German Economist: Trump Tariffs are Saving US

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Power politics is defensive politics. Dominant political entities retreat into its embrace when the going gets tough.

The U.S. is the hegemon of our time, and it no longer hides from its problems behind the rhetorical fog of moral narratives — now, it's rolling up its sleeves!

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With his tariff offensive, President Donald Trump is tackling an issue the nation has been kicking down the road since the end of the gold standard in 1971 — the gaping chasm of fiscal disaster and trade deficits.

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Tariff Policy as a Steamroller

The Trump administration didn't just start waving the flag against this twin deficit a few days ago.

Anyone following the Trump campaign since 2023 could see what's coming: a new trade order, with the U.S. as the architect of international supply chains. And it's happening with maximum radicalism.

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Aggressive tariffs, a weaker dollar, falling interest rates, tax cuts, and deregulation are the vectors of the U.S. government's battle against an enemy that has seeped into society like a creeping poison: debt.

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It's the expression of a high-time preference, the desire to have things without much effort.

Holding the world's reserve currency cheapens imported consumption, as demand for the dollar seems boundless. Free goods, just print dollars.

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This poison has politics and vast swathes of the private sector in a stranglehold.

Yet behind the curtain of tariff steamrollers and fierce rhetoric, a deeper longing glimmers: a resurgent domestic industry, the return of national creativity, a shift from consumer frenzy to entrepreneurial spirit.

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Nothing less than the revival of the American "Do it Yourself" ethos is at stake.

That spirit was outsourced ever since Former President Richard Nixon's hidden default in 1971 — the end of the dollar's gold convertibility at a fixed rate — leaving behind industrial ruins and social crises.

The Rust Belt, the region hit hardest by this policy regime, remains the embodied nightmare that just won't fade.

But how well has the U.S. government anticipated its trading partners' responses?

How precisely has it calculated the second-order effects?

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The tariff move, tailored precisely to the U.S. economy's national trade deficits, will send shock waves through markets.

Stocks sold off at first, but will be stabilizing, now that the "tariff" Damocles' sword has finally dropped.

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How will the U.S. dollar and bond markets react to this massive upheaval of the status quo?

After turbulence and high volatility, things will likely settle into business as usual — while awareness of credit risks elsewhere, like the Eurozone, grows.

There, the initial reaction was defiance: French President Emmanuel Macron urged European companies to freeze investments in the U.S., while early voices from Brussels hint at taking on American tech giants with (feeble) regulatory muscle.

Elon Musk's X is especially in their crosshairs.

Only a cynic would say this has nothing to do with Europe's censorship efforts, which have so far bounced off the platform without effect.

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The U.S. Stays on the Offensive

Meanwhile, the Americans are charging ahead, announcing massive tax cuts. The goal is rapid re-industrialization, job growth in the private sector to absorb the tens of thousands laid off from bloated government bureaucracies — a problem the US has refused to tackle for decades.

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Alongside this, the energy sector is being deregulated, securing measurable cost advantages for American manufacturers over their European rivals.

The aim is to wipe out the trade deficit, which ballooned to a staggering/unsustainable $794 billion last year.

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Remarkably, markets didn't see the tariff sword coming, even though Trump never hid his intent to use it, if need be.

Time and again, he stressed that the U.S. would no longer be taken for a ride or bled dry — and more than once, he pointed toward Brussels.

Key sectors like the auto industry (a tough blow for Germany), semiconductors, and AI data centers are set to stage a stunning comeback under the "Made in the USA" banner.

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Collateral Damage: The Eurodollar Market

This policy is laser-focused on national interests, and it might just work.

But it comes with collateral damage. It's not just the tougher price competition foreign companies will face in the U.S. market.

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A shrinking U.S. trade deficit will massively disrupt the international capital market.

Since the end of World War II, a dollar-denominated credit market — the so-called "Eurodollar market" — has emerged.

It's the great unknown in the race for cheap dollar credit, which, as the world's reserve currency with over 50% dominance, still rules the global credit mechanism.

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Even China's forced pivot or Russia's exclusion from SWIFT amid sanctions couldn't dent this supremacy.

How will international banks cope with this slow drying up of liquidity?

