My hat is off to Trump if this story is accurate.
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It looks like the American leader, during the two-day get-together in Florida, changed Sino-U.S. ties for the better—from the American perspective. Trump, in a few short hours, put Xi in his place, cut the ambitious autocrat down to size, and maybe pushed the Chinese state in better directions.
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Trump, despite all the fluffy language, looks like an exception. More than any other American president in recent memory, he thinks about international relations like the Chinese, seeing nations in a permanent struggle for dominance.
The forty-fifth president, seeking dominance, turned a well-laid Chinese trap into a debacle for Xi instead. Xi’s diplomats, especially State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Cui Tiankai, ambassador to Washington, pushed for an early meeting with Trump. China’s Washington watchers evidently thought that, by acting early, they could set parameters for the new American president, who had yet to settle on his China policy.
The Chinese plan was bold, well planned and well executed. It had, therefore, a high probability of success. But then it ran into one Donald J. Trump.
Trump, the host at Mar-a-Lago, arrived in the Florida sun about an hour after Xi Jinping’s plane touched down. That maneuver, among other things, made Xi look like a supplicant. Trump’s late arrival is reminiscent of Gen. Douglas MacArthur ordering his pilot to circle Wake Island in October 1950 so that President Truman would have to land first.
And don’t think the Chinese are okay with their president landing first. Apart from the Kim family of North Korea, there may be no group of people on earth more concerned about appearances and diplomatic protocol than Chinese Communist Party officials. If you doubt that, remember the “stairs incident” that ensued when President Obama landed in Hangzhou last September for the G-20 meeting.
President Xi, unlike Obama, got stairs on arrival, but things went downhill as soon as Trump landed. Chinese netizens, who notice everything, then commented on how Trump’s welcome of their leader seemed less than enthusiastic. Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe famously received a nineteen-second handshake at a White House photo op in February. Xi, on the other hand, got a perfunctory gesture of welcome.
The biggest embarrassment for Xi, however, was yet to come. At the end of dinner on Thursday, Trump personally informed him that he had ordered a missile strike on Syria’s Shayrat Air Field. A few moments later, the American president announced the action to the world.
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The U.S-China Showdown at Mar-a-Lago: How Trump Undercut Xi
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It looks like the American leader, during the two-day get-together in Florida, changed Sino-U.S. ties for the better—from the American perspective. Trump, in a few short hours, put Xi in his place, cut the ambitious autocrat down to size, and maybe pushed the Chinese state in better directions.
...
Trump, despite all the fluffy language, looks like an exception. More than any other American president in recent memory, he thinks about international relations like the Chinese, seeing nations in a permanent struggle for dominance.
The forty-fifth president, seeking dominance, turned a well-laid Chinese trap into a debacle for Xi instead. Xi’s diplomats, especially State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Cui Tiankai, ambassador to Washington, pushed for an early meeting with Trump. China’s Washington watchers evidently thought that, by acting early, they could set parameters for the new American president, who had yet to settle on his China policy.
The Chinese plan was bold, well planned and well executed. It had, therefore, a high probability of success. But then it ran into one Donald J. Trump.
Trump, the host at Mar-a-Lago, arrived in the Florida sun about an hour after Xi Jinping’s plane touched down. That maneuver, among other things, made Xi look like a supplicant. Trump’s late arrival is reminiscent of Gen. Douglas MacArthur ordering his pilot to circle Wake Island in October 1950 so that President Truman would have to land first.
And don’t think the Chinese are okay with their president landing first. Apart from the Kim family of North Korea, there may be no group of people on earth more concerned about appearances and diplomatic protocol than Chinese Communist Party officials. If you doubt that, remember the “stairs incident” that ensued when President Obama landed in Hangzhou last September for the G-20 meeting.
President Xi, unlike Obama, got stairs on arrival, but things went downhill as soon as Trump landed. Chinese netizens, who notice everything, then commented on how Trump’s welcome of their leader seemed less than enthusiastic. Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe famously received a nineteen-second handshake at a White House photo op in February. Xi, on the other hand, got a perfunctory gesture of welcome.
The biggest embarrassment for Xi, however, was yet to come. At the end of dinner on Thursday, Trump personally informed him that he had ordered a missile strike on Syria’s Shayrat Air Field. A few moments later, the American president announced the action to the world.
...
The U.S-China Showdown at Mar-a-Lago: How Trump Undercut Xi
