Politics
The US president said Xi Jinping would give him a “big hug”. This is what experts say will actually happen
Beijing: Ever the fashionable US President Donald Trump has placed high expectations on the bonhomie he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping will project to the world when they meet in Beijing on Thursday.
“President Xi will give me a big, big hug when I get there in a few weeks,” Trump posted on Truth Social last month, saying China was “very happy that I am permanently opening the Strait of Hormuz.”
It’s part of Trump’s usual routine of promoting his friendship – and sometimes slavish admiration – with Xi, in stark contrast to the tensions and suspicion between their two countries that touch almost every policy area.
A month later, that looks like a bold prediction from Trump, not only because Xi is hardly known for his public displays of affection, nor because he has not matched Trump’s effusiveness about their apparent friendship. But above all because the war in Iran is now entering its third month. The strait is still closed, blocked by both the United States and Iran, and the ceasefire is hanging by a thread.
Trump’s state visit to China – the first by a US president in nearly a decade – was delayed in March to end the war in Iran. But the issue appears to be high on the agenda for this week’s summit anyway, with Trump expected to press Xi on China’s relationship with Tehran and his support for reopening the crucial shipping lane during the two-day talks.
It’s unclear how much this could reshape the negotiations, but some analysts see it as strengthening China’s position.
“This is something he will really need China’s help with, because it looks like bilateral negotiations between the United States and Iran are going to get nowhere,” says Chucheng Feng, founder of Hutong Research, a Beijing-based consulting firm.
“US stocks of rare earths and critical minerals are also depleting quickly. This also requires supply from China. If you really think about it from a short-term perspective, China certainly has the upper hand.”
China analyst Arthur Kroeber of research firm Gavekal Dragonomics says the outlook for the summit favors Xi.
“Trump’s trade war is in disarray: Most of his tariffs have been found illegal and Chinese exports continue to grow despite US protectionism. Trump’s war with Iran is also a disaster,” he wrote in a recent analysis.
For some time now, Washington and Beijing have indicated that stabilizing the fragile détente in U.S.-China relations was the main goal of this summit, lowering expectations for a major breakthrough in economic or other policy.
Many analysts expect the Beijing summit to achieve little beyond securing an extension of the trade truce that Xi and Trump sealed at their last meeting in Busan, South Korea, six months ago. And maybe lock in a few more purchase orders for U.S. beef, soybeans, Boeing planes and other exports.
This does not detract from the importance of the summit. Trump may not get the embrace he seeks, but both men place a high value on leader-to-leader relationships, meaning relationships built on Xi’s turf will be key to setting the stage for at least two more potential meetings between Trump and Xi this year.
That gives the Trump administration more time to secure trade “wins,” while Xi can fine-tune his attempts to convince Trump to reduce his support for Taiwan, both rhetorically and in his arms sales to the democratic island.
“The Taiwan issue is not just one issue among many, but is the core of China’s core interests and the most sensitive red line in bilateral relations,” state media said. China Daily said in an editorial previewing the summit.
Trump said on Monday (US time) that he planned to “have that discussion” with Xi about arms sales at the summit, although US officials informed reporters that there were no plans to change US policy towards Taiwan.
“In simple terms, Trump is not that bad for China. He is considered the dove of Chinese politics in the White House,” says Zhao Minghao, an international relations expert at Fudan University in Shanghai.
Zhao reflects a common view among Chinese academics that Beijing is increasingly convinced it has the tools to overcome, and even outmaneuver, the “Trump shock,” which quickly escalated into a triple-digit tariff war last year before China eased its grip on rare earth metals.
Concern grows over strait closure
Since the Iran war began in February, Chinese experts have debated whether Beijing has significant influence over Iran, its friend and economic partner, and, if so, what it would take for Xi to leverage that influence and what he might seek to get in return.
But there are also signs that China is increasingly concerned about the standoff in the Gulf, despite its considerable oil reserves. Its export-oriented economy relies on open shipping lanes, and about half of its oil imports and nearly a third of its LNG imports pass through the Middle East.
It took two months, but in April, Xi made his first comments calling for the opening of the strait – a position repeated by Foreign Minister Wang Yi when he received his Iranian counterpart in Beijing last week.
“China has good reason to help mediate this conflict. The question is how to prevent the Iranian conflict from becoming increasingly negative and impacting U.S.-China relations,” Zhao said.
There is a lot of friction on this front ahead of the summit, and a lot of skepticism on the American side about Beijing’s willingness to play a mediating role beyond ceasefire calls on the sidelines.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a key architect of the summit on the American side, called on China to “get the Iranians to open the strait,” while accusing Beijing of “funding the largest state sponsor of terrorism” by purchasing 90 percent of Iranian oil.
China, meanwhile, last week took the unprecedented step of ordering its refineries to ignore U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil, signaling Beijing’s growing confidence to defy pressure from Washington. Just a few days ago, the US State Department sanctioned three Chinese companies accused of “providing satellite imagery to enable Iran to carry out military strikes against US forces in the Middle East.”
As Nicholas Burns, former US ambassador to China, recently said, “No matter who is in power in Washington and Beijing in the future, I think we are going to be stuck in this highly competitive relationship for well over a decade.” »
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Lisa Visentin is the North Asia correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age based in Beijing. She was previously a federal political correspondent based in Canberra.Log in via X Or e-mail.From our partners
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