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I am reading this article. Therein it is stated that:

Under national security grounds (Section 232), Trump applied tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminium in March 2018, covering $ 10.2 bn and $ 7.7 bn of US steel and aluminium imports, respectively

The paper further explains:

Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 gives authority to impose or increase tariffs on imports that are thought to threaten national security

It might be due to my complete unfamiliarity with the subject, but I fail to see any connection.

How do Mr. Trump and other adherents of this policy reason that steel Imports threaten national security?

Ludi
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4 Answers4

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By allowing the import of steel, you encourage the dissolution through insolvency of native steel firms (because they often struggle to compete economically with imported steel). This means that you now rely on imported steel for things like tanks and what have you. During times of conflict, there's now the risk that your enemy will cut your supply chains through either use of force or diplomatic pressure and render you incapable of building those machines which are vital for national defence. If you maintain the native capacity to fill those requirements, you are at significantly less risk of being rendered suddenly incapable to build war material.

Note that the other metal targeted here, aluminium, is used heavily in the construction of aircraft and naval vessels.

While I don't know whether this argument was actually advanced by President Trump, it is one that I have heard for considering steel industry as vital to national security.

Dan Scally
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    Oh, I see now! But I don’t expect this to happen, as long as the inland steel production is significantly greater than what is needed for military purposes. Is the situation of American Steel already that dire? – Ludi Sep 30 '19 at 12:00
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    @Ludi I have no idea, sorry. My experience with the argument is in the United Kingdom; we recently have a large part of our native steel production going under due to cheap imports and this has been advanced as the reason why the government should bail them out. – Dan Scally Sep 30 '19 at 12:01
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    The problem with this argument, even if it is correct, is that Trump hasn't applied it to the many resources that are even more critical than steel and aluminum. Rare earth metals are just one example. The US no longer even bothers to mine its own rare earths and the people that had the skills and knowledge of how to do it won't be around forever. Aluminum and steel production could be ramped up in a relatively short time if necessary, but how does one start up rare earth mining and production from scratch? – Ray Butterworth Sep 30 '19 at 13:44
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    There is a wide variety of different steels that differ in composition, properties and price. I doubt that frequently imported and cheap steels, e.g. for the construction industry, are relevant for defense purposes. Sometimes, the public debate about “steel” is being conducted as if it was a simple resource in a computer game, not a complex group of products. – lejonet Sep 30 '19 at 18:54
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    The "national security" argument isn't restricted to goods and materials useful to the national defense/military industrial complex. The Trump tariffs apply to a wide spectrum of goods which are hardly essential for the defense of the country. – asgallant Sep 30 '19 at 21:05
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    @Ludi, yes and no. The US steel industry nearly vanished in the wake of the 1959 steelworkers' strike. Yes, steel production is that low. No, Trump's tariffs aren't going to change the situation. – Mark Sep 30 '19 at 23:36
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    @RayButterworth I don't think that's a problem with the argument. Section 232 gives the president authority to increase tariffs for reasons of national security. It doesn't force him to do so, and it doesn't force him to do so in a consistent or rational manner if he chooses to do so. – sgf Oct 01 '19 at 09:48
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    @RayButterworth there are good reasons why the national-security argument makes more sense for steel and aluminium than it does for rare earths. The latter are much more low-volume in practice, which makes it easier to store strategic reserves or smuggle around trade blockades. And, they could more realistically be rationed in an emergency. It's hardly possible to build equipment of any use without lots of steel, but rare earths are mostly needed for high-tech high-efficiency. The US could still build decent tanks and save the rare earths for the most critical projects. – leftaroundabout Oct 01 '19 at 10:35
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    The same argument can be used to advocate for the nationalisation of the steel industry. – gerrit Oct 01 '19 at 11:42
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    @KDog 8000 tonnes would be tiny (think about how much a single bridge weighs), I think the figure is actually closer to 7 million tonnes per month (see https://www.worldsteel.org/media-centre/press-releases/2019/June-2019-crude-steel-production.html) – llama Oct 01 '19 at 17:25
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    Just to be clear, this answer is the justification for the ban given by the US government. It's pretty clear to everyone that banning steel import from Canada, who has been an ally for 200 years isn't because of security concerns. – DJClayworth Oct 01 '19 at 21:31
  • @gerrit I don't think the President is granted the authority to nationalise industries for national security reasons, whether such reasons can be successfully argued or not, so that is hardly relevant. – Will Oct 02 '19 at 13:30
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    @DJClayworth Although I agree with the main point you are making. Canada hasn't even been an independent country for 200 years. And ignoring that, I don't think the end of the War of 1812 immediately meant and alliance. – JimmyJames Oct 02 '19 at 17:32
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    @JimmyJames The argument worked for Australia, who is even shorter lived as an ally. The point is that Trump is just doing what he wants to do and making stuff up to justify it. – DJClayworth Oct 02 '19 at 17:54
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    @DJClayworth Of course. By claiming it was a national security issue, there's no need to get it through Congress. That's the crux of it. I was just being a pedant. – JimmyJames Oct 02 '19 at 18:46
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    "the public debate about “steel” is being conducted as if it was a simple resource in a computer game, not a complex group of products". Public discourse on most topics is a vain oversimplification. – aaaaaa Oct 03 '19 at 17:29
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It's not specifically the import of steel that threatens national security, but rather the loss of domestic steel production capacity. If the U.S. (or any country, for that matter) is relying on most of its steel being imported (especially if it's from less-than-friendly countries,) then your ability to produce things necessary to fight a war can be dramatically curtailed if those steel imports suddenly stop.

