Gideon Rachman: “‘Our strategy on tariffs will be to shoot first and ask questions later.’ That was what one of Donald Trump’s key economic policymakers told me late last year.”
“That kind of macho swagger is currently fashionable in Washington. But the US president’s shoot-from-the-hip tactics are profoundly dangerous — for America itself, as well as the countries that he has targeted with tariffs.
”“The potential economic risks for the US — higher inflation and industrial disruption — are well known. The strategic consequences for America are less immediately obvious — but could be just as serious and even longer lasting. Trump’s tariffs threaten to destroy the unity of the western alliance.”
“He is sowing the seeds of an alternative grouping formed by the many countries that feel newly threatened by America. Co-operation will be informal at first, but will harden the longer the tariff wars go on.”