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The relationship between the
People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
(PRC) and the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
(US) is one of the most important foreign relations in the world. It has been complex and at times tense since the establishment of the PRC and the
retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan Following their defeat in the Chinese Civil War, the remnants of the Nationalist government of the Republic of China (ROC), alongside many refugees, retreated to the island of Taiwan (Formosa) beginning on December 7, 1949. The exodus is so ...
in 1949. Since the normalization of relations in the 1970s, the US–China relationship has been marked by persistent disputes including China's economic policies, the
political status of Taiwan The island of Taiwan is the subject of a geopolitical dispute between the Republic of China (ROC), which controls it, and the People's Republic of China (PRC), which claims it as part of its territory. The Republic of China (ROC) was establ ...
and territorial disputes in the South China Sea. Despite these tensions, the two nations have significant economic ties and are deeply interconnected, while also engaging in strategic competition on the global stage. As of 2025, China and the United States are the world's second-largest and largest economies by nominal GDP, as well as the largest and second-largest economies by GDP (PPP) respectively. Collectively, they account for 44.2% of the global nominal GDP, and 34.7% of global PPP-adjusted GDP. One of the earliest major interactions between the United States and China was the 1845 Treaty of Wangxia, which laid the foundation for trade between the two countries. While American businesses anticipated a vast market in China, trade grew gradually. In 1900, Washington joined the
Empire of Japan The Empire of Japan, also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was the Japanese nation state that existed from the Meiji Restoration on January 3, 1868, until the Constitution of Japan took effect on May 3, 1947. From Japan–Kor ...
and other powers of Europe in sending troops to suppress the xenophobic
Boxer Rebellion The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Boxer Uprising, was an anti-foreign, anti-imperialist, and anti-Christian uprising in North China between 1899 and 1901, towards the end of the Qing dynasty, by the Society of Righteous and Harmonious F ...
, later promoting the Open Door Policy to advocate for equal trade opportunities and discourage territorial divisions in China. Despite hopes that American financial influence would expand, efforts during the Taft presidency to secure US investment in Chinese railways were unsuccessful. President
Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
supported China during the
Second Sino-Japanese War The Second Sino-Japanese War was fought between the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the Empire of Japan between 1937 and 1945, following a period of war localized to Manchuria that started in 1931. It is considered part ...
, aligning with the
Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
(ROC) government, which had formed a temporary alliance with the
Chinese Communist Party The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
(CCP) to fight the Japanese. Following Japan's defeat, the
Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led Nationalist government, government of the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the forces of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Armed conflict continued intermitt ...
resumed, and US diplomatic efforts to mediate between the Nationalists and Communists ultimately failed. The Communist forces prevailed, leading to the establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, while the Nationalist government retreated to Taiwan. Relations between the US and the new Chinese government quickly soured, culminating in direct conflict during the
Korean War The Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) was an armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula fought between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea; DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; ROK) and their allies. North Korea was s ...
. The US-led
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...
intervention was met with Chinese military involvement, as Beijing sent millions of Chinese fighters to prevent a US-aligned presence on its border. For decades, the United States did not formally recognize the PRC, instead maintaining diplomatic relations with the ROC based in Taiwan, and as such blocked the PRC's entry into the United Nations. However, shifting geopolitical dynamics, including the
Sino-Soviet split The Sino-Soviet split was the gradual worsening of relations between the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) during the Cold War. This was primarily caused by divergences that arose from their ...
, the winding down of the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...
, as well as of the
Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...
, paved the way for US President Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China, ultimately marking a sea change in US–China relations. On 1 January 1979, the US formally established diplomatic relations with the PRC and recognized it as the sole legitimate
government of China The government of the People's Republic of China is based on a system of people's congress within the parameters of a unitary communist state, in which the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) enacts its policies through people's congresses. ...
, while maintaining unofficial ties with Taiwan within the framework of the
Taiwan Relations Act The Taiwan Relations Act (TRA; ) is an Act of Congress, act of the United States Congress. Since the Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations, formal recognition of the China, People's Republic of China, the Act has defined ...
, an issue that remains a major point of contention between the two countries to the present day. Every US president since Nixon has toured China during their term in office, with the exception of
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
and
Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
. The
Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, took office following his victory over Republican nomine ...
signed a record number of bilateral agreements with China, particularly regarding climate change, though its broader strategy of rebalancing towards Asia created diplomatic friction. The advent of
Xi Jinping Xi Jinping, pronounced (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (China), chairman of the Central Military Commission ...
's general secretaryship would prefigure a sharp downturn in these relations, which was then further entrenched upon the election of President
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
, who had promised an assertive stance towards China as a part of his campaign, which began to be implemented upon his taking office. Issues included China's militarization of the South China Sea, alleged manipulation of the Chinese currency, and Chinese espionage in the United States. The Trump administration would label China a "strategic competitor" in 2017. In January 2018, Trump launched a trade war with China, while also restricting American companies from selling equipment to various Chinese companies linked to human rights abuses in Xinjiang, among which included Chinese technology conglomerates
Huawei Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ("Huawei" sometimes stylized as "HUAWEI"; ; zh, c=华为, p= ) is a Chinese multinational corporationtechnology company in Longgang, Shenzhen, Longgang, Shenzhen, Guangdong. Its main product lines include teleco ...
and ZTE. The US revoked preferential treatment towards
Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
after the Beijing's enactment of a broad-reaching national security law in the city, increased visa restrictions on Chinese students and researchers, and strengthened relations with Taiwan. In response, China adopted " wolf warrior diplomacy", countering US criticisms of
human rights abuses Human rights are universally recognized moral principles or norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both national and international laws. These rights are considered inherent and inalienable, meaning t ...
. By early 2018, various geopolitical observers had begun to speak of a new Cold War between the two powers. On the last day of the Trump administration in January 2021, the US officially classified the Chinese government's treatment of the
Uyghurs The Uyghurs,. alternatively spelled Uighurs, Uygurs or Uigurs, are a Turkic peoples, Turkic ethnic group originating from and culturally affiliated with the general region of Central Asia and East Asia. The Uyghurs are recognized as the ti ...
in Xinjiang as a genocide. Following the election of
Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
in the
2020 United States presidential election United States presidential election, Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 3, 2020. The Democratic Party (United States), Democratic ticket of former vice president Joe Biden and California junior senator Kamala H ...
, tensions between the two countries remained high. Biden identified strategic competition with China as a top priority in his
foreign policy Foreign policy, also known as external policy, is the set of strategies and actions a State (polity), state employs in its interactions with other states, unions, and international entities. It encompasses a wide range of objectives, includ ...
. His administration imposed large-scale restrictions on the sale of semiconductor technology to China, boosted regional alliances against China, and expanded support for Taiwan. However, the Biden administration also emphasized that the US sought "competition, not conflict", with Biden stating in late 2022 that "there needs to not be a new Cold War". Despite efforts at diplomatic engagement, US-China trade and political relations have reached their lowest point in years, largely due to disagreements over technology and China's military growth and human rights record. In his second term, President Donald Trump sharply escalated the trade war with China, raising baseline tariffs on Chinese imports to an effective 145%, prior to negotiating with China on 12 May 2025 a reduction in the tariff rate to 30% for 90 days while further negotiations take place.


History


Chinese Civil War and World War II

During the civil war, the communists petitioned the U.S. for support but were unsuccessful. Instead, the U.S. offered both military and financial support to the KMT, under the hopes that a united, democratic,
coalition government A coalition government, or coalition cabinet, is a government by political parties that enter into a power-sharing arrangement of the executive. Coalition governments usually occur when no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an ...
would be formed in China. In late 1935, the
Communist International The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern and also known as the Third International, was a political international which existed from 1919 to 1943 and advocated world communism. Emerging from the collapse of the Second Internationa ...
(Comintern) instructed the CCP to establish the broadest possible anti-fascist
united front A united front is an alliance of groups against their common enemies, figuratively evoking unification of previously separate geographic fronts or unification of previously separate armies into a front. The name often refers to a political and/ ...
. At a meeting in December 1935, the CCP Politburo resolved to reach understanding, seek compromise, and establish relations with all nations, parties, and individuals who opposed
imperial Japan The Empire of Japan, also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was the Japanese nation state that existed from the Meiji Restoration on January 3, 1868, until the Constitution of Japan took effect on May 3, 1947. From Japan–Kor ...
. After the US entry into World War II, the communists sought military support from the US. CCP Chairman
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...
welcomed the American Military Observation Group in
Yan'an Yan'an; ; Chinese postal romanization, alternatively spelled as Yenan is a prefecture-level city in the Shaanbei region of Shaanxi Province of China, province, China, bordering Shanxi to the east and Gansu to the west. It administers several c ...
and in 1944 invited the US to establish a consulate there. The defeat of Japan in 1945, caused the U.S. to reevaluate their position in Asia. President Truman was worried that the collapse of the Japanese empire would cause a power vacuum which could be filled by the Soviet Union. However, the Soviet Union acted cautiously in the conflict, eventually withdrawing in May 1946, which left the U.S. feeling as though there was not a serious Soviet threat in the region. On 5 August 1949, the Truman administration released a
white paper A white paper is a report or guide that informs readers concisely about a complex issue and presents the issuing body's philosophy on the matter. It is meant to help readers understand an issue, solve a problem, or make a decision. Since the 199 ...
on relations with China. Responding to domestic arguments about responsibility for the perceived
loss of China In American political discourse, the "loss of China" is the unexpected Chinese Communist Party coming to power in mainland China from the U.S.-backed Nationalist Chinese Kuomintang government in 1949 and therefore the "loss of China to communism." ...
to communism, Secretary of State
Dean Acheson Dean Gooderham Acheson ( ; April 11, 1893October 12, 1971) was an American politician and lawyer. As the 51st United States Secretary of State, U.S. Secretary of State, he set the foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration from 1949 to ...
placed blame on Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist government for losing the confidence of its military and the Chinese people and stated that the United States could not have prevented the outcome of the Chinese Civil War. This position failed to satisfy domestic critics. It also harmed the prospect of diplomacy with the communists and outraged Mao Zedong, who wrote a series of articles criticizing the white paper. Mao criticized the Truman administration for providing huge amounts of support to Nationalist forces which the administration deemed demoralized and unpopular, stating that the only rational basis must have therefore been the Truman administration's imperialist ambitions and desire to hurt the Chinese people by needlessly prolonging the civil war. Amidst successive PRC victories, the U.S. ambassador to China John Leighton Stewart left China in August 1949. CCP Chairman Mao Zedong penned an article directly addressing the ambassador, entitled "Farewell, Leighton Stewart!", writing that his departure represented "the complete defeat of the U.S. policy of aggression" and was "worth celebrating". The
People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
was formed after the communist
People's Liberation Army The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the military of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Republic of China (PRC). It consists of four Military branch, services—People's Liberation Army Ground Force, Ground Force, People's ...
(PLA) won the
Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led Nationalist government, government of the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the forces of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Armed conflict continued intermitt ...
against the Kuomintang nationalists (KMT) and officially established on 1 October 1949. The defeated KMT fled to
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
, which they occupied under
martial law Martial law is the replacement of civilian government by military rule and the suspension of civilian legal processes for military powers. Martial law can continue for a specified amount of time, or indefinitely, and standard civil liberties ...
until 1987, while the PLA secured control of mainland China. Following the civil war, America only recognized the KMT-controlled
Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
in Taiwan as a legitimate government, not the communist People's Republic of China.


Korean War

On 25 June 1950, the China-aligned state of
North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders China and Russia to the north at the Yalu River, Yalu (Amnok) an ...
invaded America-aligned
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...
. In response, the United States and its allies pushed the United Nations Security Council to pass Resolution 82, which authorized military action against North Korea. Although the Soviet Union had veto power, at the time it was boycotting Security Council proceedings over the UN's recognition of the ROC instead of the PRC as the representative of China. Initially, the U.S. government saw Chinese intervention as unlikely. The People's Republic was barely a year old, and it needed time to rollout new policies to begin its communist transformation. Furthermore, it appeared that, if China was going to engage in warfare, it would be in KMT-controlled Taiwan, not Korea. However, the PRC was not just focused on internal matters. They had been invaded via the China-North Korea border by Japan twice before. It was possible that, if the U.S. secured control of the Korean peninsula, they could do the same. The US was also opposed to the PRC's interests in Taiwan. Within two days of the North invading the South, the US deployed forces to the
Taiwan strait The Taiwan Strait is a strait separating the island of Taiwan and the Asian continent. The strait is part of the South China Sea and connects to the East China Sea to the north. The narrowest part is wide. Names Former names of the Tai ...
. After their defeat in the Chinese Civil War, parts of the Nationalist army had retreated south and crossed the border into Burma. The United States supported these Nationalist forces because the United States hoped they would harass the People's Republic of China from the
southwest The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A '' compass rose'' is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west— ...
, thereby diverting Chinese resources from the Korean War. It seemed to the new Chinese leadership that stopping American encroachment into Asia was an important issue. In a speech to the CCP Politburo in August, Mao stated, "if the American imperialists are victorious, they will become dizzy with success, and then be in a position to threaten us." PRC
Premier Premier is a title for the head of government in central governments, state governments and local governments of some countries. A second in command to a premier is designated as a deputy premier. A premier will normally be a head of govern ...
Zhou Enlai Zhou Enlai ( zh, s=周恩来, p=Zhōu Ēnlái, w=Chou1 Ên1-lai2; 5 March 1898 – 8 January 1976) was a Chinese statesman, diplomat, and revolutionary who served as the first Premier of the People's Republic of China from September 1954 unti ...
echoed this sentiment in a speech in September: "the Chinese people can never tolerate foreign invasion, nor allow the imperialist to invade our neighbour at will without response". Chinese leadership under CCP Chairman
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...
could not tolerate an American-occupied state directly on its border: Chinese premier and foreign minister Zhou Enlai warned that China would intervene in the war on national security grounds; this warning was dismissed by President Truman. On 30 September 1950, the UN offensive (for all intents and purposes under the direction of the United States) crossed the 38th parallel into North Korea.
Kim Il-Sung Kim Il Sung (born Kim Song Ju; 15 April 1912 – 8 July 1994) was a North Korean politician and the founder of North Korea, which he led as its first supreme leader from its establishment in 1948 until his death in 1994. Afterwards, he was ...
held an emergency meeting with Chinese officials, appealing for their urgent entry into the conflict. The UN authorized the reunification of Korea, meaning that the entire peninsula could fall into US control. In October 1950, China attempted to make contact with the United States by way of its embassy in India. The United States did not respond. On 19 October 1950, Chinese forces crossed into North Korea. In response to the PRC's entry into the conflict, the US froze all Chinese assets in America. The United States also prohibited transfers funds from the United States to recipients within the PRC, which also cut off funding for American-influenced institutions in the PRC, such as Christian Colleges. In December 1950, the PRC seized all American assets and properties, totaling $196.8 million. The PRC also began efforts to remove American cultural influence from China, including by nationalizing cultural institutions affiliated with the United States. The United States banned American citizens from traveling to the PRC. In late October 1950, China began its intervention with the Battle of Onjong. During the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River, the
People's Volunteer Army The People's Volunteer Army (PVA), officially the Chinese People's Volunteers (CPV), was the armed expeditionary forces China in the Korean War, deployed by the History of the People's Republic of China (1949–1976), People's Republic of Chi ...
overran or outflanked the UN forces, leading to the defeat of the US Eighth Army. A ceasefire presented by the UN to the PRC shortly after Ch'ongch'on River, on 11 December it was rejected by the Chinese, who were now convinced of their ability to defeat the UN forces, and wanted to demonstrate China's military power by driving them out of Korea altogether. The Chinese achieved further victory at the Third Battle of Seoul and the Battle of Hoengsong, but UN forces recovered, pushing the front back to lands around the 38th parallel by July. A stalemate followed. Even though the US Air Force would spend the entire war with total air supremacy, dropping over 635,000 tons of bombs and other ordinance on North Korea and killing millions of Koreans, the strategic impasse ultimately lasted until the
Korean Armistice Agreement The Korean Armistice Agreement (; zh, t=韓國停戰協定 / 朝鮮停戰協定) is an armistice that brought about a cessation of hostilities of the Korean War. It was signed by United States Army Lieutenant General William Kelly Harrison Jr ...
that ended the fighting was signed on 27 July 1953. Since then, a divided Korea has continued to feature in US-China relations, with large American forces still stationed in the South. In 1952, in the midst of the Korean War, the American army surveyed Chinese
prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war for a ...
(POWs) asking them why they believed the PRC was involved in the conflict. Of 238 respondents, 60% agreed it was for the defense of China against the US, while only 17% said it was to defend North Korea.


