← The Foreign Affairs Interview
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- [00:00]
A
Dan I'm Dan Kurtzphelin, and this is the Foreign affairs interview
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B
I've always thought and certainly confirmed by my years in China. It's structural, this competition. No matter who's in power in Washington and in Beijing in the future, I think we're going to be stuck with this highly competitive relationship for, well, more than a decade to come.
- [00:23]
A
Not long ago, it was practically a truism to say that a hard line on China a was the only real bipartisan position in American foreign policy. To the extent such a consensus ever existed, Donald Trump has upended it in his second term, leaving considerable uncertainty about just what he wants to achieve when he travels to China to meet with Xi Jinping this week and what Xi hopes to achieve in return. To make sense of how the Chinese are approaching the summit and what options US Policymakers have, I spoke to Nick Burns, a longtime American diplomat who served as ambassador to China until January of 2025. For this special bonus episode recorded on Thursday, May 7th, we discuss the issues that will take center stage when Trump meets Xi, from trade and technology to Iran, Ukraine and Taiwan, and the enormous stakes for US China competition going forward. Nick, thanks for joining me again. I think you were last on the podcast as you were packing up in Beijing just a few days before coming home after your almost years there as ambassador.
- [01:27]
B
That's right. And Dan, I enjoyed our interviews then, but a lot has happened in the 15 months since I left China and a very important, I think, summit meeting coming up in Beijing between President Trump and President Xi. So I'm looking forward to this conversation.
- [01:43]
A
Let's get right to that upcoming summit. It is, as we speak, still on the calendar. You've managed, I imagine, dozens of presidential summits like the one Trump and Xi are about to have. And, well, President Biden never went to China. When you were there, you prepared a bunch of meetings between him and Xi. I imagine that experience might not give you a great sense of how the Americans are preparing, given the, you know, let's say, idiosyncratic national security process on the Trump side. But you surely have a much better sense of how the Chinese are preparing for this encounter. What, in your assessment, are Xi and the Chinese leadership hoping to achieve from the meeting? And how do you think they're setting the stage for the outcome they want?
- [02:19]
B
Dan I think the Chinese are signaling that they want stability in the relationship with the United States. 2025 was a rocky year. Think of the trade war, where at one point the US was imposing 145% tariffs on China and China, 125% tariffs on the United States. We had a supply chain war, and there was actually very limited contact between the two governments outside of those economic issues, as would normally have been the case. And so obviously, the Iran war has affected the view of the Chinese. I think they're looking at this as pretty much an economically focused summit, a commercially based summit. But the Chinese, as they always do, have been quick to signal that Taiwan's going to be on the agenda. In fact, when Wang Yi, the Chinese Foreign minister, called Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week, he quickly, and the Chinese government was quick to put this out publicly, said that there are expectations that Taiwan is the great red line in this relationship. So I think from the Chinese side, that's what they're looking for. They may be looking for an opening to see if they can convince the United States to adjust its half century rhetorical and policy framework on Taiwan itself. And I think for the US There are similar ambitions.
- [03:44]
A
Focusing on the Taiwan dimension of this, there's been a lot of concern, speculation that the Chinese would try to think, maneuver Trump. I don't think tricking him is exactly the way to put it, but maneuver Trump into making an affirmative statement opposing Taiwanese independence would be a shift in the rhetorical framing. Do you think that's something that they want and what are the risks if they, in fact get such an outcome in exchange for a commercial deal or trade concessions or something else?
- [04:09]
B
Dan, as you know, Taiwan is the most sensitive and potentially explosive issue in this relationship between the United States and China. And the Chinese have been very quick to point out publicly, but also point out to Secretary Rubio when he talked to the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, that Taiwan's the red line. This is, according to Beijing, that the United States cannot cross Chinese red lines. And you can see the very aggressive posture that President Xi Jinping has brought to this over the last couple of years. Specifically since Speaker Pelosi's visit to Taiwan back In August of 2022, the Chinese have been much more aggressive in deploying their navy and air Force assets much closer across the median line in the Taiwan Strait to Taiwan itself. They've simulated blockades of the island. And I think the Chinese do anticipate that, given the fact that President Trump is a different kind of American leader, he hasn't always hewed to the main outlines of historic American policy on Taiwan that go back to President Nixon's visit in February 1972. The Chinese believe there may be an opportunity to move President Trump to A position that is more amenable to them. So the United States has been saying for half a century that we do not support Taiwan independence. The Chinese would much prefer, if the Trump administration would change that, to say that the United States opposes Taiwan independence. That may sound like a semantic difference to some of the listeners of this broadcast, but it's actually a very profound one, because if you say that the United States opposes Taiwan independence, it puts all the onus on Taiwan really, as being the responsible party in this conflict, which is not the case, of course. There's been an historic divide, the mainland in China, whether the Qing dynasty or any government of China since then in the Nationalist period and the Communist period. Mainland China has controlled Taiwan since 1895, since the Qing Dynasty lost it to Japan in the war of 1894. And so I think that is the Chinese ask here, they've been hinting at that. And by all means, President Trump should not agree to change that formulation. I think it would send shockwaves, obviously, through the Taiwan leadership, but also to our close allies in the region, particularly Japan and the Philippines, who geographically are very close to this conflict.
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A
If we look at the US Side, let me break this into two parts. What should the United States want out of this meeting, and what does President Trump want?
