East Asia

It has expanded its ties across South East Asia, Latin America and Africa – and a Belt and Road trade and infrastructure initiative shored up ties with the so-called Global South.

The Chinese leader chose South East Asia for his first trip abroad after the tariff announcement, sensing his neighbours would be getting jittery about Trump's tariffs.

Trump's tariffs in 2016 sent a glut of cheap Chinese imports, originally intended for the US, into South East Asia, hurting many local manufacturers.

Vietnam was a French colony, a Chinese vassal and for 20 years, the proxy battlefield in America's bloody struggle to stop China spreading communism across South East Asia.

So far only one country in South East Asia, Singapore, has managed to escape the "middle-income trap", where economic growth slows before countries become rich.