Vietnam War

The People's Republic of China provided resources and training to
North Vietnam North Vietnam, officially the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV; ; VNDCCH), was a country in Southeast Asia from 1945 to 1976, with sovereignty fully recognized in 1954 Geneva Conference, 1954. A member of the communist Eastern Bloc, it o ...
, and in the summer of 1962, Mao agreed to supply Hanoi with 90,000 rifles and guns free of charge. After the launch of America's
Operation Rolling Thunder Operation Rolling Thunder was a gradual and sustained aerial bombardment campaign conducted by the United States (U.S.) 2nd Air Division (later Seventh Air Force), U.S. Navy, and Republic of Vietnam Air Force (RVNAF) against North Vietnam from 2 ...
in 1965, China sent anti-aircraft units and engineering battalions to North Vietnam to repair the damage caused by American bombing, rebuild roads and railroads, and perform other engineering work, freeing additional hundreds of thousands
North Vietnamese Army The People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), officially the Vietnam People's Army (VPA; , , ), also recognized as the Vietnamese Army (), the People's Army () or colloquially the Troops ( ), is the national Military, military force of the Vietnam, S ...
units for combat against American forces supporting
South Vietnam South Vietnam, officially the Republic of Vietnam (RVN; , VNCH), was a country in Southeast Asia that existed from 1955 to 1975. It first garnered Diplomatic recognition, international recognition in 1949 as the State of Vietnam within the ...
. The Chinese presence in North Vietnam was well known to US officials. The Johnson administration sought to conceal China's involvement from the United States public, on the rationale that domestic backlash might compel the administration to expand the war to China or withdraw precipitously. American planners accounted for China's involvement, with President
Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
and Secretary of Defense
Robert McNamara Robert Strange McNamara (; June 9, 1916 – July 6, 2009) was an American businessman and government official who served as the eighth United States secretary of defense from 1961 to 1968 under presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson ...
opted not to invade North Vietnam, favoring a strategy of supporting South Vietnam in defending itself instead. The possibility of direct Chinese intervention in the Korean War was also ambiguous throughout the course of the war and remained in question as well. While Mao Zedong reportedly told journalist
Edgar Snow Edgar Parks Snow (July 19, 1905 – February 15, 1972) was an American journalist known for his books and articles on communism in China and the Chinese Communist Revolution. He was the first Western journalist to give an account of the history of ...
in 1965 that China had no intention of fighting to save the Hanoi regime and would not engage the US military unless it crossed into Chinese territory, American officials nevertheless continued to remain alert for any potential changes in plan from China. Furthermore, Mao also made additional statements where he declared belief that the People's Liberation Army would win a confrontation with United States forces should the two enter military conflict with one another, citing the Korean War as one such reason he held this belief. Regardless of whatever intentions the China may have had, United States troops ultimately exited Vietnam as domestic opposition to American deployment in Vietnam increased, ending United States involvement in the Vietnam War.


Freezing of relations (1949–1971)

Between 1949 and 1971, US–China relations were uniformly hostile, with frequent propaganda attacks in both directions. At the
1954 Geneva Conference The Geneva Conference was intended to settle outstanding issues resulting from the Korean War and the First Indochina War and involved several nations. It took place in Geneva, Switzerland, from 26 April to 20 July 1954. The part of the confe ...
, Secretary of State
John Foster Dulles John Foster Dulles (February 25, 1888 – May 24, 1959) was an American politician, lawyer, and diplomat who served as United States secretary of state under President Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 until his resignation in 1959. A member of the ...
forbade any contact with the Chinese delegation, refusing to shake hands with Zhou Enlai, the lead Chinese negotiator. Relations deteriorated further under President John F. Kennedy (1961–1963). Before the
Cuban Missile Crisis The Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as the October Crisis () in Cuba, or the Caribbean Crisis (), was a 13-day confrontation between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union, when American deployments of Nuclear weapons d ...
, policymakers in Washington were uncertain whether or not China would break with the Soviet Union on the basis of ideology, national ambitions, and readiness for a role in guiding communist activities in many countries. New insight came with the Sino-Indian border war in November 1962 and Beijing's response to the Cuban Missile Crisis. Kennedy administration officials concluded that China was more militant and more dangerous than the Soviet Union, making better relations with Moscow desirable, with both nations trying to contain Chinese ambitions. Diplomatic recognition of China remained out of the question, as a crucial veto power on the UN Security Council was held by America's ally on Taiwan. The United States continued to work to prevent the PRC from taking China's seat in the
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...
and encouraged its allies not to deal with the PRC. The United States placed an embargo on trading with the PRC, and encouraged allies to follow it. The PRC developed nuclear weapons in 1964 and, as later declassified documents revealed, President Johnson considered preemptive attacks to halt its nuclear program. He ultimately decided the measure carried too much risk, and it was abandoned. Instead, Johnson looked for ways to improve relations. The American public seemed more open to the idea of expanding contacts with China, such as the relaxation of the trade embargo. But the War in Vietnam was raging, with China aiding North Vietnam. Mao's Great Leap Forward had failed in its goal to properly industrialize China and sparked a famine, and his Cultural Revolution exercised hostility to the US. In the end, Johnson made no move to change the standoff. Despite official non-recognition, the United States and the People's Republic of China held 136 meetings at the ambassadorial level beginning in 1954 and continuing until 1970, first in
Geneva Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...
and in 1958–1970 in
Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...
. The Cultural Revolution brought about near-complete isolation of China from the outside world and vocal denunciations of both US imperialism and Soviet revisionism. Beginning in 1967, the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission established the China Claims Program, in which American citizens could denominate the sum total of their lost assets and property following the Communist seizure of foreign property in 1950. American companies were reluctant to invest in China despite (future top leader)
Deng Xiaoping Deng Xiaoping also Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Teng Hsiao-p'ing; born Xiansheng (). (22 August 190419 February 1997) was a Chinese statesman, revolutionary, and political theorist who served as the paramount leader of the People's R ...
's reassurances of a stable business environment.


Rapprochement (1968–1972)

The end of the 1960s brought a period of transformation. For China, when American President Johnson decided to wind down the Vietnam War in 1968, it gave China the impression that the US had no interest in expanding throughout the Asia-Pacific anymore. Meanwhile, relations with the USSR rapidly worsened. This gave
Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until Resignation of Richard Nixon, his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...
—running for president in 1968—the idea of using that rivalry to improve Washington's relations with Moscow and Beijing, while each rival would cut back support for Hanoi. This became an especially important concern for the People's Republic of China after the
Sino-Soviet border conflict The Sino-Soviet border conflict, also known as the Sino-Soviet crisis, was a seven-month undeclared military conflict between the Soviet Union and China in 1969, following the Sino-Soviet split. The most serious border clash, which brought th ...
of 1969. The PRC was diplomatically isolated and the leadership came to believe that improved relations with the United States would be a useful counterbalance to the Soviet threat. Zhou Enlai, the
Premier of China The premier of China, officially the Premier of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, is the head of government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and leader of the State Council. This post was established in 1911 near the e ...
, was at the forefront of this effort with the committed backing of
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...
,
Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party The chairman of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party ( zh, s=中国共产党中央委员会主席, p=Zhōngguó Gòngchǎndǎng Zhōngyāng Wěiyuánhuì Zhǔxí) was the party leader, leader of the Chinese Communist Party. The ...
. In 1969, the United States initiated measures to relax trade restrictions and other impediments to bilateral contact, to which China responded. However, this rapprochement process was stalled by the Vietnam War, where China was supporting the enemies of the United States. Communication between Chinese and American leaders, however, was conducted through
Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...
,
Pakistan Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the Islam by country# ...
and
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
as intermediaries. In the United States, academics such as John K. Fairbank and A. Doak Barnett pointed to the need to deal realistically with the Beijing government, while organizations such as the National Committee on United States–China Relations sponsored debates to promote public awareness. Many saw the specter of Communist China behind communist movements in
Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...
,
Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...
, and
Laos Laos, officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic (LPDR), is the only landlocked country in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by Myanmar and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the southeast, and Thailand to the west and ...
, but a growing number concluded that if the PRC would align with the US it would mean a major redistribution of global power against the Soviets. Mainland China's market of nearly one billion consumers appealed to American businesses. Senator J. William Fulbright, Chair of the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee The United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations is a standing committee of the U.S. Senate charged with leading foreign-policy legislation and debate in the Senate. It is generally responsible for authorizing and overseeing foreign a ...
, held a series of hearings on the matter. Richard M. Nixon mentioned in his inaugural address that the two countries were entering an era of negotiation after an era of confrontation. Although Nixon, during his 1960 presidential campaign, had vociferously supported Chiang Kai-Shek, by the second half of the decade, he increasingly began to speak of there "being no reason to leave China angry and isolated". Nixon's election as president in 1968 was initially met with hostility by Beijing—an editorial in the ''People's Daily'' denounced him as "a chieftain whom the capitalist world had turned to out of desperation". Nixon believed it was in the American national interest to forge a relationship with China, even though there were enormous differences between the two countries. He was assisted in this by his National Security Advisor
Henry Kissinger Henry Alfred Kissinger (May 27, 1923 – November 29, 2023) was an American diplomat and political scientist who served as the 56th United States secretary of state from 1973 to 1977 and the 7th National Security Advisor (United States), natio ...
. Both Nixon and Kissinger believed that relations with China would help the United States exit the Vietnam War and obtain long-term strategic benefits in confrontations with the Soviet Union. In 1971, an unexpectedly friendly encounter between the American and Chinese ping-pong athletes called Glenn Cowan and Zhuang Zedong in Japan opened the way for a visit to China, which Chairman Mao personally approved. In April 1971, the athletes became the first Americans to officially visit China since the communist takeover. The smooth acceptance of this created the term
ping-pong diplomacy Ping-pong diplomacy ( zh, c=乒乓外交, p=Pīngpāng wàijiāo) refers to the exchange of table tennis (ping-pong) players between the United States and the People's Republic of China in the early 1970s. Considered a turning point in relation ...
and gave confidence to both sides. Ping-pong diplomacy became one of the most prominent examples of people's diplomacy in China-US relations. The ping-pong diplomacy allowed reporters into the country as well, opening up communication to both sides and breaking a barrier that had been there previously. This smoothed out the start of the trade partnership that was going to happen later. China's approach to keeping these early exchanges unofficial and conduct them through non-governmental agencies was generally well received by U.S.
civil society Civil society can be understood as the "third sector" of society, distinct from government and business, and including the family and the private sphere. In July 1971, Henry Kissinger feigned illness while on a trip to Pakistan and did not appear in public for a day. He was actually on a top-secret mission to Beijing to negotiate with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai. Kissinger and his aides did not receive a warm welcome in Beijing, and the hotel they stayed in was equipped with pamphlets excoriating US imperialism. However, the meeting with Zhou Enlai was productive, and the Chinese premier expressed his hope for improved China-US relations. He commented that the US had intentionally isolated China, not vice versa, and any initiative to restore diplomatic ties had to come from the American side. Zhou spoke of the late President Kennedy's plans to restore relations with China and told Kissinger, "We are willing to wait as long as we need to. If these negotiations fail, in time another Kennedy or another Nixon will come along." On 15 July 1971, President Richard Nixon revealed the mission to the world and that he had accepted an invitation to visit the PRC. This announcement caused immediate shock around the world. In the United States, some hard-line
anti-communists Anti-communism is Political movement, political and Ideology, ideological opposition to communism, communist beliefs, groups, and individuals. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, and it reached global ...
(most notably
libertarian Republican In American politics, a Libertarian Republican is a politician or Republican Party member who has advocated libertarian policies while typically voting for and being involved with the Republican Party. Beliefs and size The Republican Party has ...
Arizona Senator
Barry Goldwater Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician and major general in the United States Air Force, Air Force Reserve who served as a United States senator from 1953 to 1965 and 1969 to 1987, and was the Re ...
) denounced the decision, but most public opinions supported the move and Nixon saw the jump in the polls he had been hoping for. Since Nixon had sterling anti-communist credentials he was all but immune to being called "soft on communism". Nixon and his aides wanted to ensure that press coverage offered dramatic imagery. Nixon was particularly eager for strong news coverage. Within the PRC there was also opposition from left-wing elements. This effort was allegedly led by
Lin Biao Lin Biao ( zh, 林彪; 5 December 1907 – 13 September 1971) was a Chinese politician and Marshal of the People's Republic of China who was pivotal in the Chinese Communist Party, Communist Chinese Communist Revolution, victory during the Chines ...
, head of the military, who died in a mysterious plane crash over
Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...
while trying to defect to the Soviet Union. His death silenced most internal dissent over the visit. Internationally, reactions varied. In the communist world, the Soviets were very concerned that two major enemies seemed to have resolved their differences, and the new world alignment contributed significantly to the policy of ''
détente ''Détente'' ( , ; for, fr, , relaxation, paren=left, ) is the relaxation of strained relations, especially political ones, through verbal communication. The diplomacy term originates from around 1912, when France and Germany tried unsucces ...
''. Romania's president
Nicolae Ceaușescu Nicolae Ceaușescu ( ; ;  – 25 December 1989) was a Romanian politician who was the second and last Communism, communist leader of Socialist Romania, Romania, serving as the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 u ...
praised the US initiative as a "move for world peace". Several communist nations, including Cuba, Albania, and North Vietnam, accused China of "capitulationism to the imperialists". North Korea proclaimed that it was the reverse and that the US had been forced to capitulate to China, having failed to isolate it. America's
NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...
allies were pleased by the initiative, especially since many of them had already recognized the PRC. Throughout the Asia-Pacific, the reaction was far more mixed. Japan was annoyed that it had not been told of the announcement until fifteen minutes before it had been made, and feared that the Americans were abandoning them in favor of the PRC. A short time later, Japan also recognized the PRC and committed to substantial trade with the continental power. South Korea and South Vietnam were both concerned that peace between the United States and the PRC could mean an end to American support for them against their communist enemies. Throughout the period of rapprochement, both countries had to be regularly assured that they would not be abandoned.
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
's Chiang Kai-Shek criticized the move, saying: "Today any international appease movement to evil power to seek for political power balance would never helpful for the world peace, instead it elongated the hardship of our 700 million people, and expand the disaster of the world." From 21 to 28 February 1972, President Nixon traveled to
Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...
,
Hangzhou Hangzhou, , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ; formerly romanized as Hangchow is a sub-provincial city in East China and the capital of Zhejiang province. With a population of 13 million, the municipality comprises ten districts, two counti ...
, and
Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...
. At the conclusion of his trip, the US and the PRC issued the Shanghai Communiqué, a statement of their respective foreign policy views. In the Communiqué, both nations pledged to work toward the full normalization of diplomatic relations. This did not lead to immediate recognition of the People's Republic of China but 'liaison offices' were established in Beijing and Washington. The US acknowledged the PRC position that all Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Strait maintain that there is only one China and that Taiwan is part of China. The statement enabled the US and PRC to temporarily set aside the issue of Taiwan and open trade and communication. Also, the US and China both agreed to take action against 'any country' that is to establish 'hegemony' in the Asia-Pacific. On several issues, such as the ongoing conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, and Israel, the US and China were unable to reach a common understanding. The rapprochement with the United States benefited the PRC immensely and greatly increased its security for the rest of the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
. It has been argued that the United States, on the other hand, saw fewer benefits than it had hoped for, inasmuch as China continued to back America's enemies in Hanoi and Pyongyang. Eventually, however, the PRC's suspicion of Vietnam's motives led to a break in China-Vietnamese cooperation and, upon the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1979, the
Sino-Vietnamese War The Sino-Vietnamese War (also known by other names) was a brief conflict that occurred in early 1979 between China and Vietnam. China launched an offensive ostensibly in response to Vietnam's invasion and occupation of Cambodia in 1978, whi ...
. Both China and the United States backed combatants in
Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
against Soviet and
Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...
n-supported movements. The economic benefits of normalization were slow as it would take decades for American products to penetrate the vast Chinese market. While Nixon's China policy is regarded by many as the highlight of his presidency, others such as William Bundy have argued that it provided very little benefit to the United States.


