Xi jinping

China has been an epicenter of diplomacy over the last month and American officials can’t help but take notice of the shift. Statesmen flying to China, hat in hand, to sign business deals with Chinese firms or enlist Chinese diplomats to assist in solving international disputes gives the foreign policy graybeards ulcers. The general rule seems to be: what’s good for China is bad for the United States. There’s no question that China’s Xi Jinping has had a good few weeks. After being occupied with a nationwide Covid-19 disaster that lasted for three years, Xi, a man whose entire legacy depends on China transforming into a superpower on par with or perhaps even surpassing the US, isn’t wasting any time before injecting his country back into the diplomatic arena.

The primetime launch event for the House China Select Committee shows the bipartisan consensus that has formed in Washington on the threat represented by China. It also illustrates the priorities for members of Congress, and their divisions over the appropriate response to Chinese influence as a military, economic and cultural adversary. Witnesses, including former Trump deputy national security advisor Matthew Pottinger and retired Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, encouraged members to take Xi's words at face value — and emphasized that for too long Washington has looked the other way while China ate America's lunch.

The Chinese balloon debacle has shone a light on America's security vulnerabilities, but it has also revealed just how audacious and deceptive the Chinese Communist Party is. As with their reaction to Covid-19's origins, they have brazenly lied from the day that the balloon’s presence was made public. It is abundantly clear that the craft was not a weather balloon, not least because of its uncharacteristically massive size. Yet China opted to construct a tall tale about a wandering weather balloon that somehow ended up over America. Oh, and the balloon over Latin America? That was just another errant storm tracker. Sure, China regrets the mishap, but there is no need to overreact. What makes the lie so extraordinary is that it is so easily debunked.

Joe Biden's meandering State of the Union left out a great many things, as his voice toggled between insincere whisper and frail bellow. The loudest moment of the night was when, going off-script from his prepared remarks, he insisted that really — c'mon, I really mean it! — China's Xi Jinping is being isolated from the world for some reason. https://twitter.com/greg_price11/status/1623157950654078977 "Name me a world leader who would change places with Xi Jinping! Name me one! Name me one!" Biden yelled. The comment had an air of frustration given that the humiliating Chinese spy balloon was fresh in the minds of all on Capitol Hill. "I’ve made clear with President Xi that we seek competition, not conflict," Biden said in his prepared remarks.

Twenty-five years ago, bipartisan American consensus about China was built on hope, spin and money. Despite the trauma of Tiananmen Square and caution about China’s true economic intentions, many believed in the potential of capitalist principles to move the Chinese Communist Party into a more open, less aggressive posture. Henry Kissinger wrote books about it; pundits and think-tank scholars gave speeches about it; Republicans and Democrats alike parroted the line well into the twenty-first century. Tom Friedman even dreamed ambitiously of what the United States could accomplish if only it were willing to be “China for a day.” What followed? As Harold Macmillan put it, “Events, dear boy, events.

The bilateral relationship between the United States and China is arguably the most important in the world today. The two countries make up approximately 42 percent of the world’s economic output and more than half of global military expenditure (at $801 billion, the US share of that total dwarfs China’s). The Biden administration’s recently released National Security Strategy names China as "the only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do it." The central objective from Washington’s standpoint is to compete vigorously with Beijing, prevent China from attaining hegemonic status in the Asia-Pacific, and ensure this competition doesn’t slide into conflict.

China’s 20th Party Congress concluded on October 23, and President Xi Jinping secured a norm-breaking third term as leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). With the Politburo Standing Committee stacked with close confidants and dissent virtually wiped out, Xi is the strongest he has ever been. Xi has also redoubled the Party’s commitment to taking the island of Taiwan, by force if necessary. Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently said that China “was determined to pursue reunification on a much faster timeline.” The alarm has been repeatedly sounded by American military officials, with speculation that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan could occur as soon as 2023.

In April 2022, six weeks after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, President Biden signed legislation to suspend Russia’s Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status. “Revoking PNTR from Russia,” he said, “is going to make it harder for Russia to do business with the United States… The free world is coming together to defeat Putin.” PNTR status, also known as Most Favored Nation (MFN) status, is a designation granted among World Trade Organization members. Receiving nations are awarded all trade advantages that any other nation receives. Revoking PNTR status from Russia was a strategic move. It opened the door to deliver comprehensive economic strikes against Moscow and sent a clear signal to markets.

There is a joke in Taipei that if China invades Taiwan the best place to shelter is in microchip factories, the only places the People’s Liberation Army can’t afford to destroy. The country that controls advanced chips controls the future of technology — and Taiwan’s chip fabrication foundries (“fabs”) are the finest in the world. Successful reunification between the mainland and its renegade province would give China a virtual monopoly over the most advanced fabs. Given that Xi Jinping has made clear his intention to take control of Taiwan by 2032, it is no wonder that the American government is worried about the concentration of cutting-edge semiconductor technology on the island.