Washington Post
Michael H. Fuchs
United States President Donald Trump spent a lot of time during the campaign criticising China and promising to get tough on Beijing if elected president. In just his first few weeks in office, however, Trump has proved to be a paper tiger with regard to China, making himself look weak in the eyes of Chinese leaders which, in turn, will embolden China’s own assertive behaviour.
During the campaign, Trump had consistently lashed out at China, making the case that the US didn’t know how to deal with China. Bad trade deals were a prime focus for Trump, who said, “The money they’ve drained out of the United States has rebuilt China”. When it comes to America’s handling of North Korea and the South China Sea, Trump claimed that “China’s toying with us.”
But as president it appears that Trump doesn’t know how to deal with China. During the transition period, Trump took a shot across China’s bow by questioning the ‘One China’ policy — the premise that Taiwan is a part of China, which had undergirded US-China relations since the 1970s — and by taking a call from Taiwan’s president. This was a heretical act from China’s perspective, one that could have sabotaged US-China relations.
Trump justified his stance on Taiwan by saying that he did not see why the US had to be “bound by the ‘One China’ policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things”. Some likewise spun his actions as a strategic ploy to shake things up and gain leverage with China on other issues, such as trade.
After Trump’s Taiwan remarks, US-China relations were off to a rocky start. As Trump began the usual series of initial calls with leaders from around the world, according to the New York Times, “administration officials concluded that Mr Xi [Jinping] would only take a call if Mr Trump publicly committed to upholding the 44-year-old policy”.
Nothing in return
And so, merely three weeks after his inauguration, President Trump reaffirmed the ‘One China’ policy in a phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping. In other words, Trump’s first act as president with respect to his China policy was to fold in his own first bluff with China. And despite Trump’s claims to know how to negotiate with, he seems to have got nothing in return for backing down on his previous ‘One China’ statements.
To be clear, in deciding to support long-standing US policy, Trump took a very necessary step to avoid potentially destabilising consequences with China. But the messages that China will take away from this event are clear and not good for US interests: An ill-informed and irresponsible US president backed away from a threat with nothing to show for it. Even the official White House readout of the phone call between Trump and Xi admitted that Trump had to give in: “President Trump agreed, at the request of President Xi, to honour our ‘One China’ policy.” The lesson China will likely take away is that Trump’s threats are not to be taken seriously.
This incident would be a bad enough start by itself. But Trump decided in his first week in office to unilaterally weaken the US position with China by withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The goal of TPP was to provide the US advantageous trade relationships with key Asian partners in a region where China’s trade relationships were expanding rapidly.
Economic position
If Trump really wanted to get tough with China on trade, he would have pushed to improve the TPP to advance America’s economic position in the region and give himself more leverage in trade talks with China. By simply cancelling US participation in the TPP, Trump gave China a gift, and again got nothing in return.
The ramifications of these initial stumbles could be significant. Not only will China believe that the new US president can be pushed around, but China will also believe that it can get away with being more assertive in bullying its neighbours. Likewise, US allies and partners in Asia will have less confidence that the new administration can be relied upon to stand up to China, sapping US credibility in the region.
From North Korea to the South China Sea, trade issues to cyber-security, there is no shortage of thorny challenges in the US-China relationship that may require the new US administration to get tough. Handing away US leverage in the relationship with China is not the right way to get started.