- [06:47]
B
You know, Dan, I think it's going to be a very different summit in one respect. It's interesting to see who is the lead cabinet official preparing the summit. It's Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant. And I can't remember a summit meeting with the exception of maybe 2008 during the financial crisis when Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson played such a leading role in stabilizing the US China relationship. I can't remember a time in many decades where the Secretary of State and or the national security advisor hasn't been the driving force. So that the agenda will be a compreh agenda, encompassing not just economic issues, but more traditional national security issues, like Taiwan, like China's very strong expansionist tendencies in the south and East China Sea, in the Yellow Sea and the Himalayan border with India. But Secretary Bessant has really focused on, as you would expect, commercial and trade and tariff issues, supply chain issues. And he has, in his negotiating partner in China, Vice Premier Hurley Fungus, a very powerful Chinese figure who's close to President Xi. Politically, they've been friends for over 40 years. And so you can see that Secretary Besson and Jameson Greer, the US Trade Representative, I think, have ambitions to accomplish the following, if they can. First, can the two governments agree at this summit meeting that there will be a continued truce in the tariff wars. It doesn't mean that tariffs will automatically be reduced. It means that they'll be kept where they are. And that should give some confidence to both economies and to world markets of predictability for the rest of this calendar year and perhaps beyond. Second, can they agree to a supply chain truce? So China, of course, would not take rare earths off the market, the global market, as it did to the shock of the industrial world in 2025. And the United States would not engage in supply chain wars itself. So I think that might be the core of what they're trying to accomplish. I think there's another issue which is very important for the American economy, and that's agricultural sales. In most years, United States ag exports in the world, 1/5 go to China. In my first full year in China, there were nearly $41 billion in sales. And so for our farm economy, our ranch economy, our fishing economy, it's very important that we get back to a full fledged agricultural relationship. Because of all the problems in the relationship during my time as ambassador, the competitiveness, the pushbacks on Taiwan, on China's support for Russia, et cetera, the Chinese have very deliberately, over the last two or three years, substantially diminished their purchases of American soybeans and wheat and pork products and fishing products. And so I think President Trump is focused on this, and I would expect there'd be an announcement of a major buy, particularly of soybeans at this summit, so very much an economic summit. And of course, that begs the question, well, what's not going to be on the agenda if this is really being organized by economic officials? Will Taiwan be on the agenda? Will human rights be on the agenda? Will, will China support for Russia be on the agenda? I think, of course, as we can expect, we should talk about this. The Iran war is definitely going to
- [10:11]
A
be on the agenda. That was what I was going to go to next. The first question that I'm curious to get your, your assessment of is exactly what the war means for China. I think there are different ways of, of reading it. There's obviously effect on China's own energy imports and the fact that I think China does not look like a great ally to a great supporter of Iran at this particular moment, but also a lot on the other side of the ledger in terms of American distraction and reactions in the rest of Asia. How do you read the implications of the war for China before we get to what they should talk about in the summit?
- [10:44]
B
I think the war has been harmful to China's global credibility and reputation in one respect and beneficial in another. As you hinted, the fact that China was not able to stand up in any meaningful way diplomatically for either Venezuela and early January or Iran. Since February 28, you know, China looks a little bit feckless and a little bit ineffective. The Chinese leadership made a big deal when I was ambassador about what they were doing with the Venezuelans to build up a strategic relationship. Similarly, you may remember in 2023, Foreign Minister Wang Yi hosted the Iranian and Saudi foreign ministers for a ceremonial handshake to restart that very fraught relationship. And I remember Chinese officials at the time crowing to me, we are going to be a big diplomatic power in the Middle East. Well, they didn't do much to help Iran. In fact, I think President Putin has been much more vocal publicly in his support for the Iranian leadership. He sent a major note of condolence after the Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, was killed on the first day of the war. You didn't really see that from the tribunal Chinese. So in a sense, Chinese credibility as a power outside of East Asia has taken a hit. On the other hand, because of the ragged nature of the way that the United States has pursued the war, conflicting rationale for engaging in the war for the first place, the president declaring effective cease fires three or four times when they didn't occur, and the fact that we have harmed our relationship with the NATO allies and have had a war of words with them, it's been very destructive to the Gulf Arab states that are important to us. I think the Chinese are now positioning themselves, President Xi Jinping in particular, as we're the responsible party, we believe in the global order. We haven't invaded anybody recently. And so acting as the more responsible global leader has been what the Chinese have been doing and projecting through their considerable propaganda network globally to the detriment of the United States. So I do think it's a mixed bag, but I would tilt it more towards the second factor. I think that the Chinese are making great gains and people have to question President Trump's leadership. He has not been a consistent leader in what he has said, certainly throughout this crisis.
- [13:16]
A
Can you see China playing an active role in brokering a true end of this war? There's a ceasefire as we speak that's mostly holding, but there have been kind of mixed messages from Chinese leaders on exactly what they think an end to the conflict looks like. Wang Yi recently met with Amasarakchi, the Iranian foreign minister, and both stressed their support for Iranian sovereignty. And right to enrich peacefully and all of that, but also did make clear that they want the Strait of Hormuz open and that that's an interest that China has. What would a Chinese role in ending this look like? And how plausible is that in the context of the summit or more generally?
