US experts back Trump's tough China line

Leading US China experts have endorsed Donald Trump’s tough approach to trade with Beijing, contending that an increasingly unbalanced economic relationship requires a change in Washington’s policy, the Financial Times reports. The call by a task force of academics and former US officials comes amid fears that the new president could set off a destructive trade war between the world’s two largest economies. But in a report the experts argue that an increasingly protectionist and mercantilist China has left the US no other option but to get tough after the failure of diplomacy and more moderate trade actions. The experts call for tougher US enforcement of both domestic and international trade rules and for the Trump administration to do more to press China to open up sectors of its economy in which foreign investment is restricted. They argue that those actions should be paired with efforts to draw China into new trade and investment deals with the US.