I have been warning about the increasing likelihood of a serious global trade war for quite some time.

That warning is now my baseline scenario. Unless there is an immediate deescalation of rhetoric and a return to rational thinking, a very destructive global trade war is baked in the cake.

I seek ways that a global trade war does not start, but I come up short.

China is upset because the EU and US Rejected China’s Market Economy Status over alleged steel dumping. In response, Beijing fired counterattack charges at the WTO.

China has launched a legal challenge against the EU and US over their reluctance to treat it as a “market economy” under World Trade Organisation rules.

Beijing is unhappy with a provision that allows trading partners to use a special formula and prices in third countries to calculate punitive tariffs for non-market economies in anti-dumping cases. It is pushing for the provision to expire with Sunday’s 15th anniversary of its WTO membership.

But the EU, US, Japan and other WTO members have resisted the move, prompting China on Monday to take the first step in launching a case with the global trade regulator.

In a statement, China’s commerce ministry said it had requested consultations with both the EU and US and would seek to have a WTO panel rule.

“China has communicated through many channels for the third-country comparison to expire. What’s very regrettable is that EU and US have not acted to allow it to expire. It has had a severe impact on Chinese exports,” it said. “China is protecting its lawful rights and acting appropriately to maintain the WTO rules.”

In the EU, fears of an onslaught of cheap Chinese goods prompted the European Commission to recommend a fundamental shift in how it conducts anti-dumping cases. Under EU rules, Brussels imposed a 21 per cent tariff on the same steel products that were hit with a 266 per cent US tariff in 2015.

In a sign of the commercial stakes, the US on Friday imposed punitive anti-dumping tariffs on Chinese-made washing machines, imports of which into the US were worth more than $1.1bn last year. It also announced the launch of an anti-dumping investigation into plywood imports from China, which were also worth more than $1bn last year.

Those US cases and the fight over Beijing’s market economy status point to the trade battles already being fought with China even as Donald Trump, the incoming president, promises to get tough with Beijing over trade and other issues.

“One of the most important relations we must improve?.?.?.?is our relationship with China,” Mr Trump said last week. “China is responsible for almost half of America’s trade deficit [and] they haven’t played by the rules.”

“They have acted like a non-market economy in so many respects with their state-owned companies, with subsidies, with dumping?.?.?.?there are more dumping cases brought against China than against all the other countries combined,” said Sandy Levin, the top Democrat on the House ways and means committee.

A US official said it would continue to fight any attempt to grant China market economy status at the WTO, pointing to “serious imbalances in China’s state-directed economy”.

“China has not made the reforms necessary to operate on market principles,” the official said. “The United States is prepared to defend its right at the WTO to protect American workers and firms from the damaging effects of persistent distortions in the Chinese economy.”

Boeing Faces China’s Wrath

Please consider Boeing Faces Prospect of China’s Political Wrath Thanks to Trump.

“China Inc.,” the combined group of airlines and lessors directed or controlled by the government, is Boeing’s largest customer, an analysis of the company’s’ backlog at Dec. 5 shows.

Boeing’s website lists “China” with 292 orders in backlog. Fifty of these appear to by Unidentified orders. LNC arrived at this figure by viewing the Chinese customers in Boeing’s identified list, which amounts to 242 orders. Some believe the number of Unidentifieds attributable to China may be higher.

The data shows just how much Boeing has at risk with the so-far unpredictable foreign trade policy espoused by President-Elect Donald J. Trump.