Why Trump's Misguided China Tariffs Won't Help the US

Last week, the White House announced plans to levy tariffs on up to $60 billion of Chinese imports. The primary, and legal, rationale hinges on the little-used Section 301 of a 1974 trade law that permits retaliation against countries that infringe US intellectual-property rights. Determined to halt what it perceives as a steady decline relative to an emergent China, the Trump administration and not a few voices in Congress are embracing a tough-on-China approach that they believe will at long last reassert American primacy. It will not; the strategy and the tactics of this trade war are a classic case of fighting not just the last war but fighting it on the adversary's terrain. Zachary Karabell is head of Global Strategies Envestnet and the president of River Twice Research.