It makes sense if you understand how Trump became president. He'll test something (through a tweet) to his audience and then amplify or kill it based on the response. It worked great with 50% of the US population or so; it doesn't seem to be working at all with the Chinese political elite.
Things like threatening Canada and Greenland's sovereignty, unilaterally tanking stock markets and levying huge tariffs on western trading partners are not popular with his voters.
What they want doesn't matter anymore, these moves are about splitting the western economic and military alliances, a goal Russia has had since the 1960s.