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 : On September 3, 2025, Beijing staged one of the most consequential parades in modern history — a stunning display of military power, technological mastery, and economic confidence. While commemorating the end of World War II, the underlying message was unmistakable: China, backed by its allies, is reshaping the global order, and the United States is no longer in control.
The symbolism was striking. Standing alongside Xi Jinping were Russia’s Vladimir Putin, India’s Narendra Modi, Pakistan’s Anwaar-ul-Haq, and leaders from across the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). What was once an informal alliance has now transformed into a strategic political and economic bloc. These nations, once victims of Donald Trump’s tariffs, sanctions, and unilateral dictates, have now coalesced into a united front, openly rejecting Washington’s domination and charting an independent path forward.
The parade showcased China’s breathtaking technological advances and unprecedented military preparedness. Rolling past the gathered leaders were the DF-5C intercontinental ballistic missile with a staggering range of 20,000 kilometers, the road-mobile DF-61 ICBM designed for rapid deployment, and hypersonic YJ-series missiles capable of penetrating U.S. carrier strike groups at Mach speeds. Among the most discussed revelations were the LY-1 laser systems capable of disabling drones, satellites, and ballistic projectiles within seconds; autonomous submarine drones like the AJX-002 designed for stealth nuclear delivery; swarm-capable torpedo-shaped sea drones; AI-powered “robot wolves” engineered for reconnaissance and battlefield dominance; and the Type-100 intelligent battle tank — a next-generation armored platform integrating real-time data with precision strike capabilities. China’s fully operational nuclear triad of land-based missiles, submarine-launched warheads, and air-deployed systems was on full display, demonstrating its complete strategic deterrence readiness.
For decades, the Pentagon believed U.S. technological superiority was untouchable. But Beijing’s show of force shattered that illusion. Analysts in Washington, Brussels, and Tokyo were forced to confront an undeniable reality: China can now match or exceed U.S. capabilities in precision strike, strategic range, and integrated defense. The balance of power has shifted irreversibly, forcing even America’s closest allies to reconsider where true leadership lies.
Yet China’s dominance is not based on weapons alone; it rests on a deeper foundation of economic strength. Trump’s tariffs, designed to cripple Beijing’s industrial power, instead exposed America’s own vulnerabilities. China today controls over 90 percent of global rare-earth magnet production and nearly 85 percent of semiconductor-grade mineral processing — the very materials required for smartphones, electric vehicles, AI chips, advanced computing, fighter jets, precision missiles, and hypersonic weapons. When Beijing announced export restrictions on seven critical rare-earth elements in early 2025, requiring special licenses for buyers, the shockwaves reverberated across the United States. Tesla halted electric vehicle production. Apple suspended multiple iPhone lines. Lockheed Martin delayed its F-35 fighter jet deliveries. Silicon Valley startups braced for mass layoffs. Defense contractors scrambled to secure emergency stockpiles of materials essential to sustain their production pipelines. For the first time, the United States found itself dependent on Beijing’s will to maintain the heartbeat of its technological infrastructure.
Washington responded by pouring billions into domestic rare-earth mining projects under the Defense Production Act, hoping to reduce reliance on China. But without Beijing’s decades-long refining infrastructure, recovery will take at least a decade, if not longer. Even as Trump threatened harsher tariffs to force China’s compliance, Xi Jinping did not flinch. The world saw, perhaps for the first time, that America’s economic lifeline had shifted decisively eastward.
While Washington reacted defensively, Beijing quietly built an entirely new architecture of global trade and influence. Through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has connected more than 150 countries via roads, railways, ports, energy pipelines, industrial zones, and digital corridors. Unlike the West’s traditional dependency model, Beijing offered investment, infrastructure, and market access on terms many developing nations found more equitable. Across Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe, countries that once relied on U.S. aid and NATO trade structures are now participating in Beijing’s economic ecosystem. By empowering local economies through financing and infrastructure, China created an alternative model of prosperity — one based on cooperation rather than coercion.
India’s defiance of Washington perfectly captures this new reality. When the U.S. demanded New Delhi stop importing discounted Russian oil, India firmly rejected the ultimatum, declaring that no foreign power had the authority to dictate its survival strategy. Through partnerships with Russia, Iran, and China under SCO frameworks, India secured energy stability, modernized its infrastructure, and strengthened its role in regional connectivity projects. Russia, for its part, proved remarkably resilient against U.S. and EU sanctions. Instead of buckling under Western economic isolation, Moscow deepened its energy and defense ties with Beijing and New Delhi, shifted trade settlements into yuan and rupees, and bypassed dollar-dominated systems. This acceleration of de-dollarization weakened Washington’s financial leverage and strengthened the SCO bloc’s independence.
