Whenever talk turns to the tough rhetoric of the incoming administration, the same hand-wringing invariably starts that President-Elect Donald Trump will launch a trade war. The implication, of course, is that because Trump has suggested punitive measures against China’s mercantilism, his actions will launch a back-and-forth row of tariffs between Beijing and Washington. This relies on a rather limited worldview, however, since it overlooks some long-standing problems.

For starters, the United States has already been fending off a trade war with China for more than 20 years. In 1994, Beijing officially pegged its currency (the yuan) to the dollar at a preferentially undervalued rate. The logic of doing so was obvious. By artificially undervaluing the yuan, China could sell its goods to the U.S. market at a particularly low cost. This currency manipulation also offered the double benefit of making U.S. goods extra expensive when entering the Chinese market.

A trade policy that punishes China for its deliberate protectionism and its violations of trade law would reward American industry for continually playing by the rules of global trade.

Beijing was wise to launch this currency manipulation, since it is a particularly effective means of boosting exports. And since selling into the vast, affluent U.S. market is a very dependable method of generating wealth, Beijing simply locked onto a strategy of export-led growth that has driven China to the top of the global economy.

A look at U.S.-China trade flows paints a particularly clear picture of why this currency manipulation has paid off for Beijing. Where the annual U.S. trade deficit with China was roughly $30 billion in 1994, it had climbed to $83 billion by 2000. And after Bill Clinton and Al Gore paved the way for China’s 2001 entry into the World Trade Organization — despite the desperate pleadings of concerned labor and environmental activists — the U.S. trade gap with China simply exploded. A $103 billion annual U.S. trade shortfall with China in 2002 quickly climbed to $202 billion in 2005, and to $268 billion in 2008. Most recently, it hit $367 billion in 2015.

It’s not just currency undervaluation that has boosted China’s exports, however. Beijing has also poured multi-billion dollar subsidies into such key strategic industries as steel, glass, paper, rubber, and auto parts. Significantly, these massive subsidies are actionable under world trade law — violations that have hardly troubled Beijing, though, since most cash-strapped U.S. companies lack the resources to initiate trade cases in response.

And then there’s the deliberate dumping of Chinese product into the U.S. market at below the cost of production. Beijing has happily and continually subsidized its steel industry, for example, to help generate employment at home and to sell its undervalued steel in the United States.

U.S. Steel Corporation is currently litigating an expensive, time-consuming trade case against this steel-dumping. The case is made all the more complicated because Chinese firms also hacked U.S. Steel’s research of high-tech steel. And so, China’s steel mills are now dumping lighter, stronger steel into the United States — the very product that U.S. Steel spent years (and millions of dollars) perfecting. And this dumped product is steadily putting U.S. Steel out of business.

Notably, both dumping and currency manipulation violate the commitments that China made when joining the WTO. But Beijing rolls along with impunity, boosting its own manufacturing sectors and clobbering U.S. companies that still play by the rules of world trade.

Thus, America has been besieged by an aggressive trade war on the part of China. It’s a battle that America never asked for — and has hardly answered.

In the actual instances when Washington has challenged Beijing on its cheating, however, China has backed down. In 2005, for instance, the U.S. Senate voted in favor of a procedural motion on a bill that would address currency manipulation. The next day, Beijing announced that it was un-tethering the yuan from its currency peg. This announcement shocked the world — and intimated that China was finally halting its currency game. Movement to pass a currency bill subsequently stalled in Congress. But Beijing simply continued on its merry way, tightly controlling its currency so as to maintain a competitive advantage.

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Similarly, in 2011, as Vice President Joe Biden prepared to visit Beijing to confront officials on the currency problem, China’s central bank suddenly and miraculously boosted the yuan to all-time highs against the dollar. This revaluation was temporary, of course, but it head-faked the Obama administration into believing that progress was being made.

Sadly, the United States already possesses a number of laws and regulations designed to tackle such predatory tactics. But America’s elected officials have simply lacked the integrity or fortitude to employ such remedies.

It’s inaccurate, though, to suggest that if Washington finally resorts to its legally permissible recourse for trade violations it will “start” a trade war.

The scenario is that a President Trump could designate China as a currency manipulator (an option available to the executive branch via the Treasury Department). Or, he could extend trade relief to industries hit by dumped product. Or, he could bring trade cases to the WTO regarding massive, egregious subsidies. And while those are perfectly reasonable courses of action, it’s envisioned that China would retaliate in ways that would hurt the U.S. economy.

What’s most often cited is that China owns America’s debt. Surprisingly, China owns only about 6 percent of total U.S. outstanding federal debt. But it is this purchase of U.S. debt that has successfully powered Beijing’s ongoing currency manipulation. (By accumulating an estimated $1.1 trillion in U.S. currency assets, Beijing has been able to drive up the value of the dollar vs. the yuan.) And so, if Beijing chose to divest itself of these holdings, the dollar could lose value.

But weakening the dollar would defeat the very currency advantage that currently undergirds China’s export strategy. And it would mean reducing the value of the very portfolio that Beijing has steadily accumulated over the past 20 years.

Notably, Beijing has maintained a huge trade surplus against the United States, in part because it doesn’t want to buy American-made goods. Instead, China hopes to simply keep selling to the U.S. market, and to keep running its factories at full tilt. The suggestion that a trade war would reduce U.S. exports to China overlooks the long-standing problem that already confronts America’s manufacturers — how to surmount existing subsidy and currency barriers.

It’s often suggested that a trade war with China would increase the cost of consumer goods flooding in from China. Undoubtedly, Americans could see an increase in the sticker price of everyday goods sold at Wal-Mart. However, Beijing is increasingly desperate to sell to the U.S. market, since the number of worker strikes and political protests against the ruling regime rose dramatically in 2015, and continues unabated. So while tariff measures could be applied to imports of Chinese steel, car tires, and auto parts, Beijing has far more to lose if it were priced out of the U.S. market. And a parity in cost between domestic and imported goods would likely motivate Americans to buy more of the higher-quality, American-made options.

Purchasing American-made goods offers a significant value-added boost to the U.S. economy as well. Manufacturing not only provides skilled, middle-class jobs but also enjoys the unique multiplier effect of supporting other good-paying jobs throughout the surrounding economy. It’s simply one reason why buying American-made products provides such a tangible benefit to the nation as a whole.

A trade policy that punishes China for its deliberate protectionism and its violations of trade law would reward American industry for continually playing by the rules of global trade. America’s factories adhere to equitable labor and workplace standards, provide fair wages and benefits, and compete without illegal trade advantages such as currency manipulation and dumping. Penalizing China for its untoward behavior would support true free trade — the idea that countries should trade openly and without resorting to self-serving, market-distorting tactics. China desperately needs to sell to the United States, a key fact that should be used as leverage to bring Beijing into line with other major industrialized nations. In the long run, it’s the only sensible, sustainable course of action.

The author of this piece served as a media director for various organizations.