Trump ends Free Trade with China. But will he stay the course?

 

He puts a 245% tariff on Chinese products. 

It was April 11, 2025 and I was delighted.
President Trump finally protected the democratic West from threatening Chinese world power. After his wild back and forth on tariffs over the last weeks, he finally decided on a tariff of 145% on Chinese products and has put almost all other tariffs on hold. He even upped it to 245%! That is roughly what I have been advocating for over the last 20 years and what I write in my book 'We Are Funding China's Growth', available on Amazon by end of April. At first sight, what Trump does should be really very good news for the survival of our Western democratic society. But does he know what he is doing?

Shockingly, neither at the New York Times, nor at The Washington Post or anywhere else do journalists understand what is happening. So please read this.

Between my writing and what POTUS does, there are differences. First, what I propose is a principled abolishing of free trade with China, while the White House just calls it ‘tariffs’. Second, the President goes about it in a very different way from what I suggested in many publications already, see my book 'We were Funding China's Growth'. What POTUS does is less understandable and somewhat more chaotic, and he does not explain what he is doing, which creates unrest, and not just on the stock market. But what he does is nevertheless wonderful, because it was so very necessary to stop the trade with China. It was high time and he does it.

It means the 145% are now stopping the free trade relation with China that the US had initiated under President Clinton. This also means, if Peter Navarro still is the adviser on the 145%, that this man has learned from his incredible mistakes under Trump 1. I therefore take back that he is incompetent. Mr. Navarro deserves admiration for this.

And please note, all other tariffs are on hold for three months, which probably means that POTUS realizes they are not at all essential, as are only the ones on China. 

Trump is now chaotically exempting some fields, like electronics, PC's and car parts. He should have thought of that earlier. But he still does it for a very good reason. It is to give American industry the time to gear up their production lines for manufacturing these goods themselves again. The President should really explain what he is doing.

But then, for the US to be really successful and stop China’s growth with Western money, the European Union, my Europe, should join and should stop their free trade with China too. Will it finally dawn on Ursula von der Leyen what Donald is doing? Brussels will have to U-turn, away from its incredible ignorance on why the EU is unable to compete, see also the weakness of the Draghi report that does not even mention cheap Chinese goods as the main problem. Whether the Europeans will begin to understand what is happening is still unclear because over the last decades, at the European Commission, any macro-economic common sense was woefully absent and right now still is. Still, my guess is Mrs. von der Leyen will eventually see the light, even if that may take her 6 months, because the Trump push and its likely outcome are quite irresistible. 

So far for now, but I fear POTUS does not really know what he is doing.