More than a month into Trump's presidency, a kind of political earthquake is unfolding across various parts of the world, from West and East Asia and Europe to North, Central, and South America. In his second term, unburdened by the constraints and considerations of his first, Trump, through proposing astonishing, unacceptable, and sometimes colonialist views regarding neighboring and friendly countries as well as strategic rivals and enemies, has sought to send a strong message to the world: America, under his presidency, will return to its former superpower status, and countries that refuse to accept this will be penalized.
This bullying approach, which Donald Trump and his key advisors refer to as "Return to Peace Through Strength" or "America First," although targeting Canada, Mexico, Panama, America’s transatlantic partners, Ukraine, and the Islamic Republic of Iran, is primarily aimed at one actor: the only country that American strategists believe possesses the necessary potential for global competition with the United States and could soon become a serious obstacle to America's unchallenged supremacy in the international system—the "People's Republic of China"!
Principally, the global approach of the US government is outlined in national security documents, among the most authoritative documents of governance in the country, typically published by the White House every four years. The Trump administration has not yet formulated a new national security document for its second term, but his stances, declared policies, and actions reveal that his general outlook on foreign policy has not significantly changed. In the 2017 National Security Strategy document of the first Trump administration, Russia and China were defined as "revisionist powers" posing a threat to America's economic supremacy, influence, and value system in the global arena.
Among these two global powers, China, due to its astonishing progress in the economic sphere, has caused greater concern for the US government. Moreover, the protracted war in Ukraine has, by itself, weakened America's other national security rival and threat, Russia, at least in the short term, inflicting serious blows to its economy, influence, and global credibility.
In the 2017 National Security Strategy document, Trump set four "pillars" for his foreign policy: "Protect the American People, the Homeland, and the American Way of Life"; "Promote American Prosperity"; "Preserve Peace Through Strength"; and "Advance American Influence." These four principles remain the roadmap for the Trump administration in its current term. Accordingly, it appears his administration, by deporting illegal immigrants and imposing tariffs on goods imported from Canada, Mexico, and China, is attempting to protect the American economy and people’s jobs and increase prosperity in his country. By striving to end the Gaza and Ukraine wars (through proposing strange and colonialist suggestions to the Palestinian and Ukrainian sides), he aims to operationalize "peace through strength." Ultimately, the goal remains "advancing American influence," for which the most significant obstacle at this juncture is China—a country that, unlike Russia, North Korea, and Iran, is not embroiled in serious regional crises or economic problems and has ambitious, yet practical and realistic, plans to play a global leadership role.
Therefore, the Trump administration's efforts to contain China are no secret. However, what this article intends to emphasize and draw attention to is China's response to this approach! Recent actions by China in the past months indicate that the country's ruling body was not surprised by Trump's election to the presidency and his anti-China measures, and they have coherent plans to respond to and even exploit them to their advantage. In the first step, it seems Beijing has learned many lessons from Donald Trump's first term and has strived to compensate for and rectify its weaknesses and damaging policies. For instance, in the past term, President Xi Jinping would issue immediate reactions to Trump's actions. However, this time, understanding the futility of this approach, he has adopted a new direction, focusing on preparing China to confront threats and reveal multiple winning cards to surprise the Trump administration. In other words, Chinese officials now recognize and understand Trump’s tactics and have concluded that they can influence his administration.
The next step of the Chinese government to counter Trump has been to enter competitive arenas that are low-tension but high-yield and pride-inducing for the Chinese people. In this vein, one of China's serious policies is the development of technology and innovation in vital fields such as electric vehicles, solar energy, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing, with the aim of expanding its influence and presence in the global arena. "DeepSeek" is a clear symbol of this.
"DeepSeek" is a Chinese artificial intelligence chatbot, financially supported by the Chinese company "iFlytek," which was released on January 20, 2025, precisely on Donald Trump's inauguration day, to send a firm and powerful message to the new US President. Prior to the release of this Chinese chatbot, America was the world's leading power in producing AI chatbots, and ChatGPT, produced by "OpenAI," had no serious global competitor. However, the unveiling of DeepSeek challenged America's unrivaled status in the field of AI chatbots.
Like other Chinese products that are exported to various countries on a large scale and at low prices, conquering global markets one by one, the DeepSeek AI chatbot has followed the same path, as it possesses some distinct features. This chatbot, due to requiring fewer chips, was produced at a much lower cost (only $6 million) compared to ChatGPT. In other words, well-known Western AI models use about 16,000 specialized chips, but DeepSeek has trained its AI model in such a way that it only 1 needs 2,000 advanced chips and thousands of lower-level chips, which is why this product is produced cheaper and more affordably than Western models.
On the other hand, China has managed to reduce hardware costs by manufacturing domestic chips. This has lessened China's dependence on Western technologies and made the development of artificial intelligence in this country more independent. As a result, unlike Western companies that depend on procuring expensive components and infrastructure, China is capable of developing AI models with a much lower budget, and this can, over time, challenge the pricing and monopoly of Western technology companies and threaten America's dominance in global artificial intelligence.
DeepSeek also differs from other chatbots, including ChatGPT, in other aspects, as it explains its reasoning process before providing an answer to a user's request. This means greater transparency of responses and higher user trust (addressing a serious weakness of other smart chatbots). Consequently, the mobile application of this product reached the top of the list of the most popular iPhone applications in the United States after its release, and according to statistics, by January 25, 2025, it had been downloaded 1.6 million times and ranked first in iPhone application stores in countries such as Australia, Canada, China, Singapore, the United States, and the United Kingdom.
Of course, this is just the starting point of the Chinese competitive spirit in this field. China has developed a smart and dynamic technological ecosystem in recent years, with its various parts exhibiting excellent complementarity. Accordingly, coinciding with the increase in the number of DeepSeek AI users to more than 20 million daily active users in less than two months, Chinese automakers are also rapidly adopting and utilizing it and aim to be pioneers by integrating this AI into the production of new and smart vehicles. Therefore, in the near future, we will witness the enhanced quality of Chinese cars and other products and increased global consumer استقبال (reception/acceptance) of them. In other words, this technological innovation inherently increases China's economic and geopolitical power, consequently increasingly reshaping global politics.
Unlike the nuclear arms race, which had a definite end, competitions in the field of artificial intelligence have no clear end. Instead, it is a continuous battle to set standards, guide key innovations, and shape the rules of the future. Thus, competition in artificial intelligence is not about who succeeds in producing a particular product, but about who can set the best standards, guide innovation, and influence the future of the global order, and China is striving to become a decisive country and leader in this field without direct conflict with the United States.
Based on this, it seems Chinese officials have an even deeper belief than Vladimir Putin, the Russian President, who said to his country's students in September 2017: "The country that masters leadership in artificial intelligence technology will rule the world." Consequently, they are striving to provide a smart response to Trump's threats and pressures. They have not engaged in costly military or even economic actions, empty rhetoric and slogans, or futile political games. They have chosen an arena for competition and confrontation with Trump's totalitarianism that leaders of other countries, even if they wanted to, cannot condemn or criticize, and global public opinion cannot have any position other than admiration for it. Chinese officials have concluded that if America is seeking greater prosperity and development for its people and influence in the world, so should they, and the success of this approach lies in answering "development with development," "technology with technology," and "influence with influence."
Azam Malayi; Researcher and Scholar of International Relations
(The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the IPIS)