Paris (Imran Y. CHOUDHRY):- Former Press Secretary to the President, Former Press Minister to the Embassy of Pakistan to France, Former MD, SRBC Mr. Qamar Bashir analysis : After months of tension, failures, and near breakdowns, the United States and China finally struck a landmark trade agreement that has reshaped the global balance of economic power. The negotiations culminated in Busan, South Korea, on October 30, 2025, where President Donald J. Trump and President Xi Jinping met face to face to seal a compromise that blended hard politics with pragmatic economics. What began as another episode in Trump’s “America First” campaign ended as a stunning reversal of Washington’s long-held trade strategy. For the first time in decades, the United States found itself negotiating not from a position of dominance, but parity—perhaps even vulnerability—with an economic rival that refused to bow to pressure.
The Busan summit produced an agreement that went far beyond tariff adjustments. It marked a recalibration of two superpowers’ economic engagement, with provisions covering tariff reductions, rare-earth exports, fentanyl-precursor chemicals, and agricultural trade. The outcome reflected necessity as much as diplomacy.
At the center of the breakthrough was a U.S. pledge to cut its combined tariff rate on Chinese imports from around 57 percent to approximately 47 percent, the first major rollback since Trump took over. The move signaled a pivot from confrontation to partial de-escalation and was hailed by economists as a lifeline for world trade.
In return, China suspended new restrictions on rare-earth mineral exports for at least one year, with an understanding that the suspension could be routinely extended. For Washington, this was no small concession. Rare earths—17 metallic elements critical to advanced technologies—form the backbone of America’s semiconductor, defense, and electric-vehicle industries. More than 70 percent of global production and 85 percent of refining capacity lie in Chinese hands, and when Beijing curbed exports in retaliation to earlier tariffs, it had paralyzed entire sectors of U.S. manufacturing. Restoring that supply flow was a strategic victory disguised as diplomacy.
Pressure on the White House had been mounting for months. Tech corporations and automakers warned of imminent shutdowns. The Pentagon privately admitted that major defense contractors depended on Chinese neodymium and dysprosium magnets for missile guidance and radar systems.
A U.S. Geological Survey report had cautioned that rebuilding a domestic supply chain could take up to ten years and cost more than $80 billion. Faced with that reality, Trump’s negotiators entered Busan with fewer cards than before, and Beijing knew it. Yet rather than triumphalism, China played its hand with deliberate restraint, focusing on pragmatism over posturing. Xi Jinping arrived at the summit not to lecture but to stabilize, projecting the tone of a statesman rather than a strategist of revenge.
Alongside the tariff cuts and rare-earth suspension came a surprising humanitarian dimension: a bilateral accord on fentanyl-precursor chemicals. China agreed to tighten monitoring of the compounds fueling America’s opioid epidemic, and in return, the U.S. halved its “fentanyl tariff” from 20 to 10 percent.
Xi also announced the resumption of large-scale Chinese purchases of American soybeans and other farm products, a symbolic win for U.S. farmers in the Midwest who had borne the brunt of earlier tariff wars. For Trump, that commitment provided domestic political relief; for Xi, it reaffirmed China’s leverage as the indispensable buyer in a fragile global food chain.
The meeting’s choreography reflected contrasting political cultures but a mutual understanding of necessity. Trump’s exuberant declaration that the talks were “twelve out of ten” was classic self-promotion, but analysts quickly noted the absence of concrete enforcement mechanisms. It was a deal built on goodwill and fatigue rather than trust.
Taiwan and semiconductor restrictions—particularly on the Nvidia Blackwell chip—were consciously excluded from discussion, a recognition that overloading the agenda could derail fragile progress. The leaders instead opted for a narrow corridor of cooperation, deferring confrontation to another day.
Another novel feature of the accord was its annual review mechanism, which replaced the rigidity of long-term treaties with a rolling, year-by-year renegotiation process. Rather than securing permanent peace, both sides built a framework of perpetual bargaining—flexible enough to adjust to political cycles yet risky enough to keep markets guessing.
