China’s Warning to Biden – WSJ

China’s director of the Central Commission on Foreign Affairs, Yang Jiechi, then shed a 20-minute tear (including translation) over the excellence of ‘Chinese democracy’ and the sins of America. The latter contained a reference to Black Lives Matter, human rights issues, and that the US ‘exercised long-standing jurisdiction and oppression and exceeded national security through the use of force or financial hegemony’.

Mr. Yang added: “We therefore believe that it is important for the United States to change its own image and to promote its own democracy in the rest of the world. Many people in the United States actually have little confidence in the democracy of the United States. ”As we have noted, the Chinese want to echo the waking American media criticism of America.

Mr. Blinken replied that the US “acknowledges our imperfections, acknowledges that we are not perfect, we make mistakes, we have reversals, we take steps back”, but then make progress again. This is true enough, but unnecessarily defensive after a foreigner’s assault on American interests and values.

***

It’s just one meeting, but it was a scale for the world’s most important bilateral relationship. The message is leaking that the private exchanges on the Chinese side were as difficult as the public remarks. The Chinese make it clear that Beijing, after the Trump years, wants to return to Obama’s policy of accommodating China’s global progress.

This means weak objections to China’s cyber and intellectual property theft. This means the end of US policy to build an alliance of democracies in Asia that opposes Chinese aggression. And above all, it means ending criticism or sanctions against China for violating the treaty with Britain over Hong Kong, threatening an invasion of Taiwan, or imprisoning Uighers in Xinjiang retraining camps.

In the first two months, the Biden administration was strong in its rhetoric about it all. Mr Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan conducted a series of well-organized meetings with Indian-Pacific allies ahead of the Anchorage meeting. They also reached an agreement on the financing of US troops deployment in South Korea.

But the real challenge will be how well it responds to the aggressive design of opponents in Beijing, Moscow and Tehran. The hard men in these capitals remember how they could progress when Biden’s liberal internationalists last came under Mr. Obama was in power. Russia seized Crimea, invaded eastern Ukraine and invaded Syria. China seized islands for military bases in the South China Sea and stole American secrets with impunity. Iran is spreading terrorism through proxy through the Middle East and fleeing John Kerry over the nuclear deal.

These regional powers are looking to see if this new US government is Obama II. Tehran’s renewed courtship to return to the flawed nuclear deal in 2015 is a sign of weakness. Vladimir Putin will surely take action against US interests in response to Mr. Biden’s affirmative answer last week to the question of whether the Russian is a “killer”.

The biggest test is China, which is growing in confidence that it has the strategic advantage over a declining America. If you do not believe it, read mr. Yang’s comments in Anchorage. The thinking of the powers in Beijing today is no different from the Soviet Union in the 1970s when American decline was in vogue and the Communists were trying to advance around the world. Except that China has much more economic power today.

The future of Taiwan is perhaps the most challenging challenge. As a locus of global semiconductor production, the island is of paramount importance to American economic interests and is a democratic ally. Chinese President Xi Jinping has made it clear that the recapture of Taiwan is a priority, and China’s military is building a force capable of falling rapidly. Mr. Xi will be eager to trade climate change promises for U.S. debt across Taiwan.

This is a dangerous moment because the world’s rogue forces want to test the decision of the Biden administration. The Anchorage reading is a warning to take seriously.