ESSAY: Sipping Fragrant Tea from Noon to Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

Emmanuel Macron’s recent visit to China saw him the recipient of a carefully calibrated charm offensive with distinctly Chinese characteristics.

Decorative pandas and colorful flowers decorated the meeting rooms as spring blossomed in Beijing during the first week of April, in what might be thought of as a spring charm offensive in foreign policy terms.

The iconic Chinese actress Gong Li and her husband Jean-Michel Jarre accompanied the French delegation, helping to get things off to an auspicious start in cultural terms. Visiting President Emmanuel Macron of France get the full red carpet treatment with Xi greeting him personally outside the Great Hall of the People accompanied by a crisp military review and a 21-gun salute. The lengthy meetings between the two leaders seemed more focused on mutual confidence building rather than tackling policy issues.

The following day, the French commercial magnates who traveled with Macron to China got a rare small-room meeting with the generally a…