Europe’s trade deficit with China has become a structural industrial problem. In 2025, the EU imported far more from China than it exported, leaving Europe with a massive goods trade deficit of around €360B. Free trade is good for consumers: lower prices, more choice, more competition. But when one side combines state subsidies, cheap credit, cheap energy and industrial overcapacity, the result is not normal competition. It is industrial displacement. Europe has already seen this in solar panels, batteries, electronics, chemicals and increasingly EVs. The answer is not protectionism everywhere. It is strategic realism: → Free trade for normal consumer goods → European production in critical sectors → Public procurement for European strategic industries The cheapest import today can become the most expensive dependency tomorrow.