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US-China trade war
EconomyChina Economy

Xi Jinping calls for ‘new Long March’ in dramatic sign that China is preparing for protracted trade war

  • Xi Jinping told cheering crowds in Jiangxi: ‘We are now embarking on a new Long March, and we must start all over again’
  • His comments come amid an increasingly sour mood in official Chinese media, which have become more forceful in anti-US rhetoric since trade war talks collapsed

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Chinese President Xi Jinping lays a floral basket at a monument marking the departure point of the Long March in Yudu county, Ganzhou, in Jiangxi province. Photo: Xinhua
Zhou Xin

Chinese President Xi Jinping has called for the nation to embark on a new Long March and “start all over again”, in the most dramatic sign to date that Beijing has given up hope of reaching a trade deal with the United States in the near term.

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Xi is in Jiangxi province for his first domestic tour since the escalation of the trade war two weeks ago. Jiangxi is where China’s defeated Red Army started its fabled Long March in 1934, and Xi’s choice of destination is being viewed as an effort to invoke a spirit of endurance and to rally public spirit amid rising tensions with Washington.

“We are here at the starting point of the Long March to remember the time when the Red Army began its journey,” Xi told cheering crowds on Monday, in footage posted on state broadcaster CCTV’s website on Tuesday. “We are now embarking on a new Long March, and we must start all over again.”

While Xi did not directly mention the trade war or the United States, his remarks are being perceived as clear signals that the Chinese public is being told to prepare for hardships because of the worsening external environment.
Men ride a scooter past a poster showing Chinese President Xi Jinping on the side of a school building in a newly developed part of Lankao county, in China’s Henan province. Photo: Reuters
Men ride a scooter past a poster showing Chinese President Xi Jinping on the side of a school building in a newly developed part of Lankao county, in China’s Henan province. Photo: Reuters
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The economy is already slowing and the trade war could trim as much as 1 per cent from its gross domestic product, Wang Yang, one of the seven members of the elite Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China, said last week.

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