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The Monday editorial in China's Global Times follows the latest series of social media attacks on Beijing by Trump.
"Trump is not behaving as a president who will become master of the White House in a month," the newspaper wrote. "He bears no sense of how to lead a superpower.
"Now people don't know if Trump is engaged in a psychological war with China or he is just unprofessional, even though he will be sworn in soon," it added. "One thing for sure is that Trump has no leverages to maneuver the world, nor can he reshape China-US relations and the way the two major powers interact.
"But if he treats China after assuming office in the same way as in his tweets, China will not exercise restraint," the newspaper warned, adding that Trump's tweets give people cause for concern.
To make things crystal clear, the editorial comment was spiced up by an online video, entitled 'Trump adds fuel to the fire,' in which the newspaper's editor-in-chief, Hu Xijin, said as quoted by Shanghaiist, "How Trump has carried himself in this whole episode is unbecoming of a president-elect. It's way below what we've come to expect of American spokespeople."
Tensions escalated last week, after a Chinese naval vessel spotted and seized a piece of "unidentified equipment" in the South China Sea, which turned out to an underwater US drone. Trump accused Beijing of "stealing" the device.
"China steals United States Navy research drone in international waters - rips it out of water and takes it to China in unprecedented act," Trump tweeted Saturday morning. "We should tell China that we don't want the drone they stole back - let them keep it!" he wrote in another tweet.
According to Pentagon spokesman Navy Captain Jeff Davis, the drone was seized while collecting unclassified scientific data. "It is ours," he told reporters on Friday, adding that the device is worth about $150,000. "It's clearly marked as ours. We would like it back, and we would like this not to happen again," Davis noted.
Beijing accused the US of repeatedly dispatching vessels and aircraft to carry out "close-in reconnaissance and military surveys" within Chinese waters, but later promised to return the device, criticizing Washington for "hyping up" the incident.
Comment: This is a non-story being made into a drama. Trump is doing his negotiating thing, while a Chinese newspaper is doing their thing. RT has been making it a big deal that the paper is state-run but so is RT. Interests can be aligned but it's not like the government is micro-managing opinion pieces. Get over it!