STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
I'm in the city of Yiwu in coastal China. It's a lovely city. I went for a run this morning around a lake in a park. More to the point, this is a trading city. It's filled with people from all over the world. Just this morning we ran into people from Ireland and Senegal. They come here making arrangements to buy consumer goods to ship to their home countries and that makes this city a good place to hear how Chinese businesspeople are responding to American tariffs. We've been listening to the sound of trade.
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INSKEEP: That's an angle grinder - a power tool - one of thousands of products for sale at a giant wholesale market here. Our editor Reena Advani and I walk through one hallway after another, filled with grills, umbrellas, basically everything.
REENA ADVANI, BYLINE: There are a number of different kinds of gift boxes. Some say Paris on them, some say flour. Some say maison de fleur. All things that you could wrap a gift in, I assume.
INSKEEP: They - they're round like hat boxes, it seems to me.
ADVANI: Very much so. Coming in all different colors. Very pretty.
INSKEEP: The United States has imposed 20% tariffs on everything here. President Trump insists China will pay the taxes. Sellers here expect that American consumers will pay. So there is a lot to discuss, and we will listen to the merchants' stories in days to come.
Almost all the news of the early Trump administration is reflected in some way here, inside America's great rival. Yesterday, on this program, we heard a Chinese scholar of the United States who asserted that stopping U.S. foreign aid diminished American influence abroad.
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DA WEI: To be honest, I think the majority view here is this is in China's interest.
INSKEEP: People here are also following the news of American National Security officials communicating on a messaging app and somehow including a journalist. A Chinese newspaper here ran a story about whether dismay among national security officials might leave somebody vulnerable to recruitment by China. The U.S. effort to take new territory has implications for China's drive to assert control over Taiwan. The list goes on and on. So what do people in China make of it all? Some Chinese may see opportunities for their country. Although, a closer look suggests some reasons that China might not seize an advantage. Our colleague Anthony Kuhn has been listening in the capital city, Beijing.
ANTHONY KUHN, BYLINE: The Trump administration's actions can mean very different things to the Chinese state and Chinese individuals. Take, for example, journalist and author Zha Jianying, who was one of the first Chinese students to study in the U.S. in the early 1980s. She says that to Chinese liberals who, like herself, look up to the U.S. as a beacon of democracy, recent developments in the U.S. are a crushing blow. But for the Chinese state, they're a propaganda windfall.
ZHA JIANYING: It's definitely an opportunity, because what's happening in the U.S. does a better job than state propaganda could do to demonize America as, you know, a phony democracy, which really is an imperialist power.
KUHN: But Wang Haolan, who was born in 1997, has never seen the U.S. as a beacon. You can sense that in the name of his popular podcast called American Roulette. He researches China at the Asia Society Policy Institute. He agrees that there's no need for China to be in a hurry when things are going its way.
HOALAN WANG: (Through interpreter) As Napoleon famously said, when your enemy's making a mistake, don't do anything to disturb him. So I think China's strategy will be more of a tranquil waiting.
KUHN: President Trump's first priority appears to be to cut the U.S.'s trade deficit with China. Here he is speaking at the Oval Office last week.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I'll be speaking to President Xi. I have a great relationship with him. We're going to have a very good relationship, but we have a trillion-dollar deficit because of Biden.
KUHN: The total U.S. trade deficit with China last year was, in fact, $263 billion, according to the Commerce Department.
Peking University international relations expert Wang Dong argues that Trump tends to use tariffs to pressure countries into making deals, and if that doesn't work, he raises the stakes. So Wang says, if China wants to seal a deal with Trump, the earlier it does so, the better.
WANG DONG: I do think there's a window of opportunity for both sides to really strike a deal, which is, I think, three to six months. If that window opportunity is gone, then Trump might be tempted to revert back to his more - sort of more confrontational approach.
KUHN: That approach, he adds, could mean using Taiwan or other issues for leverage against China, which could increase the likelihood of conflict.
Xie Tao is dean of the School of International Relations and Diplomacy at Beijing Foreign Studies University. He sees an opening for China.
XIE TAO: Look at the dismantling of USAID and many other foreign aid projects. It does appear to present an unprecedented opportunity for China to present its own alternative version of a just world.
KUHN: But Xie says that China's traditional diplomatic approach...
TAO: Also means that you behave very cautiously on the international arena. You don't want to overstretch yourself. You don't want to make promises that you cannot fulfill.
KUHN: People's University professor of international relations, Shi Yinhong is even more skeptical of any opportunity. He says that what look like opportunities for China are likely just distractions from its true goals, which he says include maintaining peace in China's immediate environment. He argues that China has neither the money nor the domestic popular support to try to fill leadership roles vacated by the U.S., especially far from home.
SHI YINHONG: (Through interpreter) China must more strictly distinguish which of its foreign interests are truly core and which ones can be reduced or even eliminated. We must reduce China's burden and focus China's strength on issues that are truly important to China.
KUHN: He adds that China should try to avoid a major conflict with the U.S. and its allies, and it should try to avoid simply reacting to the U.S. Whatever action China takes, he says, it should be on its own terms at a time and in a manner of its own choosing.
Anthony Kuhn, NPR News, Beijing.
(SOUNDBITE OF ATHETIC PROGRESSION'S "AND1") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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