Sino-US ties at a crossroads
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Some Chinese experts say the Obama administration is changing its strategy toward China to contain Beijing's rise by employing financial, military and diplomatic means and encircling the country geographically. The reason, they say, is the US cannot accept China's rapid rise as a regional and global power.
On the other hand, American strategists say China is becoming more "assertive", "arrogant" and "aggressive", because it believes "the US is declining as a power while China is rising" and "the US needs China more than China needs the US".
China and the US, as well as the international community hope Hu's visit to the US would ensure that instead of turning against each other, the two sides continue to maintain win-win cooperation, expound their real intentions and enhance their mutual trust to get bilateral relations back on the right track.
It is important for the two countries to enhance mutual trust and clear doubts to take bilateral ties forward in the new era. The two major issues standing in the way of smoother bilateral relations are "rebalance" in trade and "reassurance" in security. The US will continue to press China over issues concerning Beijing's financial security and economic development such as the yuan's exchange rate, independent innovation and protection of intellectual property rights. China, on its part, is concerned about getting recognition as a market economy and deregulation of the US' high-tech export policy and issues of mutual benefit.
Whether the two sides can achieve a breakthrough on these issues depends on Washington's will to abide by the basic principle of not politicizing economic issues and handling problems with the overall global situation and mutual benefit in mind.
On the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, China and the US share the same goal, the goal of maintaining peace and restoring stability and prosperity to the peninsula. They, however, differ on the means to achieving the goal. For the time being, they cannot agree on the resumption of the Six-Party Talks. But to maintain stability and to bury the Cold War mentality in Northeast Asia once and for all, the US has to show greater tolerance and understanding.
When it comes to arms sales to Taiwan, the US is still obsessed with petty interests and ignores the overall situation. Hu's visit is thus expected to set bilateral relations rolling in the right direction again.
That does not necessarily mean the future will be smooth. With increasingly close interests and binding gains and losses, competition and rifts between the two sides cannot be avoided. Old problems concerning US arms sales to Taiwan, the insistence of US presidents on meeting with the Dalai Lama, human rights issues and ideological differences still exist.
New problems in terms of navigation in seas, outer space and network security have been emerging. The two sides are divided over the reforms in the United Nations, global financial system, climate order construction and other issues of global significance, too.
That's why it is very important to continue regular high-level exchange visits, and contacts between the two countries' strategic, business and military circles, and peoples. Such arrangements are needed to deepen and expand existing cooperation mechanisms and view the changes in bilateral relations in a rational and healthy way.
The author is director of the American Studies Center at China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations in Beijing.
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