But refusing to meet in Singapore would risk irking other countries in a region that are pressing both sides to ease tensions.
Fairly sure nobody in SEA seriously believes that China, as opposed to the US, is causing those tensions. I would accept that lots of people in SEA are hoping that China can make the US stop threatening proxy wars. I’m failing to see why people in SEA would find China irksome for not meeting in Singapore but not irksome that the US won’t allow Li to meet in Washington.
The US and it’s mouthpieces in the press are deeply unserious actors who will soon be ignored by increasing numbers of other states if it doesn’t change. For now, the US remains relevant. But it’s not clear to me that the US realises just how irrelevant it is going to become in the next few decades. The Trump administration seemed to understand this a lot better than Biden’s.
The ‘rest of the world’ (everyone not in the Anglo-European empire) is not daft; reports like this one are written solely to persuade the residents of that empire that everything is under control because they seem to be the only people gullible enough to accept this kind of framing.
(Updates …. An earlier version corrected the misspelling of Li’s name in the first deck headline.)
“We’re taking China seriously. Honest. Please believe us, Leigh Xiangfu.”
Fairly sure nobody in SEA seriously believes that China, as opposed to the US, is causing those tensions. I would accept that lots of people in SEA are hoping that China can make the US stop threatening proxy wars. I’m failing to see why people in SEA would find China irksome for not meeting in Singapore but not irksome that the US won’t allow Li to meet in Washington.
The US and it’s mouthpieces in the press are deeply unserious actors who will soon be ignored by increasing numbers of other states if it doesn’t change. For now, the US remains relevant. But it’s not clear to me that the US realises just how irrelevant it is going to become in the next few decades. The Trump administration seemed to understand this a lot better than Biden’s.
The ‘rest of the world’ (everyone not in the Anglo-European empire) is not daft; reports like this one are written solely to persuade the residents of that empire that everything is under control because they seem to be the only people gullible enough to accept this kind of framing.
“We’re taking China seriously. Honest. Please believe us, Leigh Xiangfu.”