Reference News Network reported on April 8 that the British "Guardian" website published an article titled "Thoughts on Trump's Tariff Ultimatum: Entering the Tribute of the American Empire" on April 4. The full text is excerpted as follows:

In the Rose Garden of the White House, Donald Trump stood in front of auto union workers and announced "Liberation Day," promising to stand up for ordinary people. Whether this promise will be fulfilled remains undecided. Anyway, he would declare victory. The economic plan proposed by the US President is not only an economic plan but also an imperial plan.

Trump's logic - if there is one - is in the 397-page report he waved about "foreign trade barriers" on Wednesday. The message it conveys is extremely simple: you can sell your goods to Walmart shoppers, but only on the condition that American cloud service providers collect your data, American media flood your screens, and American technology monopoly enterprises operate under their (not yours) conditions.

The ultimatum of a week and the fabricated national emergency have exposed the pretense behind Trump's agenda. The tariffs and economic nationalism proposed by the US President are not intended to correct trade imbalances but to force other countries to accept America's economic dominance without sacrificing its domestic advantages. The US continues to run a trade deficit, not because it borrows from abroad, but because other countries around the world are willing to exchange physical goods for dollars they cannot issue. Trump demands tribute for this privilege: control over digital infrastructure, forced entry of high-tech rentiers, and suppression of competing technologies. Although Trump's foreign policy is transactional, its domestic impact may likely be transformative, and not in a good way. Tariffs lead to price increases for everyone, especially the poor, while protecting local producers from competition.

Meanwhile, as Trump clearly indicated, these revenues are not specifically used for public investment or industrial policy but for tax cuts beneficial to the rich. In this system, tariffs redistribute upward: the poor pay more, so billionaires pay less.

Rather than being "anti-globalization," this is "post-globalization." What the US seeks is not withdrawal from the world but a world that complies with new conditions. The American empire is still making money, but now demands to make more and spend less - foreign aid is cut, multilateral rules are replaced by quick bilateral agreements. If allies want to engage in trade, they must also obtain permission for Google Cloud services, purchase Boeing aircraft, and resist China's influence. Trade, technology, and security are bundled into a single rent-seeking foreign policy.

However, markets are less convinced - the continuous market collapse reflects not only concerns about recession but also growing recognition that this model is not just a quarterly adjustment. This is a paradigm shift. Even Trump admits that this pain may be real.

For other major economies including the UK, the task is to reduce dependence on the US - through deepening regional integration, investing in technological autonomy, and limiting exposure in US-controlled financial, technology, and defense sectors. (Compiled/Translated by Wang Haifang)

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7490911037542171187/

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