Recently, the acquisition of the American steel giant "American Steel Corporation" by the Japanese steel giant "New Nippon Steel Corporation" has attracted great attention from the US political circles. Both current President Joe Biden and former U.S. President Donald Trump have expressed concern and vigilance about the deal to a certain extent.
Mr. Trump was more forthright, saying that if he was elected, he would block the deal, while Mr. Biden was more subtle and said that even acquisitions between close allies should be strictly regulated. Their message is similar: rejecting the acquisition.
Originally, this was only a matter between Japan and the United States, but the current concern and opposition of the US political circles to Japan's "Nippon Steel Corporation" and the acquisition of the US Steel Corporation actually exposes the current conservatism of the United States in its trade policy and the limitations of its "friendly shore outsourcing" policy.
Trump
As we all know, since the game between China and the United States intensified and the United States was ready to go all out to suppress and contain China, it has tried to use various means to force the global manufacturing center to move from China to other "friendly shores" of the United States, so as to weaken China's competitiveness and strengthen the influence and control of the United States on the global manufacturing industry chain.
Therefore, the so-called "friendly shore outsourcing" has become a very important policy of the US government, especially the current Biden administration, which almost regards it as the most important foreign policy of the United States.
Whether it is in the fields of chip semiconductors or new energy vehicles, the United States is trying to use various means to move the manufacturing industry from China to Southeast Asia, India, and even Japan, South Korea, Mexico, and other countries that have better relations with the United States and are more deeply influenced by the United States.
In order to achieve this goal, the Biden administration has actually encouraged companies such as Japan and South Korea to invest in the United States. But now Japan's Nippon Steel Corporation, which has spent $13 billion to buy U.S. Steel, is being regulated and resisted by the U.S. government.
US President Joe Biden
In fact, this shows that the Biden administration is facing many obstacles if it wants to rely on the "friendly shore outsourcing" policy to snatch China's share of the global manufacturing industry chain, or to enhance its own influence.
On the one hand, China's own manufacturing capacity and position in the global industrial chain will counter the U.S. strategy of moving the manufacturing center away from China.
On the other hand, the manufacturing industry in the United States is actually gradually declining, since the seventies and eighties of the last century, the United States manufacturing industry began to hollow out, once able to manufacture several aircraft carriers at the same time of the manufacturing power of the United States, now there is only one shipyard in the country that can repair large aircraft carriers.
In this context, if the United States wants to increase its voice and influence in the global manufacturing industry, it can only rely on the strength of its allies. Countries like Japan, which have a certain voice and status in the field of high-end manufacturing, should become the focus of the "friendly shore outsourcing" policy of the United States.
U.S. manufacturing is in decline
To put it bluntly, when the hollowing out of the U.S. manufacturing industry is inevitable, and it is difficult to regroup due to cost disadvantages and other reasons, the United States can only use Japan, South Korea and other countries if it wants to strengthen its control over the global manufacturing industry.
In this sense, allowing Japan's "Nippon Steel" to acquire U.S. Steel and thereby strengthening Nippon Steel's global influence and share can help the United States achieve its strategic goal of "friendly shore outsourcing" to a certain extent.
However, there is an obstacle here, and that is the divergent interests between the United States and its allies. To put it bluntly, no matter how bad the U.S. Steel Corporation is now, it is the United States' own, and no matter how powerful Nippon Steel is, it is also Japan's.
Although the United States pursues a policy of "friendly shore outsourcing" and wants to include all countries that are more friendly to it in the scope of the United States confronting China and enhancing its influence on the global manufacturing industry, after all, there is a difference between intimacy and alienation, and it is completely different from the United States itself controlling the world's most important steel production capacity.
U.S. and Japanese leaders
Now Biden, Trump and other U.S. politicians are opposed to Nippon Steel's acquisition of U.S. Steel, which is actually fully reflected that the United States is not very comfortable with Japan.
Especially in such sensitive areas involving key strategies, the United States does not want companies and capital from Japan or other allies to control the industry.
In fact, this exposes the shortcomings of the so-called "friendly shore outsourcing" policy of the United States. On the one hand, the United States wants to rely on the strength of its allies, such as Japan and South Korea, and on the other hand, it is also vigilant and vigilant against these allies.
This kind of distrust in the bones will prompt the United States to instinctively oppose when the so-called "friendly shore outsourcing" is extended to sensitive industries and gradually deepened.
Human Resources in the United States
As a result, the so-called "friendly shore outsourcing" policy has actually become unattractive for countries such as Japan and South Korea. Because the United States essentially only wants to use allies such as Japan and South Korea to hand over some less important industrial areas to these countries to control.
However, from a business point of view, areas that are generally not very important to a country, or areas that are not too sensitive, do not have much interest in itself, so if countries such as Japan and South Korea cooperate with the so-called "friendly shore outsourcing" policy of the United States, it will simply become a wedding dress for others.
On the other hand, why doesn't the United States itself support the development of its own manufacturing industry? In fact, it is very simple, because at this stage of economic development in the United States, whether it is domestic production efficiency or human resource costs, it is no longer enough to support the United States to exert its strength in the relatively basic manufacturing field and compete with China and other emerging economies.
This has created a kind of dilemma in which the United States cannot do it on its own, but it is not at ease with others. If this continues in the long run, the final result will be that the United States will neglect one at the expense of the other.
American hegemony
Emerging countries and economies such as China have worked together to counter the U.S.'s sabotage of the global industrial chain, which has led to closer internal solidarity and cooperation, and we have worked together to continue to strengthen and expand their influence on the global manufacturing and supply chain.
Finally, the opposition of US politicians to the acquisition of US Steel by Japanese steel giants is in fact a reflection of the new characteristics of current global geopolitics.
That is, instability and insecurity are on the rise, and countries increasingly want to control their core interests. As the saying goes, there is food in the hand and no panic in the heart.