On Friday the Wall Street Journal reported on Titan International’s (NYSE: TWI) suit against GPX International Tire Corp. for allegedly “dumping” subsidized Chinese tires onto the U.S. market. Titan still produces its tires in the U.S., while GPX, which started as a scrap dealer, imports theirs from China.

Although sickened by the protectionist sentiments of Titan’s CEO, Maurice Taylor, I thought it would be interesting to look a little deeper into the situation using ImportGenius.com’s database of international trade records.

In the past 12 months, GPX International imported 2067 ocean containers of tires from 35 different manufacturers in China. Their most important suppliers were Aeolus Tyre of Henan, China (197 containers), Hebei Starbright Tire of Hebei, China (441 containers), Tianjin United Tire & Rubber International of Tianjin, China (256 containers) and Triangle Tyre of Qingdao, China (207 containers).

Titan, on the other hand, imported just 11 containers of tires in 2007, all from Pt. Industri Karet Deli of Indonesia, and none so far in 2008. Instead, the company imported aluminum powder from Russia and copper wire from Finland, presumably for use in its manufacturing process.

With access to a complete list of GPX International’s suppliers just a click away here at ImportGenius.com, Titan may be better served finding new sources to diversify its supply rather than fighting expensive lawsuits.