According to the Wall Street Journal, the trade war Donald Trump threatened to start with Canada today is the “dumbest trade war in history.” It isn’t,

Trump backed down Monday on his threat to impose across the board tariffs on Mexico and Canada today. Maybe tariffs were never intended as more than a negotiating tactic, maybe they will show up in 30 days. Either is not smart, but neither would be the worst trade war of all time, or even in US history.

Trade wars are a substitute for the real thing. They hurt both sides, just like a shooting war. And hey have been known to devolve into a shooting war when one side feels cornered by the other.

Donald Trump thinks he can bully Canada, the USA’s biggest friend and ally. His reasoning is that no-one can stand up to the United States. It’s a stereotypical American attitude.

While Trump’s complaints about Canada are widely recognized in the US as fantasy, this is not the first time the US has tried to bully a smaller power economically. Sometimes it works. Other times it produces desperate reactions.

Such as the time the US started off with tariffs which were then upgraded to sanctions when the tariffs didn’t have the desired result. The issue was the Japanese invasion of China in 1937.

We know how that turned out. Feeling the economic squeeze, the Japanese attacked the USA. On paper there was no contest and the outcome was a foregone conclusion. To reach that conclusion though cost the lives of 111,000 American soldiers with more than 250,000 wounded. That doesn’t take into account the deaths of Japanese military members, or the millions of civilian deaths, all from a trade war that got out of control.

Are Trump’s proposed tariffs really the “dumbest trade war in history?” Not when you look at some of the trade disasters of previous administrations.

They are pretty dumb though, If Canada and Mexico get creative with their response, Donald Trump won’t know what hit him.