Jake Sullivan, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, will visit China next week to manage tensions several months before the U.S. election, the White House said on Friday.
Sullivan will travel to Beijing from August 27 to 29. It will be the first visit by a US national security adviser to China since 2016, but other senior officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have also visited over the past two years.
The visit comes months before the US elections in November, and Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris, if she wins, is expected to continue Biden’s approach of seeking dialogue with China while maintaining pressure.
Her Republican rival Donald Trump has announced a tougher line, at least rhetorically, as some of his advisers fear a far-reaching global confrontation with China.
A senior U.S. official told reporters that the Biden administration’s engagement with China shows no signs of softening and that it remains “a highly competitive relationship.”
“We are committed to making the investments, strengthening our alliances and taking the joint steps on technology and national security that we must take,” the official said, referring to the sweeping restrictions on U.S. technology transfers to China imposed under Biden.
“However, we are determined to manage this competition responsibly and prevent it from degenerating into conflict,” she added, speaking on the usual condition of anonymity.
A major source of conflict is Taiwan, an autonomous democracy that Beijing considers its territory and does not rule out violent “reunification.”
China has continued its sabre-rattling since the inauguration this year of President Lai Ching-te, whose party emphasizes Taiwan’s separate identity.
“We will express our concern about the increasing military, diplomatic and economic pressure exerted by the PRC in Taiwan,” the government official said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.
“These activities are destabilizing and pose a risk of escalation. We will continue to urge Beijing to engage in meaningful dialogue with Taipei,” she said.
The official said Sullivan would also discuss the South China Sea, where tensions are rising between China and its U.S. ally the Philippines.
The official did not indicate that the United States expected breakthroughs from the trip, during which Sullivan will meet with China’s foreign policy chief Wang Yi.
The official said Sullivan would reiterate U.S. concerns about China’s support for Russia’s massive expansion of its defense industry since the invasion of Ukraine. Beijing counters that, unlike the U.S., it does not directly supply weapons to either side.
China has always been keen to work with US national security advisers because it views them as decision-makers close to the president who can negotiate away from the media spotlight that comes with the secretary of state or top leadership.
Modern relations between the United States and China began when Henry Kissinger, then-national security adviser to Richard Nixon, secretly visited Beijing in 1971 to lay the groundwork for normalizing relations with the communist state.
Sullivan and Wang have met four times over the past year and a half – once in Washington and the other times in Vienna, Malta and Bangkok – and together with Biden and President Xi Jinping at their summit in California in November.
The meetings between Wang and Sullivan were sometimes not disclosed until after they had ended, and the two spent many hours together behind closed doors.
Sullivan will also discuss North Korea and the Middle East with Wang. China has criticized U.S. support for Israel, and the United States has sought to call Beijing’s bluff by urging it to use its relationships to keep Iran in check.