- [13:52]
B
It's a really good question. And first, I'm assuming that the Trump administration does not want to go hat in hand to Beijing and ask the Chinese to bail us out and convince the Iranians to engage in a true ceasefire where the Strait of Hormuz would be open, where there'd be some kind of diplomatic agreement on the issue of a highly enriched uranium. And that may be why over the last several days and last several weeks, there's been this almost manic focus on a ceasefire negotiation with the ever elusive Iranian regime, which is deeply divided. That's first point. Second, I think the Chinese have been consistent in one respect. They haven't liked the fact that the Strait of Hormuz is closed. 20% of their energy comes out of the Strait of Hormuz are both the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. The Chinese have been importing about 1.4 million barrels a day of Iranian oil at a steep discount in favor of China. And that's been important to them. But it's only about 10 to 11% of their overall energy imports. They actually have more invested both into capital investments and energy investments in the Gulf Arab states, in Qatar, in Saudi Arabia, in the Emirates, in Kuwait and Bahrain. And so from the very beginning of this war, I remember Wang Yi made a public statement, I think, two days into the war, where he encouraged the Iranians not to attack the Gulf Arab states. And I think the subliminal message that Wang Yi delivered just in recent days to Foreign Minister Iraqi, when Iraqi visited Beijing was, a strait should be opened, no one should close the strait, et cetera. I thought it was actually a veiled message to the Iranians as well as a sharper message to the United States. So what the Chinese want is predictability, a normal flow of energy, because they have to import most of their energy. The Middle east is critical for them in that regard. I think they've been able to gain a lot of credibility, as we've discussed, by comparing President Xi to President Trump on the reliability index. But they certainly want this war to be over as soon as possible. So if President Trump arrives in, this ceasefire deal is not nailed down, and I would guess it will not be nailed down in all of its myriad of details, I would imagine that you see a continuation of the president and Secretary of ESSENCE saying to the Chinese, lean on the Iranians. They've been saying that publicly. They will very likely say that privately.
- [16:19]
A
One of the real surprises, I think, to most observers in the foreign policy world of Trump's second term is the change in his China policy. Though I would note that one person who was warning even before the 2024 election that we were not likely to see a continuation of the hard line of Trump's first term was your colleague at Harvard, Graham Allison. But Graham aside, I think most people expected a fairly hawkish China policy from this administration, and it's been certainly not that and often fairly hard to decipher. How does Xi Jinping understand Trump's China policy? How do the people around him understand this moment and US Policy? Quite a bewildering time.
- [16:54]
B
Well, I think the Chinese leadership understand that we're in a structural competition, our two countries. We're competing for military power in the Indo Pacific. Who's going to be the number one military power in that incredibly important region? We're certainly competing on technology. It's become the centerpiece of the competition in AI, quantum computing, biotechnology, cyber, et cetera. We had a tariff war and supply chain war in 2025. We're competing there. We're 40% of the global economy, the two largest economies, and we're certainly competing in the battle of ideas. Which country has the values that should underpin the global order, and that's one that we continue to compete on every day. So it's a competitive relationship. At the same time, I think that President Xi Jinping probably suspects that President Trump also wants stability, that he wants to focus on a commercial and economic relationship. Secretary Bessen's been very interesting on this. He said two weeks ago that the United States and China had agreed they did not want to decouple this huge two way trade relationship in goods and services. But they both wanted to de risk and they want to agree on the concept of managed trade and even maybe create, and this may be an announcement from a meeting, a board of trade, where they would try to assess where are the green lights where we can trade with each other without impinging on our respective national security interests. And where are we going to de risk, that is, take some of our products and not have them exported, our dual use technology products, for instance, on both sides to the other country, but do that in a deliberate way by being open with each other. It's an interesting idea. In fact, I think that the Trump focus and the Besson focus on stabilizing the economy is the right thing to do. This is a very important economic relationship. We have thousands of American companies with a lot at stake. And so in the Biden administration, we did not support a decoupling of the overall economic relationship. So in a sense, I think President Xi has an understanding that President Trump wants to stabilize the economic relationship. Trade and supply chains make it more predictable. But I think both presidents understand that this is going to be a highly competitive and often disputatious and very difficult relationship to manage. Dan, I've always thought, and certainly confirmed by my years in China, it's structural, this competition. No matter who's in power in Washington and in Beijing in the future, I think we're going to be stuck with this highly competitive relationship for, well, more than a decade to come.
- [19:37]
A
It strikes me that the two sides have, in some ways, a similar view of this moment. I'm not sure if Trump himself thinks this, but you do hear from others in the administration this idea that while over the long term we will be competing with China, it's in our interest to calm things down now so we can get our act together. Whether it's on critical mineral supplies or tech competition or building up military deterrence in the Indo Pacific. I think you can question whether we're really making good use of this time. But I think on both the Chinese and American side, there is a sense that strategic calm would be in their interest now as we kind of prepare for competition to come. Is that the right way of seeing it, and is that the right idea? Is that actually a smart approach from the US Perspective right now?
