The Art of the Deal: China Part II

TRUMP CONVINCES CHINA TO OPEN ITS MARKET TO U.S. BEEF, FINANCE COMPANIES, ETC.

  As for China, the villain of the piece, Trump can reasonably claim that his combination of threats of a retaliatory tariff and openness to a deal is working. Yesterday the two Presidents announced a ten-point "early harvest" from their agreement to re-set relations. China will open its market to U.S. credit card companies and rating agencies, resume imports of our beef and send a delegation to meet with potential investors in China, implying a willingness to open markets to them. In return, we will allow imports of cooked poultry meat from China, not take a stand against further Chinese investment in America:  investments by Chinese firms will be treated equally with investments by other foreigners. The U.S. also agreed to provide de facto endorsement of China's plan to invest billions to revive the ancient silk road to Europe. 

     Trump sees all of this, and an agreement to spend a year working on other measures to ease trade strains, as a personal endorsement that his "Art of the Deal" works on an international scale. And that dinner at Mar-a-Lago is a testimonial to the value of dinner-table diplomacy. "I'm dealing with a man, I think I like him a lot. I think he likes me a lot," Trump told an interviewer from The Economist. 

Link to Hudson Institute Analysis via Weekly Standard