Robert Sutter. Journal of Contemporary China. Volume 28, Issue 118. July 2019.
Republican-led congressional interaction with the Donald Trump campaign and administration on China-related matters during the 2016 US election campaign and the first year of the new administration involved often grudging adjustments on both sides. Major controversy was avoided partly because China issues often were overshadowed by other policy priorities and partly because congressional Republicans feared retribution from their mercurial leader who was very popular with the party rank-and-file and often harshly punished opponents. Moreover, Donald Trump’s adjustments in 2017 saw him come into line with conventional Republican congressional views on the importance of Asian allies and partners, nuclear weapons nonproliferation and greater US pressure on North Korea and on China to influence North Korea.
2018 featured a remarkably active Congress on China policy issues, showing strong overall support for the tough posture laid out in the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy and National Defense Strategy released just before and after the New Year that viewed China as America’s most important opponent. Congress notably endorsed the Trump administration argument that US national security relied on a secure technologically advanced economy; congressional members repeatedly sought stronger measures to protect important industries from predatory Chinese investment and industrial espionage. They also gave much stronger attention to protecting American domestic security from covert and overt Chinese information operations designed to weaken American leadership and resolve. Republican free traders had to give way in the face of the President’s punitive tariffs against China. Overall, the President in fall 2018 held the initiative in China policy; the Congress agreed with the overall hardening in administration policy toward China, generally arguing for tougher measures. Looking out, if the avowed unpredictable President Trump was to reverse course and seek a major compromise with China, as he did in 2018 with North Korean leader Kim Jung Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin, he would likely encounter strong congressional opposition.
Patterns of Congressional Influence on US Administration China Policy
Scholarship explaining domestic influences on American foreign policy discerns several key sources of domestic influence in recent decades. Among them are public opinion; the media; the political parties and related partisanship; interest groups involved with economic issues, national defense, values and ethnic groups, among others; and think tanks that reflect and sometimes foster the viewpoints of particular interests. The influence of these domestic American forces often is shown in the deliberations and actions of the President and Executive branch in the making of foreign policy. At times, however, the President and his administration choose to impose discipline, use secrecy or employ other means that allow for carrying out foreign policy deliberations and implementation while keeping domestic American influences at arm’s length. In contrast, the US Congress is much more open to and dependent on domestic American constituencies. The Congress has diffused authority, poor central control and many more access points than the Executive administration for domestic American forces to influence its policy deliberations. In practice, the Congress generally more closely reflects the concerns of domestic American groups or organizations with perspectives regarding particular issues in American foreign policy.
This article provides a context for assessing congressional-executive relations over Trump administration China policy by briefly examining the patterns seen in those relations in previous administrations. Prior to the normalization of US relations with China begun by President Richard Nixon and Chinese Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong, domestic American forces showed considerable influence in the making of US China policy. As the Cold War emerged in Asia and US policy in support of Chiang Kai-shek’s Chinese Nationalist regime failed in the face of Communist victory on the Chinese mainland, the American ‘loss’ of China became a salient and often partisan issue in the Congress, the media and during congressional and presidential elections. The full-scale war between US and Chinese forces in Korea lasted from 1950 to 1953; it was followed by almost two decades of Cold War confrontation and conflict. The early years of this period saw often intense congressional, media and Executive branch scrutiny designed to purge from government ranks and isolate advocates seen as moderate and accommodating toward the Communist regime in China. In this context, proposed initiatives for a more moderate and constructive US relationship with China were considered behind closed doors, if they were considered at all.
A prevailing pattern since the opening of US relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) over 40 years ago has been for the President and the administration to lead the formation and implementation of US policy as they endeavor to manage and develop the US relationship with China in often complicated and challenging international circumstances. Preoccupied with international statecraft, the President and the administration have tended to devote lower priority to domestic American influences in the making of US policy toward China. As domestic American influences often have reflected differences between the United States and China, they have been commonly viewed as obstacles to the administration’s objectives in fostering relations with China and broader international interests.
The main arena where the President and the administration have encountered domestic American influences on China policy has been in relations with Congress. Thus, the record of how domestic American influences have actually had an impact of US policy toward China can be seen in large measure during the course of congressional-executive relations over China policy. As noted below, the degree to which Congress mattered in US China policy changed over time. Periods of congressional assertiveness regarding China and other foreign policy, notably after the US war in Vietnam, have been followed by greater congressional deference to administration leadership in recent decades. Nevertheless, Congress’ role in authorizing and appropriating funds for defense, internal security and foreign affairs, in legislating administration trade and economic policies, in approving appointments in all areas of US government foreign interactions and in conducting oversight abroad and in deliberations on Capitol Hill provide proven levers to bend policy in favored directions. The levers become more important amid broader American debates on the way forward with China seen notably in the past few years.
While they have sometimes supported forward movement and other policy initiatives toward China carried out by the President and administration, domestic American influences reflected in the deliberations and other actions of the Congress have had more importance as sources of differences with China, posing obstacles to administration policies and prompting debate in the United States over the proper course in US policy toward China. The record of the past four decades shows some key findings:
- The importance of domestic debate and domestic interests in the making of China policy, reflected notably in annual congressional debates over whether or not to renew most favored nation trade status of China, seemed stronger for a few years after the Tiananmen incident of 1989 and the end of the Cold War than it was in prior decades.
- The domestic influences and interests seen in congressional actions sometimes prompted debate that proved to be a key determinant or ‘driver’ of the direction of US policy toward China. More commonly, they constituted a ‘brake’, a factor that slowed forward momentum in US policy initiatives toward China.
