As the director of President Reagan’s strike force against unfair trade, I targeted Airbus subsidies and a variety of Japanese trade barriers. Although we achieved positive results in specific cases, in a broader sense we got nowhere. Airbus still found ways to get subsidies and Japan remained largely impervious to imports.

My experience taught me that in today’s globalised world two different games are being played. One is suggested by the formal rules of the World Trade Organization. The other is a silent mercantilism played by countries that use subsidies and domestic regulations to exploit ambiguities in the formal WTO rules – or that simply ignore them.

I have therefore been bemused by the recent filing of WTO complaints from Washington, Brussels, and Tokyo against China’s export restrictions on rare earths. Not that I think the filings unjustified. Indeed, I believe they are a step in the right direction. But they are a sideshow.