It institutionalized uncertainty as the new normal, but also embedded the principle of dialogue into the heart of competition. For Trump, it ensured headlines and leverage; for Xi, it prevented the U.S. from dictating fixed terms that could constrain China’s long-term strategy. Both saw advantage in impermanence.
Markets reacted swiftly. The Baltic Dry Index stabilized, Pacific shipping surged, and global equities rose as investors sensed a return to predictability. The IMF projected a 0.4 percent boost to global GDP in 2026, primarily from revived trade flows and restored supply-chain continuity.
Analysts described the accord as a “pause, not peace.” It de-escalated the confrontation without resolving its causes. Beneath the smiles, the rivalry over technology, ideology, and global influence remained untouched. But Busan proved that rivalry need not mean rupture.
The deeper significance of the summit lay in what it revealed about the world’s economic transition. The age of laissez-faire globalization is fading. What emerged in Busan was the architecture of a managed economy—a hybrid system in which trade is weaponized yet indispensable, competitive yet cooperative.
America’s “America First” doctrine has evolved into “America Negotiates First,” while China’s “dual-circulation” model has shifted toward selective globalization. The WTO, once the arbiter of free trade, now stands eclipsed by the pragmatism of direct, leader-to-leader diplomacy. Every commodity—from semiconductors to soybeans—has become a bargaining chip in a global chess game where economic interdependence replaces ideology.
Yet the Busan accord also offered a rare glimpse of statesmanship amid rivalry. Xi Jinping’s calm assertion that “dialogue is better than confrontation” signaled a tactical but genuine openness. Trump, for his part, recognized—perhaps reluctantly—that economic coercion had reached its limits. Both leaders understood that in a world of intertwined supply chains, neither can thrive by isolating the other. The agreement thus stands as a testament not to friendship, but to realism: two adversaries choosing stability over escalation because chaos serves neither.
As the first container ships carrying newly authorized rare-earth cargoes departed Chinese ports, markets exhaled. The scene encapsulated the fragile peace that now defines global commerce—an uneasy equilibrium between competition and cooperation. The Busan agreement did not end the U.S.–China rivalry, but it transformed its character. It turned open confrontation into managed coexistence and replaced threats with transactions. The world may still be divided by politics, but it is bound by necessity. And in that necessity lies the quiet triumph of diplomacy over dominance—a reminder that in the twenty-first century, power belongs not to those who shout the loudest, but to those who can learn, at last, to deal.

Paris (Imran Y. CHOUDHRY) :- Former Press Secretary to the President, Former Press Minister to the Embassy of Pakistan to France, Former MD, SRBC Mr. Qamar Bashir analysis : When the British flooded China with opium in the nineteenth century, they did not merely poison a people; they paralyzed a civilization. China’s national will was broken, its economy dismantled, and its sovereignty sold to foreign powers. The Communist Revolution of 1949 ended that humiliation, abolishing monarchy and feudal privilege and rebuilding the state on socialist foundations. Yet even after political liberation, the struggle against material poverty continued.
By the start of the 1980s, China’s western frontier—especially Xinjiang—remained trapped in deprivation. The province’s per-capita GDP hovered around ¥400 (≈ US $60), barely one-tenth of the national coastal average. Literacy was below 65 percent, life expectancy only 57–58 years, and infant mortality exceeded 60 per thousand births. Unemployment and under-employment surpassed 20 percent, and fewer than 30 percent of households had access to electricity or clean drinking water. Roads were sparse, hospitals were few, and higher education enrollment stood below 7 percent of eligible youth.
In this bleak landscape, Deng Xiaoping’s declaration—“Development is the hard truth”—became a national turning point. His leadership and the political will of the Communist Party re-anchored policy around one principle: China could not rise if its western half remained behind.
The 1980s therefore marked a deliberate beginning. The state poured investment into education and human development. Thousands of rural schools were built, teacher-training colleges expanded, and adult literacy drives reached even remote villages. Within a decade, literacy climbed to 82 percent, and life expectancy rose to 63 years. Agriculture was revitalized under the household-responsibility system, lifting grain and cotton yields by more than 40 percent. Rural health clinics and cooperative medical schemes began to extend basic care.
