Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to visit Washington from September 23 to 25 to meet with US President Trump. This is the second meeting between the two this year after Xi Jinping received Trump in Beijing in May. It is also Xi Jinping's first state visit to Washington since September 2015.
Four months ago in Beijing, the two countries established many new interactive mechanisms in economic and trade, established the China-US Trade and Investment Council, launched the China-US Artificial Intelligence Dialogue, and set a new footnote for the relationship between the two countries: "China-US constructive strategic and stable relationship."
Experts analyzed to BBC Chinese that this meeting will extend the one-year trade war truce reached by the leaders of the two countries at the Busan summit last year. However, it may be difficult to see substantial results on the main differences between China and the United States, ranging from rare earth security, AI supervision, technology exports to Taiwan arms sales and the Iran issue. Both Trump and Xi are still testing what they can gain from each other.
Craig Singleton, a senior China researcher at the Foundation for Defending Democracy in Washington, describes the current common goals of China and the United States as a "control stalemate."
He told BBC Chinese that Trump and Xi Jinping each want different things. Trump wants orders for rare earths, agricultural products and results that can be shown off, while many officials in the White House want to retain room to put pressure on China in terms of advanced technology, supply chains and the Taiwan issue. Xi Jinping hopes to obtain tariff exemptions, technology access, and hopes that the United States will reduce its support for Taiwan.
"More importantly, Xi Jinping wants time. While he wants to obtain American technology and markets as much as possible, he also actively reduces dependence on the United States. Under this situation, China and the United States trade with each other but do not have mutual trust, and pursue peace and stability rather than reconciliation." He said.
Even though the differences between the two countries remain, in the eyes of Chinese scholars, Xi Jinping's return to Washington after 11 years will represent a China with greater international political and economic influence. For Beijing, after relations between the two countries reached a low point during the epidemic, they finally saw a "period of historical opportunity" in Trump.
Wang Jisi, a professor at Peking University and director of the Institute of International Strategic Studies, said in Foreign Affairs that as Trump sends a signal that he regards China as a peer power, Sino-US relations may usher in a period of stability similar to the one after Nixon and Mao Zedong broke the ice.
"The Chinese leadership is most sensitive in two situations: first, it senses that the United States is trying to deny it respect and isolate them, and second, it senses that China's power position is weaker than that of the United States," he wrote. "Today, with the improvement of China's strength and status and the series of mistakes made by the United States in domestic and foreign policies, Beijing's self-confidence has been significantly enhanced."
Trade war truce extended
On September 20, Scott Bessent held a preparatory meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in New York to discuss issues such as AI regulation and rare earth trade before the leaders’ summit.
At the Busan Summit last October, the two countries reached a one-year economic and trade truce agreement. The U.S. has suspended the implementation of the 24% reciprocal tariff and the "50% penetration principle" that may trigger secondary sanctions, making it more difficult for Chinese companies to obtain U.S. chips and other technological materials; China has suspended retaliatory tariffs and rare earth export controls, and expanded the purchase of U.S. soybeans and other agricultural products.
The summit is expected to extend the truce agreement, but the exact length of the extension is uncertain. The Financial Times reported that China hopes to extend the truce until the end of Trump's term, but the United States is only willing to extend it for half a year, mainly because it questions China's failure to implement its previous commitments on rare earths.
In addition, for Trump, China’s huge trade surplus has always been a major hidden danger for the United States. According to Chinese customs data, its exports exceeded imports by US$119 billion in August, and its total trade surplus has exceeded US$100 billion for four consecutive months. China's trade surplus with the United States reached its highest point in August since Trump took office during his second term.
In early September, U.S. Treasury Secretary Bessent publicly criticized China because Beijing blocked the issuance of a joint statement at the G20 meeting because other members criticized specific countries in the document for having "excessive and uninterrupted external surpluses." In this regard, Bessant said: "A non-market-oriented economy that continues to export cheap export products is unsustainable."
But it is not easy for Washington to maintain pressure on Beijing.
Amanda Hsiao, China business director of the New York-based Eurasia Group, told BBC Chinese that although the United States can continue to expand export controls on high-end chips, chip design software, and aircraft components, and restrict the import of Chinese products, these measures will further draw retaliation from Beijing, making it difficult for both parties to act rashly.
"So, the biggest outcome of this summit may be just to continue extending the existing truce agreement," she said.
AI regulation has its own calculations
Another issue that has attracted attention is how China and the United States discuss the regulation of AI.
When Xi Jinping visits, a group of American technology industry tycoons are expected to attend the state banquet in Washington, including Huida CEO Huang Renxun, OpenAI CEO Altman, and Tesla founder Musk.