Liaison Office (1973–1978)

In May 1973, in an effort to build toward formal diplomatic relations, the US and the PRC established the United States Liaison Office (USLO) in Beijing and a counterpart PRC office in Washington D.C. From 1973 to 1978, such distinguished Americans as David K. E. Bruce,
George H. W. Bush George Herbert Walker BushBefore the outcome of the 2000 United States presidential election, he was usually referred to simply as "George Bush" but became more commonly known as "George H. W. Bush", "Bush Senior," "Bush 41," and even "Bush th ...
, Thomas S. Gates, Jr., and Leonard Woodcock served as chiefs of the USLO with the personal rank of ambassador. China made clear that it considered the Soviet Union its chief adversary and urged the United States to be powerful, thereby distracting Moscow. Liaison officer George Bush concluded, "China keeps wanting us to be strong, wanting us to defend Europe, wanting us to increase our defense budgets, etc." Bush concluded that American engagement was essential to support markets, allies, and stability throughout the Asia Pacific and around the world. President
Gerald Ford Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. (born Leslie Lynch King Jr.; July 14, 1913December 26, 2006) was the 38th president of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, Ford assumed the p ...
visited the PRC in 1975 and reaffirmed American interest in normalizing relations with Beijing. Shortly after taking office in 1977, President
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
again reaffirmed the goals of the Shanghai Communiqué. Secretary of State
Cyrus Vance Cyrus Roberts Vance (March 27, 1917January 12, 2002) was an American lawyer and diplomat who served as the 57th United States Secretary of State under President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1980. Prior to serving in that position, he was the United ...
, Carter's National Security Advisor
Zbigniew Brzezinski Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzeziński (, ; March 28, 1928 – May 26, 2017), known as Zbig, was a Polish-American diplomat and political scientist. He served as a counselor to Lyndon B. Johnson from 1966 to 1968 and was Jimmy Carter's National Securi ...
, and senior staff member of the National Security Council Michel Oksenberg encouraged Carter to seek full diplomatic and trade relations with China. Although Brzezinski sought to quickly establish a security relationship with Beijing to counter the Soviet Union, Carter sided with Vance in believing that such a deal would threaten existing U.S.-Soviet relations, including the
SALT II The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) were two rounds of bilateral conferences and corresponding international treaties involving the United States and the Soviet Union. The Cold War superpowers dealt with arms control in two rounds of ...
negotiations. Thus, the administration decided to cautiously pursue political normalization and not military relations. Vance, Brzezinski, and Oksenberg traveled to Beijing in early 1978 to work with Leonard Woodcock, then head of the liaison office, to lay the groundwork to do so. The United States and the People's Republic of China announced on 15 December 1978, that the two governments would establish diplomatic relations on 1 January 1979.


Normalization (1979–1989)

In the Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations, dated 1 January 1979, the United States transferred diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. The US reiterated the Shanghai Communiqué's acknowledgment of the Chinese position that there is only one China, and that Taiwan is a part of China; Beijing acknowledged that the American people would continue to carry on commercial, cultural, and other unofficial contacts with the people of Taiwan. Taiwan, although fully expecting this step, nonetheless expressed disappointment at having not been consulted first. The reaction of the communist world was similar to 1972, with the Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe mostly being noncommittal, Romania welcoming the move, and Cuba and Albania being strongly against it. North Korea issued a statement congratulating "our brotherly neighbors for ending long-hostile relations with the US". Chinese leader
Deng Xiaoping Deng Xiaoping also Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Teng Hsiao-p'ing; born Xiansheng (). (22 August 190419 February 1997) was a Chinese statesman, revolutionary, and political theorist who served as the paramount leader of the People's R ...
's January 1979 visit to Washington initiated a series of important, high-level exchanges which continued until the spring of 1989. This resulted in many bilateral agreements, including the 31 January 1979 Agreement on Cooperation in Science and Technology. Scientific cooperation greatly increased thereafter. Since early 1979, the United States and the PRC have initiated hundreds of joint research projects and cooperative programs under the Agreement on Cooperation in Science and Technology, the largest bilateral program. On 1 March 1979, the two countries formally established embassies in each other's capitals. In 1979, outstanding private claims were resolved and a bilateral trade agreement was completed. Vice President Walter Mondale reciprocated Vice Premier Deng's visit with an August 1979 trip to China. This visit led to agreements in September 1980 on maritime affairs, civil aviation links, and textile matters, as well as a bilateral consular convention. The threats of the
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until it dissolved in 1991. During its existence, it was the largest country by are ...
and Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia were major factors that brought Washington and Beijing closer than ever before. In June 1979, US Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare Josephn A. Califano Jr. led an American delegation to China; the trip resulted in the long-term institutionalization of health and education links between the two countries. US-China military cooperation increased over the course of 1979 and 1980. In 1980, China allowed the United States to establish electronic listening stations in
Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...
so the United States could monitor Soviet rocket launches in Central Asia. In exchange, the United States authorized the sale of dual-use civilian and military technology and nonlethal military equipment to China. Chinese demands for advanced technology from the US were not always met, in part due to opposition from Congressmen who either distrusted technology transfer to a communist nation out of principle or concern that there was no guarantee that such technology would not end up in the hands of unfriendly third parties. In 1983, the US State Department changed its classification of China to "a friendly, developing nation", thereby increasing the amount of technology and armaments that could be sold. The skepticism of some US Congressmen was not entirely unmerited as China, during the 1980s, continued to sell arms to
Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...
and other states that were openly hostile to American interests. As a consequence of high-level and working-level contacts initiated in 1980, US dialogue with the PRC broadened to cover a wide range of issues, including global and regional strategic problems, political-military questions, including arms control, UN, and other multilateral organization affairs, and international narcotics matters. New York City and Beijing became sister cities. High-level exchanges continued to be a significant means for developing US–PRC relations in the 1980s. President
Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
and Premier Zhao Ziyang made reciprocal visits in 1984. Reagan's visit to Beijing went well, however, a speech he made criticizing the Soviet Union and praising capitalism, democracy, and freedom of religion was not aired on Chinese state television. In July 1985, Chinese President
Li Xiannian Li Xiannian (; 23 June 1909 – 21 June 1992) was a Chinese Chinese Communist Party, Communist military and political leader, president of China from 1983 to 1988 under paramount leader Deng Xiaoping and then chairman of the Chinese People's Politi ...
traveled to the United States, the first such visit by a PRC head of state. Vice President Bush visited the PRC in October 1985 and opened the US Consulate General in
Chengdu Chengdu; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: ; Chinese postal romanization, previously Romanization of Chinese, romanized as Chengtu. is the capital city of the Chinese province of Sichuan. With a ...
, the US's fourth consular post in the PRC. Further exchanges of cabinet-level officials occurred between 1985 and 1989, capped by President Bush's visit to Beijing in February 1989. Shortly after being elected president in 1980, Ronald Reagan made a speech criticizing the PRC and welcoming restoration of ties with Taiwan. These remarks aroused initial concern in Beijing, but Reagan's advisers quickly apologized for his comments, and the president-elect soon retracted them. Reagan's first two years in office saw some deterioration in US-China relations due to the president's vociferous anti-communism, as well as the inability of the two nations to come to a common understanding over the
Korean conflict The Korean conflict is an List of ongoing armed conflicts, ongoing conflict based on the division of Korea between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) and South Korea (Republic of Korea), both of which claim to be the sole Legit ...
, the Israel–Palestine conflict, or the
Falklands War The Falklands War () was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British Overseas Territories, British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and Falkland Islands Dependenci ...
. In 1982, Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, in a reiteration of Mao Zedong's "Three Worlds" theory, criticized both the US and Soviet Union for imperialism. In 1983, there were quarrels over a Chinese tennis player, Hu Na, who defected to the US, and over an incident where an Olympic parade float in New York City displayed the flag of Taiwan rather than the PRC's flag. Relations in the early part of 1984 were strained over the issue of United States arms sales to Taiwan, but later improved. By the late 1980s, China was the US's largest partner for science and technology, which had become the largest type of government-to-government exchange between the two countries. In the period before the
Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 The Tiananmen Square protests, known within China as the June Fourth Incident, were student-led demonstrations held in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China, lasting from 15 April to 4 June 1989. After weeks of unsuccessful attempts between t ...
, a growing number of cultural exchange activities gave the American and Chinese peoples broad exposure to each other's cultural, artistic, and educational achievements. Numerous mainland Chinese professionals and official delegations visited the United States each month. Many of these exchanges continued after the suppression of the Tiananmen protests. In the first decade after normalization, the US's policy towards China was largely driven by the Executive Branch of the United States, with the notable exception of the
Taiwan Relations Act The Taiwan Relations Act (TRA; ) is an Act of Congress, act of the United States Congress. Since the Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations, formal recognition of the China, People's Republic of China, the Act has defined ...
. As a result of the Executive-branch driven approach during this period, China concluded that United States Presidents primarily raised Congressional issues as a negotiating tool and that Congress was not itself a significant force in China-US relations. Consequently, China was slow to develop its Congressional liaison capacity.


George H. W. Bush administration (1989–1993)

Americans who had been optimistic about the emergence of democratic characteristics in response to the rapid economic growth and China were stunned and disappointed by the brutal crackdown of the pro-democratic Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. The US and other governments enacted a number of measures against China's violation of
human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
. The US suspended high-level official exchanges with the PRC and weapons exports from the US to the PRC. The US also imposed a number of
economic sanctions Economic sanctions or embargoes are Commerce, commercial and Finance, financial penalties applied by states or institutions against states, groups, or individuals. Economic sanctions are a form of Coercion (international relations), coercion tha ...
. In the summer of 1990, at the G7 Houston summit, the West called for renewed political and economic reforms in mainland China, particularly in the field of human rights. The Tiananmen event disrupted the US-China trade relationship, and US investors' interest in mainland China dropped dramatically. Tourist traffic fell off sharply. The Bush administration denounced the repression and suspended certain trade and investment programs on 5 and 20 June 1989, however Congress was responsible for imposing many of these actions, and the White House itself took a far less critical attitude of Beijing, repeatedly expressing hope that the two countries could maintain normalized relations. Generally, Bush's preference was for sanctions which were not formalized in law in order to provide flexibility for altering or removing them. Some sanctions were legislated while others were executive actions. Examples include: *The US Trade and Development Agency (TDA): new activities in mainland China were suspended from June 1989 until January 2001, when President
Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
lifted this suspension. *Overseas Private Insurance Corporation (OPIC): new activities have been suspended since June 1989. *Development Bank Lending/
International Monetary Fund The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution funded by 191 member countries, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It is regarded as the global lender of las ...
(IMF) Credits: the United States does not support development bank lending and will not support IMF credits to the PRC except for projects that address basic human needs. * Munitions List Exports: subject to certain exceptions, no licenses may be issued for the export of any defense article on the US Munitions List. This restriction may be waived upon a presidential national interest determination. *Arms Imports – import of defense articles from the PRC was banned after the imposition of the ban on arms exports to the PRC. The import ban was subsequently waived by the administration and reimposed on 26 May 1994. It covers all items on the BATFE's Munitions Import List. During this critical period, J. Stapleton Roy, a career US Foreign Service Officer, served as ambassador to Beijing. Debate within the United States also began on whether China should continue to receive the annual presidential waiver for
most favored nation In international economic relations and international politics, most favoured nation (MFN) is a status or level of treatment accorded by one state to another in international trade. The term means the country which is the recipient of this treatme ...
trading status under the Jackson-Vanik Amendment. US-China military ties and arms sales were terminated in 1989 and as of 2024 have never been restored. Chinese public opinion became more hostile to the United States after 1989, as typified by the 1996 manifesto China Can Say No. The authors called for Beijing to take more aggressive actions against the United States and Japan in order to build a stronger international position. The Chinese government at first endorsed the manifesto, then repudiated it as irresponsible. The end of the Cold War and
dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...
removed the original motives underlying rapprochement between China and the United States. Motivated by concerns that the United States might curtail support for China's modernization, Deng adopted a low-profile foreign policy to live with the fact of United States hegemony and focus primarily on domestic development.


Contemporary Relations


Clinton administration (1993–2001)

Running for president in 1992,
Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
sharply criticized his predecessor George H. W. Bush for prioritizing profitable trade relationships over human rights issues in China. Clinton's 28 May 1993 Executive Order 128950 linked future extension of China's most favored nation trading status to China's progress on U.S.-defined human rights measures. China made virtually no effort to comply with the U.S. conditions and in mid-1994 Clinton changed his position, de-linking the China's most favored nation status from human rights issues. Congressional pressure, especially from the Republican Party, prompted Clinton to approve arms sales to Taiwan, despite the strong displeasure voiced by Beijing. In July 1993, a symbolic United States Congressional resolution opposed China's efforts to be selected as the host country for the 2000 Summer Olympics. The resolution became a major grievance among the Chinese public, which generally viewed the Resolution as an effort to humiliate China. In July 1993, the US Navy stopped the ''Yinhe'', a Chinese container ship, en route to
Kuwait Kuwait, officially the State of Kuwait, is a country in West Asia and the geopolitical region known as the Middle East. It is situated in the northern edge of the Arabian Peninsula at the head of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to Iraq–Kuwait ...
in international waters, cut off its GPS so that it lost direction and was forced to anchor, and held it in place for twenty-four days. The United States incorrectly alleged that the ''Yinhe'' was carrying precursors of
chemical weapon A chemical weapon (CW) is a specialized munition that uses chemicals formulated to inflict death or harm on humans. According to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), this can be any chemical compound intended as ...
s for Iran. It eventually forced an inspection of the ship in
Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in West Asia. Located in the centre of the Middle East, it covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries ...
, but found no chemical precursors. The United States refused China's request for a formal apology and refused to pay compensation. This incident was viewed in China as international bullying by the United States. Nonetheless, Chinese leader
Jiang Zemin Jiang Zemin (17 August 1926 – 30 November 2022) was a Chinese politician who served as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1989 to 2002, as Chairman of the Central Mil ...
adopted a diplomatic posture of goodwill and a "sixteen-characters formula" to working with the United States: "enhancing confidence, avoiding troubles, expanding cooperation, and avoiding confrontation". In 1996, the People's Liberation Army conducted military exercises in the Taiwan Strait in an apparent effort to intimidate the Republic of China electorate before the pending presidential elections, triggering the
Third Taiwan Strait Crisis The Third Taiwan Strait Crisis, also called the 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, or the 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, was the effect of a series of missile tests conducted by the People's Republic of China (PRC) in the waters surrounding Taiwan, ...
. The United States dispatched two aircraft carrier battle groups to the region. Subsequently, tensions in the Taiwan Strait diminished and relations between the US and the PRC improved, with increased high-level exchanges and progress on numerous bilateral issues, including human rights,
nuclear proliferation Nuclear proliferation is the spread of nuclear weapons to additional countries, particularly those not recognized as List of states with nuclear weapons, nuclear-weapon states by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonl ...
, and trade. China's leader Jiang Zemin visited the United States in the fall of 1997, the first state visit to the US by a
paramount leader Paramount leader () is an informal term for the most important Supreme leader, political figure in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). The paramount leader typically controls the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Liberatio ...
since 1979. In connection with that visit, the two sides came to a consensus on implementation of their 1985 agreement on Peaceful Nuclear Cooperation, as well as a number of other issues. President Clinton visited the PRC in June 1998. He traveled extensively in mainland China, and had direct interaction with the Chinese people, including live speeches and a radio show which allowed the President to convey a sense of American ideals and values. In a speech at
Peking University Peking University (PKU) is a Public university, public Types of universities and colleges in China#By designated academic emphasis, university in Haidian, Beijing, China. It is affiliated with and funded by the Ministry of Education of the Peop ...
, he referred to the 21st century as "your century", and expressed his view that technology, including the internet, would help ease any tensions China's economic growth might cause. President Clinton was criticized by some, however, for failing to pay adequate attention to human rights abuses in mainland China. When Clinton visited Shanghai, he declared the "three nos" for United States foreign policy towards China: (1) not recognizing two Chinas, (2) not supporting Taiwanese independence, and (3) not supporting Taiwanese efforts to join international organizations for which sovereignty is a membership requirement. Relations were damaged for a time by the United States bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade on 7 May 1999, which was stated by the White House to be miscoordination between intelligence and the military. The bombing created outrage among Chinese people, who did not accept the United States claim that the bombing was accidental. For several days, Beijing was rocked by massive anti-US demonstrations. Deeming the importance of the bilateral relationship too great to be harmed by the embassy bombing, Chinese leader Jiang Zemin sought to calm the Chinese public outrage. By the end of 1999, relations began to gradually improve. In October 1999, the two countries reached an agreement on compensation for families of those who were victims, as well as payments for damages to respective diplomatic properties in
Belgrade Belgrade is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin, Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. T ...
and China. US-China relations in 1999 were also damaged by accusations that a Chinese-American scientist at the
Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory (often shortened as Los Alamos and LANL) is one of the sixteen research and development Laboratory, laboratories of the United States Department of Energy National Laboratories, United States Department of Energy ...
had given US nuclear secrets to Beijing.