The 1990s concentrated on physical connectivity. Xinjiang’s first expressway linked Urumqi to Korla, rail lines stretched toward Kashgar, and irrigation projects converted deserts into farmland. Electricity production tripled, clean-water access passed 60 percent, and telephone coverage reached nearly all prefectures. The region’s GDP surpassed ¥1,200 (≈ US $180) per person. More importantly, mobility and market access dismantled isolation.
The 2000s saw industrial take-off under the Western Development Strategy. Energy pipelines, fertilizer and textile plants, and logistics parks emerged across the province. Vocational institutes trained tens of thousands of rural youth for skilled work. Per-capita income reached ¥8,000 (≈ US $1,200) by 2010, and the poverty rate plunged from over 40 percent in 2000 to below 15 percent by the decade’s end. Stable housing, paved roads, and rural electrification transformed living conditions.
The 2010s globalized the province. With the launch of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xinjiang became China’s western gateway. The Khorgos Dry Port on the Kazakh border evolved into one of the world’s busiest inland logistics hubs, handling more than six million tons of freight annually. Rail links to Europe shortened delivery times from 45 days to 12. Border trade centers, warehouses, and customs-free zones created tens of thousands of private jobs. Tourism and cultural industries flourished, turning local music, dance, and crafts into engines of pride and prosperity. By 2018, GDP per capita exceeded ¥35,000 (≈ US $5,000) and urbanization passed 60 percent.
The 2020s have anchored the shift from expansion to innovation. Xinjiang’s deserts now glitter with solar panels and wind turbines generating over 35 percent of regional electricity. Smart farming uses artificial intelligence, drones, and sensors to manage water in the Tarim Basin. IT parks in Urumqi and Changji host software and e-commerce firms; local universities partner with national institutes on artificial-intelligence and renewable-energy research. High-speed rail now links Urumqi to Lanzhou and Beijing, cutting travel to under 11 hours. Literacy exceeds 99 percent, life expectancy tops 75 years, and infant mortality has fallen below 6 per thousand. Per-capita income approaches ¥45,000 (≈ US $6,300), and unemployment has dropped below 5 percent—a forty-year reversal of fortune.
Behind this transformation stands unwavering political will. Each Five-Year Plan built upon the last, guided by a leadership that fused vision with accountability. The Cadre Performance Appraisal System required every village and county head to meet quantifiable targets—jobs created, infrastructure completed, educational gains achieved, and environmental standards maintained. Those who delivered rose; those who failed were replaced. This meritocracy of performance ensured continuity across generations.
During the author’s visits in 2012–2013 and again in 2024, the transformation was visible not only in concrete but in confidence. Modern highways sliced through once-barren landscapes. Border bazaars bustled with Central-Asian traders. IT students filled new university campuses. Families who once lived in mud-brick houses now owned cars, smartphones, and small businesses. The people’s dignity matched their development.
Comparing Xinjiang’s condition in 1980 with its remarkable transformation by 2025 reveals a story of unprecedented human progress. Literacy has surged from around 65 percent to over 99 percent, reflecting universal education and vocational training that empowered every generation. Life expectancy, once limited to about 58 years, now exceeds 75 years, thanks to modern healthcare, improved nutrition, and cleaner living conditions. Infant mortality, which stood at nearly 60 deaths per thousand births, has fallen to less than 6, marking one of the most dramatic improvements in public health anywhere in the developing world. Per-capita GDP has multiplied from a mere ¥400 to about ¥45,000, turning subsistence living into economic self-sufficiency. Unemployment has plummeted from roughly 20 percent to around 5 percent, while urbanization has nearly tripled—from 23 percent to 68 percent—bringing modern amenities and new opportunities to millions. Perhaps most symbolic of all, electricity access, which reached fewer than one-third of households in 1980, is now universal, illuminating every home and powering a new era of industrial, agricultural, and digital advancement.