Regarding AI control, the United States itself is engaged in a fierce debate. Anthropic founder Amodai recently published an article calling on AI cutting-edge companies to slow down the pace of research and development so that security supervision mechanisms can keep up. Otherwise, AI may develop the ability to paralyze the entire network within the next year.
Amodai also called on democratic countries to coordinate with authoritarian countries including China to ensure that their AI companies do not catch up when the United States slows down. Altman, Musk and other AI leaders agree with Amoday's proposal, but Trump, Huang and others call "AI doomsday theory" a conspiracy theory and advocate that AI development should continue to be accelerated.
At the same time, the growth rate of model performance of Chinese AI companies, including DeepSeek and Moonshot, is approaching that of American AI. The United States is not only worried that relatively cheap Chinese models may seize the global AI market, but companies such as Anthropic have also accused Chinese companies of stealing American models through "distillation" to train their own AI. The outside world is also worried that Chinese AI companies that mainly use open weight models will spread risks faster once the models are maliciously abused and attacks occur.
Compared with the U.S. industry's concerns about the threat of AI to human civilization, Beijing's concerns about AI focus more on whether AI will affect national security. In a signed article in the latest issue of "China Cyberspace" magazine, Minister of National Security Chen Yixin specifically named American AI companies and models, and said that hostile forces are using AI to conduct cognitive warfare, "directly threatening political security."
At the Xiangshan Forum in Beijing on the 16th, Wu Xinbo, Dean of International Studies at Fudan University, even said that the United States is trying to delay China’s AI development by starting an AI dialogue with China. “China must be very careful.”
Under mutual suspicion, it may be difficult for China and the United States to reach a consensus on AI regulation. Xiao Yanran of Eurasia Group said that China and the United States are already in a state of open competition in AI, and both sides are worried that a more complete regulatory system will cause them to lose their advantages.
"However, even if there are no tangible results, both countries know that it is important to discuss AI safety and some mutually shared pain points," she said.
On the 20th, after representatives of China and the United States held talks before the heads of state summit in New York, Finance Minister Bessent said that the United States proposed to establish a Sino-US AI hotline to further manage risks.
It is worth mentioning that China and the United States also have reached a consensus on AI security. After Xi Jinping and Biden met in November 2024, the two sides made it clear that "the decision to control the use of nuclear weapons by humans should be maintained." This is also the first time that the heads of state of China and the United States have established a safety bottom line on the intersection risks of nuclear weapons and AI.
It is difficult to achieve a breakthrough on Iran and Taiwan issues
Another issue of concern to the outside world is Iran. As the U.S. war against Iran enters its seventh month, Tehran continues to close the Strait of Hormuz, causing international oil prices to rise. As Iran's largest trading partner, China's energy security and commercial interests have also been affected by the war.
At the end of August, the United States expanded sanctions on Iran and countered countries and companies doing business with Iran. More than 20 Chinese and Hong Kong companies and individuals were included in the entity list. In mid-September, Washington further passed another sanctions bill targeting Russian and Iranian energy. These have drawn protests from Beijing.
In addition, Beijing continues to provide support to Iran. On the 17th, China and Russia jointly vetoed a bill proposed by the United States at the United Nations Security Council regarding the supervision of Iran's nuclear program. The Wall Street Journal reported that Iran accurately attacked a U.S. military base in Jordan through satellite images provided by China, killing three U.S. troops. Just before the China-U.S. Presidential Summit, the Iranian Foreign Minister visited Beijing, and China also sent a signal that it would continue to deepen China-Iran cooperation.
Singleton of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies said that although China and the United States have common interests in opening the Strait of Hormuz, whether Beijing will use its influence on Tehran to put pressure on it is still a big question mark.
"I don't think Xi Jinping will help Trump solve such a difficult Iran issue," he said.
Singleton said that geopolitics is the area where the interests of China and the United States diverge the most. In addition to Iran, the Taiwan issue is the biggest problem between the two countries. He believes that Xi Jinping will once again forcefully demand that the United States stop arms sales to Taiwan, and his main purpose is to transform the suspension of arms sales to Taiwan into a new negotiation bottom line. Any other negotiations in the future need to start from this point.
He further analyzed that the longer arms sales to Taiwan are suspended, the more likely Beijing is to believe that stopping arms sales is a new normal. Assuming that arms sales resume in the future, Xi Jinping will not regard it as the United States returning to its usual policy stance, but as the other side turning its back on it. Beijing may then react more aggressively.
Form over substance
Xiao Yanran of Eurasia Group said: "Both sides hope to use this summit occasion to create positive energy and maintain the stability of bilateral relations."
Lin Hansheng, director of Asia Group China, told BBC Chinese that China and the United States are still competing with each other, but the relationship between the two countries is becoming more and more interest-oriented. The repeated meetings between leaders of both sides show that both Washington and Beijing hope that competition can be controlled.
