text: You make some reasonable points, but I think you over play the US's hand.
  
  China files more international patents than any other nation, including the US (though often of dubious standard)
  
  IF China and the US get into a trade war, it will drive the US into an economic crisis (China too). 
  
  The US won't be able to fund their deficit - which means Trump either slashes spending or prints money, killing the economy. Exports to the rest of the world  will dry up as trade financing evaporates, destroying the profitability of US corporations.
  
  To say nothing of China expropriating American owned assets in China - without it's Chinese operations GM is dead (again).
  
  With the US economy returning to the GFC lows, Trump would be toast.
  
  China would probably be able to marshal its citizens against the external threat and portray it as an other deliberate plan to subjugate and humiliate China, like the Boxer Rebellion.
  
  So the US would have the worst problems