Industrial strength is critical to national security

There was a time when Americans knew a simple truth: our national security depends not just on the quality of our troops, but on the industrial base that supports them in times of war and peace. During World War II, America triumphed not just because of the valor of our service members, but because our factories became the “arsenal of democracy.” We built the tanks, ships, and planes that won the war and catapulted the United States to a position of economic and geopolitical dominance in the world. We have forgotten this lesson.

Today, America is threatened by a strategic weakness that is economic in nature and military in consequence: a hollowed-out manufacturing base. For decades, we’ve been undercut by unfair trade deals and foreign adversaries like the People’s Republic of China. The Chinese Communist Party operates with little regard for the environment, workers’ rights, or market transparency. That is how they drive down the costs of producing steel, aluminum, and other industrial products—not through true market efficiency, but through pollution, state subsidies, and lopsided trade deals.

Allowing Chinese companies to offload their subsidized materials and components into our market has been a disaster for our economy and our military. Factories have shut down, jobs have vanished, and once-strong industrial regions like the Rust Belt have been hollowed out. We’ve lost generations of skilled workers and apprentices. More ominously, we have made ourselves dangerously dependent on foreign adversaries for the critical materials and components that power our military and defense systems.

This is why a pollution tariff is more than an environmental or economic policy, but also a matter of national security. By placing a tariff on Chinese goods that accurately accounts for the pollution and environmental costs that are externalized and invisibly built into the prices of Chinese-made inputs, we can level the playing field for American manufacturers and incentivize the reshoring of supply chains. It does not punish trade with foreign countries, but merely ensures that such trade takes place on fair grounds.

A pollution tariff would internalize the externalized environmental costs that China imposes onto Americans and reward our companies that follow fair labor and environmental standards. It would rebuild our manufacturing backbone. Importantly, it would make us stronger, more secure, and less vulnerable to global supply chain shocks.

If we are to protect the future of America, we must be willing to take on the economic injustices that imperil our sovereignty and safety. The time has come to “make things in America again”. A pollution tariff is a step towards achieving that goal, rebuilding our industrial might, leveling the playing field, and making America strong, independent, and prepared for the challenges of the future.

Russell E. Saffell, Ph.D.(c), M.P.S., U.S. Navy veteran. He is researching tariffs as they relate to America's industrial strength and military preparedness.