- [20:19]
B
I think it's the right way of trying to predict what we might see as a result of this Beijing summit and at the other meetings that they are planning for this year, Both at a G20 meeting and also an East Asia summit meeting. So they might meet three, as many as four times this year. I actually think that's a good idea. Xi Jinping is so powerful. He is the strongest Chinese leader since Mao in terms of his power in the party, in the system, in the country. In many ways, he might be more powerful than Mao because China's so much more powerful as an economic and technology actor, military, in the world than Miles China was. And so you've got to meet with Xi Jinping to get things done in a bilateral relationship. And President Trump understands that. And he is all powerful. He's both chief strategist and certainly chief tactician, and he's the chief spokesperson. He goes out and speaks two or three times a day in the record. So I think it's a good idea they're going to meet. I also think, however, we might say at the end this is kind of a detente, like meeting, meeting. This is a visible relaxation of the feverish tensions of the last four to five to six years, really, since COVID Let's just date it to the outbreak of COVID in early 2020. That's six years. This has been an extraordinarily difficult relationship, an absence of effective communication, almost complete distrust by each capital in the other capital. And President Trump's brand of diplomacy is to be very solicitous of Xi Jinping in public. He never criticizes him. And if they do focus on these commercial and economic issues, the message coming out could be, we'll see what happens. Quite positive for the business community. I think that's good. But it's not sufficient. I say it's not sufficient because, well, if you're totally focused on economics and trade, what's not in the agenda? President Trump has said, and I'm glad he said this, that he will push Xi Jinping for the release of Jimmy Lai, who's being unjustly held in what amounts to a life sentence in jail for crimes he didn't commit.
- [22:30]
A
Jimmy Lai for listeners, is a Hong Kong newspaper owner who was a pro democracy place, right?
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B
He published the most important pro democracy newspaper for many years in Hong Kong. He's been a consistent supporter of press rights, of human freedom, religious rights, and he was unjustly convicted by a kangaroo court in Hong Kong and is being held. He's an elderly man, and if his sentence is 20 years, he will very likely die in jail unless he's released on humanitarian grounds. And that's what President Trump is pushing for. I think that's good. But President Trump has also said in his Riyadh's speech, his first speech overseas in this term in the spring of 2025, he will not judge countries by how they treat their citizens. And you've seen an administration that pays very little attention to human rights. I think that's a mistake. I think we Americans, especially in this relationship with China, should be sticking up for the rights of their Uyghur population in Xinjiang province of West. What is happening in Tibet, which in some ways now is similar to what has happened in Xinjiang over the last seven or eight years. The same problems are occurring in Inner Mongolia in terms of taking little kids out of their parents homes and teaching them in Mandarin as 3, 4 and 5 year olds and trying to reduce the ethnic basis of all of these outlying provinces, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibetan. Continued problems, real grievances on religious rights in the Latter Part of 2025, early 2026, a waiver arrest of Christian pastors by the Chinese security services. So there's plenty to talk about on human rights. And I think the president ought to do that and Secretary of State ought to be doing that. What else is not on the agenda? There's been no criticism by the Trump administration of China's very substantial support through microelectronics of the Russian defense industrial base. Very little talk about what the Chinese are trying to do to intimidate our treaty ally, the Philippines at three different atolls in the West Philippine Sea. Very little support publicly by President Trump for a very courageous Japanese prime minister, Sanai Takaichi, who stood up to the Chinese on the issue of Taiwan. So I worry, Dan, I agree with the economic focus, but I worry about what's not on the agenda. And if that's not on the agenda, I think that's not going to be a summit that in totality really meets all of the many interests that we have with the Chinese.
- [25:09]
A
Is it plausible to you that the Chinese would be flexible in Jimmy Lai, free Jimmy Lai at Trump's request in order to, to give him a win that may not be kind of existentially threatening to them?
- [25:20]
B
It's very hard to assess this. I would think the Chinese are sophisticated, the government of China, to know that this is an albatross around their neck. They have been criticized by nearly every democratic country in the world. This is such an unjust sentencing of Jimmy Lai. So it would stand to reason this would at least move that problem off the agenda. But this is a hardcore regime in Beijing and Xi Jinping has cracked down on freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press. He's made an example out of people. They've given them extraordinarily long and harsh and brutal prison terms. So I just don't know. But I hope President Trump will really push this issue publicly as well as privately.
- [26:06]
A
We'll be back after a short break.
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C
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- [27:51]
A
you mentioned Chinese support for Russia. You can imagine a world in which Trump, having promised to end the war in Ukraine, would make this a major issue in the bilateral relationship and really lean on Beijing to lean on Russia to end the war in Ukraine. Do you see any possibility that Ukraine comes up as a major issue? And leaving aside whether Trump himself will push this, is there any possibility that China could play a constructive role here?
- [28:16]
B
I don't think the Chinese are inclined to, you know, the war in Ukraine dominated my years in Beijing and it was really sad to see for me how little attention they paid to my very good colleague, the Ukrainian ambassador. In Beijing. They could they would barely see him at a mid level in the Foreign Ministry. While they made a big deal about giving the Russian ambassador access, the Chinese didn't hide the fact that President Xi and President Putin have this very close personal tie, ideological tie, that they are working together to try to diminish American power in the world. And I think President Trump has shown his true colors. He's now Putin's lawyer, not Zelensky's lawyer. We've thrown our support behind what the Russians are trying to achieve in a bogus ceasefire agreement that would make the Ukrainians give up land that the Russians haven't even conquered in this war. And so I think we've really done a lot of damage to American credibility, certainly with the NATO allies and definitely with the people of Ukraine. And I don't see much hope that President Trump will be pushing the Chinese to push Putin. All the pressure from Washington appears to be on Zelensky, and I find that ironic. You remember in that odious situation in the oval office in February 2025 when the President and vice president of the United States said to Zelensky you have no cards. Well, look who has cards now. Ukraine's doing better on the battlefield. Ukraine has adapted technology much more quickly than the Russians in many respects. But also the Emiratis, the Saudis and the United States military have had to go to the Ukraine over the last couple of weeks to say, help us defend against shahed drones, because the Ukrainians are the best in the world at that. And so Zelenskyy has cards. And unfortunately, this would be the time for Washington to press both Moscow and Beijing for its support for Moscow. I don't think it'll happen at this summit. And that's a major, major miss, I would say big strategic era by the Trump administration.
