Secretary Blinken’s Visit to Beijing: Prioritizing Engagement Over America’s Interests

Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently visited Beijing for two days, meeting with Chinese officials before securing an audience with President Xi Jinping. While high-level diplomatic contact with China is important, the State Department has prioritized engagement with China at the expense of America’s interests. The trip’s stated goal was to stabilize communication between Washington and Beijing, but the only concrete results were agreements on marginal issues such as resuming flights, restoring educational and cultural exchanges, and exploring the establishment of a U.S.-China “working group” on preventing the export of fentanyl precursor chemicals from China. Despite Blinken’s attempt to get cooperation on military-to-military dialogue, the Chinese side is still withholding this, demonstrating that Beijing is putting up roadblocks to responsible military communications in the region. The administration has also declined to release the results of the FBI’s probe into the contents of the Chinese military-surveillance device that the PLA floated over several key U.S. bases in February to secure Blinken’s meeting with Xi. While Blinken brought up human rights in his meetings, it was not a primary concern, and the State Department declined to raise the matter of accountability for the Tiananmen massacre. The trip paves the way for other cabinet officials and climate envoy John Kerry to visit Beijing, and there may be an in-person meeting between Biden and Xi later this year. However, the administration’s weakness in rewarding the CCP’s strategy of escalation carries its own risks that are likely to be more significant over the long run. Congress may need to force the administration’s hand on the measures it is slow-walking to prevent national-security malpractice.