Expert: US-China dispute ‘is not a trade but economic war’

The ongoing trade dispute is an instrument of cold economic warfare launched by the US to “contain” China, and it could lead to the fragmentation of the global economic and financial system, warned Alicia García-Herrero, a senior fellow at Bruegel think tank.

“The difference between past trade wars and the current one is the goal”, she told EURACTIV.com in an interview.

The US aimed to reduce its trade deficit when it targeted Japan in the 1980s. The burst of Japan’s bubble that left a decade of deflation was an “unintended consequence”, she said.

But this time around, García-Herrero argued that the US is using tariffs as a “quick and not expensive tool to contain China, if not more”.

“At this stage, everybody knows that,” she added, recalling that the first list of the €50 billion Chinese goods hit by US tariffs included products not exported to the US.