The CCP Thought The US Was Dead - "Not Hardly"

I’m a sucker for old Westerns. One of my favorites is the John Wayne film Big Jake, corny and predictable as it is. The plot is pretty straightforward. A gang of desperados raids the large and wealthy ranch of one Jacob McCandles, a.k.a. Big Jake. They kill a number of the workers at the ranch and carry off Big Jake’s grandson into Mexico, demanding a massive ransom.

Unfortunately for the raiders they have grossly miscalculated. They believed Big Jake was dead. They believed the ranch was easy “pickin’s”. They were wrong.

Wayne is very much alive. You know what happens next. The Raiders pay a horrible price. The boy is rescued. The bad guys learn a very hard lesson about overplaying their hand.

The Communist Chinese are about to learn the same thing.

The key to the rise of Communist China was very straightforward. The Chinese opened their markets to the West. They invited Western companies to come manufacture on their soil. They provided cheap labor. They could care less about worker safety and environmental standards. You could move your factory from Detroit or Birmingham or Bonn to China, produce dirt cheap goods, and turn a massive profit.

Here's the catch.

Along the way, the Chinese forgot somehow that there was nothing particularly unique about this formula. It could be copied by others. It has already been copied by others. A whole host of developing nations now have major Western companies producing on their soil or are themselves producing for the Western market.

At some point, the Chinese apparently began to count on the power of their cooptees in the West to preserve this system in perpetuity. A huge number of very wealthy Americans owe their riches to their connection to the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese market. Beijing began to believe that these individuals were so powerful that the United States would never change course and never stand up to them.

They are in the process of learning that, like the raiders at the McCandles ranch, they have grossly miscalculated. Donald Trump is not afraid to stand up to the Communist Chinese. He understands the future of the American economy and, therefore, the nation depends on us breaking free of our self-destructive entanglement with a hostile Communist regime. He knows we either stand on our own two feet again or we resign ourselves to ultimate subjugation and domination.

Trump began his effort to regain American economic freedom by levying 34% tariffs on Chinese goods entering the United States. According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, the U.S. exported $143.5 billion of goods to China in 2024 while importing products worth $438.9 billion. In short, the Chinese buy almost nothing from us and flood our market with cheap goods. Trump made clear that he was not going to accept this imbalance any longer, and the world had changed.

The Chinese ignored the warning shot across the bow. They imposed reciprocal tariffs. Trump told them to back off, or he would ramp up the pressure. Beijing ignored him. He added additional tariffs, putting the total level for import taxes on Chinese goods at 104%.

Then, Trump played another card. Chinese shipments into the United States valued at less than $800 have historically avoided tariffs. This has allowed Chinese companies to market goods directly to consumers in the United States. No longer. Those sales, previously considered “de minimis” are now subject to tariffs like all others. Chinese online retailers like Temu and Shein are dead.

China has once again pushed back. It now intends to increase levies on U.S. imports to more than 80%.

In New Delhi, Hanoi, and Dhaka, they must be cheering. All of these nations have already seen businesses moving out of China and setting up shop on their soil. All of these nations, and many more, have already signaled their willingness to negotiate with Trump, reach an understanding, escape U.S. tariffs on their countries and maintain their access to American markets. The idea that they can do so and no longer have to compete with China for sales must be exhilarating.

Meanwhile, the dark reality of what is happening to China is beginning to settle in. Chinese exporters are beginning to ditch shipments to the U.S. mid-voyage. An employee of one Chinese exporter, speaking anonymously, said, “Every factory order is halted. Anything that hasn’t been loaded will be scrapped, and the cargo at sea is being re-costed. A staff member at a Chinese export company, also speaking anonymously, said its US-bound container volume had plummeted from 40-50 containers a day to just three or six.

There are already widespread reports of factories shutting down in China because of the cancellation of orders of goods destined for the United States. Amazon just canceled orders from China for beach chairs, scooters, air conditioners, and other products. In China, stores are closing. Unsold products are piling up in warehouses. Logistics companies have stopped operations.

The Chinese cannot replace the U.S. market. We import three times the volume of Chinese goods as the next closest country, Japan. Without the U.S. market, the Chinese economy collapses.

There will be some temporary disruption inside the United States. You may find that, momentarily, you will not be able to buy another can opener that will break in six months or additional cheap plastic junk to stuff into your storage locker. Then somebody else somewhere else will agree to take your money and sell you what you want. Life will continue, and only the Chinese will be left to face the consequences of the CCP’s decision to pick a fight with America.

Throughout the film Big Jake, one bad guy after another says to Wayne, “I thought you were dead.” The Duke responds in classic Wayne style, “Not hardly.” Maybe we can chisel that on the tombstone of the Chinese economy and the Chinese Communist Party.