Before U.S. Secretary of State Blinken arrived, China and the United States had already started a game in the air. The United States hyped up the "overproduction theory" and launched a new round of Section 301 investigation into China's shipbuilding industry, increasing tariffs on China's steel and aluminum by three times. Then on the eve of Blinken's visit, the U.S. Senate passed a bill to force TikTok to divest its parent company. At the same time, China's Ministry of Commerce issued an announcement saying that it would implement temporary anti-dumping measures on imported propionic acid originating in the United States. Judging by this reaction, it seems that we have fallen behind. But in fact, if you look carefully, these chips made by the United States out of thin air are not bargaining chips at all, the United States launched a 301 investigation can not hinder the vigorous development of China's shipbuilding industry, and the increase in tariffs on steel and aluminum will only increase domestic inflation in the United States. As for the bill to force TikTok to divest its parent company, China has long imposed export restrictions on related technologies, and it is impossible to sell them, at most they will withdraw from the United States. In fact, we are tired of all the various pressure and containment measures used by the United States against China in recent years, and we have seen them all over. High-tech sanctions have been sanctioned for decades, and the final chip war is actually nearing the end, while trade wars, technology wars, diplomatic wars, and information wars have almost been fought. The United States now has not many means to contain China in its toolbox, so they are so anxious that they are starting to show their final cards.
Recently, the Wall Street Journal and other media outlets, citing people familiar with the matter, said that the United States is preparing to draft sanctions that could cut off some Chinese banks from the global financial system, trying to prevent China from continuing to help the Russian military industry, and at the same time provide Blinken with diplomatic bargaining chips. The U.S. media believes that, unlike sanctioned entities and individuals, blocking banks from accessing the U.S. dollar, the main currency of global trade, has a wide impact and is usually considered a last resort. At the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the United States and the West froze the huge assets of the Russian Central Bank and removed almost all Russian banks from the SWIFT system.
However, U.S. officials soon revealed to Reuters that there are no similar plans in the near future, and they hope that officials will avoid similar actions through diplomacy, which is to create bargaining chips out of thin air for Blinken's visit to China. It stands to reason that how could the financial nuclear bomb be thrown out at this time, at least it must be thrown when our vanguard troops cross the Penghu Islands, it seems that the opposite side is really out of luck. In the face of US suppression, our mentality has also changed, in the past: what should China do if the United States is like this, but now: what should the United States do? In fact, regarding the financial war, it used to be quite bluffing, but after the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the gold content of the "financial nuclear bomb" in the United States has dropped sharply. The playbook imagined by the United States is to kick China out of the financial system so that the industrial goods they make cannot be sold. But the reality is that kicking out of the financial system, others directly settle in RMB, and the dollar system explodes on the spot, is no different from suicide. China has long relied on the Belt and Road Initiative to promote the RMB cross-border payment system, and has continued to promote the digital yuan in recent years, and has signed bilateral local currency trade agreements with many countries. More than 90% of Sino-Russian trade is settled in local currencies and almost completely de-dollarized. More importantly, China is the largest trading partner of more than 120 countries and regions, and it is also the world's largest manufacturing country, which is all confidence. The United States has played with finance, forgetting that the real economy is the essence of the economy. The financial instruments of the United States will certainly cause volatility in some areas of our country in the short term, but in the long run, they will only help us quickly build a financial system independent of the United States. The United States has to think carefully about this last shot, and be careful that it will explode before it is fired.