ASEAN-U.S. Relations: What Are the Talking Points?

9. United States-China Relations

83 9 United StateS–China RelationS Bo Zhiyue The relationship between the United States and China is the most important bilateral relationship in the twenty-first century. The status of the bilateral relationship is significant not only for the two most powerful nations, but also for the rest of the world. This relationship has three important characteristics. In political terms, the United States and China are strategic partners. They are two of the most important players in both bilateral and multilateral issues in the world. In economic terms, they are both partners and competitors. In terms of military relations, the two countries are both competitors and partners. There are some important issues facing the United States and China. Bilaterally, the United States and China will have to address their different concerns. For China, certain issues are concerned with its core interests. These include Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang, and the South China Sea. For the United States, China’s currency exchange issue and human rights are major concerns. Multilaterally, the United States needs China more than China needs the United States. The 84 Bo Zhiyue United States needs China’s cooperation on nuclear issues in North Korea and Iran, as well as a host of other issues, such as energy security and climate change. The United States and China have developed some mechanisms to deal with issues of their mutual concerns. These include summit meetings and regular exchanges between top leaders from the two countries, and annual strategic and economic dialogue sessions. These mechanisms have facilitated political communications between the two countries, but have yet to produce more tangible results. Main ChaRaCteRiStiCS of U.S.-China RelationS Strategic Partnership Although it is not explicitly spelled out in the joint statement issued by the United States and China in November 2009,1 the two major powers regard each other as strategic partners. U.S. President Barack Obama has taken China much more seriously than his predecessors. He has indicated on a number of occasions that China is becoming an important global power and that the United States treats China not just as a partner, but as a strategic partner, as reflected in his interview with Reuters on the eve of his first Asia trip on 9 November 2009. In his answer to a question about whether China is a rival or an ally, Obama came to the conclusion that China is a strategic partner. In his words, “it’s very hard to see how we succeed or China succeeds in our respective goals without working together. And that is, I think, the purpose of the strategic partnership and that’s why this trip to China is going to be so important.”2 Since he took office as the U.S. President in January 2009, Obama has made extraordinary efforts to work with China. In the past two decades, there has been a tradition in the White House for the incumbent president to meet with the Dalai Lama whenever the latter United States–China Relations 85 is present in Washington. From April 1991 to October 2007, three American presidents (George H. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush) met with the Dalai Lama altogether eleven times. However, Obama broke the tradition by avoiding the Dalai Lama in October 2009 when the Tibetan monk showed up in the U.S. capital. On the other hand, China has always taken the United States very seriously and has been trying to develop a strategic partnership with the sole superpower. President Hu Jintao met President George W. Bush sixteen times between 2003 and 2008. China conducted with the United States six rounds of “strategic dialogue” (in Chinese, but “senior dialogue” in English) from August 2005 to December 2008, and five rounds of “strategic economic dialogue” from December 2006 to December 2008.3 The “U.S.–China Joint Statement” issued on 17 November 2009 after the Obama-Hu summit devoted a whole section (Part II) on “Building and Deepening Bilateral Strategic Trust”. “The United States and China”, the statement reads, “have an increasingly broad base of cooperation and share increasingly important common responsibilities on many major issues concerning global stability and prosperity.” Therefore, “the two countries”, the statement declares, “should further strengthen coordination and cooperation, work together to tackle challenges, and promote world peace, security and prosperity.”4 economic Cooperation and Competition between the United States and China In the past three decades, the United States and...