This alliance of Trump’s intended economic “targets” has evolved into an integrated powerhouse. The SCO bloc now represents nearly half the world’s population, accounts for 30 percent of global GDP, and controls over 40 percent of global oil and gas reserves. By aligning supply chains, financial systems, and technological ecosystems, these nations have built collective resilience capable of resisting U.S. pressure. Where Trump’s tariffs once aimed to divide and weaken, they have instead unified and empowered an alternative leadership.
At the same time, the Western bloc is fracturing. The once-cohesive alliance of the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the European Union is splintering under the weight of Trump’s unilateral policies. European nations, increasingly frustrated with Washington’s dictates on trade, defense, immigration, and foreign policy, are asserting their independence. This shift became unmistakable when Trump offered unconditional U.S. support for Israel during the Gaza conflict. The move alienated much of Europe, which faced growing public pressure over mounting civilian casualties. In a historic development, several European nations — including Germany, France, Spain, Ireland, and multiple Nordic countries — have declared their intent to recognize the State of Palestine at the upcoming United Nations General Assembly session, directly defying U.S. policy. This unprecedented divergence highlights the erosion of Washington’s influence over its closest allies and demonstrates the widening cracks within NATO’s traditional sphere.
Two competing global models are now emerging. The U.S.-led Western approach remains rooted in military interventions, sanctions, and economic dominance, using pressure to force compliance while destabilizing regions and fueling refugee crises. In contrast, the China-led model prioritizes economic inclusion, infrastructure investment, fair trade, and mutual respect for sovereignty. Developing nations across Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East increasingly see tangible benefits from Beijing’s partnerships — schools, hospitals, roads, digital connectivity — while associating Washington’s interventions with bombing campaigns, regime changes, and social collapse.
In his parade address, Xi Jinping underscored this vision of inclusive leadership, declaring that no force on Earth can stop China’s rise but emphasizing that the world is vast enough for every nation to prosper together. His message of fairness, dignity, and mutual respect resonated far beyond Beijing’s immediate circle. The SCO bloc and Belt and Road partnerships now symbolize an aspirational alternative for hundreds of millions seeking growth without subjugation, stability without domination, and prosperity without conditional dependency.
For Washington, this moment represents an existential challenge. Trump’s tariffs, sanctions, and coercive diplomacy — once feared — now appear hollow against an integrated multipolar order. U.S. dominance is eroding not on the battlefield but in boardrooms, investment platforms, and supply chains. America now faces a stark choice: adapt to this transformed reality, cooperate within a new framework of equality, and rebuild global trust — or cling to outdated tools of force and economic manipulation until its influence fades into irrelevance.
On September 3, 2025, Beijing delivered a message that echoed across continents. China is no longer rising — it is leading. And it leads not through conquest but through trade, technology, investment, and inclusion. The world is reorganizing around this reality, and for the first time in a century, Washington is no longer writing the script.

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 the past 30 years, the United States has unintentionally paved the path for China’s meteoric rise. While America slept, content in its global dominance, China was meticulously building—quietly, efficiently, and comprehensively. And now, in 2025, the tables are turning. The U.S. is waking up to the realization that it has become alarmingly dependent on its once-silent economic rival.
China’s strategy was never haphazard. It was deliberate and state-driven. It began by creating massive industrial infrastructure at home, offering subsidies to companies, absorbing their liabilities, and providing utilities at heavily reduced costs. This resulted in the emergence of highly cost-effective yet qualitative manufacturing clusters, backed by a skilled and disciplined workforce trained through a state-supported education system. In contrast, U.S. industries were burdened with high labor costs, stringent environmental regulations, and legal hurdles. Setting up industrial infrastructure in America was a slow, expensive, and risky endeavor. Faced with this disparity, American corporations found shifting production to China not just appealing, but imperative for survival.
China’s strategy went beyond just making goods. It invited American companies to “design in the U.S., manufacture in China.” The U.S. retained the illusion of control while surrendering its industrial edge. Over time, China began replacing foreign designs with its own. It sent millions of students to top U.S. universities, many in STEM fields, and used that knowledge to build its domestic R&D base. China’s R&D spending now exceeds $460 billion annually—second only to the U.S., but growing rapidly and backed by centralized national direction.
