The US literally dumped their trash in China for "recycling". China doesn't want to anymore and India and several southeast Asia countries took over (Indonesia, Vietnam, ...).
And sure the the western world wasn't forced to trash China, but when a country decides to buy Chinese production that we know was made with no regard for the environment because it is more competitive than doing it locally where one has no choice but to care, then you are effectively exporting pollution.
As for Trump being an environmentalist with his tariffs. A few decades ago, he would have been, not so much anymore. If he didn't insist on trashing his own country that is.
> The US literally dumped their trash in China for "recycling"
No one "dumped" anything. There weren't random ships sneaking onto the coast and dumping their contents. No airdrops tossing out garbage bags.
This was a pull industry and China had such a negligent position on their environment that people -- Chinese people, in China, allowed by China -- made money tendering for recycling contracts and then just stacking it into a giant pile, presumably awaiting some innovation that would make it worthwhile to process. That precisely speaks to exactly what I was saying, and externalizing that and blaming it on others is the sort of patronizing, laughably bigoted infantilizing that people do about developing nations, and it's extraordinarily unhelpful. China started caring, and regulated these exploiters out of business.
> and India and several southeast Asia countries took over (Indonesia, Vietnam, ...)
Vietnam is a surprisingly clean country. Like you can drop a Google Maps pin almost anywhere in Vietnam and while it might not be glitzy and rich, there is a sense of pride in environment and a care and a concern about the commons.
India and Bangladesh, on the other hand... Yeah, this isn't covertly imported garbage, but instead is 100% domestic sourced, just as the vast majority of China's was before it became more enlightened. Countries that are cesspools overwhelmingly have themselves to blame.
I just had to respond because this sort of infantilizing "every bad thing is caused by outsiders" angle isn't remotely helpful. Like almost all of the world's ocean plastics come from Southeast Asia, and it's amazing seeing people try to rationalize how in cultures where plastics are used for everything, and discarded thoughtlessly everywhere, actually it's somehow the West's fault.