The Fault Lines in China’s Power: America Must Build—and Use—Leverage Against Beijing

[Excerpt from essay by Ely Ratner, Principal at the Marathon Initiative. From 2021 to 2025, he served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs in the Biden administration; and Nick Danby, research associate at the Marathon Initiative. He previously served as a U.S. naval intelligence officer.] The U.S.-Chinese trade war of 2025 lasted barely a month, but the strategic deficit it exposed had been festering for decades. On April 2, his so-called Liberation Day, U.S. Pres