Misdirection as his real goal is fucking China bigly. As to whether he succeeds a different story.
As to if he should even try fuck China that is hard to answer . I certainly do not have the info we need.
China caused it because only 10% was imposed on them before it was increased to 20%, 54%, 104%,
124145% and now 245%. This is because China is retaliating. Why retaliating when the trade deficit for US is so huge. The world needs to be careful of China because I do not see any problem if 10% is imposed on them by United States with such huge trade deficit.
Chinese bonds in US is the second largest while Japan has the largest. But if compared to the rest of the world, China bonds is still not much of significant amount but which is enough to affect United States if China decide to sell them. This may decrease the price of dollar but also increase the price of yaun which will still further lead to the purpose of this tariff. If China reduced the price of yuan, this is making their economy more competitive and also encouraging exports but if the bonds is sold and cause increase in price of yaun, export in China to US will be discouraged with it.
US will also suffer this because they are planning what could lead to inflation in the country. But if smartphones, memory cards, semiconductor devices, solar cells, modems, routers and flat panel displays are exempted from the tariffs, let us see how it would be.