A radio host friends recently asked: if I was somehow called to mediate the Commercial dispute with Communist China And America … What would I do?
I replied: immediately resign the position and get another job.
Why am I so pessimistic?
Because, for more than two years, when I worked in the first term of President Donald Trump as director of the National Economic Council, I was part of the Chinese commerce team.
We apparently had endless meetings with our Chinese counterparts – and that’s when I learned that they are impossible.
Really, the whole exercise came for nothing.
Our team leader was the brilliant Bob Lightthizer, who was the US trade representative and taught me a lot about unfair negotiation practices, in particular with China, but frankly with the rest of the world too.
And Mr. Lighthizer also taught me how important it was to protect entrepreneurs from Advanced Technology in America and their knowledge and intellectual property.
He produced a book on this subject which was also an incredible revelation for me to see how China was the world leader in the flight of intellectual property. And the world leader in forced technology transfers.
What so many people do not understand is that almost all American companies operating in China are really managed by the Chinese, because the advice was controlled by them from 51 to 49%, or worse. These are the rules established by the Chinese Communist Party.
And the Chinese could force the American company to unfold its technology as part of the Communist government policy.
Therefore, the forced transfer of our family jewelry.
I remember that in 2018, we went to Beijing for a great Powwow with various Chinese leaders, where it turned out that there were two honest reformers that I remember, and the other dozen Chinese players were robots of the Chinese Communist Party.
Commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, took the lead in the basic products negotiations and depressed me to help him.
We spent a whole day going through raw materials, agriculture, food, manufacturers, energy.
We set Chinese import objectives and American export objectives. Then discussed these objectives for the next two years.
The former commercial secretary, Wilbur Ross, breaks down the prices with discussions with China on “Kudlow”.
The secretary of the Treasury, Mnuchin, took the lead on financial companies and the capacity of any American company operating in China to own and manage its own companies.
He had some small successes, but overall, we were never able to penetrate the Chinese communist guard.
Mr. Lighthizer was our team leader, dealing with objects of overview, such as the flight of intellectual property and a million other things on which he and his team of American commercial representatives have worked.
We met Chinese delegates in Washington, DC a number of times – we have never made progress.
Little by little, over time, we have reached certain parameters, which have become known as the trade agreement of phase 1 of China 1.
At the end of 2019, at the G-20 meeting in Buenos Aires, we had more meetings with the Chinese, and finally a large banquet dinner, where we were led by President Trump and the Chinese by Xi Jinping.
I remember the very first question that Mr. Trump asked Mr. XI: Can you stop the fentanyl trade, and would you make suppliers of fentanyl subject to capital punishment? And, without hitting his eyes, Mr. XI immediately said yes. Of course, he was lying.
The phase 1 agreement was signed in January 2020, in the middle of Ballyhoo. The Chinese have never implemented it.
Even if the signature ceremony took place in the White House, China was desperately trying to cover the cochemiac epidemic which tormented their country – starting in a Wuhan laboratory, before spreading around the world and killing millions. We have lost more than a million Americans. A terrible tragedy.
China has never recognized it and continues to date to deny that the virus has been hatched in their Wuhan laboratory.
But the Chinese ignored the so-called agreement of phase 2, on the grounds that Covid stopped everything.
But Covid has mainly left for several years. However, China continues its flight from intellectual property, its transfer of forced technology, and they completely ignore all digital targets for the various products that Mr. Ross and I have helped to develop.
The Panelists of “Kudlow” Elizabeth Macdonald, Gerri Willis and Clay Travis discuss the response to unfair negotiation practices in China.
Barely a week ago, I spent an hour with a good friend, whose companies operate in China for many decades. He remains in close contact with all senior officials.
And I proposed that China was increasingly under communist control of the State, that the whole company had been tightened in an oppressed manner.
What he told me was: you are right.
And then he added: Xi Jinping is much more than a president of China – he considers himself an emperor of China. With powers even more important than Mao Zedong.
Mr. XI has an iron handle On all parts of Chinese society and politics. He does not tolerate any dissent.
This is why I would never even think of mediation between America and China.
And that is why Mr. Trump is absolutely right to put the price heat on the Economy of Emperor Xi Jinping.
An emperor whose lasting heritage will ruin China.
