China’s Belt & Road Initiatives & International Trade
Source: https://leidenasiacentre.nl/english-new-map-of-the-belt-and-road-initiative/#
BY STAS MARGARONIS
U.S. President Donald Trump’s massive “Liberation Day” tariffs announced on April 2nd are likely to have a negative effect on U.S. trade and along with his reconsideration of long-term military alliances are likely to benefit China and Russia.
Already two long-term U.S. allies, Japan and South Korea, have met with Chinese officials to discuss closer economic cooperation in the face of Trump administration tariffs, according to a March 23rd Nikkei Asia report.
At the same time a leaked U.S. Defense Department memo signed by Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly says the United States would likely not help Europe in the event of a Russian attack. This is antagonizing European allies already angered by the Trump administration-imposed tariffs and threats to invade Greenland.
Japanese Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul met in Tokyo for the first such meeting since 2023.
The Nikkei news report explained: “China sees an opportunity in the disruption to the international order caused by Trump, seeking to drive a wedge into the three-way alliance among the U.S., Japan and South Korea.”[1]
On April 2nd, as part of his global tariff initiative, President Trump announced new reciprocal tariffs including: 34% on China, 32% on Taiwan, 24% on Japan, 25% on South Korea.[2]
The tariffs on Taiwan are likely to undermine its relationship with the United States as the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post observed:
“Taiwan has been dealt a heavy blow in US President Donald Trump’s sweeping “reciprocal tariffs” on trading partners, with the government denouncing the 32 per cent tariff on Taiwanese imports as “deeply unreasonable”.
The decision stunned Taipei, which sees itself as having already paid “protection fees” to Washington – notably top chipmaker TSMC’s US$100 billion investment in semiconductor manufacturing in Arizona and Taiwan’s pledge to increase defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP from 2.5 per cent.”[3]
This is happening at the same time as The Washington Post reports that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is urging a major U.S. effort to defend Taiwan from China.
The need for cooperation from Japan and South Korea would seem critical in such a defensive effort and slapping additional tariffs on Taiwan is not likely to help.
The secret memo from Defense Secretary Hegseth focuses on deterring China’s seizure of Taiwan and shoring up U.S. homeland defense, which the newspaper said, in some instances, is nearly a word-for-word facsimile of a report from the conservative think tank, The Heritage Foundation.
In Heritage’s The Prioritization Imperative: A Strategy to Defend America’s Interests in a More Dangerous World, (dated August 2024), Heritage advocates defense and national security themes that have been adopted by the Trump administration since taking office in January:
“The U.S. military can no longer clearly deter China, and risk of a third world war is rising. This report proposes a new defense strategy to change that. Under this strategy, America’s military would prioritize defending the U.S. homeland and denying China’s imperial ambitions, most urgently by deterring Beijing from invading Taiwan. At the same time, Washington would empower allies and partners to lead efforts to defend against Russia, Iran, and North Korea with critical but more limited U.S. support. In this way, the United States can set conditions for lasting stability around the world on terms that ensure the security, prosperity, and freedom of Americans not just for the remainder of this decade, but for decades to come.”[4]
The Heritage Foundation may also have inspired the Trump administration’s mass-firing of federal employees through the Heritage-backed Project 2025 plan.[5]
The Post says the Hegseth memo known as the ‘Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance’ and marked “secret/no foreign national” was signed by Hegseth:
“It outlines, in broad and sometimes partisan detail, the execution of President Donald Trump’s vision to prepare for and win a potential war against Beijing and defend the United States from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama Canal.
The document — setting out a prioritization framework for senior defense officials and a vision to execute that work — also instructs the military to take a more direct role in countering illegal migration and drug trafficking.
The first Trump administration and the Biden administration characterized China as the greatest threat to the U.S. and postured the force to prepare for and deter conflict in the Pacific region. But Hegseth’s guidance is extraordinary in its description of the potential invasion of Taiwan as the exclusive animating scenario that must be prioritized over other potential dangers — reorienting the vast U.S. military architecture toward the Indo-Pacific region beyond its homeland defense mission.
