CHINA’S warning against “appeasement” of Donald Trump by governments hoping to avoid tariffs is a chance to reflect on the often misused term.

Beijing spoke out after reports indicated the US, as part of its global rivalry with China, will offer third countries relief from the tariffs if they help isolate China economically by cutting trade with it themselves. This is of course not an offer to be spared Trump’s trade war, but a threat to join his side or become a target.

Appeasement, exemplified by surrender to Hitler’s demands at Munich, is trotted out in Britain every time the ruling class wants a war: hesitation to fight or bomb anyone under any circumstances is likened to failing to stand up to the Nazis.

What is usually brushed over are the class interests that shaped British appeasement policy in the 1930s. Powerful sections of the ruling class, extending into the royal family and much of the Conservative Party, politically sympathised with Hitler. At the very least, many believed Nazi Germany’s aggression could be directed eastward and perform the useful function in their eyes of crushing the menace of socialist revolution by destroying the Soviet Union.

Comparisons with the Nazis should be used sparingly, and the modern far right we see in office in the US or Italy, and contending for power in France and Germany, differs in many respects from 20th-century fascism. However, if there is one country tearing up international agreements and threatening global war, as Germany did in the 1930s, it is the United States.

Once again, elements of the British ruling class are all for it, as we see in the Tory press’s fawning over Trump and demands that we join his trade war on the Chinese. Labour is at least still evidently reluctant to do the latter.

Today’s appeasement is not a refusal to hurl Britain into a war against “enemy” states like Russia or China. It is surrendering to the bully in the White House and enrolling among the forces most likely to start World War III.