Searching for Clues on the Coming Trump-Xi Meeting in Beijing

Logistical preparation for Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing is under way. They make the actual meeting more likely. But one cannot fail to notice the silence of much of the commentariat on this coming event. Evidently, there is more than usual uncertainty on the outcome, given the zigzags in US policy in general, and on its China policy more specifically. A notable exception is Brooking’s Ryan Hass. His thoughtful piece ends with three scenarios pointing in very different directions and a "muddle through" conclusion. Perhaps realistic, if not very satisfying to the mind.

Two images come to mind in anticipation of the meeting. One is about Xi Jinping as a praying mantis patiently waiting for the prey to come around. "Calm", "stability", "responsibility" are on display in Beijing.

Trump’s Reduced Requests from China

US expectations from China seem to have shrunk and pivoted. Since the Busan trade truce in October 2025, a pile of additional tariffs is on hold. In principle, "rebalancing trade" is still on the table. But it is now said to focus on more familiar requests: soybeans, aircrafts, energy. The administration now talks of establishing a "board of trade" and a "board of investment" between the two countries-well-worn dialogues of the kind that Donald Trump thought he could dispense himself from.

To phrase it politely, he has "reoriented" his China policy away from his first term. No comments are made about human rights whatsoever. A $11.1 billion (€9.4 billion) arms sale to Taiwan is on hold-presumably a sweetener until the summit is held. Under lobbying by Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, the administration has not formally gone ahead with a ban on the company’s H200 chips. Ironically, it is China which loudly announced that it forbade its companies to use made in China chips, again pushing up Huawei. The reality is more complex: only a few weeks later, China is said to have authorized several key companies (Alibaba, Tencent) to buy 400,000 of these H200 chips. On both sides, there is posturing.

Within the US administration, there has early on been the equivalent of a purge at the National Security Council. Alex Wong and David Feith, nominated at the start of Trump’s second term and broadly in charge of economic security, China and critical technologies, have been dismissed.
 

Floating Like a Butterfly, Stinging Like a Bee

This being said, Donald Trump remains Donald Trump and policy reversals can be reversed.

Musing about reported arms transfers by China to Iran (potential delivery of man-portable air-defense system and transfer of X-Band radars, use of Chinese satellites to pinpoint targets in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states), he reportedly said on Truth Social: "I wrote him a letter asking him not to do that (…) and he wrote me a letter saying that essentially he’s not doing that (…) President Xi will give me a big fat hug when I get there in a few weeks".

But-typically-he added: "We are working together smartly, and very well! Doesn’t that beat fighting??? BUT REMEMBER, we are very good at fighting, if we have to-far better than anyone else!!!". Comprenne qui pourra, the French might say. The way to understand this is to recall the two traits in Trump’s negotiating style: simultaneously making best offers, outlining the worst outcome, and remaining unpredictable.

A fault line running has reappeared in the administration on China policy, as has emerged on Iran. A sarcastic comment notes: "None of this would have happened if Elbridge Colby was alive". Colby, of course, is the very much alive Under Secretary of War for Policy who has consistently argued to refocus all efforts on the contest with China, often at the expense of Europe. He has recently toned down his language towards Beijing in that respect. Leaks to CBS and NBC on weapon sales to Iran, and several Wall Street Journalarticles are clearly based on sources among the remaining China hawks in the administration.

The March 2025 Annual Threat Assessment from the intelligence community was blunter than previously on threats from China, and the more recent Senate hearing held in March 2026 with that community follows the same lines. Bureau of Industry and Security, and intelligence officials have gone along with views from Silicon Valley on China distillating US AI models and using H200 chips to train models that will be used by the PLA-through integration of civilian and military research. They implicitly fight back against Nvidia’s argument that selling the chips to China actually delays its own R&D on semi-conductors and is therefore an opportune move.

China’s Posture and Realities

China is further cementing its self-reliance policies on many fronts, from semiconductors to food commodities. China’s use of its new export control legislation to ban rare earth exports in 2025 has been hailed by many as the equivalent of a nuclear deterrent. Indeed, if it had continued, it could have crippled both key civilian industry sectors using digital hardware and weapon industries. If this was a deterrent, it may have been used too early, against US export controls on chips, and therefore encouraged the Trump administration to move even more forcefully on substitutes for China’s sourcing of mineral resources and its near monopoly on refining them.

The US is now strengthening its relation with the Philippines and other Asian countries. both for forward military basing and for sourcing, transformation and industrial use of critical materials. Former USTR Robert Lighthizer has essentially advocated economic decoupling, and a resumption of the trade war could focus more on export bans and enforcing rules of origin for US imports through third countries than on the tariffs themselves.

Another sign of the yo-yo between decoupling ambitions and interlocked supply chains is the war with Iran and the closure of the Hormuz Strait that have highlighted the interdependence between China’s and the global economy. Yes, China is less dependent on oil in the very short term, thanks to coal, vast oil stocks and a fast moving energy transition. But the Gulf is still its main import source for oil. A crisis in the Gulf and in Europe resulting from energy shortage will immediately hit China’s own exports. These, it should always be repeated, are its main growth engine and the only source of profitability for much of Chinese industry.