Comment by cess11

I think it is a mistake to approach this policy as if it is about other states. One sign that it is not is that it seems to be based on a crude, almost simplistic calculation, something like trade deficit divided by exports, with a ten percent blanket tariff on states with trade surplus or no trade.

Applying the same policy against everyone indicates it's not about them, it's about the usian 'us'. Another way to look at it might be as sanctions, but instead of applying them on another state, applying them at home. And sanctions are usually a means to influence oligarchs and industrialists in a state, which probably means this is a policy directed at those groups in the US.

Why would you want to hurt US industrialists and oligarchs? Because then you can ease their pain in exchange for their loyalty. This is the logic behind castles in Europe. It's a place where the king decides the taxes, taxing illoyal barons or whatever more than loyal ones, and if they militantly disagree, shut the door and have them expend their resources on a hopefully futile siege and then be weakened anyway. Similar policy was common in colonial settings too, if the colony was uppity, tax them harshly.

The world is changing fast anyway, the liberalist hegemony wasn't going to extend far into the future for many reasons, like climate change and the general rise of autocracy worldwide. Having guarantees of loyalty and stability from the state apparatus at home when the world order inevitably crumbles while burning some bridges that would likely fall apart anyway, instead of wasting resources keeping up a charade defending some 'status quo', has a kind of logic too it.