Do Nothing. Win.

by Ahnaf Ibn Qais

Ahnaf Ibn Qais argues that given rising tensions between China & the United States, especially in areas like Trade & Commerce, the best move for the Europeans is To Not Play this Game in the First Place, & seek instead a fluid & neutral path, away from said Clash.

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The American empire is lashing out in its twilight.

In 2025, it launched a sweeping escalation of its trade war with China: 145% tariffs on Chinese goods, sweeping investment bans, & renewed tech sanctions.

Publicly, Washington talks of national security, fentanyl, & protecting democracy.

But underneath the surface, the motives are simpler: fear & decline.

The United States no longer believes it can compete with China.

& so it reaches for the tools of desperation — weaponized tariffs, diplomatic coercion, & economic self-sabotage masked as strategy.

China, for its part, is not crumbling. It is consolidating.

With retaliatory tariffs of 125% & tighter export controls on rare earths & critical minerals, Beijing is not merely reacting — it is signalling power.

It offers trade talks on its terms, not as a supplicant but as a near-peer.

The balance of the global economy is shifting eastward, & Europe — caught in the middle — must decide whether to cling to a declining Atlantic order or position itself for a post-American century.

The answer is clear. Europe should choose neither. It should choose silence.

Because in a negative-sum world war of trade, the wisest move is refusal.

Brussels faces pressure on all sides:

Washington wants loyalty: follow our lead, impose your tariffs, reduce dependence on Chinese supply chains, & reorient your industry toward American subsidies & manufacturing.

The U.S. is even directly targeting Europe — steel, aluminum, autos — as punishment for failing to align.

Meanwhile, Beijing offers quiet openings: trade cooperation, long-term supply agreements, & conditional diplomatic overtures.

Everyone wants the EU to move.

But movement right now is weak. Stillness is sovereignty.

America’s economic strategy in 2025 is not a plan — it’s a convulsion.

Lacking internal consensus, fiscal sustainability, & long-term industrial capacity, it defaults to aggression.

The CHIPS Act, the IRA, the sweeping tariffs — these are not signs of strength but of panic.

They are the actions of an empire whose institutions erode faster than its ambitions.

Europe must not mistake this flailing for leadership.

It must not mistake American demands for transatlantic solidarity.

What the United States calls “friend-shoring” is economic centralization in imperial dress.

It wants European industry tethered to Washington’s boom-bust subsidy cycles.

It wants European foreign policy as an echo of its own.

& most of all, it wants someone else to pay the price for its managed decline.

That price would be enormous.

Europe depends on China for vital industrial components, pharmaceuticals, renewable energy technologies, & export markets.

A crude decoupling would devastate already fragile European supply chains & deepen inflationary pressures across the continent.

Worse, it would tie Europe to a geopolitical strategy it doesn’t control — one that could spiral into open confrontation.

& what does it gain in return?

Washington’s temporary favour?

Access to American subsidies?

Tariffs suspended at whim?

This is not an alliance. It’s leverage.

Meanwhile, China is not standing still.

Despite internal vulnerabilities — debt overhang, demographic headwinds, political rigidity — it is acting with strategic clarity.

It is investing in supply chain resilience, expanding its reach in the Global South, & presenting itself not as a challenger to the “rules-based order,” but as the alternative.

It offers Europe a vision of post-American multipolarity: trade without loyalty tests & access without ideological vetting.

This is not benign, but it is predictable. & more importantly, it is structurally durable in a way Washington’s strategy no longer is.

So what should Europe do?

Nothing.

Not literally — trade must continue, diplomacy must proceed, alliances must be managed.

However, strategically, Europe should adopt a posture of principled non-alignment.

It should neither join America’s crusade nor submit to China’s overtures.

It should buy Time, diversify, trade with both, trust neither, & prepare for what comes next.

The true challenge of our moment is not American or Chinese dominance — it is managing the interregnum between empires.

The old order is breaking down, but the new one is not yet fully born.

This transition will be defined by volatility: tariff wars, currency instability, resource constraints, & regional realignments.

Every actor who overcommits to one side will be punished by history.

Neutrality, in this context, is not cowardice. It is preparation.

Let America plunge into a ruinous tariff spiral, & let China retaliate with poise.

Let both accuse Europe of irrelevance. That’s fine.

Let them underestimate the quiet strength of a continent that remembers decline more intimately than either empire does.

Because Europe knows this cycle, it knows what it is to overreach, decay, & collapse under the weight of unearned ambition.

That knowledge should not breed passivity, but it should breed caution.

While America hurls itself toward isolation & China quietly builds alternative systems, Europe must insulate itself from both their catastrophes.

To do this, it must shed illusions.

There is no return to postwar Atlanticism.

There is no second American century.

The moral clarity of the Cold War is gone.

This is a world of shifting alignments, failing infrastructure, resource entropy, & slow-burning crises.

The side that survives is the one that stays liquid, not rigid.

That means resisting Washington’s calls to “show resolve " & ignoring Beijing's calls to “balance against the West.”

It means doing the hardest thing in strategy: refusing momentum.

What looks like drift is poise. What appears indecisive may be deliberate.

Europe must remember its Machiavellian roots — the art of appearing motionless while repositioning internally.

There is no need for declarations. There is only a need for preparation.

So let America rage. Let China rise. Let the two powers degrade each other in a global contest of tariffs, sabotage, & exhaustion.

Europe must not be the third victim in their struggle.

It must be the aloof survivor.

Because in a negative-sum world, every active participant loses. The only victory left is to withstand.

Do nothing. Win.

In an age of imperial decay, refusing to play is the only game left.

But survival is not passive.

It must be cultivated — institutionally, economically, psychologically.

Europe must relearn the art of redundancy: dual sourcing, energy buffers, skilled labour, local production, & public trust.

It must assume that supply chains will break, alliances will fracture, & shocks will cascade.

Resilience is not a slogan — it is systems architecture built for a world where volatility is the baseline.

To refuse the game is not to retreat — it is to design a different one.

A slower one. A quieter one. One rooted not in dominance but in duration.

History will not be kind to the reckless, nor to those with lofty ambitions.

But it may spare the prepared.

Do nothing. Win.