How will nations refinance themselves when they need fresh dollar credit for debt servicing?

We're heading into a time of extreme stress in the credit framework.

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One thing is clear: If the U.S. manages to shrink its trade deficit, dollar credit will get pricier.

Fiscal room will melt away like ice in the sun, and the Federal Reserve will gain new pricing power over its product: dollar credit.

Once this process is underway, we'll witness what Trump aimed for with his "Liberation Day" — a reordering of the global economy.

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Thomas Kolbe, born in 1978 in Neuss / Germany, has a degree in economics. He has been working as a freelance author and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations for over 25 years. As a freelance journalist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow the principles that focus on the individual and their rights to self-determination.

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ADDITIONS

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Europe is Not Our Ally

Net zero by 2050 Euro elites tried to entangle the US, with help of the unpatriotic, leftist Biden clique, into going down the black hole of 30,000 MW by 2030 of expensive, highly-subsidized, weather-dependent, grid-disturbing offshore windmill systems, which would need expensive, highly subsidized, short-lived, battery systems for grid support.

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The windmill systems would have produced electricity at about 15 c/kWh, about 2.5 times greater than from domestic US gas, coal, nuclear, hydro plants, which would have made the US even less competitive in world markets.

Any tariffs would greatly increase capital and electricity costs of wind and solar systems.

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Almost the entire supply of the projects would be designed and made in Europe, then transported across the Atlantic Ocean by European specialized ships, then unloaded at new, $500-million storage/pre-assembly/staging/barge-loading areas, then barged to European specialized erection ships for erection of the windmill systems. The financing would be mostly by European pension funds, that pay benefits to European retirees.

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Hundreds of people in each seashore state would have jobs during the erection phase

The other erection jobs would be by specialized European people, mostly on cranes and ships

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Hundreds of people in each seashore state would have long-term O&M jobs, using mostly European spare parts, during the 20-y electricity production phase.

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Conglomerates owned by Euro elites would finance, build, erect, own and operate almost 30,000 MW of the offshore windmills, providing work for many thousands of European workers for decades, and multi-$billion profits each year.

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That ruse did not work out, because Trump was elected.

The European-hate-Trump elites are furious. Projects are being cancelled. The European windmill industry is in shambles, with multi-$billion losses, lay-offs and $billions of stranded costs.

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Trump spared the US from the W/S evils inflicted by the leftist, woke Democrat cabal, that used an autopen for Biden signatures and used on-the-beach/in-the-basement Biden as an increasingly dysfunctional Marionette.
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Trump declared a National Energy Emergency, and put W/S/B systems at the bottom of the list, and suspended their licenses to put their glossy environmental impact statements, EIS, under proper scrutiny.

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Europe was using its IPCC-invented, “CO2-is-evil” hoax, based on its own science, to conjure up an expensive, worldwide “Net-zero by 2050” financial scam.

Euro elites used the Wind/Solar/Battery scam as a ruse, so the US would deliver electricity to users at very high c/kWh, to preserve Europe’s extremely advantageous trade balance with the US.

 https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/international-trade-is...

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Lopsided Trade Agreements

Prior to NAFTA, Canada and Mexico always had annual trade deficits with the US
After NAFTA, Canada and Mexico have huge annual trade surpluses with the US.

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After NAFTA, foreign (and US) companies shipped parts to Mexico and assembled cars, with their entire production shipped DUTY-FREE into the US.

That is Trojan Horse exploitation to the disadvantage of the US and US workers.

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After NAFTA, Dutch companies shipped automated greenhouses, the size of airplane hangars, to Canada (which provides nearly free gas as an incentive), with their entire production shipped DUTY-FREE into the US.

That is Trojan Horse exploitation to the disadvantage of the US and US workers.

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Dutch/Belgian conglomerates own more than 50% of the food supermarkets on the US East Coast.

That means plenty of shelf space for European farm goods to the disadvantage of US farmers.

Europe has been doing this since the 1960s Kennedy Round, which opened US markets, without the US getting any lower tariffs and lower non-tariff barriers from Europe.
Euro elites loved Kennedy

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Free Trade?

