The United States says it is being looted by the world in trade and wants compensation.

This looting has happened through the US not being able to export as much as it imports because of a strong dollar. And the dollar is permanently strong because the whole world uses it and it is constantly in demand. The US is thus forced to have a high trade deficit with most nations, including its allies, who ‘cheat’ the US through subsidising their home companies and keeping their currencies artificially low.

And then the US also spends trillions on the safety of the world by maintaining military bases across the globe and fighting wars. The world must repay the US by accepting President Donald Trump’s new customs duties without retaliation and buying more things from the US, including defence equipment. They must also invest in factories in the US — or they can simply send money to the US treasury.

This, more or less, is the plan that the US president has presented before the world, asking it to pay up. Whether this is fair or not — or based on facts or not — is a separate matter. The US trade deficit is linked to its budget deficit and overspending, requiring capital to come from abroad to make up the gap.

Meanwhile, the world has not asked America to set up bases outside its borders. Who the US attacks and who it defends is not based on some global consensus but a US assessment, which it carries out alone. But all that is, as I said, separate. The issue at hand is this: Can a competent plan on a vital matter be incompetently........

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