George W. Bush administration (2001–2009)

As a presidential candidate in 2000, George W. Bush repeatedly criticized the Clinton-Gore administration for being too friendly with China, which he warned was a strategic competitor. In the
Hainan Island incident The Hainan Island incident was a ten-day international incident between the United States and the People's Republic of China (PRC) that resulted from a mid-air collision between a United States Navy EP-3E ARIES II SIGINT, signals intelligence a ...
of 1 April 2001, a United States US EP-3 surveillance aircraft collided mid-air with a Chinese Shenyang J-8 jet fighter over the South China Sea. China sought a formal apology, and accepted United States Secretary of State
Colin Powell Colin Luther Powell ( ; – ) was an Americans, American diplomat, and army officer who was the 65th United States secretary of state from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African-American to hold the office. He was the 15th National Security ...
's expression of "very sorry" as sufficient. The incident nonetheless created negative feelings towards the United States by the Chinese public and increased public feelings of
Chinese nationalism Chinese nationalism is a form of nationalism that asserts that the Chinese people are a nation and promotes the cultural and national unity of all Chinese people. According to Sun Yat-sen's philosophy in the Three Principles of the People, Chin ...
. Early on as President Bush increased arms sales to Taiwan, including 8 submarines. Bush's hostile position toward China was suddenly reversed after the
11 September terrorist attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...
, and his friendly attitude toward Taiwan became a casualty. Soon he was calling China a strategic partner in the war on terror and postponing deals with Taiwan. Two PRC citizens died in the attacks on the World Trade Center. Chinese leader Jiang Zemin sent a telegram to Bush within hours of the attack expressing China's condolences and opposition to terror; Bush responded with a phone call the next day stating that he looked forward to working with Jiang and other world leaders to oppose terrorism. Chinese companies and individuals also sent expressions of condolences to their American counterparts. The PRC, itself troubled by Muslim separatists in Xinjiang, offered strong public support for the War on Terror in APEC China 2001. The PRC voted in favor of UNSCR 1373, publicly supported the coalition campaign in
Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...
, and contributed $150 million of bilateral assistance to Afghan reconstruction following the defeat of the
Taliban , leader1_title = Supreme Leader of Afghanistan, Supreme leaders , leader1_name = {{indented plainlist, * Mullah Omar{{Natural Causes{{nbsp(1994–2013) * Akhtar Mansour{{Assassinated (2015–2016) * Hibatullah Akhundzada (2016–present) ...
. Shortly after the 11 September terrorist attacks, the US and PRC also commenced a counterterrorism dialogue. In a March 2002 trip to Beijing, Bush articulated his desire for a "constructive, cooperative, and candid" relationship with China. The third round of that dialogue was held in Beijing in February 2003. In the United States, the threat of terrorist attacks by
al-Qaeda , image = Flag of Jihad.svg , caption = Jihadist flag, Flag used by various al-Qaeda factions , founder = Osama bin Laden{{Assassinated, Killing of Osama bin Laden , leaders = {{Plainlist, * Osama bin Lad ...
greatly changed the nature of its security concerns. It was no longer plausible to argue, as the Blue Team had earlier asserted, that the PRC was the primary security threat to the United States, and the need to focus on the
Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...
and the War on Terror made the avoidance of potential distractions in East Asia a priority for the United States. There were initial fears among the PRC leadership that the war on terrorism would lead to an anti-PRC effort by the US, especially as the US began establishing bases in
Central Asia Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The countries as a group are also colloquially referred to as the "-stans" as all have names ending with the Persian language, Pers ...
n countries like
Uzbekistan , image_flag = Flag of Uzbekistan.svg , image_coat = Emblem of Uzbekistan.svg , symbol_type = Emblem of Uzbekistan, Emblem , national_anthem = "State Anthem of Uzbekistan, State Anthem of the Republ ...
and
Tajikistan Tajikistan, officially the Republic of Tajikistan, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Dushanbe is the capital city, capital and most populous city. Tajikistan borders Afghanistan to the Afghanistan–Tajikistan border, south, Uzbekistan to ...
and renewed efforts against
Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...
. The Chinese government was relieved after the United States tied up major national resources with its 2003 invasion of Iraq. China believed that the United States' Middle East meant that the United States would need China's help on issues such as counterterrorism, Middle Eastern stability, and nuclear non-proliferation and viewed the United States' focus as conducive to China's emphasis on stability and domestic development. China and the United States worked closely on regional issues, including those pertaining to North Korea and its nuclear weapons program. China has stressed its opposition to North Korea's decision to withdraw from the
Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonly known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT, is an international treaty whose objective is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology, to promote cooperatio ...
, its concerns over North Korea's nuclear capabilities, and its desire for a non-nuclear
Korean Peninsula Korea is a peninsular region in East Asia consisting of the Korean Peninsula, Jeju Island, and smaller islands. Since the end of World War II in 1945, it has been politically divided at or near the 38th parallel between North Korea (Dem ...
. It also voted to refer North Korea's noncompliance with its
International Atomic Energy Agency The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is an intergovernmental organization that seeks to promote the peaceful use of nuclear technology, nuclear energy and to inhibit its use for any military purpose, including nuclear weapons. It was ...
obligations to the UN Security Council. In 2001, a presidential plane built in the United States for Chinese leader Jiang Zemin was found to have listening devices installed. Chinese authorities located at least 20 devices, including one in the headboard of the presidential bed. The listening devices were capable of being operated via satellite. In the mid-2000s, the United States focused relatively less on China issues. This approach was reinforced by the economic benefits to the United States from its relations with China, including cheaper consumer products like clothing and electronics. During this period, the United States also issued significant debt to fund its military interventions and China became the largest foreign purchaser of U.S. government debt. Taiwan remained a volatile issue, but one that remained under control. The United States policy toward Taiwan involved emphasizing the Four Noes and One Without. On occasion the United States rebuked Republic of China (Taiwan) President
Chen Shui-bian Chen Shui-bian ( zh, t=陳水扁; born 12 October 1950) is a Taiwanese former politician and lawyer who served as the fifth president of the Republic of China (Taiwan) from 2000 to 2008. Chen was the first president from the Democratic Progres ...
for provocative pro-independence rhetoric. As Bush made his opposition to Taiwan independence clear, the PRC saw the United States as playing a positive role in restraining the separatist movement. In 2005, the PRC passed the Anti-Secession Law which stated that the PRC would be prepared to resort to "non-peaceful means" if Taiwan declared formal independence. Many critics of the PRC, such as the Blue Team, argue that the PRC was trying to take advantage of the US war in Iraq to assert its claims on Republic of China's territory. In 2008, Taiwan voters elected Ma Ying-jeou. Ma, representing the Kuomintang, campaigned on a platform that included rapprochement with mainland China. His election has significant implications for the future of cross-strait relations. The 2003 United States invasion of Iraq and the failure of the United States to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction decreased China's respect for America's power and realism. China's
paramount leader Paramount leader () is an informal term for the most important Supreme leader, political figure in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). The paramount leader typically controls the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Liberatio ...
Hu Jintao Hu Jintao (born 21 December 1942) is a Chinese retired politician who served as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 2002 to 2012, the president of China from 2003 to 2013, and chairman of the Central Military Comm ...
visited the United States in April 2006. Bush visited Beijing in August for four days to attend the
2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes fro ...
. The president and his wife Laura were accompanied by Bush's father, the former president, and his mother Barbara.


Obama administration (2009–2017)

The 2008 US presidential election centered on issues of war and economic recession, but candidates
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
and
John McCain John Sidney McCain III (August 29, 1936 – August 25, 2018) was an American statesman and United States Navy, naval officer who represented the Arizona, state of Arizona in United States Congress, Congress for over 35 years, first as ...
also spoke extensively regarding US policy toward China. Both favored cooperation with China on major issues, but they differed with regard to trade policy. Obama expressed concern that the value of China's currency was being deliberately set low to benefit China's exporters. McCain argued that free trade was crucial and was having a transformative effect in China. Still, McCain noted that while China might have shared interests with the US, it did not share American values. The election of Barack Obama in 2008 generated positive reactions from most locals and state-run media outlets in China. His presidency fostered hopes for increased co-operation and heightened levels of friendship between the two nations. On 8 November 2008, Chinese leader Hu Jintao and Obama shared a phone conversation in which Hu congratulated Obama on his election victory. During the conversation both parties agreed that the development of Sino-American relations is not only in the interest of both nations, but also in the interests of the international community. During the Obama administration, the US signed more bilateral agreements with China than it had during any other US administration, particularly with regard to addressing climate change. The two countries signed seven clean energy agreements on 17 November 2009, during Obama's visit to China, including an agreement establishing the U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center (CERC). CERC was the most ambitious clean energy technology cooperation mechanism between the two. The many technical exchanges on climate issues during the Obama era helped both sides of the relationship to better understand each other's emissions models and data, leading to increased mutual trust. Following the
2008 financial crisis The 2008 financial crisis, also known as the global financial crisis (GFC), was a major worldwide financial crisis centered in the United States. The causes of the 2008 crisis included excessive speculation on housing values by both homeowners ...
, both US and Chinese governments addressed the economic downturn with massive stimulus initiatives. The Chinese expressed concern that "Buy American" components of the US plan discriminate against foreign producers, including those in China. As the two most influential and powerful countries in the world, there have been increasingly strong suggestions within American political circles of creating a G-2 (Chimerica) relationship for the United States and China to work out solutions to global problems together. The Strategic Economic Dialogue initiated by then-US President Bush and Hu and led by US Treasury Secretary
Henry Paulson Henry "Hank" Merritt Paulson Jr. (born March 28, 1946) is an American investment banker and financier who served as the 74th United States secretary of the treasury from 2006 to 2009. Prior to his role in the Department of the Treasury, Paulson ...
and Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi in 2006 was broadened by the
Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, took office following his victory over Republican nomine ...
into the U.S.–China Strategic and Economic Dialogue. It was then led by US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer and diplomat. She was the 67th United States secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, a U.S. senator represent ...
and US Secretary of the Treasury
Timothy Geithner Timothy Franz Geithner (; born August 18, 1961) is an American former central banker who served as the 75th United States secretary of the treasury under President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013. He was the President of the Federal Reserve Bank o ...
for the United States and Vice Premier
Wang Qishan Wang Qishan (; ; born 19 July 1948) is a Chinese retired politician who was one of the leading members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Wang gained prominence in China's financial sector in the late 1980s. In 1994, Wang became the governor ...
and Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo for China. The focus of the first set of meetings in July 2009 was in response to the economic crisis, finding ways to cooperate to stem global warming and addressing issues such as the proliferation of nuclear weapons and humanitarian crises. Obama visited China on 15–18 November 2009 to discuss economic worries, concerns over nuclear weapon proliferation, and the need for action against climate change. In January 2010, the US proposed a $6.4 billion arms sale to the Republic of China (Taiwan). In response, the PRC threatened to impose sanctions on US companies supplying arms to Taiwan and suspend cooperation on certain regional and international issues. On 19 February 2010, Obama met with the
Dalai Lama The Dalai Lama (, ; ) is the head of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. The term is part of the full title "Holiness Knowing Everything Vajradhara Dalai Lama" (圣 识一切 瓦齐尔达喇 达赖 喇嘛) given by Altan Khan, the first Shu ...
, accused by China of "fomenting unrest in
Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...
." After the meeting, China summoned the US ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, but ''
Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'' has described the Chinese reaction as "muted", speculating that it could be because "the meeting came during the
Chinese New Year Chinese New Year, or the Spring Festival (see also #Names, § Names), is a festival that celebrates the beginning of a New Year, new year on the traditional lunisolar calendar, lunisolar Chinese calendar. It is one of the most important holi ...
... when most officials are on leave". Some activists criticized Obama for the relatively low profile of the visit. In 2012, the PRC criticized Obama's new defense strategy, which it said was aimed at isolating China in East Asia. Obama is looking to increase US military influence in the area with a rotating presence of forces in friendly countries. In March 2012, China suddenly began cutting back its purchases of oil from Iran, which along with some signs on sensitive security issues like
Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...
and North Korea, showed some coordination with the Obama administration. In March 2013, the US and China agreed to impose stricter sanctions on North Korea for conducting nuclear tests, which sets the stage for UN Security Council vote. Such accord might signal a new level of cooperation between the US and China. In an effort to build a "new model" of relations, Obama met Chinese leader
Xi Jinping Xi Jinping, pronounced (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (China), chairman of the Central Military Commission ...
for two days of meetings, between 6 and 8 June 2013, at the
Sunnylands Sunnylands is the former Annenberg Estate in Rancho Mirage, California. The property is currently run by The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands, a not-for-profit organization. The property was owned by Walter Annenberg, Walter and Leon ...
estate in
Rancho Mirage Rancho Mirage is a city in Riverside County, California, United States. The city is a low-density desert community with resorts, golf courses, and country clubs within the Colorado Desert section of the Sonoran Desert. Nestled along the foothills ...
, California. The summit was considered "the most important meeting between an American president and a Chinese Communist leader in 40 years, since President Nixon and Chairman Mao," according to Joseph Nye, a political scientist at Harvard University. The leaders concretely agreed to combat climate change and also found strong mutual interest in curtailing North Korea's nuclear program. However, the leaders remained sharply divided over cyber espionage and US arms sales to Taiwan. Xi was dismissive of American complaints about cyber security. Tom Donilon, the outgoing US National Security Adviser, stated that cyber security "is now at the center of the relationship", adding that if China's leaders were unaware of this fact, they know now. Obama supported the
One-China policy ''One China'' is a phrase describing the relationship between the People's Republic of China (PRC) based on mainland China, and the Republic of China (ROC) based on the Taiwan Area. "One China" asserts that there is only one ''de jure'' C ...
. In 2014, Obama stated that "We recognize Tibet as part of the People's Republic of China. We are not in favor of
independence Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...
." Beginning in 2015, China's
People's Liberation Army Air Force The People's Liberation Army Air Force, also referred to as the Chinese Air Force () or the People's Air Force (), is the primary aerial warfare service of the People's Liberation Army. The PLAAF controls most of the PLA's air assets, includi ...
began patrolling the South China Sea, including the disputed Paracel and
Spratly Islands The Spratly Islands (; zh, s=南沙群岛, t=南沙群島, p=Nánshā Qúndǎo; ; ) are a disputed archipelago in the South China Sea. Composed of islands, islets, cays, and more than 100 reefs, sometimes grouped in submerged old atoll ...
. In China's view, these disputed areas are within its
Air Defense Identification Zone An air defense identification zone (ADIZ) is a region of airspace in which a country tries to identify, locate, and control aircraft in the interest of national security. It is declared unilaterally and may extend beyond a country's territory to g ...
(ADIZ). The
United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...
does not accept this view, and flies its military planes through the area without informing China. In May 2015, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter warned China to halt its rapid island-building in the
South China Sea The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by South China, in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan island, Taiwan and northwestern Philippines (mainly Luz ...
. Obama hosted Xi for a bilateral meeting on the margins of the Nuclear Security Summit on 31 March 2016.


