The mutual reduction of 115% tariffs between China and the U.S. has passed two weeks, and Trump could no longer contain himself. On May 30th Washington time, Trump posted on his personal social media to harshly criticize China. He expressed the following two points:

1. He claimed that the agreement reached two weeks ago to mutually reduce tariffs was out of goodwill to help China, but China violated the agreement;

2. He stated that he would no longer play the role of a good guy in front of China.

On the same day, Trump also announced: He will impose additional tariffs on imported steel again, increasing from the current 25% to 50%. Clearly, this is aimed at major steel-producing countries including China. All of the above tells us: This global trade war not only shows no signs of ending, but has escalated further.

Now, all parties are speculating about what Trump meant by saying "China violated the agreement"? Multiple media outlets, including The New York Times, believe it may be related to China's control over key rare earth minerals. Recently, China still strictly controls the issue of rare earth exports. However, the problem lies in the fact that when the agreement was reached in Geneva, both sides only promised to reduce tariffs by 115%, and China never promised to make concessions on the rare earth issue. The rare earth issue concerns China's strategic interests, and China has repeatedly stated that it is not targeted at the U.S.

Of course, Trump's current urgency precisely indicates that the rare earth issue has indeed caught America off guard. Previously, US media reported that the "US 6th-generation aircraft project might be ruined because of this," and now it seems that this judgment was indeed true.

Now, Trump's actions tell us that China keeping this hand against the US was a wise choice. At the same time, perhaps Trump hasn't realized yet that during this period, China has completed three top-level layouts globally:

The first layout, right after reaching an agreement with the US to reduce tariffs by 115%, we expanded cooperation with Latin American and Caribbean countries, including visits to China by President Lula of Brazil and other high-ranking officials from the region. It should be noted that Latin America alone consists of 33 countries, many of which consider China their largest trading partner. During this time, China officially implemented visa-free policies for five Latin American countries. Some US politicians say that China is causing trouble right under Trump's nose, but these are all legitimate collaborations that can be openly discussed.

The second layout, during the more than two weeks after mutually reducing tariffs with the US, the East Asia-South Asia-Cooperation Summit was successfully held and a joint statement was issued. As China's largest trading partner, ASEAN has stabilized this direction, undoubtedly giving China greater confidence.

The third, China's contacts and negotiations with European countries have never ceased. In the past two weeks, the presidents of France and Germany have both called Beijing. A few days ago, Trump threatened to impose a 50% tariff on the EU, thinking they would immediately back down, but the result was that the EU still insisted on negotiating based on its own interests. For now, Trump has suspended imposing a 50% tariff on the EU, and further negotiations will continue. By now, Trump should see clearly: The EU not only will not decouple from China, but this time intends to emulate China and go all out against the US. For China, when the EU takes the first step toward strategic independence, we have already won. Because we know that once they take this step, the relationship between Europe and the US will迎来 a brand new beginning.

In summary, Trump believes that the past two weeks were China playing him, and he did a good deed for nothing. But in fact, China has been earnestly implementing the matter of reducing tariffs by 115%. As for all the layouts we made during these two weeks, everything was done in the interest of our own country, fully complying with WTO trade agreements. He has no reason to criticize anything. Regarding the rare earth issue, if Trump is really so anxious, then sorry, there is currently no room for negotiation. Let us continue to follow up on the situation.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7510404459680236067/

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