- [30:26]
A
The persistence and I suppose you could say flagrancy of Chinese support for Russia and the war in Ukraine makes me wonder just how well China is using this moment. That should be a time of kind of global opportunity for them, given how much the Trump administration is alienating American allies, especially in Europe. Though Chinese support for Russia is one of the real barriers to kind of picking up support from Europeans or establishing better relationship from Europeans at this moment. So you'd think it might be in their interest. But you can see this in all a whole host of other areas where you know that there is this kind of moment of rupture and tension or alienation and key American relationships. But China has not really changed its economic model, despite the ways that that threatens industries in both developed countries and in the Global south, it's continued to be relatively aggressive, as you noted earlier, in the Indo Pacific and the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait and elsewhere. So it does make me wonder whether they're going to, you know, kind of make good an opportunity they should have. And I'm curious if you share that skepticism or see them making gains that I'm missing.
- [31:29]
B
I share your sentiment. And on the one hand, our tariff policy has been enormously destructive to the confidence and strategic links that a lot of countries around the world used to have with the United States. You know, when you put high tariffs consistently on India, and India has been, of course, a country that both every president since Bill Clinton have tried to build a strategic relationship. And so it's really been self defeating. And you see that the Indians who don't want to work closely with China, they have a major border dispute and their strategic rivals, the Indians, have had to kind of hedge their bets. And Prime Minister Modi went on his first trip to Beijing in seven years. You see the same thing with the Japanese and South Koreans are major treaty allies. But if you continuously emphasize the trade war between the United States and these two great treaty allies, they have to live in Asia next to China as well. And so you can see them perhaps not hedging their bets, but pulling punches and maybe not working as closely with us because we've created a real problem for them. The same is true of Brazil. So I think the tariff policy, first of all on economic grounds, has hurt us, has been inflationary, has been disruptive to global trade, including American trade, has made it difficult for American exporters, manufacturers. It's also hurt us diplomatically. And the Chinese have taken advantage of that. They are pressing their positions all over the world. They have more embassies and consulates, a few more than the United States does. They have a much bigger propaganda network through cctv, cgtn, et cetera, the big Chinese global television networks. We've now defunded Voice of America, Radio Free Asia. They have the Belt Road Initiative, which gives them enormous influence in the global south. And we've destroyed usaid. So I really worry that structurally the Chinese have out competed us. We weren't doing great during the Biden administration, to be truthful, we were on the back foot. But now we have no way to basically prevent in Sub Saharan Africa, in South America, Southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands, Central and South Asia, and that's much of the global South. No way to prevent China as leading trade partner, leading purveyor of assistance, leading lender to most of these countries, they now have influence that we don't have. The one part of the world which has been resistant to these Chinese entities that, hey, work with us. We're the responsible power, not the Americans. The irresponsible power has been Europe, but only because of the Ukraine war, because Russia's assault on Ukraine is an existential threat to the NATO countries of Central Europe and Western Europe. They wonder if Putin gets away with his crimes in Ukraine. You know, is Romania, is Poland, is Estonia, is Lafayette. Are they all vulnerable to Russian blackmail and coercion and even possible Russian invasion in the case of the Baltic state. So only because of the Ukraine war, have the Europeans not decided that they also have to kind of make up with the Chinese? And so I think this has been really harmful to American national interests. The tariff policies, the unilateral behavior of the United States, driving away our allies, making life difficult for Japan and South Korea and India, threatening to invade Greenland, questioning Canadian sovereignty. I think the most important lesson I learned, and I served in Republican and Democratic administrations, six presidents, three Democrat, three Republican that was my career, is we are more powerful than China because of our East Asian allies, and we're certainly more powerful than Russia because of NATO. And if we begin to disavow those alliances and break the bonds of trust, particularly with the Europeans over Greenland and Canada, boy, that is a distinct disadvantage for our country. It's an own goal. We've caused it. I worry about that. The Chinese are onto this and they're trying to capitalize on it.
- [35:38]
A
I imagine the India piece of this is particularly painful for you to watch, given that when you were Under Secretary of State in the Bush administration, you were very integral to building that relationship at a time when there was still a lot of historic mistrust and friction.
- [35:53]
B
It is. It's one that I've really, really worried about the last couple of months. What had India become? Until January 2025, we did more military exercises most years with the Indian navy and Air Force in the Bay of Bengal and the Western Pacific than most of our East Asia Treaty allies. We had this big economic relationship, the civil nuclear deal, and I was the negotiator for that. That led to an opening of our defense, our science, our technology relationship. We now have more Indian students in the United States than Chinese students at the graduate level. Look at all of our tech companies and the infusion of talent of CEOs now of Indian origin, and a very successful immigrant community, the Indian Americas, in terms of educational attainment and prosperity. All that was going for us, and suddenly we're only judging India on the basis of our trade differences. And we're penalizing the Indians because they won't agree with our preposterously high tariff levels on them. I think this is a big strategic era by this administration. This whole issue of how we've treated our allies and our partners like India and the treaty allies. And I believe we can recover from it, but probably slowly. And if a conservative Republican president or a Democratic president in 2029 tries to repair the damage, which they will have to do, it's not going to be easy, given how much destruction has been caused over the last 15 months.