First Trump administration (2017–2021)

During his presidential campaign,
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
promised an assertive stance towards China. The presidency of Trump led to a negative shift in US relations with China. President-elect Trump's telephone conversation with the president of Taiwan
Tsai Ing-wen Tsai Ing-wen (; pinyin: ''Cài Yīngwén''; born 31 August 1956) is a Taiwanese politician and legal scholar who served as the seventh president of the Republic of China (Taiwan) from 2016 to 2024. A member of the Democratic Progressive Party ...
on 2 December 2016 was the first such contact with Taiwan by an American president-elect or president since 1979. It provoked Beijing to lodge a diplomatic protest ("stern representations"). Trump went on to clarify his move: "I fully understand the 'one China' policy, but I don't know why we have to be bound by a 'one China' policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things, including trade." On President Trump's inauguration day, an official from the China's People's Liberation Army wrote on the official website that the American military build-up in East Asia and the Asia Pacific, and its push to arm South Korea with the THAAD missile-defense system were provocative "hot spots getting closer to ignition" and that the chances of war had become "more real." On taking office, the Trump administration stopped negotiations on a bilateral investment treaty with China which had begun in 2008. According to
Michael Froman Michael Braverman Goodman Froman (born August 20, 1962) is an American lawyer who is the current president of the Council on Foreign Relations. Froman served as the U.S. Trade Representative from 2013 to 2017. He was Assistant to the President ...
, the lead negotiator during the preceding four years, the effort to reach an agreement was "more than 90 percent complete." On 23 January, speaking about China's claims to sovereignty over the
Spratly Islands The Spratly Islands (; zh, s=南沙群岛, t=南沙群島, p=Nánshā Qúndǎo; ; ) are a disputed archipelago in the South China Sea. Composed of islands, islets, cays, and more than 100 reefs, sometimes grouped in submerged old atoll ...
in the
South China Sea The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by South China, in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan island, Taiwan and northwestern Philippines (mainly Luz ...
, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said, "It's a question of if those islands are in fact in international waters and not part of China proper, then yeah, we're going to make sure that we defend international territories from being taken over by one country." On 4 January, on a visit to Japan, US Defense Secretary
James Mattis James Norman Mattis (born September 8, 1950) is an American military officer who served as the 26th United States secretary of defense from 2017 to 2019. A retired Marine Corps four-star general, he commanded forces in the Persian Gulf War, th ...
reaffirmed Washington's commitment under the
Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the United States and Japan The more commonly known as the U.S.–Japan Security Treaty in English and as the ''Anpo jōyaku'' or just ''Anpo'' in Japanese, is a treaty that permits the presence of U.S. military bases on Japanese soil, and commits the two nations to defen ...
to defending Japan, including the
Senkaku Islands The Senkaku Islands, known as the Diaoyu Islands in China and the Tiaoyutai Islands in Taiwan, are a group of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, administered by Japan. They were historically known in the Western world as the Pinnacle ...
(the
East China Sea The East China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean, located directly offshore from East China. China names the body of water along its eastern coast as "East Sea" (, ) due to direction, the name of "East China Sea" is otherwise ...
) that are claimed by China. On 9 February, Trump spoke with China's leader Xi Jinping over the phone discussing a wide range of issues; Trump was said to have re-iterated the United States' commitment to the status quo 'one-China' policy. In a 3 July 2017 telephone conversation with Trump, Xi stated, "China-US relations have made great progress in recent days, but they have also been affected by some negative factors." By "negative factors",
Geng Shuang Geng Shuang (; born April 1973) is a Chinese politician serving as China's Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations. He formerly served as the deputy director of the Information Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Biogr ...
, a Chinese government spokesmen, explained in a televised briefing: "Under the pretext of navigational freedom, the American side once again sent military vessels into the Chinese territorial waters of Xisha ( Paracel) Islands. It has violated Chinese and international law, infringed upon Chinese sovereignty, and disrupted order, peace and security of the relevant waters and put in jeopardy facilities and personnel on the relevant Chinese islands. It is a serious political and military provocation. The Chinese side is strongly dissatisfied with and firmly opposed to the relevant actions by the US." In 2017, the Trump administration terminated the Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (JCCT) between China and the United States. The JCCT had met annually from 1983 to 2016 and had been a generally effective mechanism to address various trade issues between the two countries. The Trump administration also terminated the Strategic and Economic Dialogue after holding the June 2017 meeting under the name "Comprehensive Economic Dialogue." According to ''Chaos Under Heaven'', a book by Josh Rogin, a group of officials including Peter Navarro, Stephen Miller and
Steve Bannon Stephen Kevin Bannon (born November 27, 1953) is an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker. He served as the White House's chief strategist for the first seven months of president Donald Trump's first ...
that wanted Trump to "speed the downfall" of the
Chinese Communist Party The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
and that "believed in economic nationalism, the return of manufacturing from abroad, and the protection of domestic industries, even at the expense of free trade" emerged during the early stage of the Trump administration. China enforced punitive tariffs on 128 categories of American goods on 1 April 2018 in retaliation for the Trump administration's national-security levies on steel and aluminum imports the previous month. The Chinese Government's response is measured, affecting $3 billion in annual trade or about 2% of US goods exports to China. By late September 2018, the Trump administration had placed tariffs (25% tax increase) on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods, in an attempt to offset the trade imbalance between the two major economic world powers. In what put additional strain on US-China relations,
Huawei Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ("Huawei" sometimes stylized as "HUAWEI"; ; zh, c=华为, p= ) is a Chinese multinational corporationtechnology company in Longgang, Shenzhen, Longgang, Shenzhen, Guangdong. Its main product lines include teleco ...
's vice-chair and CFO
Meng Wanzhou Meng Wanzhou ( zh, c=孟晚舟; born 13 February 1972), also known as Cathy Meng and Sabrina Meng, also informally known in China as the "Princess of Huawei", is a Chinese business executive. She is the deputy chair of the board and chief fin ...
was arrested in Canada on 1 December 2018 at the behest of US authorities. US Senator Ben Sasse accused China of undermining U.S. national security interests, often "using private sector entities" to by-pass US sanctions against the sale of telecom equipment to Iran. According to political analyst, Andrew Leung, "China is perceived as the antagonist and rival of the United States," and that China's economic growth is seen as a "threat to the world order underpinned by American dominance or American values." He claimed, moreover, that the arrest of the CFO of Huawei on 1 December 2018 corresponded with the suspicious death on that same day of a leading Chinese national quantum physicist and venture capitalist at
Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
, Shoucheng Zhang, who was on a
H-1B visa The H-1B is a foreign worker visa in the United States that allows U.S. employers to hire foreign workers in so-called specialty occupations. The regulation and implementation of the visa program is carried out by the United States Citizenship ...
, giving rise to conspiracy theories. In August 2018, the US government signed an update to legislation for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., broadening governmental scrutiny to vetting VC-backed, and especially Chinese state-funded, investments in US tech startups. Both sides signed the US–China Phase One trade deal on 15 January. Unlike other trade agreements, the agreement did not rely on arbitration through an
intergovernmental organization Globalization is social change associated with increased connectivity among societies and their elements and the explosive evolution of transportation and telecommunication technologies to facilitate international cultural and economic exchange. ...
like the
World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland that regulates and facilitates international trade. Governments use the organization to establish, revise, and enforce the rules that g ...
, but rather through a bilateral mechanism.


Rapid deterioration of relations (2019–2020)

Michael D. Swaine warned in 2019, "The often positive and optimistic forces, interests, and beliefs that sustained bilateral ties for decades are giving way to undue pessimism, hostility, and a zero-sum mindset in almost every area of engagement." According to two experts on US-China relations, Rosemary Foot and Amy King, the consensus of experts is that: :The relationship began to deteriorate in the second decade of the 21st century, and that the Trump administration has accelerated the deterioration. Explanations...have ranged over a large number of factors, all of which have played some role. Some relate to changes in official personnel in both the United States and China, others to the shifts and relative power between the two countries after the
2008 financial crisis The 2008 financial crisis, also known as the global financial crisis (GFC), was a major worldwide financial crisis centered in the United States. The causes of the 2008 crisis included excessive speculation on housing values by both homeowners ...
, and yet others to China's greater determination to reform global governance institutions and to play more of a global leadership role. Foot and King emphasize China's aggressive efforts in developing cutting-edge technologies with significant military and commercial implications, while the United States sees the need to defend itself aggressively against technological theft. U.S. academics have made various policy prescriptions for the United States within the context of its deteriorating relationship with China. According to
Lawrence J. Lau Lawrence Lau Juen-yee, Gold Bauhinia Star, GBS, Justice of the Peace, JP ( zh, t=劉遵義; born 12 December 1944) is a Hong Kong economist and the former Chancellor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He was a non-official member of the E ...
, a major cause of the deterioration is the growing battle between China and the United States for global economic and technological dominance. More generally, he argues, "It is also a reflection of the rise of populism, isolationism, nationalism and protectionism almost everywhere in the world, including in the US." According to Ian Bremmer, the US and China are in a technology cold war and Trump's technology war against the PRC has been his administration's biggest foreign policy win, saying, "on the issue of tech decoupling that it was America out front with most allies on board." According to Greg Autry, an academic at the University of Southern California, Trump's China policy was working, pointing to increased revenue intakes by the Treasury Department and offshoring by US manufacturing supply chains from China, and crediting the administration for being the first to fully recognize that globalization had not delivered for Americans and that China was an existential threat. Former Obama administration officials
Samantha Power Samantha Jane Power (born September 21, 1970) is an Irish-American journalist, diplomat, and government official who served as the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development from 2021 to 2025. She was the 28th Unite ...
and Susan Rice have criticized China's actions on trade, over the Meng Wenzhou affair and in Hong Kong while simultaneously criticizing the Trump administration for inadequate pushback. In 2018, the US Department of Justice initiated a " China Initiative" to "combat economic espionage". DOJ ended the program on 23 February 2023. No one was charged or convicted of spying in any China Initiative case. The
Director of Policy Planning The director of policy planning is the United States Department of State official in charge of the department's internal think tank, the policy planning staff, with a rank equivalent to assistant secretary. The position has traditionally been he ...
at the
United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy of the United State ...
, Kiron Skinner drew international attention in April 2019 for stating at a foreign policy forum that the US competition with China would be especially bitter, because unlike the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
with the
Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
which is "a fight within the Western family", "it's the first time that we will have a great-power competitor that is not Caucasian". In 2019, prominent Americans, including some with ties to the administration, formed the Committee on the Present Danger: China (CPDC) to advocate for a more hawkish foreign policy against China. On 29 January 2020, the Interior Department's fleet of more than 800 Chinese-made drones, including those by DJI, were grounded, citing security concerns. On 18 February 2020, the US government announced five Chinese
state media State media are typically understood as media outlets that are owned, operated, or significantly influenced by the government. They are distinguished from public service media, which are designed to serve the public interest, operate independent ...
firms
Xinhua News Agency Xinhua News Agency (English pronunciation: ),J. C. Wells: Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, 3rd ed., for both British and American English or New China News Agency, is the official state news agency of the People's Republic of China. It is a ...
, China Global Television Network, distribution company of ''
China Daily ''China Daily'' ( zh, s=中国日报, p=Zhōngguó Rìbào) is an English-language daily newspaper owned by the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party. Overview ''China Daily'' has the widest print circulation of any ...
'' newspaper, and the distribution company of ''
The People's Daily The ''People's Daily'' ( zh, s=人民日报, p=Rénmín Rìbào) is the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It provides direct information on the policies and viewpoints of the CCP in multiple lan ...
''
would be designated "foreign missions", requiring them to be legally registered with the US government as a foreign government entity. On the following day, China took action against three American journalists with ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'' by revoking their press credentials over a
coronavirus Coronaviruses are a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans and birds, they cause respiratory tract infections that can range from mild to lethal. Mild illnesses in humans include some cases of the comm ...
opinion column which their paper had run. According to China, the column was Racism, racist and libelous; the CEO of the company that published the WSJ defended the article, as did the State department. A March 2020 article by Reuters said that Washington slashed the number of journalists allowed to work at US offices of major Chinese media outlets to 100 from 160 due to Beijing's "long-standing intimidation and harassment of journalists". In response, China expelled about a dozen American correspondents with ''The New York Times'', News Corp's Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, which prompted criticism from the State Department. On 8 May, the US moved Chinese citizens at non-American news outlets from open-ended work visas to extendable 90-day work visas and in June the State Department designated a further four Chinese media outlets as foreign embassies. By May 2020 relations had deteriorated as both sides were accusing the other of guilt for the COVID-19 pandemic, worldwide coronavirus pandemic. Washington has mobilized a campaign of investigations, prosecutions and export restrictions. Beijing, meanwhile, has stepped up military activities in the contested South China Sea, and launched denunciations of American Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and publicly speculating that the American military deliberately unleashed the virus in China. In the growing aspersion, on 15 May 2020, the US blocked shipments of Semiconductor, semi-conductors to Huawei, while China, for its part, has threatened to place Apple Inc., Apple, Boeing, and other US firms on "unreliable entities" lists, and has blamed the US government of using state power under the excuse of national security, and of abusing export control measures to continuously oppress and contain specific enterprises of other countries. Orville Schell, the director of the Center on US-China Relations at the Asia Society, summed up the situation as follows: "The consequences of the breakdown in US-China relations is going to be very grave for the world and for the global economy because the ability of the US and China to work together was the keystone of the whole arch of globalization and global trade. With that pulled out, there's going to be a tremendous amount of disturbance", often compared to the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
. However Tony Blair noted there is "an interconnectedness, economically and in trade terms between the US and China that just wasn't there in the US-Soviet Cold War" that makes it an imperfect analogy. He further felt the China-U.S. relations would be the "determining geopolitical relationship of the 21st century." In June 2020, US Ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft sent a letter to the U.N. secretary general explaining the US position on China's "excessive maritime claims". On 17 June 2020, President Trump signed the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act, which authorizes the imposition of United States sanctions, U.S. sanctions against Chinese government officials responsible for Xinjiang re-education camps, detention camps holding more than 1 million members of the country's Uyghurs, Uyghur Islam in China, Muslim minority. On 9 July 2020, the Trump administration imposed sanctions and visa restrictions against senior Chinese officials, including Chen Quanguo, a member of China's powerful Politburo. A research paper by the Begin–Sadat Center for Strategic Studies said that Chinese state-controlled media enthusiastically covered the protests and rioting attending the Murder of George Floyd, comparing the George Floyd protests, American protests to the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, protests in Hong Kong and used the Violence and controversies during the George Floyd protests, rioting and Violence and controversies during the George Floyd protests, violence in the United States as evidence that the democratic system was hypocritical and morally bankrupt. A report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said that racial tensions in the United States was a key area of focus for "a campaign of cross-platform inauthentic activity, conducted by Chinese-speaking actors and broadly in alignment with the political goal of the People's Republic of China (PRC) to denigrate the standing of the US." In July 2020, FBI Director Christopher A. Wray, Christopher Wray called China the "greatest long-term threat" to the United States. He said that "the FBI is now opening a new China-related counterintelligence case every 10 hours. Of the nearly 5,000 active counterintelligence cases currently under way across the country, almost half are related to China." In July 2020, the Trump administration Chinese Consulate-General, Houston#2020 closure, ordered the closure of the Chinese consulate in Houston. In response, the Chinese government ordered the closure of the Consulate General of the United States, Chengdu, US consulate in Chengdu. On 20 July 2020, the United States sanctioned 11 Chinese companies, restricting any trade deal with America for what the US government said was their involvement in human rights violations in Xinjiang, accusing them specifically of using Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in forced labor. On 23 July 2020, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the end of what he called "blind engagement" with the Chinese government. He also criticized CCP general secretary Xi Jinping as "a true believer in a bankrupt totalitarian ideology". In August 2020, Washington imposed sanctions on 11 Hong Kong and Chinese officials over what it said was their role in curtailing political freedoms in Hong Kong through the imposition of the 2020 Hong Kong national security law, Hong Kong national security law; China retaliated by sanctioning 6 Republican lawmakers and 5 individuals at non-profit and rights groups. In September 2020 the United States had under a 29 May presidential proclamation revoked more than 1,000 visas for PRC students and researchers visas who the US government said had ties to the Chinese military in order to prevent them from stealing and otherwise appropriating sensitive research. On 26 September 2020, the US Commerce Department put restrictions on Chinese chip maker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), following which the suppliers were required to have an export license for exporting the chip. The restrictions were imposed after the US concluded that an "unacceptable risk" equipment supplied to SMIC could potentially be used for military purposes. On 6 October 2020, Germany's ambassador to the UN, on behalf of the group of 39 countries including Germany, the U.K. and the U.S., made a statement to denounce China for its treatment of ethnic minorities and for curtailing freedoms in Hong Kong. On 9 October 2020, the Department of Justice disallowed the use of its fund to purchase DJI drones, which the DoJ classified as a "Covered Foreign Entity". On 21 October 2020, the US approved arms sales of $1.8 billion to Taiwan. It involved three packages that included high technology weapons such as SLAM-ER missiles, HIMARS M142 Launchers and Recce Pods. On 26 October 2020, China announced its intentions to impose sanctions on US businesses and individuals, including Boeing Defense, Space & Security, Boeing, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. Taiwan welcomed the arms sales and disapproved of the sanctions. Taiwan also said it would continue buying arms from America. In a December 2020 report, US intelligence officials claimed that China had supervised a bounty program that paid Afghan militants to kill US soldiers deployed in the country. On 5 December 2020, the US State Department ended five cultural exchange programs with China, which are - "the Policymakers Educational China Trip Program, the U.S.-China Friendship Program, the U.S.-China Leadership Exchange Program, the U.S.-China Transpacific Exchange Program and the
Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
Educational and Cultural Program." They described these programs as soft power propaganda tools of Chinese government. In December 2020, an investigation by ''Axios (website), Axios'' was published that detailed the suspected activities of Christine Fang, a Chinese national who has been suspected by US officials of having conducted political espionage for the Ministry of State Security (China), Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) while she was in the United States from 2011 to 2015. While Fang's suspected activities prior to the Axios investigation had already drawn scrutiny from federal law enforcement agencies, the subsequent reactions to its publication drew further scrutiny from politicians and the media.


