Editor’s note for June 20, 2023
A note for Access newsletter readers from Jeremy Goldkorn.
Dear reader:
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken went to Beijing and the commentariat has not shut up since then.
It was something of a Rorschach visit: Some of America’s China hawks said Blinken was humiliated by the seating arrangement at his meeting with Xí Jìnpíng 习近平, and nationalist Chinese complained that the U.S. wants dialogue but refuses to back down on various trade and security policies that target China.
There were no major announcements or concrete decisions, but people in both countries who favor engagement were cheered by the resumption of high-level ties.
As we note in today’s newsletter, Blinken’s visit follows trips by Bill Gates and Elon Musk to China, and amid a flurry of diplomatic activity: China’s premier and No. 2 leader Lǐ Qiáng 李强 is schmoozing in Germany this week, and U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan went to Japan last week where he met the prime minister as well as his counterparts from Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines.
Perhaps most notably for China, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi will pay a state visit to the U.S. this week. Despite Modi’s increasingly authoritarian ways, it looks like he will be greeted with the type of bipartisan enthusiasm that Xi Jinping could not dream of.
Who knows what any of this will mean a few months from now, but at least for the moment, the news is about talks, seating plans, and meetings, not fighter jets, bombs, and militarized islands.
Our Word of the Day is: Rorschach test (罗夏测试 luō xià cèshì), also known as the inkblot test (墨迹测验 mòjī cèyàn).