One of the most egregious strategic errors was in the mineral and rare-earth sector. Instead of setting up refining units within U.S. borders, American firms began shipping raw materials to China for processing, lured by low costs. Today, China controls over 60% of the world’s rare earth refining capacity and 80% of global graphite processing—both critical for high-tech industries like electric vehicles, defense, and semiconductors.
China also capitalized on its dominance in global shipping. As the U.S. shipbuilding industry shrank—now accounting for less than 1% of global output—China surged ahead. Over 43% of the world’s commercial vessels are now built in Chinese shipyards. As a result, the entire global supply chain, including America’s, relies on Chinese-built vessels operating in Chinese-managed logistics routes.
As of 2024, China leads the world in AI research publications, quantum computing patents, 5G infrastructure, and has even launched its own satellite navigation system, BeiDou, which rivals America’s GPS. In semiconductors, China now dominates several parts of the value chain—from mining critical minerals to chip assembly—while the U.S. struggles to regain ground after decades of neglect.
On the energy front, China saw the future. Knowing that high-tech industries—from AI to quantum computing—require colossal amounts of power, it rapidly expanded its energy infrastructure. Between 2000 and 2023, China added over 1,200 GW of power capacity. It now has the largest solar, wind, and hydroelectric capacity in the world, along with growing nuclear and coal infrastructure. The U.S., meanwhile, has suffered from energy bottlenecks and aging grids, with nearly 70% of transmission lines more than 25 years old.
Then came China’s most brilliant geopolitical stroke—the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Launched in 2013, BRI is a multitrillion-dollar infrastructure, trade, and development strategy connecting Asia, Africa, Europe, and Latin America. China built highways, ports, railroads, and energy grids in 153 countries, creating a global trade and political network. The result? China no longer relied solely on exports to the U.S. Today, American demand accounts for just 12% of China’s exports—down from over 20% two decades ago.
The Trump administration attempted to reverse this trend by imposing tariffs on Chinese goods, hoping to hurt China economically and financially. But it underestimated China’s resilience. Instead of collapsing, China retaliated with its own tariffs and expanded trade with other partners, particularly in the Global South.
Worse still, as China invested its trade surpluses into infrastructure and defense, the U.S. was caught off guard. China now boasts the world’s largest navy, cutting-edge hypersonic missiles, space-based sensors, and cyberwarfare capabilities. Its military is indigenous, highly disciplined, and rapidly modernizing.
Even the once-unquestioned dominance of the U.S. dollar is under threat. BRICS nations, along with others like Brazil, Russia, India, and Saudi Arabia are exploring non-dollar trade settlements. If this trend continues, and the dollar loses its reserve currency status, America’s economic supremacy could be fatally undermined.
What hurts more is the realization that the U.S. lacks any meaningful leverage left both economic and military. China has become self-reliant in industrial inputs, diversified its markets through BRI, and built independent platforms in AI, defense, and digital currency.
The strength of America once lay not just in wealth, but in strategic foresight. That foresight is what’s missing now. Internal political divisions, power struggles between Congress, the Senate, and the White House, the bureaucracy, civil society and Judiciary, and a weakening consensus on national direction are all stalling progress.
Yet, all is not lost.
The United States still has world-class universities, unmatched innovative talent, abundant natural resources, and deep global alliances. What it needs is a paradigm shift—not just in economics, but in strategic, technological, and geopolitical thinking. It must rebuild its industrial base, repatriate key supply chains, invest in new power infrastructure, create its own version of BRI, and, above all, unite its political machinery toward a common national goal.
History has shown that America has the capacity to reinvent itself. From the post-WWII recovery to the space race, the U.S. has overcome structural crises before. The question is: does it still have the grit to do so now?
Time is ticking. The first step must be bold, focused, and unrelenting—because China is already racing ahead, and the window of strategic opportunity is narrowing with each passing year.

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 : Donald Trump’s return to aggressive protectionism—through sweeping tariffs on allies and rivals alike—has ignited what can only be described as a global trade war, or more aptly, a form of “tariff terrorism.” Cloaked in the rhetoric of “America First,” these economic policies were touted as the tools that would restore American greatness. Instead, they have exposed the diminishing grip of U.S. hegemony and accelerated the emergence of a multipolar world where unilateralism no longer commands submission.
China’s response to Trump’s tariffs is equally telling. Initially targeted with punitive duties reaching 145% on certain goods, Beijing did not fold. Instead, it recalibrated. By diversifying its trade relationships and reducing reliance on the U.S. market—now only accounting for 12% of China’s total exports—China insulated itself from American economic warfare. State propaganda turned Trump into a laughingstock, nicknaming him “Tariff Grandpa” and mocking U.S. inflation, while Chinese consumers embraced patriotic boycotts and switched from iPhones to Huawei.