Japan has a 700% tariff on US rice. India has a 100% tariff on US rice, Egypt has a 65% average tariff on all US goods. Canada has a 290% tariff on US dairy products.

Canada’s current economy would not be viable without the US as a neighbor. Same with Mexico

I, living in Vermont, buy my electricity (GMP), propane (IRVING), gasoline (IRVING), and some greenhouse vegetables from Canadian companies.
Perot, a realistic Texas businessman, predicted NAFTA would be sucking tens of $billions of wealth and millions of jobs out of the US.
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Trump is doing the right thing with tariffs to increase US production of goods and services that will employ tens of millions of workers, build strong families and communities, and will reduce imports of goods and services, and will transform decades of wealth/job-sucking trade deficits into trade surpluses to MAGA

German Economist: Trump Tariffs are Saving US

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/german-economist-trump...

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If Europe, China, etc., do not like US tariffs, why do they have their own tariffs and non-tariff barriers?

In response to US tariffs, Vietnam finally reduced its tariffs to ZERO, but that is no big deal, because its sales to the US were $136.6 billion, and it bought from the US $13.1 billion, in 2024.

Vietnam, Canada, Mexico, Europe, China, Korea, Japan, etc., with huge trade surpluses, should concentrate not on retaliating, but on buying more US goods to reduce their trade surpluses.

https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=Vietna...

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Collusion Coalition of the Desperate

Europe is arranging and coordinating a group of ideological allies to collude with counter sanctions.  Those allies include Canada and to a lesser extent, Mexico.  Trump is onto their collusion. He said, if Europe colludes with Canada to harm the US, higher US tariffs will be placed on both of them.

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Finally, the US has a hard-nosed businessman in the White House, who cannot be $bought, instead of a senile, grifting/grafting marionette, or, God-forbid, a cackling word salad.

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/international-trade-is...

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When will woke Euro elites finally admit, increased CO2 ppm, an essential, life-creating gas, is needed to grow more flora and fauna, and increase crop yields to feed 8 billion people?

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/co2-has-a-very-minor-r...

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/we-are-in-a-co2-famine

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Europe in Big Do-Do

Europe is in poor shape. It has a decreasing/stagnant GDP, stagnant real wages, major civil unrest, and tens of millions of incompatible, subversive, walk-ins, who will undermine, instead of fight for traditional European values and culture.

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/government-advisor-war...
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Euro elites, having lost the wind/solar “climate war”, need a new enemy to distract and unify the people.

Euro elites doing Russo-phobic, saber rattling to aid Ukraine is empty posturing, without the US “backstop”

Russia, with a growing GDP, despite sanctions, a unified people, gaining on the battlefield, would just roll over and play dead?

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Trump would be an idiot to agree to prolonging the Russia-Ukraine conflict with the US “backstop”, as demanded by the UK, because it would be a major drain on US finances for years, and a huge distraction regarding MAGA.

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However, the Deep State and in Congress, most Democrats and some Republicans would love it. 
Musk is getting close to divulge how many of these Members of Congress are outperforming investment professionals on Wall Street. They have no problem defending/financing corrupt Ukraine, an undemocratic state, where:

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1) Elections were canceled (also in Rumania), or stolen (also in Moldova), and Le Pen was sidelined in France

2) The Russian Orthodox Church was banned,

3) Political opponents were silenced/tortured/killed,

4) The USAID-subsidized pro-Ukraine media were put under total government control, “because of martial law”

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Germany, the UK, France, etc., are in Chaotic De-growth Mode

Their Euro elites are forcing populations to put up with, and pay for, tens of millions of unvetted walks-ins, who make minimal contributions, cause maximal pain, crime and chaos, all while sucking from the government tit.

Spending more on defense and Net-Zero green stuff, will be accelerating de-growth

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The woke elites in Europe and the US are pre-maturely closing, already-paid-for, in-good-working-order, nuclear plants.

The woke elites have banned 1) oil and gas fracking projects, 2) gas/oil pipelines, 3) gas/oil storage systems near power plants, and 4) new energy exploration projects, as part of "leaving it in the ground"

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The US should not bail out Europe by exporting its coal, oil and LNG, but use them to make more US products and services for domestic use and exports.

