Nada Tawfik
New York correspondent
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Donald and Ivana Trump disembark the Trump Princess Yacht in New York in 1988
When Donald Trump’s fortune has slowed down in the 1990s and he had to collect funds quickly, he sailed his 282 -foot Superyacht (85m), Princess Trump, in Asia hoping that he could attract the Rich from Japan.
It was not the first time that the businessman has requested Japanese buyers or lenders for his projects.
In the world of real-york real estate, Trump had a headquarters at the first row line of his skyscraper from the fifth avenue de la Folie d’Ackyo in the 80s of the emblematic American brands and properties, Including the Rockefeller Center.
It was then that his world vision on trade and American relations with his allies was formed, and his fixation on the prices, a tax on imports, began.
“He had a huge resentment for Japan,” said Barbara Res, former executive vice-president of the Trump organization.
He looked jealousy the Japanese businessmen were considered geniuses, she said. He felt that America did not have enough to help its ally in Japan in military defense.
Trump has often complained of having difficulty concluding large groups of Japanese businessmen.
“I am tired of seeing other countries tearing the United States.”
This quote from Trump could have been withdrawn from 2016, but it was actually in the late 80s when he made an appearance on CNN Larry King Live, roughly when he launched his name as potential presidential candidate.
Fresh to share his commercial philosophy in his 1987 book, The Art of the Deal, Trump made a tirade against American trade policies in national interviews.
In an animated interview with Oprah Winfrey in front of a live studio audience in the Oprah show, he said that he would manage foreign policy differently by making the country allies “pay for their fair share”.
He added that there was no free trade when Japan “poured” products on the American market, but made “impossible to do business”.
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Donald and Ivana Trump on Oprah Winfrey Show in April 1988
Jennifer Miller, an associate professor of history at Dartmouth College, said that others shared her concerns concerning the economy at the time.
Japan has provided competition for American manufacturing, especially in electronics and cars for the general public. While the American factories closed and the new Japanese brands entered the market, experts spoke of Japan exceeding the United States as a global economy.
“Trump is sort of symbolic of many people who questioned American leadership in the international order led by the Americans, and if that has really served the United States,” said Professor Miller.
Before his appearance of Oprah, Trump had spent nearly $ 100,000 to publish an “open letter” in full advertisements in three major American newspapers.
The title indicates: “There is nothing wrong with America’s foreign defense policy that a little dorsal thorn cannot heal.”
In this document, he said Japan and other nations have been enjoying the United States for decades. He said that “the Japanese, without hindrance by the enormous costs of the defense of themselves (as long as the United States does it for free), built a strong and dynamic economy with unprecedented surpluses”.
Trump thought that the obvious solution was to “tax” these rich nations.
“The world makes fun of American politicians while we protect the ships that we do not have, transporting oil that we do not need, intended for the allies who will not help,” he wrote.
Watch: Donald Trump opens in the 1998 interview on the BBC on surviving financial loss
More on Trump’s prices
The announcement was a powerful introduction to the vision of Trump’s foreign policy, according to Professor Miller. One relied on the zero-sleep belief that the allies are freeeloaders and that the liberal internationalist approach that had dominated since the Second World War was weak and stupid in a competitive world. The solution, he argued, was a more aggressive and protectionist trade policy.
“I think this is one of the reasons why he loves prices so much, it is that they correspond not only to his transactional ideology, but also to his sense of himself, which is very deeply rooted as successful profession, “she said. “And the fact that prices can be threatened; they can be suspended from another country.”
Clyde Prestowitz led negotiations with Japan during the Reagan administration as an adviser to the Secretary of Commerce. Long-standing criticism of free trade policies, he said that no one who was intellectually serious was affiliated with Trump or his simplistic approach at the time. He maintains that the president did not offer a real solution to the problems he raised.
“The prices are a kind of indicator that you can say, look at what I did, I hit these guys … so you know, you can be a hard guy. Whether or not to be effective or not Whatever it is really open to discussion. “
Mr. Prestowitz thinks that the real problem at the time and now is that the United States has no strategic manufacturing policy, although complaining about unfair trade.
Of course, the fears of the elevation of Japan have calmed down over time and now it is an ally. Rather, China is the most fierce business in the United States. This week, Trump welcomed the Prime Minister of Japan in the oval office as one of his first foreign visitors.
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Trump and Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba
But the governing philosophy of Donald Trump is always the same as when he was a young real estate developer. He always believes as strongly in prices as a tool to put pressure on other countries to open their markets and reduce trade deficits.
“He just says that all the time to anyone who listens whenever someone has been asking for, and it’s true for 40 years. And in all honesty for him, you know that it is a very natural way of seeing trade International, “said Michael Strain, a conservative American Enterprise Institute.
He says that students often share Trump’s intuitive thinking about the economy, and one of the great challenges that teachers are confronted is to convince them that their understanding is wrong.
Mr. Strain says that despite Trump’s grip on the party, with a position that has upset decades of republican adoption of free trade, he does not think that he is convinced of skeptical legislators, business leaders and economists.
The collation points remain that his opinions according to which foreign imports are bad, that the size of the trade deficit is a useful measure of the success of the policy or that the ideal state for the American economy is to import only goods which cannot be physically manufactured in the United States.
Strain believes that threats to increase the prices of American allies could reduce commercial investments and weaken international alliances.
Joseph Lavorgna, chief economist of the National Economic Council during Trump’s first mandate, believes that there was too close concentration on prices and not enough attempt to understand the overview of what Trump tries to accomplish.
He says that the president wants to galvanize the national industry, in particular the manufacture of high technology.
The administration, he explains, believes that they can encourage more companies to come to the United States using prices, combined with deregulation, cheaper energy and lower taxes, if they are promulgated by the congress.
“I think that President Trump understands something that is very important, being a businessman and being transactional, and it is free trade is excellent in theory, but in the real world, you must have a fair trade And it’s a fair playground. “
He bet that Donald Trump is right. Few Republicans have publicly opposed the President when he demands loyalty to his program.
However, some who have remained silent understand that their voters could be affected by the price increase, and hope that they will be able to convince Trump not to follow his beloved prices.
