Trump’s security strategy is making a hard pivot on China. Why now?
By Jessie Yeung, Mike Valerio, CNN
(CNN) — When the Trump administration unveiled its new national security strategy (NSS) last week, many experts noticed one major shift: how it talks – or more importantly, doesn’t talk – about China.
Gone are the sweeping declarations about China being “America’s most consequential geopolitical challenge,” as articulated by the Biden administration. Nor does it include much of the stronger language in the NSS of President Donald Trump’s first term, describing China in 2017 as challenging “American power, influence and interests.”
Instead, this latest document, one that every president submits to Congress outlining their foreign policy vision, emphasized the US-China economic rivalry above all – barely mentioning the concerns of authoritarianism or human rights abuses that had consistently peppered previous administrations’ reports.
“There isn’t a single mention of great power competition with China. China is seen much more as an economic competitor,” said David Sacks, a fellow for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Wen Ti-Sung, a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank’s Global China Hub, described the document as a “rebalancing between interests and values.”
Instead of the US portraying itself as the “shining city upon a hill” – the President Ronald Reagan model of a nation acting as a beacon of freedom for the world – Trump’s new NSS is “about America first, it’s about focusing on developing America itself, and talking about commerce, almost first and foremost,” Wen added.
Another clue to how Trump views China on his list of security priorities lies in just how little it’s mentioned at all – only for the first time on page 19 of a 33-page document, and occupying just one section in a report that also covers Europe, Africa, the Middle East and other regions. By comparison, the Biden NSS from 2022 discusses China repeatedly throughout its 48 pages.
This change in tone and narrow economic focus appear to have been well received in Beijing. When asked about the NSS at a news conference on Monday, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Guo Jiakun emphasized the benefits of “mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation.”
“China is willing to work with the US to promote the continued stable development of China-US relations, while firmly safeguarding its own sovereignty, security, and development interests,” he said.
While Guo reiterated China’s position on sensitive topics such as Taiwan – a self-ruling island democracy that Beijing claims as its own territory – his statement was otherwise cautiously neutral, lacking the vitriol that often characterizes Chinese responses to US policy.
“I read that as fairly positive,” Sacks said, pointing to the fact that Trump plans to visit Beijing next spring in a highly anticipated summit.
“I think that the Chinese are also saying that the door is open to economic cooperation, and they want to work towards the April meeting between the two leaders.”
But some in China interpreted Trump’s NSS with a warier eye – warning that the shift in language is not necessarily a retreat.
State-run tabloid Global Times cited an expert who warned that the US’ new strategy “repeatedly emphasizes the need to eliminate any external competitors or threats to US interests,” reflecting the ongoing competition between both nations.
Meng Weizhan, a researcher at the Fudan Institute for Advanced Study in Social Sciences, gave a similar warning. “The change in wording does not mean that the US no longer views China as a competitor,” he wrote in an article, adding that Trump may be switching tactics to “seek a more advantageous position.”
Economics as the ‘ultimate stakes’
The NSS makes its focus clear from the start, declaring economics as “the ultimate stakes.” It speaks at length about the trade relationship between the two countries, including the imbalance in China’s exports to low-income countries versus to the US.
“Going forward, we will rebalance America’s economic relationship with China, prioritizing reciprocity and fairness to restore American economic independence,” it reads.
It’s markedly different from Trump’s 2017 NSS, which “described China as a revisionist power,” Sacks said. “This one has nothing to say about China’s strategic ambitions … and whether those are compatible with US interests.”
Particularly stark is the lack of any ideological contrast or mention of human rights concerns, which populated the previous two NSS documents.
The Biden administration had highlighted Beijing’s role in committing alleged genocide in Xinjiang, human rights violations in Tibet, and the dismantling of freedoms and autonomy in Hong Kong. In 2017, Trump’s first-term document had criticized China for its authoritarianism, mass surveillance, and push to create a new world order alongside Russia.
“That’s completely absent from this document,” Sacks said, adding that Beijing is “probably pretty pleased … because (the NSS) doesn’t set up an existential competition with (China).”
There could be a few reasons behind this shift. Trump’s administration could be trying to play it safe ahead of the president’s April meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, hoping not to jeopardize any deals or negotiations, Sacks posited.
It could also reflect a change in Trump’s cabinet, which in his first term was populated by more “traditional Republican national security thinkers” than in his current term, Sacks said. Or maybe the latest trade war was unexpectedly humbling for America – shifting how the White House views Beijing.
“I think there were many who believed that the United States had escalation dominance,” Sacks said. But “we’ve seen in recent months that there is going to be a level of US-China interdependence … and both countries can do significant damage to each other in the economic realm.”
A new focus: Taiwan
This new NSS also focuses less on sensitive geopolitical flashpoints, experts said. For instance, the Biden NSS had mentioned several ongoing regional conflicts including the military coup in Myanmar and the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. By contrast, this version doesn’t mention North Korea once.
The one geopolitical issue it does tackle is Taiwan – a thorny topic Washington has long walked a fine line on.
China’s ruling Communist Party has vowed to take control of the island one day, by force if necessary, and views the issue as one of its strongest red lines.
Washington maintains close unofficial ties with Taiwan, and is bound by law to sell arms to the island for its self-defense – despite recognizing the People’s Republic as the sole legitimate government of China, and acknowledging Beijing’s position that Taiwan is part of China.
However, while the US has never accepted the CCP’s claim of sovereignty over the island, Washington has largely remained vague on whether it would intervene in the event of a Chinese attack, a policy known as “strategic ambiguity.”
In the latest NSS, compared with past versions which only briefly mention of Taiwan, Trump has dedicated multiple paragraphs to the island – highlighting its increased importance in his agenda, according to Sacks.
“There is, rightly, much focus on Taiwan, partly because of Taiwan’s dominance of semiconductor production, but mostly because Taiwan provides direct access to the Second Island Chain and splits Northeast and Southeast Asia into two distinct theaters,” the new NSS reads.
“Given that one-third of global shipping passes annually through the South China Sea, this has major implications for the US economy. Hence deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, is a priority,” it reads, adding that the US and its allies must step up defense spending to prevent “a potentially hostile power to impose a toll system over one of the world’s most vital lanes of commerce.”
It sends a strong message to Beijing of deterrence, which could be good news for Taiwan, said Sacks. But the document also softened its language elsewhere – saying the US “does not support any unilateral change to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait,” instead of the previous phrasing of “opposing” any such change.
That could be welcomed by Beijing – making the Taiwan section of the NSS a confusing set of mixed messages, Sacks added.
The Chinese foreign ministry’s response on Monday was similarly muted, with the spokesperson Guo urging the US to “handle the Taiwan issue with utmost caution.”
People in Taiwan are likely in “wait and see” mode, perhaps feeling ambivalent or unsure where they stand under the new NSS, said Wen, the Atlantic Council fellow.
“I think Taiwan is looking towards Washington to see whether this show of goodwill and responsibility will finally lead to more consolidation and more predictability in a firm US support position for Taiwan going forward,” he added.
The-CNN-Wire
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