That way the US would reduce imports and increase exports, which would rapidly decrease our decades of wealth/job-sucking trade deficits, and would employ tens of millions of additional US workers, which would strengthen families and communities.

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The very important results of DOGE are not reported by the leftist, USAID-subsidized, Corporate US Media, but the criticisms of DOGE are reported 24/7/365.

The people in New England, the US and Europe are permanently kept in the dark, already for at least 5 decades, or more.

The Social-Media, by gaining eyeballs, is quickly ending the Corporate-Media monopoly, which is losing eyeballs. 

But the Euro elites are hell-bent to put social media in straight-jackets ASAP, because they provide a public forum for free speech.

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UKRAINE A GEO-POLITICAL PAWN OF US/UK/NATO TO WEAKEN RUSSIA

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/the-plot-is-thickening...

By Willem Post

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THERE ARE AT LEAST 8 PROVOCATIONS THAT LED TO THE UKRAINE- RUSSIA CONFLICT  https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/there-are-at-least-8-p...

By Willem Post

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1) The US-led NATO expanded beyond East Germany to the borders of Russia, after on February 9, 1990, US Secretary of State James Baker reassured Gorbachev, on several occasions, NATO would not expand by "one inch" beyond East Germany. Russian leaders were duped again.

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2) At the 2008 Bucharest summit, NATO agreed, Ukraine and Georgia would become members, but did not specify how or when this would happen. Russian objections were ignored.

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3) The US fomented, organized, and financed the illegal Coup d'Etat in Kiev in 2014, which deposed Yanukovych, a legally elected President, and left about 100 people dead and severely wounded.

The US spent at least $5 billion from 1990 to 2014, per Victoria Nuland, to set up Ukraine NGOs, subsidize Ukraine Media, buy West-leaning politicians, to lead many parades with flags, etc., in preparation of the Color Revolution that would push Ukraine into the EU and NATO, in due time.

From 1990 - present, thousands of West European companies expanded their operations to Ukraine and other East European states, and to Russia.

The “Revolution” often became violent during 2013 and 2014, because a major part of the population, likely of Russian origin, wanted to continue the status quo.

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4) From 2014 to February 2022, the Kiev government armed forces, UAF, with NATO arms, decided to attack, kill and severely wound about 15,000 of its own citizens in East Ukraine over an eight-year period, because those citizens, did not agree with the US-installed clique in Kiev in 2014.

Russia supported the ethnic Russians to prevent increased genocide.

The UN/EU/US/UK/NATO encouraged Ukraine by staying silent, or saying "Ukraine has a right to defend itself".

Those ethnic Russians have been living there for about 400 years

5) Ukraine Presidents Poroshenko and Zelensky sabotaged the Minsk Agreements, with silent approval of NATO and Merkel and Sarkozy/Hollande, the “guarantors”.

The frequent Minsk meetings by the parties were futile. Russian leaders were hoodwinked again.

The West's aim was to give Ukraine time to build its armed forces with NATO training and weapons.

Those Agreements would have given limited autonomy to East Ukraine, while remaining part of UKRAINE

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6) In early February 2022, an army of at least 100,000 of the Ukraine Armed Forces, UAF, increased its long-distance shelling of East Ukraine by a factor of 3 to 5, likely a prelude to an assault on East Ukraine.
This was subsequently confirmed by captured Ukraine POWs.

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7) On February 22, 2022, Russia finally said "enough is enough", and invaded Ukraine to put an end to the ethnic cleansing in East Ukraine. 

Russian troops entered Ukraine 1) with the aim of forcing Kiev to halt military attacks on East Ukraine, 2) to ensure its own security, and 3) dismantling a regime that fostered the growth of neo-Nazism in the country

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8) During March/April, 2022, a Russia-Ukraine agreement was partially negotiated and initialed in Turkey, but PM Johnson interrupted the peace process by visiting Kiev to tell Zelensky to keep on fighting with NATO backing.

Zelensky, with no military skills, agreed to fight a war of attrition against a much larger and better-armed opponent

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Ukraine is Slowly Disintegrating

Ukraine, which had been losing population prior to 2014, has a remaining population in Kiev-controlled areas of about 25 million, of which 10.7 million are pensioners. Ukraine could never win a war of attrition.

