China / United States: why Donald Trump lost

Audio 03:53

Xi Jinping's trade war against China was one of the hallmarks of the Trump presidency.

(illustrative photo) BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI / AFP

By: Dominique Baillard Follow

8 min

The trade war with China was one of the hallmarks of the Trump presidency.

A fight that he is far from having won, on the contrary, China's economic success is eclipsing that of the United States.

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If the White House wanted to weaken the Middle Kingdom, the operation is failed: the country, the birthplace of the coronavirus, was the first to overcome the pandemic, and its economy is therefore the first to take off again.

She flies from record to record again.

Yesterday, the vitality of industrial activity, determined by orders placed in October, impressed again.

This performance confirms the V-shaped rebound announced a fortnight ago.

In the third quarter, Chinese GDP growth picked up again, approaching the 5% mark.

If these Chinese figures are still suspect, the IMF's arbitration is final: the fund estimates that China will experience 2% growth this year, it will be one of the few countries to be in positive territory while the US economy will decline by more than 4%.

And we fear the worst in the United States: the new wave of Covid-19 worries more and more the business community, at least as much as the result of the presidential election.

On the trade front, Donald Trump ended up signing an interim agreement with China but without solving the basic problem

The Chinese have bought soybeans and American corn as provided for in the agreement signed in January, but they are far from fulfilling their obligations.

They only achieved half of the promised imports.

This war had the merit of highlighting the danger posed by the double standards that China practices with its partners, and not just with the Americans.

But in economic terms, this is a mess for the United States.

The trade deficit with China that is at the origin of the conflict finally fell in 2019, but the overall US trade deficit is still the same.

The United States now buys from Vietnam or Mexico what it no longer imports from China.

American companies have suffered from the increase in import taxes imposed to bend Beijing, they have increased their prices, squeezed wages to compensate, in short American households have paid the bill.

Donald Trump has also launched an all-out war against Chinese tech giants

Huawei, which wanted to make itself indispensable for 5G networks around the world, paid the price.

Tiktok, the ultra popular application among young people is threatened with disappearing from the American universe.

These companies suspected of potential espionage are seen as threats to the national security of the United States.

They also worry other Western countries.

What is at stake are economic interests, but also strategic interests.

Donald Trump succeeded in slowing down Chinese progress

But it also boosted China's determination to assert its technological domination.

Beijing is working hard to assert its technological sovereignty and offer the rest of the world new inexpensive tools, such as electric cars or drones.

Even the US military is getting caught up in it.

Air Force has just bought Chinese drones for training, angering Republican senators, reports the

This anti-Chinese crusade thrives on competition between the two great powers, which is why it is not ready to end even if Joe Biden wins the election.

IN SHORT

Twitter and Facebook

are mobilizing to avoid spreading misleading information about the results of the US election.

If both camps prematurely claim victory on these two social networks, their moderators allow themselves to warn users with thumbnails mentioning that official sources do not yet give the same result.

Twitter has also listed sources it considers reliable.

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