- [37:28]
A
There are people in the Trump administration who would argue, counter that by saying, look, ultimately these alliances, especially in East Asia and in Europe, are not about Americans being nice. They're not about, you know, good visits and good speeches. It's about power and it's about geography. Ultimately, Russia and China are the. The nearby threats, and we're more distant. And ultimately, these allies have. Have no real choice that, you know, when it comes down to it they might complain about us and we sure will have to do a little bit of, of rebuilding. But they'll come out of these years much more capable, able to offer much more to shared security interests, and will emerge from this with stronger alliances, not weaker ones. What would you say to that argument from someone in this administration?
- [38:14]
B
I'd say that hope is not a policy. Those are hopes. You have to deal in cold reality. These countries, of course, are going to want to align with the United States. If Putin and Xi Jinping are both in power for the next 10 years and they're both fairly healthy 72 year olds, that's a probability. But when you break a trust bond, if you're the Japanese prime minister and we haven't really stood up for you in the single greatest crisis of your time as prime minister, do you think the Japanese are going to forget that and begin to hedge a little about the United States? I do think the administration, and President Trump in particular, has done a good job of convincing tactics were tough, but they convinced the European allies to spend more on defense. That's a victory. But I found, Dan, when I was ambassador in Beijing that we were much more effective with the Chinese. When I could align what we were doing with the ambassador of the European Union or the German ambassador or the Japanese, Korean and Australian ambassadors. And we wouldn't walk into the room together, but we would compare notes and we would let each other know what we were doing and we would align what we said to the Chinese, we would push against them together. We would sanction Chinese companies involved in defense trade with Russia for the Ukraine war. We would sanction China on human rights violations together. That was powerful. And I think the Chinese leadership worried most that when I was there during the Biden administration about the fact that President Biden was so successful in building up our alliance, particularly with Japan and South Korea, and helping the Japanese in South Korea to begin to work together because of their continuing disagreements over the Second World War and the issues emanating from that. And so we need leverage when we deal with the Chinese and leverage comes from these allies. And right now, I don't see them very much inclined to work that closely with the United States because of for all the reasons we talked about. So I would disagree with that Trump administration view. Oh, they'll come back. Don't worry. A lot of damage has been done.
- [40:26]
A
How deep are your worries about the future of the transatlantic alliance? You were ambassador to NATO during 9 11. Can you imagine NATO truly coming apart or being so kind of grievously undermined in this administration that it's never really the same.
- [40:40]
B
I don't think NATO will collapse in the next year or two or three. Our national security interests and those of the Canadians and the west and Central Europeans, is so involved in trying to limit Russian power in Europe. And I think there's so much strong sentiment in the Congress. But you've seen Republican leaders in Congress come out against this proposal to take 5,000American troops out of Germany, for instance. Instance. I think NATO will survive, but will it survive as the effective force that it was? The United States has a right to ask the Europeans and Canadians to spend a lot more in defense. I think most Americans agree on that, and President Trump's been right about that. But the damage done for an American president to threaten to invade a NATO ally, it's never happened before in the history of NATO going back to 1949. Countries aren't going to forget that quickly. And so I think the next president, Republican or Democrat, is going to have to work overtime on that issue of trust that we will be with you in a Article 5 situation, that we will defend Estonia and Latvia. It's so important that Putin understands that, so he's not more inclined to take a risk in attacking those two countries in particular. A lot of work is going to have to be done to repair NATO. It's not dead, but it's going to change. And we should want to have allies in the world. That was my principal takeaway from 9 11. I was ambassador, and when I couldn't reach the Pentagon, the State Department, the White House on that terrible morning, because I was in Brussels, Belgium, because they'd been evacuated, because we thought Flight 93, the flight that eventually was brought down by the passengers heroically in Pennsylvania, we thought it might be headed to the Capitol or the State Department or the White House. My phone rang. In the silence, I couldn't reach Washington. It was the Canadian ambassador. I find this deeply ironic. David Wright. He said, we're with you. We'll go into battle with you. If it was Osama bin Laden, we'll go fight with you. And by the next morning, every country had pledged to fight with us. And I remember thinking to myself, we are so fortunate at a time like this to have friends and allies we can count on. That's what President Trump is breaking that bond of trust. So that in a crisis, if our back's against the wall, the Danish prime Minister, the Canadian prime Minister, the British Prime Minister, the Italian are going to say, of course we're going to be with the United States because the United States is always there for us. And so that's the psychological, political, human bond that I think we have broken, that President Trump has broken that badly needs repair.
- [43:28]
A
There are two more issues that are not exactly in the headlines at this moment, but do go to the heart of the US China dynamic. And I know you spent a lot of time on when you were the ambassador. The first is technology competition. I think there's a debate between the Biden administration and people in the Trump administration about the best way to carry out tech competition. The Biden approach articulated recently by Jake Sullivan in our pages was really about restricting Chinese access to the highest end semiconductors and chip manufacturing equipment and things like that to maintain an American edge. Parts of the Trump administration, especially David Sachs when he was in the White House, is the technologies are, you know, believe we should kind of open up the taps of business and that ultimately that's more important than restrictions. As you had conversations about technology with your Chinese counterparts, how did you see this debate? How did you see their reaction to different American options for waging this competition that inform how you understand that debate?