- From the Richard Nixon administration through the early years of Ronald Reagan’s administration, domestic American factors generally were a brake slowing efforts led by the administration to move closer to China and away from past American ties with Taiwan. The congressional rewriting and passage of the Taiwan Relations Act in 1979 was a highlight of this effort.
- For a few years after the Tiananmen crackdown and the end of the Cold War, domestic American forces drove US efforts in opposing China’s policies and in improving ties with Taiwan. Congress was virtually unanimous in pressing the Clinton administration to grant a visa for the Taiwan president to visit the United States in 1995. Clinton bowed to the pressure and the visit resulted in the greatest military crisis over Taiwan since the 1950s.
- Congressional and other domestic support for a tough stance toward China and strong support for Taiwan proved thin and fickle by the mid-1990s in the face of serious adverse consequences posed notably by China’s strong and increasingly powerful opposition. Congress went silent as Chinese ballistic missile and other military forces threatened Taiwan with destruction over the course of 1995-1996.
- US preoccupation in the twenty-first century with the struggle against terrorism, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, nuclear proliferation crises in North Korea and Iran, domestic and international economic stagnation and China’s rising as a world economic and growing military power reinforced an overall pragmatic approach to China. In general, the salience of differences posed by American domestic influences declined. Congress also became much less active in trying to influence policy toward China and other sensitive international issues. In this situation, the limited domestic influences reflected in congressional actions sometimes prompted debate or served as a brake on forward movement in US relations with China.
The pattern of the past 40 years is undergoing fundamental change as the Trump administration leads US policy in downgrading positive engagement with China and focusing on Beijing as America’s leading rival and opponent. Long more wary of China than the Executive branch and often skeptical of past administration promises of the benefits of engagement with Beijing, Congress in the past two years, through hearings and investigations, has focused on the warnings of senior administration officials and non-government specialists to urge an overall hardening in US policy against the increasingly powerful and dangerous Chinese opponent. Barring major concessions from Beijing to meet American demands, an abrupt change in course by the avowedly unpredictable President Trump, or an unexpected crisis or war, the American Executive and Legislative branches are likely to remain remarkably united on a path of intense rivalry with a powerful and predatory China.
Candidate Trump, Congressional Preferences and the 2015-2016 Election Debates
Asian Order and US Rebalance
The years leading up to the 2016 presidential election featured strong debate over perceived weaknesses in American foreign policy throughout the world, including Asia and China in particular. Republican leaders in Congress and supporting think tanks and interest groups joined media and other commentators in depicting major shortcomings in the Barack Obama government’s policies in Europe, the Middle East and Asia. One target was the so-called Obama Doctrine laid out in the president’s speech to graduating West Point cadets in 2014 that showed greater administration wariness regarding security engagements abroad. The president’s cautious approach seemed in line with prevailing American public opinion, even though the Republican-led critics in Congress and various media stressed the president’s approach-reflected weakness.
The Obama government approach to Asia was defined by its ‘pivot’ or rebalance to Asia policy announced in 2011.The United States accompanied military pullbacks from Iraq and Afghanistan with greater attention to a broad range of countries in Asia from India in the west to Japan in the northeast and the Pacific Island states in the southeast. US diplomatic activism increased; existing substantial military deployments were maintained and strengthened in some areas; trade and investment remained open and were poised to increase, notably on the basis of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), a 12-nation Asia-Pacific economic pact that represented the centerpiece of the economic dimension of the Obama administration’s rebalance policy in Asia.
The new US activism was widely welcomed by the governments in the region, with the notable exception of China. Under a new leadership of communist party chief and President Xi Jinping (2012-), China used economic enticements on the one hand and coercive and intimidating means short of direct military force on the other hand in order to compel neighbors to accept Chinese claims to disputed territories and to side with China against American foreign policy initiatives. Congressional and other American critics of the Obama rebalance claimed that the US government was not resolute enough in defending the US role as regional security guarantor and not active enough in promoting greater American trade, investment and diplomatic engagement in competition with China’s state-directed efforts. For example, the Republican-leaning Heritage Foundation summed up the critics’ concerns by offering far-reaching political-security recommendations for Asia that added to the Foundation’s longstanding support for greater free trade and investment there. The recommendations included more robust military spending to allow for a long-term goal of 350 naval ships (there are now about 280 ships in the Navy), increased support for allies and partners, expanded involvement with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and other regional groups, and advocated for greater firmness in dealing with Chinese challenges to regional and American interests.
Relevant 2015-2016 Election Debates
Most candidates talked about eroding or challenged US international power and influence, and the need to re-affirm America’s role in the world. Candidates Hillary Clinton, John Kasich, Donald Trump and other leading congressional candidates running for the presidency, Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, in varying ways favored strengthening US power and leadership. Senator Bernie Sanders favored less muscular approaches than the other candidates, emphasizing negotiations over military means and pressure. Most candidates affirmed strengthened relations with allies without much emphasis on greater reciprocity on the part of the allies.
On specific issues involving US leadership, John Kasich joined free trade advocates in Congress like House Speaker Paul Ryan to support the TPP. Clinton, Cruz, Sanders and Trump voiced varying opposition to the trade pact. Donald Trump was alone in insisting that allies do more to reciprocate American costs in maintaining their security and overall regional stability or face American withdrawal, and he accepted the possibility that allies without US support like Japan and South Korea might be compelled to develop nuclear weapons to protect themselves. All the candidates agreed with overwhelming majorities in Congress in emphasizing applying pressure, including pressure on China, to get the North Korean leader to denuclearize, but Mr. Trump was alone in also calling for direct talks with the North Korea’s Kim Jung Un.
