The Council on Foreign Relations claims Europe must “take on China” to save free trade. Behind that contradiction lies a wider campaign to turn tariffs, export controls, investment screening and trade agreements into a coordinated architecture of containment. Western governments subsidize their own industries while treating Chinese planning and technological advance as violations of the market. This essay exposes how “free trade” becomes selective access for European capital and selective restriction for China, tracing the struggle back to imperial domination and forward to the danger of economic war becoming military confrontation. The answer is organization before the fine print becomes a front line.