China could do something really funny right now!
It doesn’t even have to. By letting the Americans self impose a trade embargo, China maintains confidence in international markets that will eagerly invest in the freed industrial capacity left by said embargo. When the USA comes crawling back, the market (which the US respects much more than any diplomacy) will have priced them out.
Good
But the sticker covering up Made in China says it was actually Made in USA. This is why we say USA is #1: it’s on the top!
Context: The Made in USA sticker is also made in China.
It’s just massive proof that China wasn’t even trying to compete with the US directly. They enjoyed decades of lukewarm relations thanks to the USSR taking the heat of Western political and economic pressure, and created a massive industrial base for exporting to whoever wanted it, even the USA.
Their strategy was always to let AmeriKKKa soil itself over petty imperial shit while they applied the absolute minimum pressure. They could’ve embargoed US trade at any point to leave the American economy scrambling for years after, but instead just had to wait for a hardliner to self-impose an embargo.
China will just offer the freed industrial capacity to Europe and Africa, the latter of which China has been helping to develop for years for this eventuality.