TCSS Security Commentaries #037
The two-hour conversation between the two world leaders gave some reprieve to beset US-China ties. It restored military dialogue, crucial in avoiding miscalculations in hotspots like the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait. It also outlined areas for cooperation, from counternarcotics to climate change and AI. It was fleeting but vital in steadying the world’s most consequential bilateral ties as it faces more headwinds next year.
Lucio Blanco Pitlo III, Taiwan Fellow and Visiting Scholar, NCCU.
For the second consecutive time, an international gathering provided a venue for top leaders of the United States and China to sit down and talk. The sideline meeting between Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping became a key highlight of this year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit held in San Francisco. Around the same time last year, both chief executives also met on the sidelines of the 17th G20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia.
The meeting can help stabilize fraught ties ahead of more turbulence as the US heads to elections next year. In America, being tough on China has become one of the rare sources of bipartisan consensus. On the campaign trail, presidential contenders will likely outcompete each other on who can be more strident in dealing with Beijing. This will deal further blows to already strained ties between the two major powers. Hence, the Biden-Xi meeting was a chance to sturdy guardrails of the world’s most important bilateral relations as it braced for further storms.
The Biden-Xi meeting underpins the significance of maintaining leader-to-leader dialogue. Both sides understand the need to ensure that great power dynamics will be handled responsibly and conflict will be avoided. They recognize the huge stakes involved if unfettered competition will run amok. The US and China do not see eye to eye on several hot-button issues, but they know that cooperation is necessary to address pressing domestic and global issues like narcotics, climate change, and rules of the road for advanced technology.
And as rivalry deepens and tensions mount, there is all the more reason for both sides to step up talks. The Biden-Xi meeting did not come out of the blue. Since summer, both sides have been busy preparing the groundwork. Four US cabinet secretaries, a Senate delegation, and the California governor visited Beijing. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Washington to reciprocate these US gestures. These show intense diplomacy between determined contenders split on a suite of subjects from security flashpoints to supply chains. That US and China, divided by far broader and deeper structural issues, managed to sustain high-level interaction offers profound lessons for the region. There is no alternative to direct dialogue between competitors and disputants. This may resonate with US ally Philippines facing dangerous run-ins with China in the contested South China Sea. Manila suspended military exchange and cut off hotline communications with its big neighbor raising the specter of accidents in the flashpoint.
The Biden-Xi meeting can deliver tangible dividends for both parties and the world. China’s cooperation can help the US combat its opioid epidemic. Chinese authorities can clamp down on the trafficking of fentanyl or precursor chemicals to third states like Mexico, from which such illegal drugs and substances can slip to the long contiguous US border.
One key US goal behind the meeting was the resumption of bilateral military dialogue. This is critical given the growing cases of close encounters between Chinese vessels and aircraft and their US and allied counterparts in congested spaces like the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. Institutionalized hotline channels and regular security exchanges are indispensable in preventing accidents and miscalculations in these choppy waters and the airspace above them. Both sides restored military communication “on the basis of equality and respect”. This includes bilateral Defense Policy Coordination Talks and Military Maritime Consultative Agreement meetings. Beijing and Washington also agreed to “conduct telephone conversations between theater commanders.”
Getting two of the world’s biggest carbon emitters to agree on reducing methane emissions is also a big win for the planet. Both sides agree to accelerate the transition to renewable energy by 2030, a welcome commitment in the leadup to the COP28 next month in Dubai. If Beijing’ Belt and Road Initiative, Washington’s Build Back Better World program, and the G7-backed Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment prioritize funding for solar, wind, and other green energy sources, it can go a long way in helping many developing countries make the shift to more sustainable fuel.
The two countries also pledged to establish an intergovernmental dialogue on artificial intelligence (AI). This is important as cutting-edge technologies became arenas for great power struggle, threatening to disrupt value chains, fragment standards, and create parallel incompatible systems. Washington launched its Clean Network program, while Beijing pitched its Global Data Security Initiative and, recently, its Global AI Governance Initiative. Agreeing on common norms and rules is vital to keeping a seamless technology space.
However, while the meeting may have provided some relief, expectations remain reserved. Taiwan continues to be a thorny subject in US-China relations. Beijing continues to oppose US arms sales to the island and protest what it deems to be official exchanges between Taipei and Washington. But the US is unlikely to yield. China is also becoming more daring in challenging US military presence and activities in the South China Sea. Washington, on the other hand, has become more vocal in calling out its near-peer for its excessive maritime claims, which were already invalidated by an arbitral tribunal, and efforts to enforce the same against its smaller neighbors, such as the Philippines and Vietnam.
While Xi will stay in power in the foreseeable future, Biden will stand for reelection next year. Elections in Taiwan this January and the US next November are key variables that may impact US-China relations. Great power chasm will remain a central feature of global geopolitics. In such a context, it will take more than familiarity or personal chemistry between top leaders to steady troubled ties.
Lucio Blanco Pitlo III is a Taiwan Fellow and Visiting Scholar at the Department of Diplomacy and Center for Foreign Policy Studies of the National Chengchi University.
Taiwan Center for Security Studies 