[binaryfinery]

Except that if we do, China will simply stop recycling its share of our government debt and the US government defaults. It will take a president with huge balls to call China on its trade war, and risk having to monetize that debt.

[linhares]

As of now, if I remember correctly, China has over 2 Trillion greenbacks. It's _impossible_ to win a trade war. We're talking about something _very_ much like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis#Financial_pressure

It is easy to be protectionist. But a major selloff of the USD by China would create the mother of all confidence crises, and, while _everyone_ would lose, the world's reserve currency, the USD, would be forever damaged.

This is not a war you can realistically fight to win. I really expected more from someone of Grove's intellect. Much much more.

[binaryfinery]

"Damaged" i.e. lose a lot of value. Precisely. We could no longer afford to buy goods from China, Japan, etc. China doesn't have the internal economy to risk that. Yet. US manufacturing, and the US social fabric, would win win win. This is absolutely a war we can fight to win. And win it we must.