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ESSAY: Reading between the lines of US-China readouts

ESSAY: Reading between the lines of US-China readouts

There was only one phone call, and it was recorded by both sides, but reading the readouts you’d think that Biden and Xi lived in parallel universes where entirely different conversations took place.

Apr 04, 2024
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ESSAY: Reading between the lines of US-China readouts
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There was only one phone call, and it was recorded by both sides, but reading the readouts you’d think that Biden and Xi lived in parallel universes where entirely different conversations took place, and in a way that best describes what happened.

The US readout of the April 2 Biden-Xi phone call was written up in the smooth, accomplished bureaucratic argot of State Department lingo. It was brief, but left no key talking point behind. The readout conjured up the image of a frank and candid exchange of ideas in which Biden firmly presented the White House view. He was polite but did not dodge discussion of differences. He expressed US concerns with civility. All in all, a productive phone call, summed up with considerable concision.

The Chinese readout took an entirely different tact. It, too, is the product of a skilled bureaucracy, but there was a personal animus embedded throughout. It was riddled with the aphorisms of Xi Jinping, and is a textbook example of how diplomacy in …

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