Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis will meet with two top Chinese officials in Washington on Friday. But the meeting won’t produce any significant dividends for the United States.
On paper, things look more positive. Coming off the back of months of escalating tensions, President Xi Jinping’s decision to deploy his top foreign policy adviser, Yang Jiechi, and his defense minister, Wei Fenghe, suggests interest in rapprochement. Certainly, Yang and Wei are power players. Yang is the architect of Xi’s grand effort to displace the American-led international order, and Wei is behind Xi’s effort to decay America’s security umbrella in the Indo-Pacific. But Yang is a particularly skilled political operator; astute both to U.S. domestic politics and Washington’s policy development. Sending these two operators to Washington, Xi thus uses the pretense of an olive branch in order to gauge Trump’s determination to continue his showdown with Beijing. It is notable here that the Chinese have not sent their foreign minister, Wang Yi. Although his position would suggest diplomatic acumen, Wang lacks Yang’s charm and Wei’s military relevance. He is known to annoy America and its allies.
But where it matters: In policy terms, Xi’s deployments have nothing to do with rapprochement. Ultimately, on the issues that matter — from trade, to intellectual property protection, to security, to the nature of the international order itself — China and the United States are diametrically opposed. Still, the Chinese believe that by playing nice with the U.S. in occasional diplomatic dealings such as this week’s, they can defray Trump’s harsher action against them. In specific terms, the Chinese want to avoid new U.S. tariffs and decrease the scale of U.S. military deployments into the South China Sea.
What will Yang and Wei offer in return for such American compromises?
Well, not much. Perhaps a few commitments to reduce the scale of China’s massive intellectual property theft and an agreement to reduce their importation of Iranian oil. But any concessions will be small in consequence to Beijing and designed to reap far greater rewards from America. The one positive possibility here might be an improvement in military-to-military dialogue. That matters because the risk of an undesired military exchange in the South China Sea has never been greater. But where it matters, Mattis and Pompeo understand the Chinese strategic gambit here. And as they continue to build stronger U.S. alliances in the Indo-Pacific, it is likely that they’ll advise Trump to retain his pressure on Beijing.
I would suggest that’s a good thing. China is, on a generational timeline, determined to improve its economic and security interests at the expense of America and her allies. The Trump administration must not allow that agenda to succeed. But American resolution here is also important for another defining reason: the upholding of basic human rights in the great power struggle of the 21st century. As Adrian Zenz reported on Monday, China’s Uighur concentration-camp empire is now proven to be for imprisonment, not for skills-based training as China’s regime falsely claims.
That speaks to the critical issue here: China is neither our friend nor our prospective partner. Under Xi, its regime has utter disdain for that which America cherishes. Until that changes, for the sake of the global liberal order (the cause and function of our shared prosperity), Trump must put up robust opposition to Xi.
