Chinese President Xi Jinping landed at Joint Base Andrews Wednesday for a three-day state visit, and Donald Trump was waiting for him at the foot of the red carpet.
That’s highly unusual. US presidents typically receive foreign leaders at the White House.
In fact, with the exception of popes, no president had met a foreign leader on the tarmac since 1962, when JFK went out to greet British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan.
Judging by the media’s reaction, however, you would think Trump bent the knee and swore fealty to his communist overlords.
There was a short clip of US troops on their hands and knees, smoothing the carpet before Xi stepped out of the plane. It went viral. Chinese were gleeful, and Americans were disgusted, at what appeared to be a humiliation ritual… even though smoothing out the red carpet is pretty standard.
The over-analysis continued. When B-1 bombers passed overhead— Trump flinched and Xi didn’t move a muscle— the Twitterverse exploded with commentary about what that means for American primacy.
Then there were hot takes on Xi’s every smile, every Trump fidget. Commentators claimed that Xi speaking Mandarin through his translator was ‘asserting language dominance’ over Trump.
It’s all ridiculous. I honestly don’t remember an event where so much irrelevant minutia was over-analyzed for hidden meaning.
The larger point is that the US is clearly treating China like an equal— something that America does not do for anyone else. When the President of France, or Ukraine, or anywhere else comes to town, the President receives them at the White House.
China, on the other hand, is now a peer… not a superior. But definitely not a junior partner.
The biggest takeaway, though, seems to be lost on everyone… but hit me right between the eyes.
At a formal White House ceremony the next morning, Xi declared that “the Thucydides Trap can be overcome. . .”
The Thucydides Trap, of course refers to the famous ancient Greek historian who wrote of the Peloponnesian Wars between Athens and Sparta. Athens was a declining power and Sparta was the rising power; and the theory asserts that rising and declining powers often go to war against one another.
World War I was an obvious example of the Thucydides Trap. Britain was in decline. Germany was rising fast. War became inevitable.
When Xi made this assertion, most of the media coverage treated his remarks as a wonderful message of peace and reassurance.
BUT NO ONE BOTHERED TO QUESTION HIS PREMISE, i.e. that America is permanently in decline and will be surpassed by China.
Xi obviously likes this analogy because he views China as the rising power… eventually the world’s superpower… and the US as the declining power.
What he essentially said was: America is finished, we’re going to pass you… and while that historically has led to war, I’m going to be super magnanimous and claim that I prefer peace.
Talk about being presumptuous. This guy comes to America’s house and tells everyone that he’s going to dominate?!?
Obviously he believes this— he’s the one who has been steering China for 14 years.
And yes, America is in decline. Between the $40 trillion in debt, Social Security running dry in a few years, foreign central banks dumping dollars for gold, and a Congress too dysfunctional to fix any of it, that much is indisputable.
But America is not in PERMANENT decline.
The problems that the US faces can be fixed with some rational thinking and a few hundred signatures: cutting fraud and waste. Immigration reform. Social Security reform. Regulatory reform to boost productivity growth.
None of this is difficult. But Congress can’t seem to muster the will to make it happen, and voters keep sending the same corrupt idiots to office.
But if you think America has a debt problem, China has even worse debt challenges. Plus their entire economy is run by communist bureaucrats and businesses who ‘innovate’ by stealing other people’s intellectual property.
And that doesn’t even scratch the surface of their biggest challenges.
America needs some sensible politicians to fix its problems. China needs a time machine.
They’d have to go back in time to reverse their one-child policy… or undo decades of communism that created a business culture where screwing up means getting shipped off to a ‘reeducation’ facility.
Say the wrong thing and you get disappeared like Jack Ma, who was the richest man in China until he criticized the regulators in 2020, then vanished for three months, and now gets rolled out for the occasional proof of life.
There’s a reason why wealthy Chinese people leave the country. People who have the means hit the exits.
And, seriously, eight decades later, these guys are still whining about Taiwanese independence. Get over it already!
Undoing all of that requires a complete cultural reset.
So when he boasts about becoming the next dominant superpower, Xi is way over his skis.
America has a regulatory problem. China is literally communist. Nothing happens there without the Party’s permission, and it has to steal every idea it can’t come up with itself.
Yes, China has had a good run for the past ~20 years. America’s has been miserable. But past performance is no indication of future returns.
If anything, Xi’s remarks should shame Congress into finally lifting a finger to do the right thing and pass sensible reform.
And you’d think more of the pathetic press would have the dignity to call that out as well.
Unfortunately, Congress and the media tend to attract the worst people on earth, so don’t hold your breath waiting for either one to find a spine.
Time will tell if America can reverse course… and if China can live up to Xi’s fantasy. But that’s why it makes sense to have a Plan B.