China remained the main country of concern regarding challenging US leadership in Asia. Relevant election discourse focused on how China was an unfair partner, and how the US needed to counter negative features of China’s rise. China generally was not seen as an adversary, rather it was depicted as neither an enemy nor a friend. Candidates Clinton, Cruz and Rubio argued for greater firmness against China; Sanders urged negotiations as did Trump, who also favored military buildup and large trade sanctions if needed.
Hillary Clinton’s priorities included holding China accountable. She spoke highly of Obama’s policies, played up her part in the rebalance and called for continuity of the rebalance policies.
Ted Cruz said that Presidents Obama and Clinton had weakened America and jeopardized its global interests.
Bernie Sanders believed in resolving international conflicts in a peaceful manner. Sanders said, ‘we must move away from policies that favor unilateral military action… and that make the United States the de facto policeman of the world’. Sanders, like Trump, blamed current economic problems in the US on ‘disastrous trade policies’ involving China and other countries.
Donald Trump said ‘…we have to rebuild our military and our economy’. He held that international trade agreements were not beneficial; he preferred bilateral trade deals and opposed the TPP. Trump also fixed on currency manipulation, citing China and Japan. He usually did not find fault in China and others for taking advantage of perceived maladroit US trade policies. He promised swift and dramatic retaliation against Chinese and other unfair economic practices.
Implications
Broad American concern with China remained active but secondary in the campaign debates about Asian issues. It was overshadowed by strong debate on international trade and the proposed TPP accord, and on candidate Donald Trump’s controversial proposals on allied burden sharing, nuclear weapons proliferation and North Korea.
Mr. Trump’s strong opposition to the TPP and other US trade efforts was at odds with the free trade policies favored by Republican congressional leaders, but the Trump position had a strong appeal among both Republican and Democratic voters. He and Sanders’ reinforced each other’s arguments; Clinton, Cruz and others reversed or modified their positions to accord with the changed politics surrounding the TPP.
Candidate Trump’s unique emphasis on getting Japan, South Korea and other allies to compensate America for its role as regional security guarantor prompted serious negative reactions that promised significant complications for US alliance relations if Trump was elected president and attempted to follow through on his demands. His calls for Japan and South Korea to compensate the United States for American security support were at odds with proposals by Speaker Ryan, Senator John McCain and other Republican congressional leaders as well as many Republican-leaning think tanks and media. Some of these congressional Republicans publicly opposed such policies.
Trump’s acceptance of Japan or South Korea developing nuclear weapons for self-defense following a US pullback was a major departure from longstanding policies of Republican and Democratic US governments which was widely seen to add to the danger of war in northeastern Asia.
Trump’s abrupt announcement that he would seek direct talks with North Korea’s leader undermined existing US, South Korean and Japanese policy and deviated sharply from the tough US posture on this issue favored by the Obama government and by Republican and Democratic congressional leaders and rank and file.
These three sets of controversial proposals by Mr. Trump garnered little support in the United States and prompted opposition, including from prominent congressional Republicans.
Meanwhile, candidate Trump’s flamboyant and often vulgar campaign attacks were widely seen as diminishing the United States abroad. His populist appeal came from a style of campaigning that featured repeated personal attacks, gross language and salacious accusations which degraded America’s image and provided fodder for Chinese and other opinion stressing the weaknesses of US democracy. Republican congressional and other leaders often showed unease in reacting to media queries in response to controversies centered on candidate Trump’s campaign tactics and behavior.
On policy issues, the success of the Sanders and Trump campaign attacks on the TTP surprised congressional leaders along with most American and Asian commentators. Their success notably underlined seemingly weak popular American support for this important component of US policy in the region, which Ryan, McCain and other Republican congressional leaders continued to support. The fact that the Republican Party—widely seen in the region as strongly committed to US defense ties with Asia—selected Mr. Trump despite his controversial views on military disengagement from Asia and Europe and acceptance of proliferation of nuclear weapons raised serious doubts about America’s future regional role. Among Asian countries depending on military support from the United States, Japanese non-government commentators seemed the most concerned. On the other side of the spectrum of Asian views were Chinese commentators who saw opportunities for Chinese gains in competition with the United States for leadership in Asia as a result of the election’s negative impact on the credibility of American commitments to Asian allies and friends. This development reinforced the determination of Senator McCain and a large bipartisan group of colleagues to travel to the region prior to the election to reassure allies and partners of continued US support.
President Trump’s China Policy and the US Congress
The crisis over nuclear weapons development in North Korea beginning in 2017 and tensions caused by tough US tariffs and other economic measures against China in 2018 were high-priority issues for the administration, the Congress, the media and non-government organizations dealing with American policy. But they competed for attention with pressing domestic issues. Those included health-care reform, tax reform, disaster relief, control of immigration and Supreme Court nominations. Also of great concern for administration and congressional decision-makers were the domestic and foreign policy implications of the role of Russia in influencing US domestic politics and the investigation into possible collusion with the Trump campaign during the 2016 election. Finally, international issues preoccupying the US government at this time were the wars in Syria and Afghanistan, growing frictions in US allied relations in Europe and North America, and the challenges posed by the US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, Russian and Iranian assertiveness, and their expansionism in Europe and the Middle East.
