China Doesn’t Want to Compete. It Wants to Win.

A parade of senior American policy makers is traveling to Beijing on diplomatic missions to mend tattered relations between the United States and China. The U.S. climate envoy John Kerry is expected in Beijing on Sunday, a week after Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen was in town. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited a month ago. After nearly a year of strained communication, the flurry of diplomacy is good news: If the two governments are speaking with each other, perhaps they won’t shoot at each other.

Or at least that’s the idea. The improved dialogue is President Joe Biden’s attempt to demonstrate the possibility of a middle path between conflict and appeasement in contending with China. He believes that the U.S. can and should compete with China while setting in place guardrails that will prevent competition from veering into confrontation. The two countries might even find opportunities to cooperate