The bipartisan agreement on China was limited to acknowledging a threat. It lacked any real consensus on the specific challenges or the appropriate American response, a shallowness that President Trump’s second term has exposed.
Rather than slowing China down, US measures like chip export controls backfired. They effectively incentivized China to accelerate its own modernization and develop an independent, and equally effective, technology stack, diminishing long-term US leverage.
China's use of critical minerals as a geopolitical weapon was not a long-planned scheme. Instead, China studied US sanctions over three administrations, prepared its own tools, and only unleashed them in response to escalating US pressure, catching Washington by surprise.
China's control over critical minerals is not the result of a grand strategic plot. It's a consequence of developed countries in the 1990s offshoring highly polluting and expensive mineral processing to China, a market shift driven by cost and environmental arbitrage.
Despite perceived US withdrawal from the world stage, China is not rushing to fill the leadership vacuum. Beijing remains cautious, focused on domestic economic challenges, and unwilling to make the necessary compromises to earn global trust and assume global burdens.
The risk of a Taiwan conflict is driven more by political calculations than the military balance. Beijing views Taiwan as a crisis to be avoided, not an opportunity to be seized. This contradicts the narrative that Xi Jinping is simply waiting for a moment of military superiority.
China's global vision is not to remake the world in its own image. It seeks a "particularist" order where state sovereignty and non-interference are paramount. This nationalist "China First" approach contrasts sharply with the universalist ideals of American foreign policy.
A successful China policy should not be defined as "beating" China. Instead, success is achieving a stable modus vivendi that serves core American interests—like affordability, energy, and innovation—while enabling cooperation on shared global challenges.