Biden administration (2021–2025)

Following his election, relations with the Presidency of Joe Biden, new Biden administration in 2021 included heightened tensions over trade, technology, and human rights, particularly regarding Hong Kong, and the treatment of minorities in China. In addition international tensions regarding control of the South China Sea remained high. Biden has largely continued the China policies of his predecessor, Donald Trump. However, the Biden and Xi administrations agreed to collaborate on long-term projects regarding climate change, nuclear proliferation, and the global COVID-19 pandemic. On 20 January 2021, China imposed sanctions against outgoing US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, secretary of health and human services Alex Azar, former under secretary of state Keith J. Krach, outgoing US ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft, and 24 other former Trump officials. Biden's United States National Security Council, National Security Council called the sanctions "unproductive and cynical". In his nomination hearing, Blinken endorsed Pompeo's report that China is committing a genocide against Uyghurs, reaffirming Biden's campaign stance. The new US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, called-out China on its treatment of the ethnic Uighurs. President Biden, in his first foreign policy address, labeled China as "the most serious competitor" to the US. During his first visit to the Pentagon on 9 February 2021, Biden urged the United States Department of Defense to review its national security policy concerning China. On 12 March 2021, Huawei, ZTE, Hytera, Hikvision, and Dahua Technology were designated as national security threats by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). From 18–19 March 2021, United States–China talks in Alaska, bilateral talks in Alaska took place. Blinken and national security advisor Jake Sullivan met with CCP Politburo member Yang Jiechi and Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi (politician), Wang Yi. The Americans unleashed heated attacks on China's policies regarding human rights, cyberattacks, Taiwan, and its crackdown in Xinjiang and Hong Kong. The Chinese side countered by attacking the U.S's standing in the world and defending China's sovereign rights and model of development. In the week ahead of the talks, the administration met with US allies in Asia and imposed sanctions on senior Chinese officials amidst Beijing's 2020 Hong Kong national security law, contemporaneous crackdown on Hong Kong. On 22 March 2021, in conjunction with the European Union, United Kingdom and Canada, the United States imposed sanctions against Chinese officials in relation to the human rights violations in Xinjiang. The sanctions marked the first time the Biden administration took such coordinated action against Beijing. On 8 April 2021, the US Commerce Department added seven Chinese supercomputing entities to its Entity List on national security grounds. This was the first action taken by the Biden administration to restrict Chinese access to US technology. On 3 June 2021, Biden signed Executive Order 14032 which saw the expansion of Executive Order 13959 signed by the Trump administration as preventing American investors from investing in Chinese companies identified by the US government as having ties to Chinese People's Liberation Army, China's military or Mass surveillance in China, surveillance industry. On 13 June 2021, leaders from the G7 democracies sharply criticized China for a series of abuses. The G7 nations—the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Canada and Japan—had been hesitant about acting separately. Pressured by US President Joe Biden, they unanimously agreed on a sharp criticism, followed the next day by a similar strong unanimous attack by NATO members. The criticisms focused on the mistreatment of the Muslim Uyghur minority, the systematic destruction of democracy in Hong Kong, repeated military threats against Taiwan, unfair trade practices, and lack of transparency regarding the origins of COVID-19. China rejected the criticism as interference in what it considers to be its internal policy matters. In August 2021, China tested a nuclear-capable Hypersonic flight, hypersonic missile, hypothesized as part of a Fractional Orbital Bombardment System, that circled the globe before speeding towards its target. The ''Financial Times'' reported that "the test showed that China had made astounding progress on hypersonic weapons and was far more advanced than US officials realized." On 18 August, while discussing the larger ramifications of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan on cross-strait relations, Biden said that the two cases were incomparable as the United States had an Article Five commitment to defend Taiwan. The remarks, which were the first by Biden to touch directly on US policy towards Taiwan, were interpreted as signalling a shift in the country's position of strategic ambiguity. A Biden administration official later said there had been no change to US policy on Taiwan, and analysts said Biden appeared to have mischaracterized America's defense commitment to Taiwan. On 15 September 2021, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia formed AUKUS. Australia will be provided with conventionally-armed submarines powered by nuclear energy. See SSN-AUKUS. These submarines will be based on Britain's advanced nuclear submarine design and will incorporate the latest technology from the United States. The partnership involves the construction and utilization of these submarines by both the U.K. and Australia. The long-term strategic goal is to help neutralize Chinese military expansion to the South. China has denounced the agreement as "extremely irresponsible". In November 2021, the United States updated its assessment of China's nuclear weapon stockpile, showing that China will have 700 nuclear warheads by 2027, and that number will reach 1,000 by 2030. Biden held his first virtual meeting with Xi on 15 November 2021. On 24 November 2021, the Biden administration invited Taiwan to attend the 'Summit for Democracy' - to be held in December 2021. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China, China's Foreign Ministry reacted by saying it was "firmly opposed" to the invitation. On 2 December 2021, the US Securities and Exchange Commission finalized rules which would enable it to delist Chinese firms which have been determined to be non-compliant with the disclosure requirements as stipulated in the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act from US stock exchanges. On 6 December 2021, the United States announced that its diplomats would Concerns and controversies at the 2022 Winter Olympics#United States, boycott the Beijing Olympics. On 23 December 2021, Biden signed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act into law. On 27 December 2021, Biden signed his first defense bill National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022, into law. Certain provisions of the act called for the enhancements to the security of Taiwan, including inviting the Taiwanese navy to the 2022 Rim of the Pacific Exercise, Rim of the Pacific exercise in the face of "increasingly coercive and aggressive behavior" by China. On 27 February 2022, the White House urged China to condemn 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia's invasion of Ukraine. China accused the United States of being responsible for the war in Ukraine. On 18 March 2022, Joe Biden and Xi Jinping directly communicated with each other for the first time since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In May 2022, Chinese officials ordered government agencies and state-backed companies to remove personal computers produced by American corporations and replace them with equipment from domestic companies. Bloomberg said the decision was one of China's most aggressive moves to eliminate the usage of foreign technology from the most sensitive parts of its government and spur its campaign to substitute foreign technology with domestic ones. In late May 2022, the State Department restored a line on its fact sheet on US-Taiwan relations which it removed earlier in the month and stated it did not support Taiwanese independence. However, another line which was also removed in the earlier fact sheet that acknowledged China's sovereignty claims over Taiwan was not restored while a line that stated the US would maintain its capacity to resist any efforts by China to undermine the security, sovereignty and prosperity of Taiwan in a manner that was consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act was added to the updated fact sheet. On 11 June 2022, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin condemned China's "provocative, destabilising" military activity near Taiwan, a day after China's Defence Minister Wei Fenghe warned Austin that "if anyone dares to split Taiwan from China, the Chinese army will definitely not hesitate to start a war no matter the cost." In July 2022, speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi announced that she would be leading a congressional delegation to the Indo-Pacific region. She has planned to visit Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan, as well as the island of Taiwan. China has responded to this by saying "it would constitute a gross interference in China's internal affairs", and continued military exercises within Chinese territories. When 2022 visit by Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan, Pelosi visited the island the following month, the act was strongly condemned by China. As a result, China severed ties in all cooperation activities with the United States in several areas, including military matters, global climate cooperation, and drug trafficking enforcement. Later the State Department summoned Chinese ambassadors to complain about Chinese aggression. China claimed that the Pelosi visit served no other purpose than to provoke China and to deteriorate Sino-American relations while the United States, pointing to past precedent, said that Pelosi had the right to visit Taiwan and attacked the Chinese response as disproportionate. After Pelosi's departure, the PRC began 2022 Chinese military exercises around Taiwan, military exercises encircling Taiwan. On 7 October 2022, the US implemented new United States New Export Controls on Advanced Computing and Semiconductors to China, export controls targeting China's ability to access and develop advanced computing and semiconductor manufacturing items. The new export controls reflect the United States' ambition to counter the accelerating advancement of China's high-tech capabilities in these spaces to address foreign policy and national security concerns. On 14 November 2022, Joe Biden and Xi Jinping met on the sidelines of the 2022 G20 Bali summit, G20 summit in Bali for their first in-person encounter since Biden became president. The meeting lasted for more than 3 hours and they discussed a range of issues which included tensions over Taiwan and North Korea, and the war in Ukraine. Some geoeconomics experts see an acceleration of the US–China rivalry as "inevitable" given the tensions manifested openly in the last months of 2022 and early 2023. In a series of interviews with BBC News and Asharq News, Nicolas Firzli, director, Singapore Forum, EU ASEAN Centre, argued that "Cold War 2 with China [was] part of the Biden Doctrine, and the only remaining point of convergence between Biden and a Republic dominated Congress [...] January 2023 is the moment when things crystalized irreversibly". On 2 February 2023, 2023 Chinese balloon incident, a Chinese reconnaissance balloon was spotted flying over US airspace in the state of Montana, potentially to collect information related to nuclear silos in the area. Two days later, the United States shot it down over the Atlantic Ocean, citing national security concerns. The balloon incident followed previous Chinese government actions targeting the U.S., including the Chinese espionage in the United States, Chinese theft of the designs for the F-35 about fifteen years earlier and successful Chinese government-sponsored Office of Personnel Management data breach, cyberattacks targeting the Office of Personnel Management security clearance files (2015), the Anthem medical data breach, healthcare company Anthem (2015), and the Marriott International system (2018). In 2022, the US and its allies imposed stringent additional export controls on the sale of "foundational technologies" (including Semiconductor device fabrication, advanced semiconductor chips and related technology) to China, with the aim of inhibiting any Chinese military buildup. The Biden administration has also sought to maintain critical-sector supply chains independent from China. The Beijing government expressed strong dissatisfaction and protest against the US's use of force, calling it a violation of international practice. The US claimed the balloon was a violation of its sovereignty. On 11 February 2023, the US Commerce Department prohibited six Chinese companies connected to the aerospace programs of the Chinese army from acquiring US technology without authorization from the government. These six businesses include Nanjiang Aerospace Technology of Beijing; The 48th Research Institute of China Electronics Technology Group Corporation; Technology for Dongguan Lingkong Remote Sensing; Aviation Science and Technology Group of the Eagles Men; Tian-Hai-Xiang Aviation Technology in Guangzhou; together with the Shanxi Eagles Men Aviation Science and Technology Group. In April 2023, China sanctioned US Representative Michael McCaul in response to a legislative trip for Taiwanese President
Tsai Ing-wen Tsai Ing-wen (; pinyin: ''Cài Yīngwén''; born 31 August 1956) is a Taiwanese politician and legal scholar who served as the seventh president of the Republic of China (Taiwan) from 2016 to 2024. A member of the Democratic Progressive Party ...
. In May 2023, an American citizen living in Hong Kong named John Shing-Wan Leung was sentenced to life in prison on charges of espionage. Leung was arrested in 2021 by China's counterintelligence agency. On 23 September 2024,The Biden administration is banning Chinese software from U.S. internet-connected vehicles, citing national security risks. This move builds on previous actions against Chinese tech, deepening the digital divide between the two nations.


