Track 2 dialogue can help improve Sino-US ties

There have been some positive developments, of late, in Sino-US relations including meetings at different levels and between some Chinese and US government departments, which have raised hopes that bilateral tensions could be defused.

To begin with, Wang Yi, China’s top diplomat, held in-depth talks with US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan in Vienna, Austria, in May. Later that month, while attending the APEC Ministers Responsible for Trade meeting in the US, Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao met with US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and US Trade Representative Katherine Tai. And early this month, Daniel Kritenbrink, US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, and Sarah Beran, White House National Security Council’s senior director for China, visited China and met with Foreign Ministry officials.

More important, the visit of Secretary of State Antony Blinken to China from Sunday to Monday could be a good omen for what till now appeared to be foundering China-US ties.

Conditions conducive for resuming Sino-US contacts

There is a good momentum for the business and academic communities in the two countries, too, to resume contacts and exchanges.

I visited the US earlier this month for a closed-door symposium on China-US relations in Denver, Colorado, co-sponsored by the Pax Sapiens Foundation and Geneva-based INHR. We discussed the outlook on Sino-US strategic confrontations and prospects, diplomacy and crisis management, risk prevention and control across the Taiwan Strait and in the South China Sea, and the establishment of a “Track 2” dialogue mechanism.

This workshop focused on how to use the lessons learned from handling China-US crises in the past to prevent and manage the current risks. The meeting covered many such hotspot issues in all their dimensions in a harmonious atmosphere, and the US scholars were very friendly with the Chinese academics, something that is becoming rare in these times of rising tensions.

The three long years of the COVID-19 pandemic brought to a near standstill exchanges between Chinese and American people, academic institutions and businesses, and, more importantly, “Track 1” dialogue between the two governments. Without normal, regular in-person exchanges for years, China and the US have been losing mutual trust. And intensified information asymmetry has led to misinterpretations, misjudgments, misunderstandings, and even given rise to suspicion, which perhaps has prompted the US to intensify its efforts to contain China.

Not only have China and the US failed to resolve any bilateral problems in the past three years, they also face a myriad of new and more complex issues today which have made resolving bilateral issues an even bigger challenge. But, as a Chinese saying goes, “ice a meter deep is not frozen in one day”.

However, it is the US that is mainly responsible for the deterioration in China-US relations. In violation of basic international rules and norms, the US has cracked down on Chinese high-tech companies and wantonly imposed sanctions on Chinese businesses, in an attempt to exclude China from the global industry and supply chains in such important sectors as semiconductors. In this way, the US intends to maintain its technological leadership worldwide.

Beijing’s relationship with Washington is very important, not least because it has a huge impact on China’s overall foreign policy. Given the uncertainties over the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the global economic recession and the rise of the Global South, taking effective measures to keep China-US relations relatively stable and prevent the escalation of tensions will not only serve the interests of Beijing and Washington but also meet the expectation of the international community.

It is highly likely that the US will continue, even intensify, its efforts to contain China at least in the near future. Twists and turns in Sino-US relations could even become the new normal. If that be the case, there is a need to take measures to stabilize China-US ties and strive to seek certainties amid uncertainties.

Time to seize chance to improve relations

It is imperative to seize the good opportunity that the lifting of travel restrictions have created to boost people-to-people exchanges, in order to clear the misunderstandings that have built up over the years, and prevent further misinterpretations and misunderstandings. In particular, priority should be given to strengthening Sino-US communication and gradually rebuilding mutual trust.

Chinese and American people, businesses and governments at different levels need to increase people-to-people exchanges — and set moderate goals for such exchanges. Because it is not impossible, through discussions and exchanges, to mitigate misunderstandings, build consensus and boost mutual trust.

Promoting people-to-people diplomacy and Track 2 dialogue is an effective way to start rebuilding mutual trust and preventing Sino-US relations from deteriorating further. In fact, Track 2 dialogue has resumed, albeit slowly, with China lifting the strict pandemic prevention and control measures.

Take for example the “China-US Track 2 Dialogue on Maritime Affairs and International Law” co-sponsored by the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, which I work for, and the National Committee on US-China Relations. The two organizations have agreed to resume in-person dialogue in the near future. Yet bilateral dialogue should be held keeping in mind the situation before the pandemic and in light of the misjudgments, which can be partly attributed to the developments over the past three years.

While making efforts to restore the previous dialogue mechanisms, the two sides should focus on building trust, dispelling suspicion, guiding public opinion and reaching consensuses in Track 2 dialogue. Chinese officials can work together with their US counterparts to build new and stable Track 2 dialogue channels on issues with common interests and concerns.

Second, it is urgent to build a crisis management mechanism to prevent the escalation of disputes and confrontations, especially because of the recent marked increase in the US’ provocative actions in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, as well as China’s growing capacity to defend its core interests and take countermeasures. Among the most provocative US moves is a US RC-135 reconnaissance plane which deliberately intruded into People’s Liberation Army Navy’s training area over the South China Sea, obviously with the aim of disrupting the Chinese military’s training.

In response, the PLA Navy sent aircraft to monitor the US plane’s movements. But the US denied that its military aircraft had intruded into the Chinese navy’s training airspace, and alleged that the “aggressive” interception by Chinese aircraft could have led to an accident. More recently, the US military said a Chinese warship sailed “in an unsafe manner” near a US destroyer in the Taiwan Strait.

In recent years, the US’ freedom of navigation operations, close-in reconnaissance, drills by aircraft carrier fleets, and forward deployment of nuclear-powered submarines in the South China Sea have increased in frequency and scale. In response, China has no option but to keep enhancing its capability to defend its core interests and take countermeasures while urging the US to stop taking provocative actions. Such developments have made the establishment of a China-US risk prevention and crisis management mechanism all the more important.

And third, diplomacy and favorable public opinion are the two “golden keys” to ensure stable and sustained development of China-US relations. In the meeting in Denver, Chinese and American academics reviewed and reflected on the near air collision incident in the South China Sea in April 2001. They said that an open and effective diplomatic channel, public opinion and media regulation helped the speedy resolution of the incident after the US spy plane broke into China’s airspace and landed at a Chinese military airport without approval.

In this sense, preventing diplomacy from being hijacked by negative public opinion and sensationalized media coverage is an effective way to deal with difficult and thorny issues in Sino-US relations. The American academics who participated in the symposium discussed how the US has handled the unmanned airship incident in February 2023, with some saying the US made a mistake by resorting to military means, ignoring China’s  efforts to resolve the issue through diplomatic channels.

China-US relations cannot “go back to the past”. But we should not allow bilateral ties to go into a free fall. Since it is not impossible to find a solution to any problem, neither side should give up efforts to improve bilateral relations. Track 2 diplomacy represented by dialogue between think tanks and other organizations on the two sides can be an important part of this endeavor.

The author is also chairman of Huayang Research Center for Maritime Cooperation and Ocean Governance, chairman of the Board of China-Southeast Asia Research Center on the South China Sea, and chairman of the Academic Committee of the National Institute for South China Sea Studies.

The views don’t necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

This piece was originally released on China Daily on June 18, 2023.