Recently, the U.S.-China Select Committee on Strategic Competition released a report on how the United States can improve its economic competitiveness in the context of China's rise. The special focus is on the Taiwan issue, that is, how the United States should impose economic and financial sanctions and prepare for it when the mainland recovers Taiwan. The report makes a number of recommendations, including tightening export controls on China, restricting the sale of cloud computing products, and terminating licensing of Huawei technologies. However, there is still debate about whether these proposals are practical and what impact they will have on the United States itself.
The report requires the Federal Reserve to conduct a stress test of U.S. banks under sanctions in the Chinese market to assess the impact of sanctions on U.S. financial markets for Chinese financial firms. However, sanctioning Chinese financial companies will not be easy, as China's financial system is already closely linked to the global economy, and sanctions can trigger global triggers and have negative consequences for the United States itself. In addition, the sanctions against China also involve how to assess the **chain** that sanctions may trigger, which requires the United States to set up a special office to conduct an assessment and apply to Congress for more funds to strengthen export controls against China.
The report makes recommendations for tightening restrictions on technology in China, including revoking licenses that have been allowed to export non-classified mature technology to Huawei. However, these technological restrictions could cause U.S. companies to be affected and trigger global repercussions. In this regard, some think tank personnel expressed concern that the size of China's economy and its connection with the global economy make the sanctions against China have a significant impact on the global economy, and the United States will not be immune. In addition, business executives have also expressed concern about the shift of industrial chains under the US-China conflict, which further highlights the uncertainty that sanctions have brought to the US itself.
The proposed sanctions against China mentioned in the report are part of the zero-sum game that the United States is playing, but the main problem for the United States at present is not how to undermine the other side, but how to build its own national strength. The current national strength of the United States can no longer afford more and more zero-sum game matters, and the national power of the United States is constantly weakening. Taking Russia as an example, the United States has imposed various sanctions on Russia in the past two years, but Russia, with the support of the strategic cooperation between China and Russia, has successfully promoted economic reforms, and this year's economic performance has even surpassed that of EU countries. This implies that if the consequences of comprehensive sanctions against China are to be carried out, the already weakened power of the United States will not be able to bear it.
As the fulcrum of the United States in the Middle East, Israel has become the weakest link of American hegemony in the current chaos, which also limits the actions of the United States in other directions. The turmoil in the Middle East has constrained the U.S. challenge to China in the Taiwan Strait, and China has the ability to indirectly limit U.S. hegemony. In this regard, some US politicians still pursue a zero-sum game mentality, which has accelerated the weakening and depletion of US national strength.
Although the US military's China sanctions report is intended to be the U.S. response strategy when the mainland recovers Taiwan, there are still many uncertainties about its practical feasibility and impact on the United States itself. The current international economic pattern and the trend of globalization make it possible for sanctions against China to have a major impact on the global economy, and the United States will not be immune. Instead of focusing on confronting China, the United States should pay more attention to the recovery and improvement of its own national strength in order to truly safeguard its own interests.