曾任特朗普（Donald Trump）总统首席战略师的班农（Steve Bannon）5月6日在《华盛顿邮报》刊发题为《美中身处经济战 妥协无用》的评论文章。文章称，无论美国和中国最终达成的贸易协议是什么，都不能称之为贸易协议，而只是与中国为期一年的经济及战略战的临时休战。
班农在文章中让读者从六个方面"理解"：美国向中国的妥协是徒劳的。
第一方面的理解是，自2001年中国加入世界贸易组织（WTO）以来，中共一直在与工业民主国家进行经济战争，现在中国已成为美国有史以来面临的最大经济和国家安全威胁。当前贸易谈判的框架指出，中国必须同意结束强迫性技术转让、知识产权盗窃、商业网络攻击、人民币操纵、高关税和非关税障碍和对国有企业的不公平补贴。但是，如果中国同意美国强制性方式的要求，这等同于对中国国家资本主义的阶梯。
第二方面需要理解的是，本月正在谈判的贸易协议不是寻求更紧密联系的两个类似系统之间的协议——它在华尔街以及媒体和学术界的啦啦队争辩。相反，这是两种截然不同的经济模式之间的根本冲突。
美国最好的结果是一份详细的文件，其中中国放弃其掠夺性和重商主义的做法，同时提供充分的手段来监督和迅速执行协议。
中共最好的结果是通过提交大量纸张来解除关税，这些承诺将允许它在特朗普政府中耗尽时间并希望减少敌对民主党的选择。
中国能得到的最好结局是用虚假、无法履行的承诺写满纸张，换取取消关税，等待特朗普政府任期结束，寄望于较少对抗的民主党政府。
第三个理解是，中国国家资本主义对其所有者 - 中共党员来说是高利润的。陷入困境的国有企业通过大规模的政府补贴以及通过窃取外国人的知识产权，技术和创新而获得的低成本竞争优势。
如果中国停止这种大规模盗窃，它的企业将迅速遭到德国，韩国，日本，特别是美国的超越。这个事实解释了今天的中国内部政治……
第四方面的理解是，白宫内外的某些特朗普顾问正在扮演总统在股市上涨中的骄傲，并担心他可能会失去农场带以试图阻止他陷入弱势交易。但任何未能达成协议都将导致市场崩溃和经济崩溃，是一个明确错误的叙述，
事实上，特朗普对中国保持大胆关税的理由并不比美国第一季度美国经济以3.2％的年增长率增长的最新报道更好。
任何不太重要的事情都会使总统受到民主党的查尔斯·舒默和伯尼·桑德斯的无情批评。此外，Sens.Marco Rubio（R-Fla。）和Ted Cruz（R-Tex。）可能会用它来到特朗普对中国的权利 - 可能会引发一个后来的主要挑战。由于这些原因，总统最好的政治选择不是投降，而是要降低关税 - 他们在不损害美国经济的情况下向中国施加压力非常有效。
特朗普的最佳政治选择不是妥协，而是加倍征收关税，这对向中国施压极其有效，而且不会损害美国经济。
第五方面的理解，即使是最棘手的协议也需要有效的监督，即使是在容纳合作伙伴的情况下也很困难，而中国也许是不可能的。总统签署一份看似合理的协议，并在几年后发现美国被蒙蔽了，这是危险的。
美国未能充分监测中国2001年加入世界贸易组织的情况。自2000年以来，美国失去了超过500万个制造业岗位，而不是接触10亿中国消费者。
第六个需要理解的是，现在世界见证了一个迅速军事化的极权主义国家，它囚禁了数百万个工作营;迫害维吾尔人，基督徒和佛教徒;并监视和奴役自己的人民。
这是正在进行着的历史；世界分裂成一半奴役，一半自由（两部分）。特朗普和习近平他们正朝着不同的方向。一种方式可以带来自由，民主和自由市场资本主义的好处。另一个导致了具有中国特色的国家资本主义的极权主义和重商主义势力。
美国的斗争针对商务不是中国人民，而是中共。中国人民是这个野蛮政权的第一个也是持续不断的受害者。
必须面对的核心问题是中国在世界舞台上的意图以及这些野心对美国繁荣意味着什么。在我们的国家处于十字路口的情况下，特朗普遵循他的直觉而不是软化他对美国曾经面临的最大存在威胁的态度比以往任何时候都更加重要。
——网友推荐
附班农英文原文
Steve Bannon: We're in an economic war with China. It's futile to compromise.
