trump forced to bargain with China as US mourns loss of supremacy

As Trump tries to package his US trade climbdown as a win, it’s clear that China is now on an equal footing, heralding a new phase in power dynamics

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Illustration: Craig Stephens
Terry Su
Terry Su is president of Lulu Derivation Data Ltd, a Hong Kong-based online publishing house and think tank specialising in geopolitics.
After intense two-day negotiations with China in Geneva recently, the United States agreed to postpone its “reciprocal tariff” on China for 90 days, with both sides cutting additional tariffs mostly to 10 per cent. In yet another example of US President Donald Trump taking people by surprise, he declared the climbdown a “historic trade win”.
Trump and his supporters claimed a victory by pointing to the pre-April-2 fentanyl-based tariff of 20 per cent on China that remains, by Beijing agreeing to “suspend or remove the non-tariff countermeasures” introduced against the US since April 2 – presumably including the rare earth export controls that threaten to hamper US military and chip industries – and, in Trump’s words, by China deciding to “open itself up to American business”.

But the world in general has deemed it a serious setback to Trump’s much-trumpeted agenda, so much so that the Wall Street Journal labelled it a “major retreat”, observing “the China deal is more surrender than Trump victory”. The Guardian calls May 12 – the day the joint statement on the Geneva meetings was released – America’s “Capitulation Day”.

However, in achieving a climbdown of this scale without devastatingly denting US credibility and prestige as the world’s sitting superpower, Trump deserves some applause. And he could not have done this without Beijing’s tacit collaboration. After all, China wants its rise to continue peacefully, believing time is on its side.

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