Steel is needed to make very nearly everything. Perhaps not quite as much as several decades ago, but it's still pretty high on the list. You can't make cars without it. You can't make tanks without it. You can't make most weapons without it. The list goes on.

This risk is not merely theoretical. Prior to 1940, the U.S. was Japan's primary supplier for oil, steel, iron, and other such high-importance commodities. However, in 1940, as Japan continued its invasion of China, the U.S. began to slow the shipment of those materials to Japan. By mid-1941, once Japan had officially allied itself with Germany and Italy and expanded its invasions of Southeast Asia, the U.S. implemented a full embargo on exports to Japan. The resulting steel and oil (and rubber, etc.) shortages were a MAJOR problem for the Empire of Japan and ultimately contributed heavily to its eventual loss of the war. It was unable to build new ships and aircraft - or to repair or upgrade the ones it had - at anywhere near the U.S. production capacity. For that matter, the same was true for pretty much all of its war material needs. Eventually, it became unable to even fuel what Navy it had left and the Imperial Japanese Navy was rendered more or less useless for the remainder of the war. Once that point was reached, Japan's ultimate surrender was only a matter of time.

Germany tried to force a similar fate on the U.K. during WWII by attempting to disrupt its supply lines from North America. Thankfully, that ultimately didn't work out, as the British and American navies were able to keep the supply lines mostly open.

reirab
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  • You shouldn't say thankfully, now you're conflating an opinion on what is best. Not everyone agrees with that. – paul23 Oct 02 '19 at 09:59
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    Of course, this also has another side - the more countries rely on trade with each other, the less capable they are of waging war against one another. If Japan and Germany were self-sufficient before starting the wars, the World War would look quite a bit different - while on the other extreme, if world trade wasn't disrupted beforehand, there would be little reason for conquest in the first place. Of course, neither had much choice either way - they didn't have the resources to be self-sufficient even if they wanted to, and spent loads of effort developing and producing local substitutes. – Luaan Oct 02 '19 at 10:22
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    @paul23 I assumed being glad Nazi Germany didn't defeat the U.K. in WWII was a rather uncontroversial opinion these days. To be honest, if someone doesn't agree with that, I'm not sure that I really care about their opinion. – reirab Oct 02 '19 at 15:03
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    @Luaan Japan began their conquest of Eastern and Southeast Asia before the disruption of trade. The trade was disrupted because of the conquest (years after it began,) not the other way around. Though it's true that the conquest became more important to Japan after the disruption of trade. You're right about there being two sides to this and the countries relying on each other's exports does help to reduce the probability of war in the first place, though. However, that only works if the dependence is mutual (and, even then, it's not a guarantee.) – reirab Oct 02 '19 at 15:07
  • @reirab Yeah, I wasn't thinking about "world <-> Japan" trade in particular; more about the rebirth of protectionism all around the world. Trade wasn't stopped, but there was a large bias towards local production, with many tariffs, monopolies etc. reappearing after a period of relative freedom in trade and foreign investment. Essentialy, you got a positive feedback loop - the more trust disappeared, the more you actually had to rely on local production, and the less you cared about international trade, and all of this of course went hand in hand with nationalism. – Luaan Oct 03 '19 at 08:20
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"National security" doesn't just mean military security, it also includes economic security, and security of social systems. This effectively gives the President wide latitude in instituting tariffs. As Dan Scally says, it can be justified on the grounds that military equipment depends on steel, and we don't want to be dependent on potential enemies for important munitions.

