Chris, what you are saying alludes to the infant industry argument that I have mentioned in my article. A country may want to impose tariffs to protect its domestic industries when they are still growing so that it doesn’t become overdependent on imports. That’s certainly a valid reason.

However, protecting domestic industries is one thing and claiming that doing so is solely for upholding national security is another. Further, national security encompasses both economic and military security, of which the former may be harmed because of the imposition of tariffs.

Also, in line with your example, wouldn’t import tariffs cause those foreign countries to become hostile?

Additionally, in America’s case, its “military requirements for steel and aluminum each only represent about three percent of U.S. production.” Here, I would think that using the infant industry argument for trade barriers would be invalid, for there seems to be ample production capacity.