- [44:27]
B
Now, Dan, when I was sworn in late 2021, if I go back that day, I think I would have said, oh, technology is going to be a very important area. By the time I left, technology was the most important issue. It had gone right center stage in the relationship because of the enormous transformational impact of AI, quantum biotech, cyber space based technology, just to name five, but also by the fact that this has become the central competitive element between us and what's been ironic in this competition between China and the United States. Let's just take AI compared to say the old Cold War, our competition with the Soviets back then it was over nuclear weapons. And governments conceived of nuclear weapons, you know, built nuclear weapons and wholly owned them. This tech competition is being waged by our companies. Nearly all the talent and all of the capacity and the products themselves are being developed and owned and operated and manufactured and sold by American tech companies. So I always felt as ambassador, I would tell my team our big job here is to support the American tech industry and to give them a clear field to compete against their Chinese counterparts. Alibaba, Huawei, Baidu, Tencent, the other big Chinese tech companies, and to make sure that our government was fully behind them. And that was the Biden policy. And as part of that, we were convinced and I know we were right and are still right to deny to the Chinese our most advanced and sophisticated dual use technologies and put export controls in them, make it impossible for American companies to export into China for two reasons. Reason number one, if you export Nvidia's or AMD's or Intel's most advanced semiconductors for AI purposes into China, reason number one, that'll just help the Chinese tech companies to compete against our tech companies. Reason number two, which I think is ultimately more important, is that under the civil military fusion in China, where the PLA can reach into any Chinese research lab, university or company and say, I want that technology, it give them an advantage, the pla, in trying to out compete the United States Navy and Air Force for strategic advantage in the future in the Indo Pacific. And so for those reasons, we shut down in October 2022 trade in those advanced semiconductors. I thought it was a major mistake for President Trump on two or three occasions in 2025 to allow Nvidia and AMD and other countries to sell these advanced semiconductor products, chips into the Chinese market. And what it does is okay. It might give greater export earnings to these American companies for seven or eight months. And then what happens? The Chinese reverse engineer these products. Once they get them, they begin to shut Nvidia and other companies out of the market and they can't sell anymore because the Chinese have become adept at mimicking and copying the technology. So what do we get? We get revenues for American company, we lose on national security. There's no question what the right answer here is. And I hope the Trump administration will really reconsider this policy of allowing our tech companies to sell these very, very advanced and sensitive products into the Chinese market. So technology has become a key, key issue and it's largely competitive. And the Biden strategy, I think, was right. And by the way, when I presented it to Chinese, they knew that behind me was a united Congress. We had tremendous Republican support as well as Democratic support. And a lot of the criticism to President Trump is coming from the Republican Party, not just the Democratic Party. So I think that technology is going to remain a very difficult competitive issue in the relationship because we both want to be number one as first mover and first adapter, because it will allow us to dominate the economic and commercial space, but also the military space with the spinoff technologies. And we both cannot be together, number one. So it's a furious race on. And I think that in a way, President Trump's administration, I find it positive that they're so close to our tech community and so supportive in many ways. But I have this big disagreement, as many people do, with allowing these dual use products to be exported into China. But then there's another side of the coin that we should talk about. Technology is both a competitive issue, but at least on the issue of AI, there may be reasons for the United States and China to be cooperating in a sense. And that could be an issue that's unveiled at the Beijing summit.
- [49:21]
A
When the White House or Commerce Department would announce controls on a new kind of chip or manufacturing equipment or something else. What would your Chinese counterparts say to you? Would they protest? Would they pretend they didn't care? What were those conversations like?
- [49:33]
B
They were furious. I was called into multiple meetings because, you know, we put waves of export controls and sanctions on Chinese companies. We sanctioned hundreds of Chinese companies during the Biden administration. And so I was called in repeatedly for very difficult, angry, contentious meetings with the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Foreign affairs and other people in the Chinese government. And in 2022 and 2023, the Chinese were very slow to hit back to respond to then sanction American companies. That's all changed. And we really saw that come into full view, this more aggressive Chinese attitude in 2025 over when they responded to our 145% tariffs, the Trump tariffs, by withholding rare earths. I think the Trump administration didn't expect it. They didn't read the Chinese correctly. And now whenever the United States imposes sanctions or export controls, the Chinese are very quick to come back and impose their own controls, export controls or sanctions against American companies. I think China's decided they need to hit back every single time. So we need to recognize that new dynamic which I think is now dawned on the Trump administration.
- [50:51]
A
The other issue that you would hope would be on the agenda in a summit, though may not be in a serious way, is discussion of military and nuclear issues. Both the fact that there's very little military to military communication, and in a crisis that would become quite dangerous, and then also China's nuclear weapons buildup and what that means for strategic stability. Do you see any willingness with the right US Approach, any willingness on Beijing's part to really engage seriously on those questions, or are they still intent on building up power as much as possible before having those conversations?