Attempts to fix relationship (2023–2024)

In mid-2023, both countries started to increase meetings between high-level officials in the hope of stabilizing the relationship; on 11 May, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan met with Wang Yi (politician), Wang Yi, director of the Office of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission, with the topics including Taiwan and Russia's invasion of Ukraine. On 21 May, Biden commented during the 47th G7 summit, G7 summit in Hiroshima that he expected a thaw in relations with China soon, commenting that the two countries were moving towards more dialogue but "this silly balloon that was carrying two freight cars worth of spy equipment was flying over the United States and it got shot down and everything changed in terms of talking to one another". On 26 May, Chinese minister of commerce Wang Wentao met with US secretary of commerce Gina Raimondo, where Raimondo raised concerns about treatment of US companies by China. US officials also announced in June that Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director William J. Burns (diplomat), William J. Burns travelled to China in May. However, a meeting in the Shangri-La Dialogue between Chinese minister of national defense Li Shangfu and US secretary of defense Lloyd Austin failed to take place, after China rebuffed US requests to meet. In late June 2023, Blinken traveled to China and met with Xi; subsequent public statements by both countries were largely positive, with Xi and Blinken emphasizing that both sides have a responsibility to manage relations. However, relations became more contentious after Biden called Xi a "dictator". The trips further continued as between 6–9 July, United States secretary of treasury Janet Yellen visited China, her first trip to the country during her tenure as well as the first trip to the country by a US Treasury secretary in four years. During the visit, she met with various Chinese officials, including former vice premier Liu He (politician), Liu He, governor of the People's Bank of China (PBC) Yi Gang, minister of finance Liu Kun, CCP secretary of PBC Pan Gongsheng, vice premier He Lifeng, and premier Li Qiang. During her visit to, Yellen criticized China's treatment of American companies with foreign connections, stating to Li Qiang: "We seek healthy economic competition that is not winner-take-all but that, with a fair set of rules, can benefit both countries over time." She also said that the US national security restrictions on investment in China were intended to be narrowly focused and not have broad effects on the Chinese economy. On 13 July 2023, Secretary of State Antony Blinken met the Director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (politician), Wang Yi in Jakarta at the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference at the request of Blinken to discuss the removal of obstacles that complicate US-China relations, such as the Taiwan question and sanctions the U.S. is imposing against China's high-technology sector, as well as to promote the pragmatic approach with regard to regional cooperation. Former Minister of Foreign Affairs of China Qin Gang had just been replaced by his predecessor Wang Yi (politician), Wang Yi due to an extramarital affair of Gang in July of the same year. This meeting also paved the way for a further encounter of China's top diplomat Wang Yi before year's end when he will be invited to meet Blinken in Washington DC. Later on the sidelines of the U.N General Assembly (UNGA) in NY on 26 September, Vice-president Han Zheng met with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to further nurture the strained bilateral ties of both superpowers. The absence of Xi-Jinping at the 2023 G20 New Delhi summit in India on 9 and 10 September was regretful, according to a statement by U.S. President Joe Biden, however, recent news reports indicate that both CCP General Secretary Xi as well as CCP Foreign Affairs Commission Office Director Wang Yi will meet Biden and Blinken before year's end to hopefully ease the strained relations between the two nations. Yellen's visit was followed by a visit by United States secretary of commerce Gina Raimondo between 27 and 30 August, where she met minister of culture and tourism Hu Heping, minister of commerce Wang Wentao, vice premier He Lifeng, and premier Li Qiang. Raimondo also visited Shanghai, where she met with Shanghai Communist Party secretary Chen Jining, and visited Shanghai Disneyland. During the meeting, the two sides announced a working group on commercial issues and an export control enforcement “information exchange” dialogue. The working group, upon its launch on 22 September 2023, was divided into two segments: one economic subgroup and one financial subgroup. On 2 November 2023, a report from the Wall Street Journal was released saying that the U.S. and China would hold nuclear arms talks, a rarity, ahead of Xi Jinping's visit to the United States. At the beginning of November 2023, insiders cautiously expressed hope for a climate agreement between China and
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
ahead of the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, similar to the agreement of 2014 which paved the way for the Paris Agreement. One contentious topic is a plan for reduction of methane emissions in China. According to China's climate envoy Xie Zhenhua (politician), Xie Zhenhua "progress on a plan reflected the state of US-China relations." Another is a reduction in Coal in China, coal use in China. China says it expands coal use for improving energy security, even though many think there are better ways to improve it. Talks between Janet Yellen and He Lifeng yielded a decision to enhance cooperation between China and the United States in several domains, including Climate change, climate, debt relief. Much is expected from the meeting between Joe Biden and Xi Jinping. According to Kate Logan from the Asia Society Policy Institute, cooperation between the 2 countries, can "set the stage for a successful outcome at the COP28". On 15 November 2023, President Joe Biden met with Xi Jinping at the APEC United States 2023, 2023 APEC Summit in San Francisco. This was speculated to be their last meeting of 2023 before Biden's Joe Biden 2024 presidential campaign, 2024 reelection campaign. The US and China resumed semi-official nuclear arms talks in March 2024, with China reassuring the US it wouldn't use nuclear weapons over Taiwan and reaffirming its no-first-use policy. Despite broader tensions, both sides plan to continue discussions in 2025. In October 2024 American drone maker Skydio was sanctioned by China after its products were approved for use by fire departments in Taiwan. The Chinese government forbade components suppliers and other businesses in China from doing business with Skydio. In November 2024, John Moolenaar, chairman of the United States House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, introduced legislation to revoke Permanent normal trade relations, PNTR status for the People's Republic of China. The same month, the United States–China Economic and Security Review Commission unanimously recommended revocation of China's PNTR status. On 16 November 2024, Xi Jinping and Joe Biden discussed stabilizing U.S.-China relations at APEC Peru 2024, APEC Summit in Lima, as Trump's return raises concerns over potential trade and Taiwan tensions. Beijing seeks dialogue but braces for challenges. On 1 December 2024, China condemned a U.S. arms sale to Taiwan, valued at $385 million, which included F-16 jet parts and radar support. The sale was approved by the U.S. just before Lai Ching-te began a Pacific tour with stops in Hawaii and Guam. China criticized the sale for encouraging Taiwan's independence and damaging U.S.-China relations, and objected to Lai's U.S. transit, calling him a "separatist." Despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties, the U.S. is required by law to assist Taiwan in defending itself, which continues to provoke Beijing. Taiwan rejects China's claims of sovereignty. After Washington announced more military aid and sales to Taiwan, China called it "playing with fire" and said such actions by the United States contradict the solemn commitments of its leaders not to support Taiwan independence.


Second Trump administration (2025–present)

Following his 2024 United States presidential election, second election victory as President of the United States in November 2024, Donald Trump nominated Florida Senator Marco Rubio as Secretary of State and Representative Mike Waltz as National Security Advisor in his second administration. According to Neil Thomas, a fellow in Chinese politics at the Asia Society Policy Institute's Center for China Analysis, the selection of Rubio and Waltz—both known as hardliners on China—signals that Trump's foreign policy will prioritize China above all else. Just before Second inauguration of Donald Trump, Trump's second inauguration in January 2025, Vice President JD Vance and ally Elon Musk each held separate meetings with China's vice president Han Zheng, who was in Washington attending the event as China's president
Xi Jinping Xi Jinping, pronounced (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (China), chairman of the Central Military Commission ...
's special representative. Han's presence at the capitol was seen by commentators as representative of Xi's interest in strengthening the two countries' relationship under Trump's tenure. In March 2025,
Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...
denounced G7 statements accusing it of destabilizing maritime security, highlighting ongoing diplomatic friction. On 23 March 2025, Premier of China, Chinese Premier Li Qiang met with U.S. Senator Steve Daines, a Trump ally, in Beijing. Li emphasized the need for dialogue over confrontation, while Daines carried Trump's "America First (policy), America First" agenda, particularly on trade and fentanyl issues. The U.S. imposed 20% tariffs on Chinese imports, prompting Beijing to retaliate with 15% duties on American farm goods. China maintained that economic cooperation was vital and opposed U.S. pressure over fentanyl controls. Trump blamed China for the Opioid epidemic in the United States, opioid crisis in the United States. He said the tariffs are intended to pressure China to do more to stop the flow of fentanyl into the US. Opioids, predominantly fentanyl, have killed over 500,000 Americans since 2012. On 18 April, 2025, the U.S. State Department accused China’s Chang Guang Satellite Technology of providing satellite imagery to Iran-backed Houthis, Houthi forces, allegedly aiding attacks on U.S. and international vessels in the Red Sea. Officials described the support as ongoing and “unacceptable,” despite prior U.S. diplomatic engagement with Beijing. Under the directive published by the State Department of the United States, U.S. State Department in 2025, the Chinese leader should be referred to as “General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party”, rather than “President of China” reflecting the supremacy of the One-party state, party over the state. In June 2025, a majority of 119th United States Congress, U.S. senators supported secondary sanctions against Russia over Vladimir Putin's unwillingness to agree to a Peace negotiations in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, ceasefire in Ukraine, which would impose 500% Tariffs in the second Trump administration, tariffs on countries that buy Petroleum industry in Russia, Russian oil, Natural gas in Russia, natural gas, Mining industry of Russia, uranium and other exports. China is one of the major consumers of Russian energy.


2025 trade war

In April 2025, China imposed a 34% tariff on all U.S. imports, matching the rate introduced by Donald Trump, President Donald Trump earlier that week. The move came after two rounds of U.S. tariffs; each 10%; were implemented in February and March, citing China's alleged role in the fentanyl crisis. In retaliation, China also restricted exports of rare-earth elements, filed a complaint with the
World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland that regulates and facilitates international trade. Governments use the organization to establish, revise, and enforce the rules that g ...
, and blacklisted several U.S. firms. Additional measures included suspending imports from American agricultural and food producers and launching an anti-monopoly probe into DuPont, DuPont China. Analysts noted this marked a significant escalation in the ongoing trade tensions, reducing prospects for near-term diplomatic resolution. Trump threatened to impose an additional 50% tariff on Chinese goods on 9 April if China did not withdraw its retaliatory measure of a 34% tariff on all US goods by 8 April. This would boost the effective 54% tariffs on China on 9 April to 104%. China responded with retaliatory tariffs of 84% on US goods. In response, Trump increased tariffs on Chinese goods to 125% on the same day. However, the White House clarified the next day that the tariff rate had risen to 145%. China, in retaliation, announced an increase in tariffs on all American imports from the previous 84% to 125%, set to take effect on 12 April. The US later announced reciprocal tariffs will exclude consumer electronics from tariffs from most countries, but retained a 20% tariff on electronics from China. On 10 May 2025, Trump declared a ‘total reset’ in US-China trade relations after tariff talks in
Geneva Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...
. According to transcripts, witnesses saw both delegations returning after a lunch break to an UN ambassador’s villa in Cologny. On 12 May 2025, the United States and China agreed to for a period of 90 days, reduce their tariff rates from 145% to 30% and 125% to 10% respectively by 14 May, while further negotiations take place. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant stated that the "somewhat stalled" US-China trade talks necessitate direct communication between the leaders of both countries, especially as the US implements technology restrictions on China.


Economic relations

As part of Foreign-exchange reserves of China, China's foreign-exchange reserves, China has a preference for dollar-denominated assets, including United States Treasury security, United States treasury securities. In turn, the United States benefits because it lacks the National saving, domestic savings to fund its National debt of the United States, budget deficit. After the
2008 financial crisis The 2008 financial crisis, also known as the global financial crisis (GFC), was a major worldwide financial crisis centered in the United States. The causes of the 2008 crisis included excessive speculation on housing values by both homeowners ...
, Chinese policymakers and the general public viewed China's holdings of US debt as unwisely overexposing China to volatility. China remains a major holder of United States treasury securities, although the amount has decreased as of at least 2022. In trade matters, the United States has benefitted from China's demand for United States export products, which grew rapidly from 2000 to at least 2021. As of 2021, China was the third largest market for United States export merchandise. Inexpensive Chinese exports to the United States increase the purchasing power of American consumers and American business profits. Both countries are benefitted by the demand for their respective exports to the other. In 1991, China only accounted for 1% of total imports to the United States. For many years, China was the most important country which required an annual waiver to maintain free trade status. The waiver for the PRC had been in effect since 1980. Every year between 1989 and 1999, legislation was introduced in Congress to disapprove the President's waiver. The legislation had sought to tie free trade with China to meeting certain
human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
conditions that go beyond freedom of emigration. All such attempted legislation failed to pass. The requirement of an annual waiver was inconsistent with the rules of the
World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland that regulates and facilitates international trade. Governments use the organization to establish, revise, and enforce the rules that g ...
(WTO), and for the PRC to join the WTO, congressional action was needed to grant permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) to China. This was accomplished in 2000 (United States–China Relations Act of 2000), allowing China to join WTO in 2001. China's most favoured nation (MFN) status was made permanent on 27 December 2001. Since the China and the World Trade Organization, entry of China into the WTO in December 2001, the decline in Manufacturing in the United States, U.S. manufacturing jobs has accelerated (the China shock). The Economic Policy Institute estimated that the trade deficit with China cost about 2.7 million jobs between 2001 and 2011, including manufacturing and other industries. The PRC and the US resumed trade relations in 1972 and 1973. Direct investment by the US in mainland China covers a wide range of manufacturing sectors, several large hotel projects, restaurant chains, and petrochemicals. US companies have entered agreements establishing more than 20,000 equity joint ventures, contractual joint ventures, and wholly foreign-owned enterprises in mainland China. More than 100 US-based multinationals have projects in mainland China, some with multiple investments. Cumulative US investment in mainland China is valued at $48 billion. The US trade deficit with mainland China exceeded $350 billion in 2006 and was the United States' largest bilateral trade deficit. Some of the factors that influence the US trade deficit with mainland China include: *a shift of low-end assembly industries from newly industrialized country, newly industrialized countries in East Asia and the Asia-Pacific to mainland China. Mainland China has increasingly become the last link in a long global value chain, chain of value-added production. Because US trade data attributes the full value of a product to the final assembler, mainland Chinese value added is overcounted. Using a statistical model that eliminates these global value chain-related distortions, OECD, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and WTO researchers have concluded that the United States' measures may overstate the value of Chinese exports by as much as 35%. According to Pascal Lamy: "The statistical bias created by attributing commercial value to the last country of origin perverts the true economic dimension of the bilateral trade imbalances. This affects the political debate, and leads to misguided perceptions. Take the bilateral deficit between China and the US. A series of estimates based on true domestic content can cut the overall deficit – which was $252bn in November 2010 – by half, if not more." *US demand for labor-intensive goods exceeds domestic output: the PRC has restrictive trade practices in mainland China, which include a wide array of barriers to foreign goods and services, often aimed at protecting state-owned enterprises. These practices include high tariffs, lack of transparency, requiring firms to obtain special permission to import goods, inconsistent application of laws and regulations, and leveraging technology from foreign firms in return for market access. Mainland China's accession to the WTO is meant to help address these barriers. *the undervaluation of the Renminbi relative to the United States dollar. Beginning in 2009, the US and China agreed to hold regular high-level talks about economic issues and other mutual concerns by establishing the Strategic Economic Dialogue, which meets biannually. Five meetings have been held, the most recent in December 2008. Economic nationalism seems to be rising in both countries, a point the leaders of the two delegations noted in their opening presentations. The United States and China have also established the high-level US-China Senior Dialogue to discuss international political issues and work out resolutions. In September 2009 a trade dispute emerged between the United States and China, which came after the US imposed tariffs of 35 percent on Chinese tire imports. The Chinese commerce minister accused the United States of a "grave act of trade protectionism", while an Office of the United States Trade Representative, USTR spokesperson said the tariff "was taken precisely in accordance with the law and our international trade agreements". Additional issues were raised by both sides in subsequent months. When a country joins the
World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland that regulates and facilitates international trade. Governments use the organization to establish, revise, and enforce the rules that g ...
they commit to keep their tariffs beneath the bound tariff rate, bound rate, which is generally around 39 percent. China's reaction is due to the fact that nations usually keep their tariffs at an average of 9 percent, but when the US raised their Tariff on Chinese imported tires to 35 percent, it was still below the average bound rate. In early 2012, a Rare earths trade dispute, dispute over rare earth minerals was brought into the light between the two countries. Barack Obama, President Obama made an announcement that the United States would be one of a few countries to file a trade dispute with China. Amongst the United States, Japan and other Western European countries would also be filing disputes as well. This is simply just one of few disputes between the United States and China. It is believed by many experts, including Chris Isidore, a writer for CNN Money, that "any one of the disputes could damage the economies of both countries as well as the relationship between them". The dispute was filed, and China was charged with putting unfair restrictions on the exportation of rare earth minerals. These minerals were crucial and in high demand by all countries. President Obama believed the United States should have those minerals in the United States whereas China disagreed. China denied all of the said charges brought forth "saying its rules are defensible on grounds of environmental and economic sustainability, and suggests there would be consequences if the United States presses the case." It is important to understand the relationship between the United States and China, especially economically. There is not one without the other. China's state news agency commented that "past experiences have shown that policymakers in Washington should treat such issues with more prudence, because maintaining sound Sino-American trade relations is in the fundamental interests of both sides" China was the biggest trading partner of the United States until 2019, when it dropped to the third place because of the ongoing China–United States trade war, trade war. In November 2021, US producer Venture Global LNG signed a twenty-year contract with China's state-owned Sinopec to supply liquefied natural gas (LNG). China's imports of US natural gas will more than double. US exports of liquefied natural gas to China and other Continental Asian countries 2021 global energy crisis, surged in 2021, with Continental Asian buyers willing to pay higher prices than European importers. On 25 March 2023, Apple CEO Tim Cook made an official visit to Beijing to attend the China Development Forum. Cook praised China's innovation, and long history of cooperation with Apple Inc. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Apple supplier Foxconn was heavily disrupted by workers protesting China's zero-COVID policies. Cook also presented an expanded rural education program for 100 million yuan (currency), yuan to further improve the skill-set of Chinese workers. Between 2020 and 2023, 70% of all Rare earth industry in China, rare earth compounds and metals imported into the United States came from China. China produces 90% of the world's rare-earth elements. On 13 September 2024, the Biden administration finalized the increases of Economic policy of the Joe Biden administration, tariffs on Chinese exports. Tariffs increased to 100% on Electric vehicle industry in China, electric vehicles, 50% on solar cells and 25% on Electric vehicle battery, electric vehicle batteries, critical minerals, steel, and aluminum. In February 2025, Donald Trump signed an executive order that directed the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to restrict Chinese investment in strategic economic areas. Premier Li Qiang emphasized the need for open markets and fair competition, while the U.S. accused China of unfair trade practices and inadequate fentanyl control efforts.


