Xi Jinping calls for ‘healthy’ competition between China and the United States

China and the United States, the world’s two largest economies, are rivals, but they would do well to get along. That was the message repeatedly conveyed — both directly and indirectly — by their respective presidents, Xi Jinping and Donald Trump, during their summit on Thursday at a lavishly decorated White House, which went all out to welcome its guest and where the two sought to showcase their harmony. Beijing and Washington need not necessarily refrain from competing, Xi said, but that competition “should be a healthy one and should be kept within bounds. It should be a race of catching up with one another, not a wrestle in which one either wins or loses” emphasized the Chinese leader, who noted that both countries have the “capability and responsibility” to manage artificial intelligence effectively.

Maintaining a stable relationship and preventing any of the many deep disagreements between the two countries from derailing it was the main objective of the meeting, which Trump described as “very good.” The two leaders, who share a good personal relationship, broke with protocol at the end of the two-hour meeting in the Oval Office: the Republican took the Chinese leader to the White House gardens so he could board his presidential helicopter, Marine One, and see the new helipad and the construction work on the presidential residence’s new ballroom. “Xi is an expert on stone, aside from many other things, and he loves good granite,” the Republican said, as his guest gave a half-smile.

AI appeared to be at the forefront of the two leaders’ concerns. Both leaders explicitly referred to this technology, in which their respective countries aspire to be leaders. “We have both the capability and responsibility to develop and manage AI for good and ensure that the development of AI is always under human control and serves the well-being of the people,” Xi stated in his opening remarks at the start of the meeting. Immediately before welcoming Xi at the White House, Trump had written on his social network, Truth, that AI “will be a big topic of discussion” but that he wanted to “leave it exactly where it is. That is China’s position also.”

Xi emphasized the importance of fostering “strategic stability” between the two countries at a time of great geopolitical turmoil. “The interests of China and the U.S. are deeply intertwined,” he said.

Both governments believe that advances in this technology are essential to their economic and military competitiveness. The United States has repeatedly accused China of developing its own models by building on American ones.

On the eve of the meeting, the United States had announced a temporary solution to another major point of contention in the relationship. The tariff truce agreed upon by the two governments last year — which was set to expire on November 10 — will be extended until January 10 to give both sides more time to negotiate a more lasting agreement, according to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who made the announcement after an unscheduled meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng on Wednesday. The two had already met on Sunday in New York, where they agreed to formalize a dialogue on AI, explore a communication channel for incidents affecting national security, and meet again in November during the APEC summit in Shenzhen (southern China). According to the U.S. treasury secretary, Beijing has raised the possibility of a more ambitious trade deal between the world’s two largest economies.

To resolve remaining disagreements and stabilize a relationship that is as fundamental as it is complicated, the two countries have turned to a remedy very much to Trump’s liking: pomp, hospitality, and deference. Throughout Thursday, he treated his guest to a welcome ceremony, a military review, a flyover by the United States’ most modern warplanes, and — the ultimate tribute, in Trump’s eyes — a tour of the construction site for the new White House ballroom. The pomp and circumstance was set to continue into Thursday evening with a state dinner to which some of the giants of American technology were invited, from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to Apple’s Tim Cook.

Xi received an extraordinary welcome on landing Wednesday: before Trump, the last time a U.S. president had gone to an airport to greet a foreign leader arriving for a state visit was in 1962, when John F. Kennedy also traveled to Andrews Air Base to welcome British prime minister Harold Macmillan. Those were the days of the “special relationship” between London and Washington.

Since then, the understood protocol that a U.S. president receives foreign leaders at the White House or, if meeting them outside Washington, at the agreed meeting site rather than at the airport, has only been broken on very rare occasions. Last year, Trump welcomed Russian President Vladimir Putin, a theoretical adversary of the U.S., at Elmendorf-Richardson Air Force Base in Alaska before the summit the two held there. But that meeting was not at the level of a state visit.

Both Trump and Xi are aiming to preserve the “strategic stability” they referred to in May and to carry on with the trade truce struck last year at their meeting in South Korea, without bilateral ups and downs distracting them from their own domestic problems. The Chinese president wants calm to focus on his country’s flagging economy. Trump faces the war in Iran and midterm elections in November.

This is the second time the two leaders have met this year, after Trump’s visit to Beijing in May. Convinced that regular contact between them is the key to stability in bilateral ties, they plan to meet again in November at the APEC forum in Shenzhen and at the G20 summit in Miami in December.

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