In a Global Economy it would be foolish to think that any one country could win a Trade War. If a full scale trade war starts we could be looking at Global Financial Meltdown.
To understand how deeply the world Economy is intertwined together just look around yourself. The laptop I am typing this article on is made by an American Company but assembled in China. The Processor and Operating Systems are both American. Now if you only focus on the Part that is being assembled in China your only looking at one side of the story. Intel almost has an Monopoly in CPU manufacturing. A laptop sale in India/Other Countries is one of the reasons why Intel and Microsoft flourish. To sell a Laptop in India you have to keep the manufacturing cost low as Indians do not have the same purchasing power as Americans or Europeans.
So tomorrow lets assume Mr Trump decides to close down assembly plants in China and bring Back those jobs from Chinese to Americans. But by doing that they would increase the cost of the American product which would no longer make it an affordable item in India. Thus bringing down the revenue of an American Company.
Now what would happen if in retaliation the Chinese Govt stops buying american debt. The Chinese Govt is the biggest buyer of American Debt. Last year alone they bought $ 127 Million debt and in total China holds 1 Trillion Dollar worth of American debt.
If we look closely at the events that led up to World War 2 we do see that Trade Wars was one of the reasons for it. In 1930 The Smoot Hawley Tariff act was passed by America. It damaged American relationship with European Counterparts and damaged US industry leading to The Great Depression.
One of the reasons for the formation of WTO after World War 2 was to prevent another trade war.
Creating Jobs and providing employment is a Govt's duty. But a short term stop-gap arrangements can never be the long term solution.