“Tariffs are America’s Strength”, says Trump, while giving few details on Truce strategy.

Trump doubles down on tariffs and mentions that there is no clear end goal for the US-China trade war.

Intan Khairiah Adilah Binte Abdullah | The Business Times

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US President Donald Trump talks about the current standing of the U.S.-China trade war. PHOTO: PREPMUN. 

THE BUSINESS TIMES, SINGAPORE - A press conference was held earlier today to clarify the United States’ stance on the ongoing trade tensions with China. US President Donald Trump instead delivered an ambiguous defence of tariffs as America’s primary strategic tool. 

While his rhetoric remained politically aligned, the implications for markets, supply-chain diversification, and regional economies are less encouraging. 

The question posed by The Business Times centred on a concrete concern where China still controls 70% of rare earth mineral processing, which is vital for the US in advancing technologies, green energy, EVS, and defense systems. ASEAN economies are also shifting towards a ‘China +1’ diversification strategy. With these issues, what contingency plans does the US have if this truce collapses?

Trump says, asserting that WASHINGTON would simply “raise tariffs further”, did little to relieve uncertainty among businesses and investors already adjusting to the most volatile trade environment in decades.

The President’s insistence that “America is great because of tariffs” reflects a worldview in which duties are not merely tactical points but ideological anchors. However, tariffs risk entrenching global supply chain fragmentation. 

This pushes allies and rivals to form alternative trade blocs that bypass US influence, such as ASEAN, increasingly negotiating a trade arrangement among itself. 

Consequently, this potentially undermines long-term economic leadership and diplomatic leverage in Asia and beyond. It could also pose a threat to the US economy through a reduction of US imports and the increasing competition for US goods. 

Trump’s commentary ventured beyond economics and delved into geopolitical rivalry, accusing China of influencing gang violence and drug proliferation linked to the fentanyl crisis within the United States. 

Trump also dismissed Chinese manufacturing quality, asserting that America could produce “better products”. These claims allow the Trump administration to expand trade tensions as moral rather than commercial disputes; they do not speak to the economic realities facing industries reliant on Chinese inputs or assembly. 

On the other hand, Trump praised South Korea and Japan, describing them as “great” and commending Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi for Japan’s recent investments of S$550 billion into America, and their newly formed Technology Prosperity Deal. 

Contrastingly, Trump depreciates countries such as Iran, addressing them as “weak, loser countries” due to their lack of investment in the US and geopolitical rivalry. Trump has also highlighted and reiterated strongly that he believes decreasing or cutting funding to developing countries is a project that the administration has to work on. 

Cutting off funding for developing countries, whose economies are already unsteady, poses a threat to their economic stability. 

Beyond that, it is a form of strategic self-sabotage for the US, where debt distress, infrastructure paralysis, and market instability in the Global South ultimately raise costs for global investors. It also disrupts supply chains and risks the expansion of China’s geopolitical leverage. 

BT’s View: Tariffs are not an economic strategy.

From a market standpoint, the administration's tariff-first position is unsustainable as long-term policy. Tariffs are feasible as bargaining tools, but they are not a substitute for industrial strategy, infrastructure renewal, workforce upgrading, or supply-chain security.

Tariffs impose costs on domestic industries while failing to address the root causes of structural dependencies, especially in areas such as rare-earth, where the US lacks processing capabilities of its own. 

Moreover, merging trade disputes with narcotics trafficking and social disorder politicises an issue that requires analytical clarity, not rhetorical escalation. 

Businesses and investors need predictable economic climates, transparent timelines, measurable benchmarks, and a clear set of rules; however, none were provided in Trump’s response. 

While strategic competition between the US and China will shape global markets for the years to come, sustainable economic leadership requires credible frameworks. Multinationals will continue to diversify supply chains away from the concentrated production nodes, but they require a strong foundational policy built on stability rather than politically driven volatility. 

If WASHINGTON continues to affirm its posture, it should articulate a coherent endgame with plausible timelines. Economic realities and national security priorities are crucial in offering markets an outline they can trust. Until then, tariffs may be beneficial in leveraging geopolitical rivalry, but they remain insufficient for the world’s largest economy.