Email
\n <\/a><\/p>\n
Link<\/p>\n
\n The United States and China have settled into a steady state of pragmatic, if uneasy, d\u00e9tente.\n <\/p>\n
\n Tariffs sit at unprecedented, but not economically debilitating <\/a>levels. Three rounds of bilateral talks have steadily developed and expanded, with a fourth expected this fall. President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping are circling an in person meeting<\/a> before the end of the year.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI don\u2019t think anyone wants to see those tariffs snap back to 84%,\u201d US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said ahead of Trump\u2019s decision to sign off on a 90-day extension of the trade truce agreement put into place in May.\n <\/p>\n \n But beneath the surface, Trump\u2019s trade war has dramatically accelerated efforts to find and demonstrate an ability to exploit vulnerabilities that will define the future of the relationship and shape the potential conflict for years ahead.\n <\/p>\n \n China\u2019s grip on rare-earth elements<\/a>, critical for electronics, defense equipment and other crucial products, has triggered an urgent scramble across the US government and its allies. Despite an agreement that China would unlock the supply of rare earths, US officials and corporate executives with knowledge of the acquisition and export process say there remain difficulties for critical industries, exceedingly granular demands for corporate data and a seemingly implicit effort to choke off some national security related purchases.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cIt was a wakeup call to the world,\u201d a senior White House officials said. \u201cThat was a major thing in world geopolitics.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Xi\u2019s ability the choke off western access to essential components has become the dominant topic of discussion during all three rounds of bilateral talks so far.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe\u2019re focused on making sure that the flow of magnets from China to the United States and the and the adjacent supply chain can flow as freely as as it did before the control,\u201d said Greer, leading up to Trump\u2019s extension of the pause, as US and Chinese continued intensive technical discussions behind the scenes. \u201cAnd I\u2019d say we\u2019re about halfway there.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n At the same time, US technological advantages have sparked sharp rebukes and a push to rapidly ramp up capabilities in Beijing. The United States also probed clear choke points in supply for industries critical to China\u2019s economy. America imposed export controls for software tools, aerospace equipment and the sale of ethane, a major petroleum byproduct for China.\n <\/p>\n \n The actions weren\u2019t heavily publicized \u2013 most of the coverage came from corporate securities filings or leaks from frenzied executives. Some of those executives were Republican donors, people familiar with the matter said, and raised concerns directly to Washington.\n <\/p>\n \n The lobbying appeared to have little effect, as US officials leveraged the economic pressure as an unequivocal counter to China\u2019s rare-earth actions in the second round of bilateral talks. They were maintained in the immediate aftermath as US officials continued to press for quicker action on the matter.\n <\/p>\n \n Shortly before the July 4th holiday, US Commerce officials notified major ethane producers the export controls had been rescinded.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI am informing you that effective as of the date of this letter, the license requirements set forth in my June 1, 2025 and June 25, 2025 letters are hereby rescinded,\u201d a top export administration official wrote in the notification letter sent July 2 to Enterprise Products Partners.\n <\/p>\n \n Over the last several weeks, Trump clinched a rolling series of bilateral trade frameworks that have included explicit commitments to shore up US supply chain vulnerabilities and implicit agreements to shift production, supply chains and security assets away from Chinese influence. New penalties for \u201ctransshipped\u201d products \u2013 an additional 40% tariff on goods shipped from a high-tariff country to a lower tariff country prior to export to the US \u2013 have been put into place, with new regulations expanding their reach forthcoming.\n <\/p>\n \n At the same time, China has grown more aggressive in pushing against regional players in territorial disputes as US officials have used Trump\u2019s brute-force tariff approach to build a nascent but deeply consequential new alignment that breaks from the global trading system the president has long pilloried. Even student visas for Chinese citizens have been leveraged for effect.\n <\/p>\n \n Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Trump\u2019s lead negotiator in three rounds of trade talks with China, has told associates it\u2019s the equivalent of \u201cthree-dimensional chess.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Bessent insists that the US now holds a clear advantage \u2013 a message he said he delivered directly to his Chinese counterparts last month during two days of negotiations in Stockholm, Sweden.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI just said the world\u2019s with us now,\u201d \u201cIt looked in April, May like that the US was alone against the world,\u201d Bessent said during a policy event with Breitbart news shortly after he returned from the third round of US-China trade talks. \u201cNow that we\u2019ve done deals with our top trading partners, we have a lot more leverage.\u201d\n <\/p>\n![\"US](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/gettyimages-2226925002.jpg\")
<\/p>\n