China is saying almost nothing about Indonesia's US trade deal. That is not approval

When Indonesia signed its Agreement on Reciprocal Trade with the United States in February, several clauses in it pointed straight at China. Luna Ge Lai and Maria Monica Wihardja of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore write in Fulcrum that Beijing has said almost nothing in public about it. They read that silence as a sign of how much is at stake, not as acceptance.

Look at what the text asks of Jakarta. One article pushes Indonesia to follow American export controls, meaning the US "Entity List" of firms that American companies may not supply, which covers Huawei and ZTE in areas like 5G and 6G networks and undersea cables. Another clause, which the authors call a poison pill, lets Washington cancel the deal and put back a 32 per cent tariff if Indonesia signs a trade agreement it judges harmful to American interests. Rules of origin, the test of how much of a product was really made in Indonesia, could block exports carrying too much Chinese content. And the lifting of foreign ownership limits in mining applies only to American investors, which leaves Chinese-run nickel and solar plants on worse terms in a country where they already built the factories.

China's tools are quieter than tariffs. Sinosure, the state insurer that stands behind Chinese firms working abroad, could quietly rate Indonesia as riskier, and that alone raises the cost of money for Chinese projects here, with no announcement anyone can protest. Beijing could also go to the WTO and demand the same treatment America gets, with a precedent to point at: an exemption on export earnings written first for the United States was later extended to three more countries, China among them. Open retaliation is possible too, under a revised Foreign Trade Law from December 2025 that lets China's State Council approve countermeasures. Canada is already on the receiving end of those on farm goods.

None of this is settled, because the agreement is not ratified. The American tariffs that pushed Indonesia to the table were struck down by the US Supreme Court, and Washington is now looking for other ways to bring them back.

Why it matters

If your job sits anywhere near nickel, solar panels or any factory built with Chinese money, the risk here is not a loud punishment but a slow one: dearer finance and cooler investment, showing up as a project that quietly stalls. A deal meant to protect Indonesian exports to America can raise the price of Chinese capital at home. Watch what the DPR decides about ratification, and whether Beijing's silence lasts once it does.