More importantly, China didn’t come begging. Instead, it issued its own ultimatum: all tariffs must be removed, ab initio, or there will be no negotiations. Trump’s boast that President Xi would come “running on his knees” proved a fantasy. The tables have turned. Today, Trump’s team is the one chasing a deal while China plays hardball with its own set of strategic levers—like restricting rare earth exports vital to U.S. tech and defense.
Trump’s tariff strategy was initially framed as a corrective measure against trade deficits and so-called unfair practices, especially targeting China. But soon, the net widened to include America’s closest allies—Canada, Mexico, and the European Union. Steel and aluminum tariffs on Canada, for example, struck at the heart of a nation that sends 75% of its exports to the U.S., risking over 2.5 million jobs and nearly 20% of its GDP. To many Canadians, this was akin to a trusted firefighter torching their home and then demanding they hand over the deed for the promise of rebuilding.
Canada, once America’s most dependable partner, struck back with retaliatory tariffs on $155 billion worth of U.S. goods—from coffee and cars to ketchup and orange juice. Simultaneously, consumer prices in the U.S. rose due to higher import costs, pushing inflation up and GDP growth down. According to independent economic analyses, Trump’s tariffs contributed to a nearly 3% hit on U.S. GDP and stoked a persistent inflationary trend. The Yale Budget Lab estimated that his blanket tariff regime lifted the effective U.S. tariff rate to its highest level since 1943—an astounding shift in a matter of months.
Yet, Trump insists these measures are about reciprocity. “Other nations have taken advantage of us,” he says. But what is rarely acknowledged is that the U.S. has enjoyed an 80-year advantage since it established the dollar as the world’s reserve currency post-WWII. That singular privilege has allowed it to run deficits others could not afford. Trump’s zero-sum worldview ignores this history, bulldozing through nuanced economic relationships in favor of brute-force diplomacy.
What he and his acolytes misunderstand is that trust—not fear—is the bedrock of global trade. When the U.S. unilaterally imposes tariffs on allies and tears up treaties like the USMCA, it shatters that trust. Trump has turned America’s traditional leadership role into a transactional, coercive enterprise. As a result, even America’s friends are turning elsewhere. In 2024, China overtook the U.S. in trade volume with the European Union—€856 billion versus €822 billion—a symbolic but significant shift in global allegiances.
Meanwhile, Europe, another target of Trump’s scorn, has closed ranks. His attacks on NATO, his support for authoritarian-leaning figures like Viktor Orbán, and his lecturing of EU leaders by political novices like JD Vance have unified the continent in resistance. They are no longer willing to accept the U.S. as the sole arbiter of global order. What Trump saw as leverage turned into alienation. A once-cohesive transatlantic alliance now navigates its future with less dependence on Washington.
This unraveling of global goodwill is compounded by economic damage at home. Tariffs don’t make America stronger—they hurt American families and businesses. One importer, who once paid $26,000 in annual tariffs, now faces a $346,000 bill due to the new 104% tariff on Chinese goods. Small manufacturers have seen input costs skyrocket. And while some champions of re-industrialization argue for building local supply chains, the short-term impact is crushing. Trump’s protectionism may eventually lead to a more roboticized, domestic manufacturing base—but at what social and economic cost?
Far from creating a golden age, Trump’s trade policies are inviting stagflation—a toxic combination of stagnant growth and rising prices. This chaos has eroded America’s standing, both economically and diplomatically. At a time when coordinated responses to climate change, AI governance, and global debt crises are desperately needed, Trump’s America is retreating into isolationism and infighting.
The irony is brutal. The tariffs meant to punish foreign adversaries have instead punished domestic consumers. The trade wars meant to lower deficits have likely widened them. The vision of renewed American strength has manifested as global disillusionment. And the promise to bring adversaries to heel has revealed an unsettling truth: the world is no longer America’s to command.
What remains now is the wreckage of broken agreements, the fraying of alliances, and the slow but steady realization that the 21st century will not be defined by a single superpower. The multipolar world has arrived—with China, the EU, and even smaller economies like Canada standing their ground. America still matters, immensely so, but it must lead by example, not coercion. Trump’s tariffs have done what no global coalition could achieve: they’ve exposed the limits of American power.
And so, as the dust settles on Trump’s tariff regime, one fact becomes clear—economic nationalism may win elections, but it rarely wins wars.