This has to be bluffing as surely the EU is not that stupid as this would see the closure of all legacy car makers in the West. We know the EU car manufacturers cannot compete on price with the Chinese and if this was true having zero tariffs on electric vehicles then the likes of Mercedes, VW, BMW, Renault and Ferrari will be shut down very quickly.
This has to be a bluff trying to scare the US showing they have other options, but we all know this is realistically a non starter. The car manufacturers in the EU account for 7% of the entire GDP and employ close to 14 million people. This would not end well and I would say most definitely would end the EU very quickly.
The Chinese would love nothing more that to get their paws on the EU car manufacturing industry. This has to be protected at all costs and has to be a non starter. I see no negotiations and one has to also consider the carbon taxes. CBAM was introduced to make a level playing field which it certainly is not currently as the likes of Mercedes had to partner with Tesla in January and buy their carbon credits. China is not using green energy for manufacturing at present and is still building coal fired power stations at a rate of 4 new ones per year.
Personally I have never trusted the EU and would hate to have them looking over my countries shoulder telling them what to do. I don't see them being this stupid as the risks are far too high and not worth even considering. Yes they are crazy on their green stances and are very far left ,but not suicidal to the pint of risking it all. They know they do not have the cards to play this game and this as to be seen as a way of trying to bargain with the US on lower tariffs. I would say that this is not the way to negotiate a deal and I insulting everyone's intelligence.
If I was in the EU this would not fill me with confidence and would only underline how moronic the EU leadership is believing they could try and bluff their way to a better deal by using China. China cannot be that stupid either and will use it for another angle as they know the EU cannot afford to relinquish tariffs on any vehicle. Apparently the EU and China are meeting in June which you would have thought the EU would have already negotiated out a deal with the US. China is not your trading friend and the sooner everyone realizes this the better and they can move forward.
The greedy corporations are to blame for the mess we see today as they were the ones who allowed manufacturing to move to China all in the name of making bigger profits. What the Chinese have done over the years is copied those products and is now their competitor so that was not exactly a Hollywood ending. Countries have no choice but to manufacture themselves and stop relying on others to do it for you. We saw during Covid how reliant everyone country is on China and this is a big worry.