Stephen K. Bannon served as chief strategist for President Trump from January 2017 to August 2017.
Getting tough with China to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States was the linchpin of President Trump's electoral march through the Rust Belt during his 2016 victory. Today, the goal of the radical cadre running China — the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) — is to be the global hegemonic power. The president's threatened tariffs on Sunday demonstrate the severity of this threat. But as Washington and Beijing wrap up months of negotiations on a trade deal this month, whatever emerges won't be a trade deal. It will be a temporary truce in a years-long economic and strategic war with China.
These are six "understandings" that highlight why it is futile to compromise with this regime.
The first understanding: The CCP has been waging economic war against industrial democracies ever since China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, and now China has emerged as the greatest economic and national security threat the United States has ever faced.
As a framework for the current trade talks, China must agree to end forced technology transfers; intellectual property theft; cyberintrusions into business networks; currency manipulation; high tariff and nontariff barriers; and unfair subsidies to state-owned enterprises. However, if the CCP agrees to the United States' demands in an enforceable manner, it would amount to a legal and regulatory dismantling of Chinese state capitalism.
The second understanding: The trade deal under negotiation this month is not a deal between two similar systems seeking closer ties, as its cheerleaders on Wall Street and in the media and academia argue. Rather, this is a fundamental clash between two radically different economic models.
The best U.S. result is a detailed document in which China renounces its predatory, confiscatory and mercantilist practices while providing ample means to monitor and promptly enforce the agreement.
The best CCP result is to get the tariffs lifted by filing reams of paper with false, unenforceable promises that will allow it to run out the clock on the Trump administration and hope for a less antagonistic Democratic alternative.
The third understanding: Chinese state capitalism is highly profitable for its owners — the members of the CCP. Stagnant state-owned enterprises gain a competitive edge through massive government subsidies and the cost savings won by stealing the intellectual property, technology and innovations of foreigners.
If China halted such grand theft, its enterprises would be rapidly outcompeted by the Germans, South Koreans, Japanese and especially the United States.
This fact explains much about internal Chinese politics today. President Xi Jinping faces a palace sharply divided between reformers led by chief trade negotiator Liu He and a swarm of hawks who have profited and gained power from the status quo. Within China itself, it is both gallows humor and even money as to whether Liu He will be celebrated as the next Deng Xiaoping or end up in a Chinese gulag.
The fourth understanding: Certain Trump advisers inside and outside the White House are playing on the president's well-earned pride in a rising stock market and a fear he might lose the Farm Belt to try to box him into a weak deal. But it is a decidedly false narrative that any failure to reach a deal will lead to a market meltdown and economic implosion.
In fact, there is no better argument for Trump keeping his bold tariffs on China than the latest report that the U.S. economy grew at an annualized rate of 3.2 percent in the first quarter.
Anything less than a great deal will subject the president to relentless criticism from the Charles E. Schumer and Bernie Sanders wings of the Democratic Party. In addition, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) might use it to get to the right of Trump on China — potentially setting up a later primary challenge. For these reasons, the president's best political option is not to surrender, but rather to double down on the tariffs — they have been highly effective in pressuring the Chinese without harming the U.S. economy.
The fifth understanding: Even the toughest agreement needs effective monitoring, which is difficult even with accommodating partners and perhaps impossible with China. The danger is for the president to sign what appears to be a reasonable deal and find out several years later that the United States was hoodwinked.
The United States failed to adequately monitor China's entry into the WTO in 2001. Instead of access to a billion Chinese consumers, the United States lost more than 5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000.
The sixth understanding: The world now bears witness to a rapidly militarizing totalitarian state imprisoning millions in work camps; persecuting Uighurs, Christians and Buddhists; and spying on, and enslaving, its own population.
This is history in real time; and the world is a house divided — half slave, half free. Trump and Xi are facing off to tip the scales in one direction or the other. One way leads to the benefits of freedom, democracy and free-market capitalism. The other leads to a totalitarian and mercantilist power run on state capitalism with Chinese characteristics.
The United States' fight is not with the Chinese people but with the CCP. The Chinese people are the first and continuous victims of this barbarous regime.
The central issues that must be faced are China's intentions on the world stage and what those ambitions mean for U.S. prosperity. With our country at a crossroads, it is more important than ever that Trump follow his instincts and not soften his stance against the greatest existential threat ever faced by the United States.
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