- [51:23]
B
I think that the Chinese do not want to sit down and have serious conversations with the United States or anybody about the dramatic increase in their nuclear weapons buildup. If you look at the unclassified Pentagon report just issued a couple of months ago, in 2025, the Chinese want to achieve parity with us in the numbers of strategic nuclear weapons by the mid-2030s and they are on a pace to do that. And the Chinese unfortunately see no reason, they say, to sit down with us. They just kind of clam up. They don't really give us much of an excuse, but I think we know what the reason is. They think there'll be a tactical and strategic disadvantage if they begin to negotiate now. And I hope the Chinese will come under pressure from countries all over the world. This is entirely irresponsible. They are not at all transparent about their nuclear weapons system and collection stock, I should say, as we are, as the Russians have been, because of a half century of arms control. And so there has to come a time when the Chinese decide they owe the rest of the world transparency, accountability and some description of why they're engaged in this nuclear weapons buildup. But I don't think, unfortunately, and I think the Trump administration is right to pressure them on this, but I don't think we're going to get redress on it. It is more complicated on the issue of military to military relations. We made some progress in the Biden administration in 2024 and this was very public. President Biden leaned on President Xi Jinping. We need to have our senior military officers talking to each other. We did have a few very high level meetings. We were encouraged. I think the Chinese have shut down since then. And so you haven't seen any degree of senior military to military contacts. And that was my nightmare scenario when I was ambassador. A crisis, an accident, a collision of our naval vessels, of our aircraft, and that's happened before that we couldn't handle because, you know, we didn't have the connectivity at the political level. That was true during the Berlin Crisis in early 2023. Quite a. I was the conduit to the government of China from our government. But it wasn't sufficient for me to be talking to the vice foreign minister of China when the PLA was the problem with that balloon that drifted slowly across the United States and they refused to talk the Chinese to our military leadership. And that's what I was trying to get them to do. So I worry about that as well. The military to military channels that just aren't there yet. Neither country wants a war. Presidents Biden and Trump have been completely clear. We want peace with China. And I think President Xi Jinping has said the same thing. But the problem is not a war that results from strategy, from a decision to go to war. It's a mistake, it's a collision, it's an accident. And suddenly it balloons the whole crisis balloons because you can't handle it in communications channels.
- [54:21]
A
With apologies for ending on a down note. You talked earlier about what a good outcome from your perspective would be in the upcoming summit. What would a bad one look like?
- [54:30]
B
I think a bad one would look like if the relationship between the two leaders was so difficult and we had disagreed on so many issues that they couldn't agree on anything. And that was for a couple of reasons. The Iran war is one, Russia's war on Ukraine as a second, that would really operate against the interests of both countries. But I don't expect that. I think there's a very low probability that this summit ends up in a disagreement, a major disagreement. I think they'll be able on the economic and commercial side to have enough to agree on that propels them towards the next meeting at the end of the summer. Two more points, Dan, that I think might be important for the Trump administration going forward. AI is a point of competition. But if you look at the Mythos and the ChatGPT latest agentic models, the real problem here may be that cyber terrorists, the terrorist groups, the criminal groups, could get their hands on this very powerful, say, the anthropic mythos model technology. And that could present a major challenge to every country in the world and to global economic and political stability. So there is also an argument that the Chinese and American leadership should agree to have a series of talks to begin to work together to plan for this potential downside, the misuse of AI technology by cyber terrorists and cyber groups, and therefore to begin to agree on ways to regulate and ways to safeguard the international system against these more nefarious actors. We started it in the Biden administration. President Biden did in his last meeting with Xi Jinping. They agreed that human beings should remain in control of nuclear weapons, not AI systems. That was a start. And I hope that President Trump and President Xi can build on this. I think the Trump administration may be inclined to do that. And then the last point, Dan. The Trump administration, I think, needs to fill out this relationship. It's one thing to be focused as they are on economic and trade issue. And I've been supportive of them in doing that. But I don't see that the Trump administration has developed a kind of high level channels from Secretary of State Rubio to Wang Yi, for instance, by Secretary Lutnick with the Minister of Commerce Wang Wen Tao. We had in the Biden administration Secretaries Yellen and Raimondo, John Kerry and John Podesta, our two climate negotiators. They had really good, strong channels into the Chinese leadership and that allowed us to both to avoid mistakes and unnecessary tensions, but also to deliver hard messages where we disagreed. And I think the Trump administration has put, it seems to me, almost all their eggs into economic and commercial issues. And yet on the national security side, are we talking to them regularly about Taiwan at the highest level to warn them? Are we talking to them about what they're trying to do in the Philippines to intimidate the Philippines? I think this is an issue and I hope we're going to see the Trump administration broaden out these high level contacts.
- [57:38]
A
Well, Nick, thank you so much for doing this ahead of the summit and we will look forward to picking up this conversation as these meetings between Trump and Xi continue over the course of this year.
- [57:46]
B
Dan, thank you very much. Always a pleasure.
- [57:54]
A
Thank you for listening. You can find the articles that we discussed on today's show@foreign affairs.com this episode of the Foreign Affairs Interview was produced by Rachel Powell and Kanish Tharoor. Our audio engineer is Marcus Zachariah. Original music is by Robin Hilton. Special thanks as well to Arina Hogan. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts and if you like what you heard, please take a minute to rate and review it. We release a new show every Thursday. Thanks again for tuning in.
- [58:42]
C
We hope you enjoyed this episode of the Foreign Affairs Interview. Don't forget to visit foreign affairs.comspotlight to sign up for Dan Kurt's video Phelan's free weekly newsletter featuring more of the clear headed analysis that you enjoy here on the podcast. Sign up today@foreign affairs.com spotlight.