Things are looking up for China and its long-time leader, Xi Jinping, who heads to the United States on Wednesday very much on the front foot, safe in the knowledge that President Donald Trump will give him everything he needs to secure yet another term as his country’s most-powerful political figure in a generation in about 12 months’ time. This is Xi’s first official state visit to Washington, D.C., since 2015 and his first meeting with Trump on U.S. soil since an invitation to the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida in 2017. It’s a big deal for the general secretary of Chinese Communist Party to be pampered by the leader of the free world at a time when the U.S. is under pressure from its allies to check China’s rise.
Pageantry isn’t the only thing Xi wants from his U.S. trip. He has told China’s ruling elites that the West is in decline and that time is on their side. Beijing plans to manage what it sees as a steady U.S. decline and can catch up to America without triggering a war.
And it intends to seize a rare window of opportunity to wrest control of Taiwan from Washington’s influence. Trump needs Xi’s help resolving separate wars involving China’s allies Russia and Iran, and he’s looking for more sweet trade deals with Beijing to soften the blow of the Democratic offensive in the upcoming midterm elections in November. China is already a major power, but Xi wants his country to be viewed as a coequal with the U.S. and he’s brought the receipts to justify it.
Trump helped Xi raise his diplomacy portfolio this year with May’s state visit to China. In the weeks that followed, Xi showed off his easy access to Russian President Vladimir Putin, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian—twice. Xi will arrive at Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday a confident man.
The pomp and ceremony of his U.S. state visit will begin with a personal greeting by Trump on the Tarmac, "an unprecedented gesture," said Rush Doshi, a former White House National Security Council official now teaching at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. Trump on Thursday will further honor Xi and Peng Liyuan, the Chinese first lady, with an Air Force flyover by a B-2 bomber and four F-22 fighter jets, according to the official schedule. "Nothing like this occurred when President Trump visited Beijing in May of this year," Doshi wrote on Monday.
The Chinese leader will receive an honor guard and a military band will play the U.S. and Chinese national anthems as part of a welcome ceremony at the White House before their summit begins. A state dinner for Xi in the evening will be attended by a delegation of leading U.S. tech companies, in another sign of America’s deference to the Chinese market. Xi’s entourage will have secured guarantees from the U.S. of no lapses in diplomatic protocol and no hiccups that could embarrass China’s president during the state visit, which will boost his political stature at home and around the world.
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