Xinjiang’s story now transcends its borders. It offers a replicable model for nations still trapped in cycles of poverty and underdevelopment. The region demonstrates how to transform an unskilled population into a skilled, confident workforce through mass education and vocational training; how to turn formidable deserts into power-producing fields of solar and wind energy; how to bring greenery and agriculture to barren lands using modern irrigation and AI-driven precision farming; and how to elevate primitive bazaars into vibrant commercial centers and cross-border markets that drive regional trade. Xinjiang also illustrates the leap from subsistence agriculture to high-productivity agribusiness and from negligible industrial output to a thriving manufacturing base capable of meeting domestic demand and exporting abroad.
For developing nations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, the Xinjiang model provides a roadmap—a synthesis of political commitment, institutional accountability, human-capital development, and environmental innovation. With local adaptation, the same principles can raise any struggling region: empower people with education, equip them with skills, connect them through infrastructure, and sustain them with green technology.
From the forgotten deserts of 1980 to the dynamic economy of 2025, Xinjiang’s journey proves that prosperity is built, not bestowed—a triumph of will, work, and wisdom. Its transformation stands as living proof that visionary leadership, disciplined planning, and social investment can lift not just a province, but an entire civilization from poverty to pride.

Paris (Imran Y. CHOUDHRY) :- Former Press Secretary to the President, Former Press Minister to the Embassy of Pakistan to France, Former MD, SRBC Mr. Qamar Bashir analysis : For decades, presidents of the United States have believed they could shape the world by interfering in other nations’ affairs—installing leaders of their choice, propping up allies who served their interests, and sidelining or imprisoning nationalist figures who threatened American designs. This pattern, repeated from Latin America to the Middle East, has been central to Washington’s projection of power. But under President Donald Trump, the limits of that model are becoming clear. Despite America’s military reach and financial muscle, there now stand two forces beyond Trump’s control: China, which has matured into an economic giant strong enough to resist U.S. leverage, and the American people themselves, who are openly challenging what they see as his king-like behavior. To this must be added a third failure closer to home—his inability to bring Congress into agreement, leaving the federal government paralyzed in a costly shutdown. Together, these three fronts expose the fragility of Trump’s leadership and the strain on America’s global standing.
For decades, Washington relied on leverage to bend others to its will. Yet China, over years of patient strategy, has taken its fate into its own hands. It has grown economically, financially, and industrially so strong that America can no longer dictate terms. Any attempt to coerce Beijing now risks countermeasures with devastating consequences for U.S. industry and commerce. The clearest example lies in rare earth minerals and magnets, critical to modern technology, where China holds near total dominance. Nearly 70% of global rare earth mining and over 85% of refining is controlled by Beijing, a chokehold over the materials that power smartphones, electric cars, wind turbines, and advanced weapons systems. When Beijing tightened its grip on exports, the United States was brought to its knees. Without these inputs, the American defense and tech industries risk collapse. Trump’s response has been to consider imposing another one-hundred percent tariff on Chinese goods—on top of the $361 billion in Chinese imports already tariffed since 2018—but Beijing has already diversified away from dependency on the American market. What once was a weapon of leverage for Washington is now a hollow threat.
China’s leverage extends far beyond minerals. It holds over $775 billion in U.S. Treasury securities, the largest foreign holder after Japan, and can disrupt the global currency balance by offloading them. It has built infrastructure and currency swap agreements across the Belt and Road Initiative, encompassing more than 150 countries and covering two-thirds of the world’s population, allowing trade in national currencies that bypass the dollar altogether. It possesses the capacity to redirect exports to other markets: in 2024, ASEAN overtook the U.S. as China’s largest trading partner, with bilateral trade worth more than $950 billion, compared to just $575 billion with the United States. By contrast, U.S. options look weak. Threatening to halt sales of civilian aircraft parts may wound Boeing more than Beijing, since over 25% of Boeing’s orders in the last decade came from China, worth nearly $150 billion. Proclaiming America as the ultimate consumer market rings hollow when China has been cultivating alternative demand across Asia, Africa, and Europe. Trump’s bluster of tariffs and ultimatums may play well to his base, but it cannot mask the reality that the United States has lost the upper hand. Only negotiation, not confrontation, offers a way forward, but the White House seems unwilling to admit it.