In Asia, President Trump in 2017 came to see the need to altering his policies toward allies and to joining congressional and other leaders in pressuring North Korea hard on nuclear weapons proliferation. However, his overall approach to Asian and other international diplomacy continued to feature dramatic and often crude initiatives that were hard to predict and that raised international tensions with President Trump at the center of attention. The United States is a superpower with many powerful options of possible use in seeking international advantage. President Trump was much more likely than the measured and predictable Barack Obama to use them in surprising ways, notably by linking issues, using one source of power in one issue area to seek advantage in another area of policy concern. Where the Obama government seemed to prioritize carefully managing differences and resulting tensions, President Trump sought advantage in stoking tensions and exacerbating differences in diplomacy in Asia and more broadly. Such behavior mimicked his controversial and unconventional behavior in his remarkable and unexpected presidential election victory against more experienced and conventional political candidates.
Early Trump administration initiatives in Asia upset regional stability, complicating the foreign policies of Asian partners and opponents alike, including China. Pragmatic summitry in 2017 eased regional anxiety and clarified the new government’s security and political objectives, laid out in the administration’s National Security Strategy and National Defense Strategy. Nonetheless, an effective American strategy remained elusive. There were deep divisions in the US administration on trade and economic policy. And the President was prone to switch course abruptly in ways that upset allies and partners, as in the case in June 2018 with the summit with North Korea and discord at the G-7 meeting in Canada, as a result of the president’s summit with Vladimir Putin in July, and as in the case of off-again on-again punitive tariffs impacting China and US allies alike.
There was considerable domestic support, notably in the Congress, for the new president’s broad security plans which were generally compatible with the priorities of Republican congressional leaders stressing the need to reinforce the American military presence in the Asia-Pacific region. The Omnibus spending bill signed by the president in March 2018 included the first installment of a planned US$160 billion defense spending increase over two years that will improve US military readiness and advance capabilities in the Asia Pacific and other key theaters of operations. Congress was also active in legislation, hearings and in authorizing and appropriating funds to shore up American domestic security against perceived pernicious Chinese government efforts to acquire technology, classified information and political influence in broad efforts targeted at undermining US power and leadership.
The president’s broad personal engagement with Chinese and other Asian leaders in 2017-2018 detailed below was generally supported in Congress. As discussed there, few public complaints were seen in Congress, albeit more in the media and among concerned interest groups, about the new US government’s reduced emphasis on human rights and good governance as it pursued high-level meetings with Asian leaders heretofore viewed warily or held at arm’s length because of various human rights and governance issues. Congress generally supported the efforts by Republican congressional leader and now Vice President Michael Pence and other administration leaders including Defense Secretary James Mattis, National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to steer President Trump to strongly support the US alliance relationships with Japan, South Korea, Australia and others that had been seriously questioned by candidate Trump. The turnover in senior administration leaders with Tillerson and McMaster leaving in 2018 and being replaced, respectively, by Mike Pompeo and John Bolton, proponents of a harder line in US foreign policy, raised little significant congressional opposition.
Congress remained overwhelmingly supportive of greater US pressure on North Korea, including pressure on China to pressure North Korea. Thus, there was little objection to the high priority the president and his staff gave to responding to North Korean weapons tests in 2017 with recently unprecedented demonstrations of military power and resolve. The tension featured strident rhetoric from the president that for a time caused a few congressional leaders to register concerns about a possible impulsive presidential move that would start a nuclear war. Subsequently, Congress reacted with what was characterized as hesitant optimism to the outcome of President Trump joining other leaders in exploring détente with North Korea in a summit in June 2018.
2018 saw a bipartisan turn of the Congress toward viewing China more critically as a very serious threat to America and its interests. Congress supported stronger administration efforts to prevent Chinese covert efforts to manipulate and influence American opinion on issues important to China and illicit and other acquisition of US technology. Senior Members sometimes objected to the president’s decisions beginning in 2018 to impose punitive tariffs on China and on many allies and other US partners, but they avoided standing against the often vindictive president. Meanwhile, when the President took actions seemingly out of line with established strategy, as in easing restrictions on the prominent Chinese technology firm ZTE for its duplicitous behavior undermining US interests, congressional leaders and other Members objected, but avoided confrontation with the president. Overall, Congress was in-line with the China policies of the administration’s National Security Strategy and the National Defense Strategy, establishing a remarkable bi-partisan congressional-executive hardening in US policy toward China not seen since the depths of the Cold War.
Significant Developments
President Trump’s unconventional personal style in foreign affairs added to uncertainty in US relations with China and the broader Asia-Pacific region. Notably, President Trump repeatedly inserted himself in the policy process through bluntly worded tweets and other initiatives that exacerbated frictions at home and abroad over important issues in ways that appealed to Mr. Trump’s populist constituency but upset foreign partners and opponents.
President Trump quickly followed through on his campaign pledge to withdraw from the 12 nation TPP. Then came the announcement that the Obama government’s overall Asian engagement policy known as the rebalance policy was ended, with little indication of the Trump administration’s regional approach. Both moves reinforced anxiety and dismay by US regional allies and partners over the direction of American policy. The angst was not significantly reduced by the administration’s new regional policy focused on the Indo-Pacific. After over a year of waiting, the announced policy has only begun to be defined clearly.
The new president’s national security leaders along with Vice President Pence led the administration’s reversal of candidate Trump’s low regard for US alliances, notably those with Japan, South Korea and Australia. Their travels to the region reassured allies and partners of US security commitments. Economic relations remained in question as President Trump continued complaints about the US trade agreement with South Korea and US trade deficits with China and many other Asian countries.
