The president’s visit to Beijing was an effective acknowledgment that the U.S. and others can no longer constrain China’s emergence as an economic superpower.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping following a state banquet held in Beijing, China, May 14, 2026. Credit: The White House via Flickr
‘Nixon goes to China’ was one of the seminal episodes of the Cold War, the moment in 1972 when a previously hawkish U.S. President restarted relations with the country then led by Mao Zedong, illustrating the divisions within the Communist bloc of countries as he did so.
‘Trump goes to China’ could yet be its equal for the post-Communist era but for the exact opposite reason, with a now unquestioned superpower, under its autocratic leader Xi Jinping, receiving a blessing from it
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From Mike Mansfield to Max Baucus and Steve Daines, Montana has been the unlikely source of America’s most influential China-hand senators over the past half-century. But amidst spy balloons, trade wars and mutual paranoia, being a proponent for rational and beneficial relations between the two countries has never been harder.
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