How China could strike back at Trump’s tariffs

America’s industries, including defense, outsourced tens of thousands of key parts to China during the past 20 years. US manufacturers don’t produce capacitors, accumulators, pumps, compressors, switching equipment and other essential equipment for US electrical utilities.

None of these are hard to manufacture or expensive when manufactured in volume. But rebuilding industrial capacity for a wide range of critical inputs would be extremely expensive. Key dependencies on Chinese imports make America vulnerable to Chinese retaliation in the event of a trade war.