But the tariffs can also be justified on the grounds of trying to protect the American economy. Making foreign steel more expensive encourages more domestic steel production, which protects American steel companies and the jobs they provide.

The boundary between "national security" and other "national interests" is pretty fuzzy, so the President can use national security as a justification for many policies.

Barmar
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    Of course, this argument only works if you ignore that the net result is that steel is more expensive. You're "protecting" the economy by moving money from steel consumers to steel producers, while also preventing the worldwide economy from equalizing - all the while countries which didn't tax steel imports benefit from the lower prices. The price for helping the steel producers is the harm to all the other industries, which makes them less competitive. Of course, the usual "solution" is more tarrifs :) – Luaan Oct 02 '19 at 10:25
  • @Luaan True, one has to make a number of assumptions about the tradeoffs. Trump's tariff policies are based on serious ignorance (he thinks the tariffs are being paid by the Chinese). I was just trying to provide an additional perspective on the notion of security. – Barmar Oct 02 '19 at 16:46
  • By this argument every tariff could be "in the interest of national security". Which would make agreements not to impose tariffs except in the interest of national security irrelevant, since every tariff would be exempt. – DJClayworth Oct 02 '19 at 17:40
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    @DJClayworth I think the point I was suggesting is that the difference between "national security" and "national interest" is quite fuzzy and can potentially be used to justify almost anything. – Barmar Oct 02 '19 at 18:08
  • @Barmar And that's my point exactly. (By "this argument" I meant the argument in the answer.) – DJClayworth Oct 02 '19 at 18:12
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    @DJClayworth That doesn't make the answer wrong. – Barmar Oct 02 '19 at 18:13
  • It does make it obvious that the people who wrote the treaty didn't intend it to be used that way, because why include a clause in a treaty that would mean "any party can exempt themselves from the requirements of this treaty if they fell like it". – DJClayworth Oct 02 '19 at 18:16
  • What treaty are you talking about? The question refers to a law that gives power to the President. – Barmar Oct 02 '19 at 18:18
  • @DJClayworth It's not defined that way in the treaty, it's in the laws that limit what the US government can or cannot do. The US was created as a liberal (in the old sense) state with extremely limited government powers, and much emphasis on individual action and voluntary association of people. "National security" wasn't meant as a loophole you could use to give the government unlimited power, but it's used that way today. The power was intended for things like "we can block someone trying to sell weapons to our enemies", and then someone was like "but isn't selling bronze just as bad?". – Luaan Oct 03 '19 at 09:29
  • @DJClayworth And don't forget that this is the same President who also declared illegal immigration to be a national emergency so he could redirect military funds to building the border wall, called the whistleblower a spy for reporting what he heard, and Rep. Schiff a traitor for holding hearings as part of impeachment investigation. Stretching definitions is his SOP. – Barmar Oct 03 '19 at 16:00
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All the above are excellent points and I'd like to add that not only does it take time to build up an industry that has dwindled through reduced use, but there's always technique of the industry personnel who do the work in the mills, the mills themselves get behind in technology because the reduced income doesn't allow for updating/upgrading. Man, there's a ton of reasons metal production is considered strategic.

F1Krazy
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Teb
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    You're getting downvoted because of the unnecessary commentary at the end. Removing that, and adding some sources to back up the point about mills not being upgraded would make this a better answer. – Rupert Morrish Oct 02 '19 at 22:43