China Tells EU They Might be Facing a Trade War Over US-Backed EV Tariffs

Elvis Dunderhoff June 22, 2024

The EV tariffs were unprompted.

It’s a protectionist agenda being pushed by the US, which wants their own companies (Tesla, in particular) to dominate the EV market. (Obviously, Ford and other American companies, as well as all of the German companies, are trying to get into the market, but the one that the US went all-in on was Tesla. Meanwhile, the owner of Tesla was going all-in on playing Diablo 4 12 hours a day while using the cheapest possible materials in his vehicles, charging literally 8 times what China charges for a comparable model.)

China is really not a country that Europe can afford a trade war with.

The US probably could, and they’ve been edging around it for a while now.

But Europe definitely cannot manage such a thing. The fact that the US told them to do these EV tariffs is more proof that the US is (for whatever reason) attempting to weaken Europe. At the very least, they are willing to use Europe to hurt Russia and China, even when the thing hurts Europe a lot more than Russia or China (see the bombing of the Nord Stream).

Reuters:

Beijing warned on Friday that escalating frictions with the European Union over electric vehicle imports could trigger a trade war, as Germany’s economy minister arrived in the Chinese capital with the proposed tariffs high on his agenda.

Robert Habeck’s three-day trip to China is the first by a senior European official since Brussels proposed hefty duties on imports of Chinese-made electric vehicles to combat excessive subsidies. That has unleashed countermeasures by China and harsh criticism from Chinese leaders.

In an unexpected twist, Habeck – from the ecologist Greens Party which is a junior partner in Germany’s fractious three-way coalition – criticised Berlin’s 11-month-old China strategy document as too short-termist and not in sync with the China strategies of other EU countries.

This week alone, Chinese automakers urged Beijing to hike tariffs on imported European gasoline-powered cars and the government launched a dumping probe into EU pork imports in retaliation for the EU Commission’s move.

“The European side continues to escalate trade frictions and could trigger a ‘trade war’,” a statement attributed to the Chinese commerce ministry’s spokesperson said. “The responsibility lies entirely with the European side.”

It said that with its dumping probe, the European side had “intimidated and coerced Chinese enterprises, threatened to apply punitive high tariff rates, and demanded overly broad information”.

Habeck’s visit is seen as an opportunity for Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, to explain to Chinese officials the recent tariff announcement while allaying the risk of retaliation from China that could harm German businesses.

Germany’s voice carries particular weight, and its leading car manufacturers have vociferously opposed the EU tariffs. Berlin has urged dialogue while expecting China to compromise.

The country’s carmakers would be the most exposed to any countermoves from China, as almost a third of their sales came from the $18.6 trillion economy last year.

The EU’s move on EV tariffs plunged trade ties with the world’s second-largest economy to a new low.

China already won the EV war.

It’s over.

These tariffs are like squirting a Super Soaker at a forest fire.

The US apparently doesn’t understand that.

They appear to understand very little, in fact.

To be fair, this one sort of happened “all of a sudden,” and it always takes the US Machine at least several years (often more than a decade) to realize something has changed.

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