Crisis with North Korea and China Policy
North Korea’s threatening rhetoric, repeated ballistic missile launches and nuclear weapons testing saw the Trump government in 2017 adopt a new strategy accompanied by far more tension than the Obama government’s more moderate and reactive policy of ‘strategic patience’. Notably, President Trump and senior administration officials repeatedly warned of unspecified US military options to deal unilaterally with the North Korean threat, while they markedly increased public pressure on China to use its influence to get North Korea to halt its nuclear weapons program. President Trump repeatedly intervened with harsh public criticisms and disparaging comments of the North Korean regime and its leader Kim Jung Un. His public remarks on China’s willingness and ability to get North Korea to stop varied from optimism to warnings that the United States was prepared to take unilateral military actions, responding to the North Korean threat with ‘the fire and the fury like the world has never seen’.
The crisis over North Korea saw the US administration devote careful handling to relations with China. The Barack Obama government remained positive about US-Chinese relations to the end of its tenure. However, the eventual Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, the Obama government’s first-term Secretary of State, sharply criticized a wide range of Chinese government actions. Between the two candidates, Chinese specialists judged that Mr. Trump was a pragmatic businessman who could be ‘shaped’ to align with Chinese interests and would be easier to deal with than Clinton.
President-elect Trump up-ended these sanguine views when he accepted a congratulatory phone call from Taiwan’s president. The call reportedly was facilitated by longstanding Republican Party leaders, reflecting the Party’s 2016 platform that was remarkably supportive of Taiwan and harsh toward China. When China complained, Mr. Trump questioned why the United States needed to support a position of one China and avoid improved contacts with Taiwan. President Trump eventually was persuaded to endorse—at least in general terms—the American view of the one China policy. His informal summit meeting with President Xi Jinping in Florida in early April went well. The two leaders met again on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in July and held repeated phone conversations over North Korea and other issues in the lead up to the US president’s visit to Beijing in November. Despite serious differences between the two countries, both leaders seemed to value their personal rapport. President Xi organized a remarkable visit for President Trump in China, prompting President Trump’s personal gratitude and appreciation.
After the Florida summit, the Trump government kept strong political pressure on China to use its leverage to halt North Korea’s nuclear weapons development. Planned arms sales to Taiwan, freedom of navigation exercises in the South China Sea and other US initiatives that might complicate America’s search for leverage to stop North Korea’s nuclear weapons development were temporarily put on hold. The two sides also reached agreement on a 100-day action plan to further bilateral economic cooperation prior to the first US-China Comprehensive Economic Dialogue set for July.
As President Trump registered dissatisfaction with China’s efforts on North Korea in June, the Taiwan arms sales and freedom of navigation exercises went forward. And the July economic dialogue reached no agreement on actionable new steps to reduce the US trade deficit with China and ended in obvious failure. News leaks of senior administration meetings showed the President rejecting compromises with China that were supported by senior administration economic officials in favor of unilateral sanctions against adverse Chinese trade practices. The administration avoided harsh economic measures in lead-up to the President’s trip to China in November, but they emerged in 2018.
Secretary of State Tillerson, usually positive in public comments about relations with China, averred in interviews prior to the president’s November trip that the administration was ‘expecting some movement’ from China on longstanding disagreements on trade and North Korea. He and Secretary of Defense James Mattis also registered the administration’s first criticism of China’s widely publicized Belt and Road Initiative, the centerpiece of President Xi Jinping’s foreign policy envisioning a China-centered economic order throughout Eurasia. The also administration objected to the World Bank’s continuing practice of providing a couple of billion dollars a year in development loans to China.
China’s uncertainty over the American president added to reasons for Beijing to avoid in 2017 controversial expansion in the disputed South China Sea. Beijing also was loathe to take serious expansionist actions at the expense of Philippines’ claims in the South China Sea that would upset China’s efforts to woo President Rodrigo Duterte from the previous Philippines government’s close alignment with the United States. The respite in China’s South China Sea aggrandizement was temporary. In 2018, Beijing took steps to militarize Chinese installations on the recently created South China Sea land features.
Building Close Ties with Asian Leaders
The crisis over North Korea overshadowed the administration’s progress in advancing diplomatic, security and economic relations with other important Asian countries. As seen in the president’s interaction with Xi Jinping, the approach featured summit meetings with President Trump, even with leaders previously shunned by the United States because of American concerns over adverse trends in their countries regarding Democracy, human rights and corruption. The Trump government made clear that it was less concerned with such matters and ready for pragmatic improvement of ties regarding more tangible American economic, security and political interests. By and large, the Asian leaders responded positively to the high-level attention by the new US president, which many of them actively sought. Though many in Congress strongly supported Democracy, human rights and good governance abroad, there was little objection and considerable support for the president’s pragmatically building of better relations among Asia’s leaders. Congressional interchange often was part of the agenda for the foreign leaders.
Japan’s long-serving Prime Minister Shinzo Abe solidified a position as the American president’s closest regional partner with a remarkable meeting in New York with the president-elect followed by a summit in Washington in February that included a full weekend at the President’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. The two leaders remained on the same page throughout the tensions over North Korea, while US military and diplomatic leaders strongly affirmed Japan’s centrality to the American posture in the Asia Pacific. Japan was more anxious than the Trump government about negotiations with North Korea in 2018, and it was seriously disappointed with the president’s decision to impose punitive tariffs on Japan and other US allies and partners as well as China.
Visiting Asia in April, Vice President Pence said President Trump would attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Vietnam and the US-ASEAN and East Asian summits in the Philippines in November 2017. The Vice President’s stop to Australia helped to set the stage for a cordial meeting in New York in May between the President Trump and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. The two leaders put aside their earlier heated argument in a phone conversation in January regarding the United States accepting over 1000 refugees in Australian custody. Australia went along with President Trump’s June 2018 summit with North Korea’s Kim Jung Un and it avoided punitive US tariffs, given the large Australian deficit in trade with the United States.