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/about-half-of-ukraine-...

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After 3 years of fighting, East Ukraine is in total ruins.

Russia annexed over 20% of Ukraine. Its real GDP is growing far in excess of the US and EU, despite sanctions.

Russia, with many highly educated STEM graduates, became more united, due to the war effort, and more sovereign, due to a huge increase of "Made in Russia" products and services that used to be imported from Europe.

In 2023, EU GDP growth was about zero %, US about 2.9%, Russia about 3.8%.

In 2024, EU GDP growth was about zero %, US about 2.8%, Russia about 4.1%
A major return of Western companies to Russia would “increase dependency/decrease sovereignty”, as happened after 1990.

The forces of Russo-phobia, propagated by the subsidized, government-controlled Corporate Media in the US and EU, were working overtime to keep the US/EU populations in hate-Russia mode, while falsely claiming Ukraine was "winning".

Ukraine Likely to Lose 4 Provinces, plus Crimea

Each side lost up to one million dead and seriously wounded.

Russia has re-joined most of 4 eastern provinces that were part of the Czarist Russian Empire for hundreds of years

Their people, almost all ethnic Russians, voted by more than 90% to rejoin Russia in 2022.

Crimea, 70% Russian, 20% Ukrainian, 10% Tartar, voted by more than 96% to rejoin Russia in 2014.

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Future US-Russian Relations

As part of the Ukraine Peace talks, Russia and the US have decided to co-operate with each other in large-scale ventures, such as extracting rare-earth minerals from Russian soil for export to the US.

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After the Ukraine conflict is settled, the Euro elites, after decades of tying the economy into climate-policy knots, and spouting hateful Russo-phobia to unify/rally/control/brainwash the population, will need to shift to Russo-neutral, if they want to do business with Russia, all while justifying spending much more on all sorts of NATO weapons to fight Russia, which does not attack, unless provoked.

Quite a hat trick!

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The Euro elites are using Orwellian measures, such as censorship, misinformation labeling, throwing out elections if they do not like the results, freezing out major political parties, blacklisting people, companies, social media, etc., jailing political opponents (as in Rumania), to cow/brainwash/disenfranchise the population, similar to what the USAID-subsidized US Corporate Media are still doing. 
The federal government buys tens of thousands of expensive subscriptions to subsidize those Media, as was revealed by DOGE.

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Ukraine Resists Peace, Wants to Continue Fighting with Only EU Backing

The neo-NAZI, Bandera-adoring Nationalists want to keep fighting, and get all land back from Russia, and restart the genocide of ethnic Russians in East Ukraine.

That likely would mean losing more land, more destruction, and about 25,000 killed and seriously wounded per week on both sides. That would mean 18-year-old recruits, with minimal training, to the front lines.

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That would mean NATO “boots on the ground and planes in the air”, if it were up to the UK and its “Coalition of the Willing”, with US battlefield awareness systems as a “backstop”, orchestrating it all behind the scenes. WW3, anyone?

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NOTE: Battlefield awareness, aka “backstop”, involves US satellites and US spy planes to feed battlefield information to the Ukraine Armed Forces.

Musk’s satellite-based STAR link plays a major role spreading battlefield information

Advanced artillery systems, provided by the US, UK and France, are operated by personnel of those countries, who use that information to hit targets in Russia. WW3 anyone?

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US and Ukraine officers planned major counteroffensives together and launched long-range, high-precision strikes, using Western-supplied weapons onto Crimea. The strikes led to civilian casualties, with one ATACMS attack on a Sevastopol beach killing four and injuring more than 150 in June 2024.

The US also dispatched dozens of military advisers to Ukraine, some of whom were allowed to travel close to the frontline.

In 2024, the US extended its permissions to allow Ukraine carry out limited long-range strikes using US-supplied weapons onto Russian territory. Washington provided Kiev with the targeting data for the strikes.

One European intelligence official was shocked by the level of US involvement in the conflict, telling the Times, 

“They are part of the kill chain now.”

https://www.rt.com/news/614965-nyt-investigation-us-secret-meddling...

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/key-takeaways-nyts-secret-hi...