Trump is serious about US divorce from China

The phrase "new Cold War" should never have been coined. Nothing in the original stand-off between the Soviet Union and the United States could prepare the global economy for what President Donald Trump is demanding of America's trading partners. Moscow and Washington had existed in separate orbits. Now the rest of the world is being asked to make a choice between China and the US, two intimately entwined economies. Nor does the label "trade war" begin to capture the dimensions of what this implies.

America's partners are being pressured to eject Huawei, China's leading telecommunications equipment supplier, from their 5G networks. But Mr Trump's all-or-nothing ultimatum is by no means confined to Huawei. Almost every Chinese product is now under suspicion of concealing the "Manchurian chip" - backdoor technology that can lie dormant until it is activated.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on September 21, 2019, with the headline Trump is serious about US divorce from China. Subscribe