In late April, President Trump called leaders of Singapore, The Philippines and Thailand, inviting them to visit the White House. The invitations to the latter two and a separate invitation to the prime minister of Malaysia represented a break from the Obama government’s arm’s length treatment of these governments because of concerns over human rights and corruption. Secretary of State Tillerson and National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster also hosted meetings with the ASEAN foreign ministers visiting Washington in May.
Vietnam carried out previously agreed US visits of its senior leaders—the prime minister, the foreign minister and the deputy defense minister. Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc was the first Southeast Asian head of government to meet with President Trump in late May. Following his election and quick inauguration in May ending a South Korean presidential crisis caused by a corruption scandal, South Korean President Moon Jae-in traveled to Washington for a summit with President Trump in late June. President Moon gave top priority to cooperating with the US president in dealing with the North Korean threat. He also put aside anti-Japanese sentiment in South Korea and worked closely in trilateral cooperation involving Japan and the United States. He also followed through with the deployment of the US Thermal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system in South Korea despite unprecedented pressure from China. In the interests of projecting unity in the face of the North Korean threat during the summit, President Trump temporarily muted his longstanding criticism of the Korea-US trade agreement. The two countries in March 2018 reached a new agreement dealing with the Trump trade complaints.
In late June, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was warmly welcomed at the White House as the leader of an important world power and economic and security partner. India’s importance grew with President Trump’s decision in August to add 4000 troops to the 8000 American troops stationed in Afghanistan endeavoring to counter Taliban combatants seeking to overthrow the US-backed Afghan government. Defense Secretary Mattis made his first visit to India in September with the Pentagon stressing ‘US appreciation of India’s important contributions toward Afghanistan’s democracy, stability, prosperity and security’. The United States continued to press Pakistan to suppress pro-Taliban forces operating along its border with Afghanistan and take other measures to support the Afghan government. The results were disappointing, reinforcing a higher US priority in working with India on Afghan issues despite the India-Pakistan rivalry.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak was a close partner of the Obama government until he became mired in a major corruption scandal. Najib found the Trump government more welcoming during a visit to the White House and a cordial meeting with President Trump in September.
US-Thailand relations remained stalled on account of the 2014 Thai military coup ending democratic rule and the slow progress toward a return to democratic governance. Nonetheless, the leader of the 2014 coup and current Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and his wife were warmly welcomed by President and Melania Trump at the White House in early October. This marked the first such visit by a Thai leader since 2005.
Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong made a six day trip to Washington in late October, just prior to President Trump’s inaugural visit to the region. Singapore consistently runs a trade deficit with the United States, so the Trump administration has not pressed the government to remedy trade imbalances. The prime minister came to Washington fresh from a summit with Xi Jinping in Beijing. Underlining Singapore’s balancing between the two great powers, he urged President Trump to seek a good relationship with China.
Apart from North Korea, the most strident rhetoric criticizing the US government by an Asian leader over the previous year came from Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte. Duterte’s Draconian crackdown on drug traffickers resulted in thousands of extralegal killings that have been strongly criticized by human rights advocates at home and abroad. The White House put aside such concerns when President Trump in April invited President Duterte to meet in Washington. Duterte demurred, saying he was too busy but the Philippines leader was publicly conciliatory toward the United States in welcoming Trump to the East Asia Summit hosted by Manila.
Result of the Trump Visit to Asia, November 2017
As with his friendly visit to China, President Trump’s trips to the various Asian countries featured Asian leaders seeking improved relations with the new US leader. The achievements of the trip were heavily symbolic, focused on establishing personal rapport at the top levels of government. The US president’s concerns about the threat from North Korea and about US trade imbalances and other economic complaints were evident throughout. His speech at the APEC meeting laid out a strong warning to all concerned that the United States would no longer play what the president saw as a passive role in the face of unfair practices by economic partners that disadvantage the United States. While President Trump continued to reject multilateral economic agreements, he participated fully in the APEC meeting and the US-ASEAN summit and was prepared for the East Asian Leadership summit. The latter steps and the president’s attentiveness throughout his remarkably long and demanding schedule in the region signaled strong top-level US commitment of continued active engagement in regional affairs. There was little in the trip for administration critics in the Congress or elsewhere to complain about. Indeed the Congress at this time was very preoccupied with other matters, such as aborted efforts to repeal the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act and a head-long rush to pass major tax overhaul legislation before the end of the year. That would change in 2018.
Congressional Activism on China in 2018
In 2018, Congress turned attention to China policy through:
- extensive hearings on the challenges Chinese policies and practices pose for American interests;
- a variety of individual bills on specific issues, some of which were incorporated into such important legislation seen as requiring congressional approval as the annual National Defense Authorization bill;
- letters to the administration signed by bipartisan congressional leaders warning of Chinese actions and urging firm responses.
A bipartisan turn of the Congress toward viewing China more critically as a very serious threat to America and its interests showed in congressional hearings on the China danger featuring a range of witnesses selected by majority (Republican) and minority (Democrat) Members on the committees. In the past, those selections would include prominent witnesses representing the view favoring constructive US engagement with China and managing differences through American as well as Chinese compromises. In 2018, it was common to find no such witnesses, with those testifying stressing the need for US firmness and resolve to defend against Chinese malign actions. Most notable in this regard was a June hearing by the House Intelligence Committee where prominent China critic James Fanell submitted an over 60 page indictment of the Chinese government’s policies.
