The White House is currently finalising the details of President Joe Biden’s latest exercise in economic sparring with Beijing: a planned 25 per cent tariff on imports of the Chinese cranes which dominate the container-unloading business at American ports.
On the surface, the tariffs have a conventional rationale — Biden hopes that, over time, the measures could help bring crane-building back to the US and boost the country’s manufacturing base.
But the measures also reflect the way national security concerns have intruded into economic policy. US officials have fretted that China could employ the hulking cranes to conduct espionage at US ports, for example by using their sophisticated logistics software to monitor military-related shipments.