President-elect of the United States (US) Donald Trump is now in the process of formulating his future cabinet. Reportedly, he has selected Congressman Mike Waltz as the would-be National Security Advisor and Senator Marco Rubio as the would-be Secretary of State. Both nominees are widely known as anti-China hawks but for disparate reasons.

Congressman Waltz considers that China has been trying to revive the 1930s era of Nazi Germany by mounting a military build-up to advance the Chinese interests in the Pacific, hence the beginning of a Cold War with the US in the Pacific. Perhaps, Waltz is overlooking a fact that, during his tenure (2009-2017), former US President Barack Obama tried to establish an East Asia strategy known as the Pivot to Asia. In this famous book, The Pivot: The Future of American Statecraft in Asia, published in 2016, Kurt Campbell elaborated on the philosophy of the pivot heralding a shift in the US foreign policy away from worn-out spheres of Europe, South Asia and the Middle East (ME) to the hemisphere of Asia-Pacific, assuming it a dynamic region, where the history of the 21st century would be written. Obama wanted to develop a working relationship with emerging Asian powers such as China and India. However, the pivot remained an over-ambitious plan, divorced from ground realities – in an attempt to leave behind a legacy to be cherished later – as Obama’s plate was already full. Neither could he withdraw US forces from Afghanistan nor could he mollify the ME. Eventually, Obama had to abandon the dream of pivot-making. He could spare neither cost nor attention.

On the other hand, during his previous presidential tenure (2017-2021), Trump’s major achievement on (the war front of) the US foreign policy was that he was able to disengage US forces from Afghanistan, thereby ending expenditures of war spanning two decades (2001-2021). A question is this: Does Waltz think that Trump would be ready to open any confrontational front in Asia-Pacific?

The probable answer is in the negative. A reason is this: to do so, the US has to calm the ME down and end the Ukraine-Russia war to make space for opening a new dimension. During his presidential tenure (2021-2025), the outgoing US President Joe Biden failed desperately on the war front, proving that the Democrats (such as Obama and Biden) were incapable of taking bold foreign policy decisions. Owing to their incapacities, the local economy was hurt. They failed to understand that the economy fuels a war. For Trump, two prime challenges will be not only to introduce peace into Europe and the ME, but also to participate in post-conflict efforts to reconstruct war-ravaged areas and rehabilitate refugees. Certainly, these efforts require money, which may deter the US from intervening in the Pacific.

Senator Rubio is of the view that, in the 21st century, the success or failure of the US will be determined by its capability of (whether or not) uncoupling the US economy from China’s. Rubio believes that China’s economy has got an edge over the US economy because of certain reasons including cheap labour exploited by overseas investment made by multinationals. Similarly, over the years, China has become able to influence American society through cheap products and services, which work as lobbying for China. It is apparent that Rubio wants Trump to pick up the threads of the past. Agreed on December 13, 2019 and signed on January 15, 2020, in Beijing, during this previous presidential tenure (2017-2021), Trump signed a bilateral trade deal with China’s President Xi Jinping. The deal was meant for halting the escalation of trade war by decoupling the US economy from China’s. The deal committed China to purchase $200 billion of additional US exports over 2017 levels before December 31, 2021. This was called phase one of the trade deal. China had to buy at least $228 billion of US exports in 2020 and those of $275 billion in 2021 for a total of $502 billion over the two years. The main focus of the deal was to facilitate US’ manufacturing sector especially sectors of autos and aircraft.

However, China could not go beyond 60 percent of its commitment for 2020 and 2021 each. Similarly, the deal failed to convince China to remove technical barriers to US farm exports, besides respecting intellectual property rights and opening up its financial services sector. One reason for the failure of the deal was Covid-19 pandemic which made the US manufacturing sector underperform whereas the other was that two Boeing planes met accidents, offering sufficient excuse to the Chinese importers to pull out. The added factor was the slackness of the Biden administration which could not initiate phase two of the trade deal with China. Apparently, the Biden administration exercised leniency towards China to the loss the US economy.

At this juncture, a point of conflict surfaces between approaches of Waltz (who is anti-China in the political domain) and Rubio (who is anti-China in the economic domain). Whereas Waltz wants the revival of the Asia-Pacific pivot, which will annoy China, Rubio wants the renewal of US-China trade deal for the next phase, which will benefit the US economy. The choice lies with Trump depends on which foot he put forward. The first option may revive the pivot but at the cost of expenditure putting a further strain on the US economy. The second option may revive the trade deal to the benefit of the US economy, but leaving Taiwan in status quo.

Most probably, by disappointing Waltz, Trump may opt for the second option: start phase two of the trade deal with China to revive the US economy and avoid a confrontation in Asia-Pacific.

Dr Qaisar Rashid
The writer is a freelance columnist. He can be reached at qaisarrashid@yahoo.com