THINKING ALOUD
A managed rivalry between US and China serves the world well
History shows that when great powers act together, another country’s sovereignty may be affected
STRIP away the hoopla from a meeting of equally powerful world leaders and what is revealed is usually a carefully managed relationship. So it was with the summit in Washington last week between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The summit’s only concrete deliverable was the two-month extension of the trade truce concluded in Busan in October 2025, stretching the pause in their tariff war from its Nov 10 expiration this year to Jan 10, 2027.
On agriculture and rare-earth agreements, progress appears uneven.