The Pentagon will “assume risk in other theaters” given personnel and resource constraints, and pressure allies in Europe, the Middle East and East Asia to spend more on defense to take on the bulk of the deterrence role against threats from Russia, North Korea and Iran, according to the guidance.”[6]
The leaked memo drew negative reaction in the UK from The Daily Mail worrying that defending Europe from Russian aggression would be tougher.
The newspaper also noted that support for Taiwan has not been a top Trump priority in the past but may now be motivated by the realization of Taiwan’s “niche manufacturing output” which refers to the U.S, dependence on advanced Taiwanese semiconductor technology needed for AI and other applications:
“The United States would likely not help Europe in the event of a Russian attack, a leaked Pentagon document has revealed. Secret guidance from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth acknowledged that the Trump administration is unlikely to provide substantial, if any, support to Europe in case of a Russian advance, according to the Washington Post … The admission echoes recent calls from Hegseth and senior administration officials for European allies to do more to invest in their own defence and reduce reliance on the United States.
The guidance document argues the importance of recalibrating military focus on China, fearing a potential clash in the Pacific over Taiwan, which is seen as being both geostrategically important and crucial for its niche manufacturing output.
Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, had also committed to defending Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion – but it was something Trump signalled he would not do as recently as last summer, arguing the island ‘doesn’t give us anything’.The stark admission on Europe comes in spite of existing NATO commitments binding members to help each other in their time of need – only previously invoked by the U.S. in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and met by a large European response.”[7]
Meanwhile as Hegseth urges more focus on confronting China and defending Taiwan, the fallout from Trump’s tariff and defense withdrawal plans appear to help Beijing as the Nikkei report explains:
“Japan and South Korea both rely on the U.S. military for security. But they now sense uncertainty in these bedrock arrangements as Trump complains about costs.
China welcomes this relations shake-up. China is engaged in a tariff war with the Trump administration while tensions remain elevated in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea. Beijing seeks to move closer to Japan and South Korea through a three-way framework that excludes the U.S.”[8]
FOOTNOTES
[2] https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Trump-administration/Trump-reveals-reciprocal-tariffs-34-on-China-24-on-Japan?utm_campaign=GL_one_time&utm_medium=email&utm_source=NA_newsletter&utm_content=article_link
[3] https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3305129/deeply-unreasonable-trumps-32-tariff-taiwanese-imports-stuns-taipei
[4] https://www.heritage.org/sites/default/files/2024-09/SR288_0.pdf, p.1
[5] “In 2018, President Trump issued Executive Order 1383916 requiring agencies to reduce the time for employees to improve performance before corrective action could be taken; to initiate disciplinary actions against poorly performing employees more expeditiously; to reiterate that agencies are obligated to make employees improve; to reduce the time for employees to respond to allegations of poor performance; to mandate that agencies remind supervisors of expiring employee probationary periods; to prohibit agencies from entering into settlement agreements that modify an employee’s personnel record; and to reevaluate procedures for agencies to discipline supervisors who retaliate against whistleblowers. Unfortunately, the order was overturned by the Biden Administration,17 so it will need to be reintroduced in 2025”. —Mandate for Leadership 2025, p.73: See: https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_CHAPTER-03.pdf
[6]https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/03/29/secret-pentagon-memo-hegseth-heritage-foundation-china/
[7] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14554059/us-help-europe-russian-invasion-hegseth.html
[8]https://asia.nikkei.com/Economy/Trade-war/Trump-s-threat-to-free-trade-brings-China-Japan-South-Korea-closer?utm_campaign=GL_china_up_close&utm_medium=email&utm_source=NA_newsletter&utm_content=article_link&del_type=9&pub_date=20250327233000&seq_num=6&si=48aa74a8-b49f-4cfb-9af2-fab861422636