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Eurasia
26/05/2023 07:00
The trade war continues to heat up, and now the boundaries are starting to be defined, Pilkington points out, recalling that on Sunday, the Chinese government announced that semiconductors from the American company Micron would be banned among operators of “critical infrastructure” in China. He notes that South Korea signalled that it would not do anything to prevent the Chinese buying chips from their companies as a substitute, even though the US had asked Seoul to do so.
South Korea’s refusal to damage its companies to fulfil the desires of the DC. foreign policy establishment shows that there are hard limits to Washington’s trade war, Pilkington points out. "The only way America can make its trade war work is to convince a substantial slice of the world economy to put in place similar restrictions to those being imposed by Washington. But as the Micron example shows, these restrictions bring with them counter-restrictions — and this grim cycle can quickly escalate, destroying the companies caught in its wake. Countries like South Korea are simply not interested in getting involved," he explains.
According to the economist, "this last year has produced a series of lessons for the US and its allies that, in a rapidly changing world, there are limits to their power, both hard and soft". "China is not Iran, or even Russia. Trying to isolate the country economically and diplomatically is near-impossible, and may well end up isolating the country attempting to impose the measure. In the coming months, it seems increasingly likely that America will have to revise its China policy," he concludes.
