So here we are. China has responded to Trump’s tariffs by cutting off U.S. supply of some of the most essential ingredients of the modern world. The U.S., meanwhile, is standing in the cold, holding a clipboard and wondering where the magnets went.
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I’m surprised they didn’t do it a long time ago. There’s clearly powerful people who want a hot war with China. Why the hell would they help us build the weapons to do so?
The next thing about this is that it’s part of a perfect storm:
- Trump demonstrates to our allies that we can’t be trusted on defense; allies start ramping up domestic defense
- Allies make the obvious connection that it they can’t trust us on defense, they can’t trust us on weapons. There are domestic competitors to US weapons - Leopard tanks often compete with the Abrams, the EuroJet and French submarines compete on bids; the EU already uses mostly domestic riflery. So they start ramping down purchases of American military arms; bids and evaluations now include the consideration of the instability of the US government.
- Now the US defense industry not only has fewer customers, but don’t have the materials to build the weaponry anyway
- We’re not subsidizing Ukraine anymore, which is a significant loss in sales even if we were selling them old stock - if we still have that old stock, there’s less demand to replace it, ergo the US military is buying less materiel.
I’m sure the military-industrial complex is loving this administration.
