US policies on China self-defeating: former US diplomat

BEIJING - America's latest policies toward China, including the trade war, will prove self-defeating, said former senior US diplomat Charles W. Freeman Jr. in an article in the East Asia Forum online research platform Sunday.

The trade war launched by the United States has backfired, said Freeman, who argued that US farmers, companies and families are paying the price by losing the Chinese market, profits and jobs.

The country can expect job losses of 320,000 by 2025 and a gross domestic production $1.6 trillion less than it would have been, he said.

"China is not breaking stride," said Freeman, adding that with an overall trade surplus rising to a new high in 2020, China is striking free trade deals with many other countries and investing more in education and global manufactures.

Freeman also warned that China has become "the antidote to the US post-Cold War-enemy-deprivation syndrome and a gratifying driver of US defence spending."

Freeman expressed his belief that extensive US-China cooperation, which involves addressing problems like pandemics, nuclear proliferation and poverty, developing a multilateral monetary order, promoting cross-Strait negotiations, and encouraging Chinese studies to enhance understanding of China, etc., benefits mutually and globally.

"Antagonism, seeking to hamstring one other entrenches hostility, justifies hatred, injuries, and threatens to weaken both sides," said Freeman.