If China represents Trump’s international failure, the American people have emerged as his domestic challenge. Unlike Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, or Syria, where U.S. power crushed resistance, Trump now faces opposition at home that cannot be bombed into silence or destabilized through covert tricks. Across states and cities, nearly two million Americans have taken to the streets, protesting what they describe as Trump’s king-like conduct. They oppose his deployment of federal immigration forces and even National Guard units into states under circumstances that many legal scholars argue violate the Constitution. The Guard is meant to be mobilized for extraordinary threats, typically from foreign enemies, not to police civilians in peacetime. To many, Trump’s orders resemble the occupation of foreign lands rather than the governance of a democracy. Protesters chant that they do not want a king; they want liberty, dignity, and democracy respected. So far, their defiance has been largely peaceful, but if Trump continues his path of executive overreach, anger could boil over into violence, with consequences that would plunge the nation into crisis.
Trump has dismissed these accusations with irritation, insisting he is no monarch but a servant working day and night to restore America’s dignity and power. Yet perception matters, and his tone has only fueled resistance. Unlike pliant foreign regimes, the American people are vocal, organized, and fully aware of their rights. They are not easily subdued. If Trump cannot win their trust, his authority will be weakened from within, regardless of what strength he projects abroad. For a president who promised to put America first, alienating America itself is a damning irony. Perhaps he should take inspiration from his so-called “favorite” Field Marshal Asim Munir of Pakistan—a man who has managed to bend under his thumb not only the National Assembly, Senate, Judiciary, and Government, but also an entire population of 250 million. If Trump truly yearns to rule unchecked, maybe a mentoring session with Munir could teach him the dark arts of silencing institutions and crushing dissent. It would be a masterclass in authoritarian success, but one that destroys democracy in the process.
On a third front, Trump has stumbled in the political heart of Washington: the relationship with Congress. It is now the twenty-second day of a government shutdown, with no bipartisan agreement in sight to reopen the federal apparatus. The impasse revolves around social spending, especially healthcare and Social Security benefits for seniors, retirees, and the disabled. Democrats insist these programs be preserved at their previous levels; Trump threatens to cut them unless his budget priorities are met. In retaliation, he has warned that Democratic initiatives and projects will be frozen entirely if they refuse to yield. This standoff has left more than 800,000 federal workers unpaid, public services crippled, and international confidence in U.S. governance shaken. The economic cost has been staggering: independent estimates suggest the shutdown has already drained nearly $3 billion per week from the U.S. economy, with projections of as much as $24 billion in losses if it lasts two months, shaving 0.2% off quarterly GDP growth. Small businesses relying on federal contracts are collapsing, loan approvals are frozen, and families living paycheck to paycheck are being forced into debt. The possibility that the shutdown could extend for months looms over the nation like a shadow, underlining not only a breakdown of negotiation but a collapse of leadership. The president, ultimately responsible for ensuring the functioning of government, has instead become the architect of its paralysis.
The damage reverberates abroad. Allies and rivals alike are watching, noting that America cannot manage its own house, let alone dictate terms to others. Each passing day without resolution chips away at U.S. credibility. For Trump, the stakes are immense. His ability to govern effectively is being judged not only by his opponents but by history itself. To fail simultaneously in managing China, his own people, and his own legislature would mark not just a troubled presidency but a broken model of leadership. Yet so far, he has responded with threats and defiance rather than compromise and wisdom.
The way forward is clear, though whether Trump will take it is uncertain. He must abandon the illusion of unilateral control and return to democratic norms. He must negotiate in good faith with Congress to restore government operations, even if it means conceding ground. He must respect the constitutional limits on deploying federal forces in states, reassuring the public that their freedoms are safe. And he must recognize that with China, confrontation is a dead end; dialogue is the only path that preserves America’s interests without triggering global economic disruption. Every war, whether military, trade, or political, ends at the negotiating table. Sooner is always better than later, for the longer conflict drags on, the greater the damage to all sides.
Trump has prided himself on being a deal-maker, but at this crossroads he has become a breaker of deals, a divider of people, and a trigger of crises. His legacy will not be judged by the force of his threats but by his capacity to resolve conflicts constructively. If he fails to change course, his presidency may be remembered not for making America great again, but for revealing just how fragile its greatness had become.