Underlining the shift to a tougher policy toward China was resistance in the Congress to the appointment of Susan Thornton, a career Foreign Service officer who had a high profile during the Barack Obama administration’s strong emphasis on engagement with China, to the position of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson relied on and publicly praised Thornton as acting assistant secretary for East Asian affairs in putting forth her nomination, but Senator Marco Rubio threatened to place a hold on her nomination in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Following Tillerson’s replacement by Pompeo, Thornton’s retirement from the State Department was announced in June 2018.
Some of the congressional hearings on China in 2018 provided an opportunity for administration witnesses to offer their negative views of China’s impact on American interests, with some offering dire warnings that reinforced the contemporary congressional view of the Chinese regime. FBI Director Christopher Wray highlighted a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in February by depicting China’s heavy engagement with espionage and influence campaigns in the United States involving wide use of ‘nontraditional collectors’ including Chinese students researching sensitive technologies. Leaders of the US National Intelligence Council in June testified before the House Armed Services Committee about China’s multi-faceted techniques to acquire by illicit and clandestine means the US military and commercial technology Beijing seeks in order to overtake American leadership.
Defending the United States from such espionage and intellectual property theft and guarding against clandestine Chinese efforts to influence public and elite opinion in the United States in ways that play down the threat and weaken US resolve were featured in hearings by the US Congressional-Executive Commission on China. Legislation was proposed in the House and Senate by the commission’s chairs, Representative Christopher Smith and Senator Marco Rubio. A bipartisan group of 27 of the most senior Senators, headed by Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn and Minority leader Charles Schumer, sent a letter in May to the top American economic negotiators with China, urging a firm line against recent Chinese technology theft and ambitions. Other prominent actions included a letter to senior Trump administration officials by a group of 12 Senators, including prominent liberal Elizabeth Warren, urging a ‘comprehensive strategy’ to defend against Chinese influence operations in democracies around the world. In August, congressional concern with China’s perceived predatory international lending practices and their negative implications for US interests including with the IMF reached a new high in a letter signed by 16 senators including longstanding conservative critics of China and some leading liberals with great experience with American foreign assistance and international finance, notably Patrick Leahy.
Like the Trump Administration, Congress remained divided on how to deal with trade and investment issues. Members often objected to the adverse impact of tariffs or other punitive measures on the businesses and consumers in their constituencies. They also voiced opposition to imposing tariffs on allies at the same time tariffs were being imposed on China. Overall, there was much less opposition to the tariffs against China. Congressional efforts to check President Trump’s proclivity to seek compromise after raising tensions came in the sharply negative response to the President’s decision in May to ease the harsh sanctions against the prominent Chinese high technology firm ZTE, in response to a personal plea from the Chinese president. This congressional response was among factors reportedly prompting President Trump at that time to come down on the side of hard liners in his government in dealing with trade and investment issues with China. In the end, the Congress proved unwilling to stand against the president’s compromise on sanctions on ZTE.
A variety of bills on strengthening US support for Taiwan urged the American defense department and the US government more broadly to come up with strategies to bolster US-Taiwan military ties, assist Taiwan in countering escalating efforts by Beijing to isolate Taiwan and promote higher level contacts between the US and Taiwan governments. As discussed below, much of this legislation was incorporated into the large annual defense authorization bill that passed Congress and was signed by the president in August 2018. A stand-alone bill advocating more and higher level US official visits to Taiwan, known as the Taiwan Travel Act, passed the Congress with unanimous votes in the House and Senate in February and was signed by President Trump in March. Taiwan generally enjoys broad support in Congress but achieving a unanimous vote on an issue strongly opposed by and lobbied against by China suggested to veteran congressional observers just how negative a turn the Congress was taking in regard to the Chinese government and its concerns.
In accord with the direction of the congressional Taiwan initiatives, the Trump government took a variety of relatively small steps to show greater support for Taiwan despite Beijing’s opposition. But after his reversal following the phone call with the Taiwan president in December 2016, President Trump reportedly remained wary of more dramatic steps on Taiwan policy that might jeopardize China’s cooperation on higher priority issues, notably North Korea. Thus, media reports sourcing unnamed US officials said President Trump was upset that a deputy assistant secretary of State gave a public speech in Taipei attended by the Taiwan president where he hailed ever strengthening US-Taiwan relations. President Trump reportedly judged China might retaliate by severely complicating the Trump government’s engagement with North Korea. Other reports said the President personally reviewed the guest list of US officials attending the inauguration of the new unofficial American office in Taipei to assure that no higher level official offensive to China would be attending. The Taipei office inauguration coincided with President Trump’s 12 June summit with the North Korean leader in Singapore, reportedly reinforcing his unwillingness to jeopardize Chinese support at that critical time.
The capstone of 2018 congressional activism to harden American policy toward China came with the numerous provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act FY-2019 that impact China policy. As noted above, the Act passed the Congress and was signed by the president in August prior to the congressional summer recess.
The language on China is harsh, accusing Beijing of using an ‘all-of-nation long-term strategy’ involving military modernization, influence operations, espionage and predatory economic policy to undermine the United States and its interests abroad. In response, the law directs a whole-of-government US strategy. It requires the Defense Department to submit a five-year plan to bolster US and allied and partner strength in the Indo-Pacific region. The new law extends the authority and broadens the scope of the Maritime Security Initiative covering Southeast Asia to include the Indo-Pacific region. It also requires a US strategy to strengthen military ties with India, prohibits China’s participation in Rim of the Pacific naval exercises and requires a public report on China’s military and coercive activities in the South China Sea. Broadening the scope of the annual Defense Department report to Congress on Chinese military and security developments, the law requires the report to now include ‘malign activities’ including information and influence operations, as well as predatory economic and lending practices. Meanwhile, Defense Department funds for Chinese language programs at universities that host Confucius Institutes were curtailed by the new law.
