President Donald Trump on Thursday announced tariffs on about $60 billion of imports from China in response to what the United States sees as China's unfair trading and investment practices including alleged intellectual property and technology theft.

Under the retaliatory action, Washington will levy 25 percent additional tariffs on a range of products in the aerospace, information communication technology and machinery sectors that it views as supported by an unfair industrial policy.

The administration also plans to restrict Chinese investment in the United States in sensitive U.S. technology and confront what it views as China's discriminatory technology licensing practices through a World Trade Organization dispute proceeding.

"We're going to be doing a Section 301 trade action," Trump told reporters at the White House as he called for "reciprocal" trade with China. "It could be about $60 billion."

The set of measures came ahead of the launch Friday of stiff tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum, an action that apparently targets China as the administration prods the country to reduce its excess capacity -- and exports -- in these metals.

Given the series of actions, trade friction between the world's two largest economies is likely to intensify, with Beijing vowing retaliatory steps against Washington.

China condemned Thursday's announcement, calling it "a typical unilateral trade protectionist action."

"China does not want a trade war with anyone. But China is not afraid of and will not recoil from a trade war," the Chinese Embassy in the United States said in a statement. "If a trade war were initiated by the U.S., China would fight to the end to defend its own legitimate interests with all necessary measures."

Trump criticized the United States' $375 billion goods trade deficit with China last year as "the largest deficit of any country in the history of the world."

Trump also rebuked Beijing for "tremendous intellectual property theft" that he said costs Washington "hundreds of billions of dollars" on a yearly basis.

The president directed U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to publish a list of Chinese products that will be subject to tariffs in 15 days, according to the White House.

A senior White House official said the tariffs cover about 1,300 items.

Trump directed Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to propose restrictions on Chinese investment in the United States in 60 days.

Trump urged Lighthizer to cooperate with other WTO members to address China's trade practices, a call that could lead to joint action with Japan and the European Union at the Geneva-based global trade watchdog.

Citing estimates, the senior White House official said the U.S. trade deficit results in 2 million more jobs in China and 2 million fewer in the United States.

"They have benefited far more from this relationship than we have," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "What the United States is doing is simply strategically defending itself against this particular form of economic aggression."

Another senior U.S. official said, "The end objective of this is to get China to modify its unfair trading practices."