For months, the US-China trade fight has been about tariffs. Now it is about printers, drones, and the software inside office copiers.
On Aug. 5, China fired back at Washington with a new round of countermeasures that go well beyond tariffs.
China delivered its answer through five separate statements, following new US limits on imported robots and power-conversion gear.
The package introduces a national security probe for the first time under Beijing's amended Foreign Trade Law.
The package also features tighter scrutiny of drone-related exports.
It sanctions seven American entities and halts US participation in the inspection of products bound for China.
Chinese cybersecurity authorities also opened a security review of Palo Alto Networks products sold in China.
The one-line statement said the move protects critical infrastructure, but it did not say whether it was retaliation.
In June, China restricted exports to 10 US companies tied to the military. That came after the Pentagon added some large Chinese tech firms to its list of military backers.
The US answered in late July. On July 28, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) imposed new limits on imported robots and power-inverters.
Three days later, the Department of Homeland Security blacklisted 43 Chinese companies over forced-labor allegations.
Two of the targeted groups, Applied DNA Sciences and Responsible Business Alliance, are among six entities tied to US forced-labor-related restrictions.
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Another target, Compliance Testing, is an Arizona firm accused of helping the FCC impose its limits.
A Commerce Ministry spokesperson described the package as broadly restrained, urged a return to talks, and warned that new US restrictions would bring more Chinese action.
Beijing is clearly trying to impose costs without wrecking the trade truce or the late September meeting planned between Xi and Trump.
It expires in November unless both sides extend it.
This one-year arrangement came out of the Trump-Xi summit in South Korea and has already paused tariffs, rare-earth limits, and probes into Chinese shipbuilders.
Last week, senior officials showed how much strain it is under.
Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng raised "serious concern" about US restrictions. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent urged China to "fully meet" its commitments on rare earth access and purchases of US farm goods.
In China, nationalist voices are welcoming the response. Former Global Times editor Hu Xijin wrote that China is "no longer a nation that can only passively endure US suppression," adding that its countermeasures are ready to use.
If the US chooses to escalate, he said, China will "see it through to the end."
The most practical damage is buried in a technical rule. China suspended approval of US certification bodies to perform follow-up factory inspections under the mandatory China Compulsory Certification system, called CCC.
That move could push US manufacturers to arrange inspections through non-US authorized bodies.
Higher costs and delays are the likely result, and those usually find their way into corporate earnings and consumer prices.
Ryan Etzcorn, senior director at Ankura China Advisors, sees it as a messy new burden.
"This round of countermeasures whip up some real compliance headaches for multinationals," he said, with the effects reaching "into daily supply chain compliance."
Henry Gao, a law professor at Singapore Management University, says Beijing is getting bolder with its legal tools.
"The signal is straightforward: Beijing is prepared to respond quickly and in kind, and to normalize tit-for-tat escalation as a standing feature of the relationship," he said.
Eurasia Group analysts, including Dominic Chiu, warned that harsher US steps, like restricting Chinese open-weight AI models or limiting Chinese chip access through cloud services, would mark a step change and put the truce at risk.
The late September summit between Xi and Trump is the first test.
The November deadline for the trade deal is the second. Right now, both sides sound willing to keep talking, which is the best cushion against a full-blown fight.
That likely means more headline-driven swings, with the summit and the deadline acting as the tripwires.
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