The Act’s provisions on Taiwan reaffirmed various aspects of longstanding American commitments to Taiwan. They sought in particular to enhance US arms sales, and higher level US defense and related personnel exchanges, training and exercises with Taiwan. The Act required a comprehensive Defense Department assessment within one year of Taiwan’s military forces and reserve forces, including recommendations for US actions to assist Taiwan and a plan on how the United States would implement the recommendations.
The Act contained a separate set of provisions to modernize, strengthen and broaden the scope of the interagency body, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), to more effectively guard against the risk to US national security seen posed by Chinese and other predatory foreign investment. It also included key reforms in US export controls that will better protect emerging technology and intellectual property from Beijing and other potential adversaries.
President Trump’s Controversial Leadership Style
Any assessment of Congress and President Trump requires a review of the respective leadership styles of the President and the congressional leaders. Many in Congress, notably the Republican leadership in the House and Senate, adhere to a style of leadership more compatible with the deliberative and methodical lawyerly approach of Barack Obama. While they try publicly to support President Trump and maintain Republican Party unity in dealing with China and other issues, their private reservations about President Trump’s handling of foreign policy and other issues are reportedly serious and continuing. Those reservations are held in check as the leaders as well as other congressional Members are well aware of the president’s strong popularity within the Republican Party and his willingness to retaliate against opponents.
As seen above, President Trump in 2017 brought the substance of his policy preferences into accord with those of Congress in regard to treatment of Asian allies, nuclear weapons non-proliferation and negotiating with North Korea, but in 2018, the president seemed less constrained by senior staff and much freer in pursuing initiatives at odds with conventional policies. This shift may have influenced the administration’s tougher stance toward China on trade and investment issues, despite continuing disagreement on these matters among senior administration officials and among Republican congressional leaders. Further confusing the situation, President Trump at the same time repeatedly avowed a good personal relationship with Chinese President Xi Jinping and at times signaled an interest in negotiating compromise agreement on these trade and economic issues with China. If the congressional flap over President Trump’s moderation of sanctions against the Chinese firm ZTE is an indication of future congressional response, major Trump administration compromises with China over economic or other sensitive issues in relations with China may be unacceptable to congressional leaders and others. Meanwhile, many in Congress remain wary of the US president’s flamboyant and high-profile interventions into foreign policy matters seen better left to experienced professionals.
On a personal basis, there is strong negative feeling among some in Congress on the way former Senator and now Attorney General Jeffrey Sessions was demeaned by the president because of Mr. Trump’s frustrations over the special investigation into possible Russian collusion with the Trump presidential campaign during the 2016 election campaign. It is widely known on Capitol Hill that Senator Sessions was the first to endorse the Trump candidacy; Session’s office provided the support candidate Trump needed to deal in a reasonably sophisticated way with the complicated issues of foreign affairs and national defense during the run for the presidency. The president’s turning against this important loyal supporter in this way served as a salient negative example of what one can expect from what is seen as a very self-absorbed president. The result divides the president and the Congress, where this president’s mutual deals and commitments are starkly transactional, with none of the personal commitment that historically has been glue in Congress reaching compromise needed for effective governance.
Conclusion
The foreign policy record of the Trump government in dealing with China and Asia in 2017 and 2018 was better than forecast by a wide range of specialists and commentators. The progressive South Korean president, representing a political party long suspicious of the US government, has duly credited the risky Trump pressure tactics on North Korea, including unprecedented pressure on China, as deserving credit in halting North Korean nuclear weapons-related testing and threats and getting North Korea to agree to come to meet with an American president demanding denuclearization. Of course, many experienced observers judge that the Trump government will have a hard time avoiding North Korea following past practice in using diplomacy to buy time for North Korea to advance its diplomatic influence and weapons development.
The controversial consequences of the Trump government’s recent tough economic measures against China are harder to defend diplomatically, in part because they have negative impacts on and come in tandem with tariffs on Japan and many other American partners in Asia. They also prompt controversy at home, including among Republican Party leaders in Congress and elsewhere.
The president’s summitry in Washington and Asia was successful in establishing a positive basis for relations with all major Asian leaders, with China’s Xi Jinping as a notable example. The US leader constructively interacted with various Asian regional groups apart from the TPP and other such regional economic organizations. The Trump government’s TPP withdrawal was negative in the view of many Asian leaders. Many Asian leaders welcome and few object to the Trump government’s pragmatic and low-keyed diplomatic posture on Democracy, human rights and non-corrupt governance. Asian government disappointment with the president’s reversal of the Obama government’s stance on climate change remains ambiguous and has registered faint impact. On the whole, Congress has registered few major objections with these Trump government moves.
Clear American strategy documents undergird a substantial strengthening of the US security and other measures at home to defend against perceived Chinese inroads and presence in the region that will be widely welcomed (except notably by China) if carried out along the lines of current sober-minded leadership of James Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Dunford. Such steps enjoy strong congressional backing. The documents are grim in portraying an array of serious challenges and dangers headed by China. Crafting and implementing effective US countermeasures will require years of expensive and effectively managed US whole-of-government efforts. Congressional activism on China policy in 2018 demonstrated strong support for such countermeasures, establishing bi-partisan Executive-Congressional hardening in a broadly based American policy targeting China.
Sustaining American resolve against China will be costly and potentially risky. For now, barring major concessions from Beijing to meet American demands, an abrupt change in course by the avowedly unpredictable President Trump, or an unexpected crisis or war, the American Executive and Legislative branches seem likely to remain remarkably united on a path of intense rivalry with a powerful and predatory China.