Currency dispute

China engaged in currency manipulation from 2003 to 2014. Economist C. Fred Bergsten, writing for the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said that, during this period, "China bought more than $300 billion annually to resist upward movement of its currency by artificially keeping the exchange rate of the dollar strong and the renminbi's exchange rate weak. China's competitive position was thus strengthened by as much as 30 to 40 percent at the peak of the intervention. Currency manipulation explained most of China's large trade surpluses, which reached a staggering 10 percent of its entire GDP in 2007."C. Fred Bergsten
China is No Longer Manipulating its Currency
Peterson Institute for International Economics (18 November 2016).
China's currency manipulation was a point of conflict with the United States. Domestic leaders within the United States pressured the Obama administration to take a hardline stance against China and compel China to raise the value of its currency, and legislation was introduced to the United States Congress calling on the President to impose tariffs on Chinese imports until China properly values its currency. Nonetheless, the United States was not willing to label China as a "currency manipulator" at that time, on the theory that doing so would risk China's cooperation on other issues. In 2014, China stopped manipulating its currency,Paul Wiseman
Fact check: Does China manipulate its currency?
Associated Press (29 December 2016).
as the growth in the Chinese economy slowed and Chinese investors made more investments outside the country, leading to a drop in the yuan's value in relation to the dollar, as well as a decline in China's reserves. In August 2019, five years after China had stopped manipulating its currency, the United States Department of the Treasury, US Treasury designated China as a currency manipulator. Some US analysts characterized the belated designation as "embarrassing", "without factual basis", or "a stretch". On 13 January 2020, the United States removed the designation as part of the Phase One efforts to reach a deal on the trade war.


Important issues

Relations between the two world powers have historically been stable, punctuated by several periods of open conflict, most notably during the
Korean War The Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) was an armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula fought between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea; DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; ROK) and their allies. North Korea was s ...
and the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...
. The United States and China have mutual environmental, political, economic, and security interests, such as climate change and the nuclear proliferation, non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, but there remain perennial concerns, such as human rights in China, as well as cross-strait relations and the US's attitude towards the One China, One China policy. China is the second largest foreign creditor of the United States, after Japan. Chinese expansionism, China's expansion in the Indo-Pacific has triggered pushback from the US and its partners in the region. The two countries remain in dispute over South China Sea disputes, territorial issues in the South China Sea; China claims sovereignty over large swaths of the
South China Sea The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by South China, in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan island, Taiwan and northwestern Philippines (mainly Luz ...
; the United States instead sees much of this ocean as international waters, and as such claims Freedom of navigation, the right of its warships and aircraft to conduct military operations within them.


Military spending and planning

China's investment in its military is growing rapidly; the United States remains convinced that the PRC conceals the real extent of this expansion, a view shared by many independent analysts. China claims it spent a total of $45 billion over the course of 2007, an average of $123 million per day. That same year, the US military spent $548.8 billion, or an average $1.66 billion per day. US estimates of Chinese military expenditure range between $85 billion and $125 billion. Concerns over the Chinese military budget may come from US worries that the PRC is attempting to threaten its neighbors or to challenge the United States. Concerns have been raised that China is developing a large naval base near the South China Sea and has diverted resources from the People's Liberation Army Ground Force to the People's Liberation Army Navy and to air force and missile development. On 27 October 2009, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates praised the steps China has taken to increase transparency of defense spending. In June 2010, however, he said that the Chinese military was resisting efforts to improve military-to-military relations with the United States. Gates also said that the United States would "assert freedom of navigation" in response to Chinese complaints about US Navy deployments in international waters near China. Admiral Michael Mullen said that the United States sought closer military ties to China but would continue to operate in the western Pacific Ocean, Pacific. James R. Holmes, a specialist on China at the US Naval War College, has said that China's investments towards a potential future conflict are closer to those of the United States than may first appear because the Chinese understate their spending, the internal price structures of the two countries are different, and the Chinese need to concentrate only on projecting military force a short distance from their own shores. The balance may shift to the advantage of the Chinese very quickly if they continue double-digit annual growth, and the US and their allies cut back. In line with power transition theory, the idea that "wars tend to break out... when the upward trajectory of a rising power comes close to intersecting the downward trajectory of a American decline, declining power," some political scientists and international relations scholars have argued that a potential conflict between China, an Potential superpower#China, emerging power, and the United States, the current superpower, is all but inevitable. Many academics disagree with applying power transition theory to the China-U.S. relationship. Robert Art states that these perspectives generally ignore China's peaceful rise strategy. Steve Chan concludes that the China-U.S. power transition will be more similar to the United Kingdom–United States relations, U.K.-U.S. power transition than the Germany–United Kingdom relations, Anglo-German power transition in which World War I arose. On 29 March 2024, the Biden administration revised rules aimed at Artificial Intelligence Cold War, restricting China's access to U.S. artificial intelligence (AI) chips and chipmaking tools, including those from Nvidia, as part of Artificial intelligence arms race, efforts to address national security concerns over Beijing's tech advancements potentially aiding its military.


Taiwan issue

Since the renewal of US-China relations in early 1979, the Taiwan issue remained a major source of contention. After the announcement of the intention to establish diplomatic relations with China, Mainland China (PRC) on 15 December 1978, the Taiwan, Republic of China (Taiwan) immediately condemned the United States, leading to rampant protests in both Taiwan and in the US. In April 1979, the US Congress signed into law the
Taiwan Relations Act The Taiwan Relations Act (TRA; ) is an Act of Congress, act of the United States Congress. Since the Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations, formal recognition of the China, People's Republic of China, the Act has defined ...
, permitting unofficial relations with Taiwan to flourish and granting the right to provide Taiwan with List of US arms sales to Taiwan, arms of a defensive character. Its passage prompted Deng to begin to view the United States as an insincere partner willing to abandon its prior commitments to China. The expanding relationship that followed normalization was threatened in 1981 by PRC objections to the level of US arms sales to the Republic of China on Taiwan. Secretary of State Alexander Haig visited China in June 1981 in an effort to resolve Chinese concerns about America's unofficial relations with Taiwan. Vice President Bush visited the PRC in May 1982. Eight months of negotiations produced the US-PRC Joint Communiqué of 17 August 1982. In this third communiqué, the US stated its intention to gradually reduce the level of arms sales to the Republic of China, and the PRC described as a fundamental policy their effort to strive for a peaceful resolution to the political status of Taiwan, Taiwan question. When
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
won the 2016 United States presidential election, 2016 presidential election, contention over the Taiwan issue intensified; President Trump became the first sitting US president since Jimmy Carter in 1979 to have any formal political or diplomatic contacts with Taiwan when he decided to receive a phone call from president Tsai Ing-wen, Tsai Ing-Wen. Trump expanded the duties of the US' ''de facto'' embassy in Taipei - the American Institute in Taiwan - by adding more security personnel, and oversaw increasing non-diplomatic visits of Tsai Ing-Wen and Congressmen to each other's countries/regions. In addition, American warships reportedly crossed the Taiwan strait and increased military drills with Taiwan, which mainland China views as a direct threat to its sovereignty. Chinese leader Xi Jinping told European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in April 2023 that the United States was trying to trick China into attacking Taiwan, but he would not take the bait. Tensions persist over Taiwan, with China conducting military drills in March 2025 following U.S. statements on Taiwanese sovereignty.


Human rights

In 2003, the United States declared that despite some positive momentum that year and despite greater signs which showed that the People's Republic of China was willing to engage in discussions about human rights with the US and other nations, there was still serious democratic backsliding, backsliding. In principle, China has acknowledged the importance of the protection of human rights and it has claimed that it has taken steps to bring its own human rights practices into conformity with international norms. Among those steps are China's signing of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in October 1997, which was ratified in March 2001, and China's signing of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in October 1998, which has not been ratified yet. In 2002, China released a significant number of political and religious prisoners and it also agreed to hold discussions about torture, arbitrary detention, and religion with UN experts. However, international human rights groups assert that there has been virtually no movement with regard to those promises, with more people having been arrested for similar offences since then. Those groups maintain that China still has a long way to go in instituting the kind of fundamental systemic change that will protect the rights and liberties of all its citizens in mainland China. The US State Department publishes an annual report on human rights around the world, which includes an evaluation of China's human rights record. In a decision that was criticized by human rights groups, the United States State Department did not list China as one of the world's worst human rights violators United States' Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, in its 2007 report of human rights practices in countries and regions outside the United States. However, the assistant secretary of the State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Jonathan D. Farrar stated that China's overall human rights record in 2007 remained poor. Since 1998, China has annually published a Human Rights Record of the United States, White Paper detailing the human rights abuses by the United States and since 2005 has also published a White Paper on its own political system and democratic progress. On 27 February 2014, the United States released its United States' Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, China report on human rights practices for 2013, which, according to its executive summary, described the PRC as an authoritarian state and a place in which repression and coercion were routine. On 28 February 2014, China published a report on human rights in the United States that cited Mass surveillance in the United States, surveillance on its own citizens, Human rights in the United States#Prison system, mistreatment of inmates, gun violence, and homelessness, despite having a vibrant economy, as important issues. American criticism of China on human rights, especially on the issue of the Xinjiang internment camps, significantly expanded at the end of 2018 and in 2019. In March 2019, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo indirectly compared China to the Nazi Germany by saying that the roundup of Muslim minorities to into camps had not been seen "since the 1930s". In May 2019, the United States government accused China of putting
Uyghurs The Uyghurs,. alternatively spelled Uighurs, Uygurs or Uigurs, are a Turkic peoples, Turkic ethnic group originating from and culturally affiliated with the general region of Central Asia and East Asia. The Uyghurs are recognized as the ti ...
in "concentration camps". The US government has also considered sanctioning Chinese officials involved in the camps, including Chen Quanguo, the Chinese Communist Party Committee Secretary of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, Xinjiang and a member of the 19th Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party although no CCP Politburo member has ever been sanctioned by the US government. In July 2019, Vice President of the United States, Vice President Mike Pence accused China of persecuting Christianity in China, Christians, Islam in China, Muslims and Chinese Buddhism, Buddhists. On 4 October 2019, the Houston Rockets' general manager, Daryl Morey, issued a tweet that supported the 2019–20 Hong Kong protests. Morey's tweet resulted in the Chinese Basketball Association's suspension of its relationship with the Houston Rockets and the issuance of a statement of dissatisfaction from the consulate office of China in Houston. On 6 October, both Morey and the NBA issued separate statements addressing the original tweet. Morey said that he never intended his tweet to cause any offense, and the NBA said the tweet was "regrettable". The statements were criticized by US politicians and third-party observers for the perceived exercise of economic statecraft by the PRC and insufficiency of the NBA's defense of Morey's tweet.Some relevant sources include: * * * * * * * * * Critics also contrasted the league's disparate response to Morey's tweet with its history of political activismSome relevant sources include: * * * * * * The statements also drew criticism from PRC state-run media for their perceived insufficiency, as Morey did not apologize. In June 2020, the White House on 31st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown, asked Beijing to respect human rights, carry out its due commitments on Hong Kong, as well as flog persecution of ethnic and religious minorities. On 9 July 2020, the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
announced US Sanctions, sanctions against Chinese politicians, who as per its record were responsible for human rights violations against Uyghurs, Muslim minorities in
Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...
. On 20 July 2020, US government sanctioned 11 new List of companies of China, Chinese companies from purchasing American technology and products over human rights violations in China targeting
Uyghurs The Uyghurs,. alternatively spelled Uighurs, Uygurs or Uigurs, are a Turkic peoples, Turkic ethnic group originating from and culturally affiliated with the general region of Central Asia and East Asia. The Uyghurs are recognized as the ti ...
in the
Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...
region. Many American companies, including Delta Air Lines, Coach New York, Marriott International, Calvin Klein and Tiffany & Co. have apologized to China after "offending" the country and China's ruling Communist Party. On 15 September 2020, the US government decided to take steps to block some exports from Xinjiang, over the country's alleged human rights abuses directed mostly against Uyghurs of the region. In 2020, Chinese diplomats increasingly adopted " wolf warrior diplomacy" to deny all accusations of human rights abuses. Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian tweeted that as long as the US had problems itself, it "had no right" to criticize China on human rights abuses. On 19 January 2021, Mike Pompeo officially declared that China is committing a 21st century genocides#Allegations of genocide against Uyghurs, genocide against Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region. Pompeo called for "all appropriate multilateral and relevant juridical bodies, to join the United States in our effort to promote accountability for those responsible for these atrocities". Salih Hudayar, the prime minister of the East Turkistan Government-in-Exile (who claim to be the legitimate government of Xinjiang), has said, "We hope that this designation will lead to real strong actions to hold China accountable and bring an end to China's genocide." On 20 January 2021, China imposed sanctions against outgoing US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, secretary of health and human services Alex Azar, former under secretary of state Keith J. Krach, outgoing US ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft, and 24 other former Trump officials. Biden's United States National Security Council, National Security Council called the sanctions "unproductive and cynical". In his nomination hearing, Blinken endorsed Pompeo's report that China is committing a genocide against Uyghurs, reaffirming Biden's campaign stance. On 31 October 2022, the United States, on behalf of 50 countries, delivered a joint statement to the UN General Assembly Third Committee expressing concern over human rights violations against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang, citing UN findings of arbitrary and discriminatory detention and urging China to meet its international obligations.


Competition for regional influence

China's economic rise has led to some geo-political friction between the US and China in East Asia as well as to an extent in Southeast Asia and in Central Asia including Afghanistan. For example, in response to China's response to the bombardment of Yeonpyeong by North Korea, "Washington is moving to redefine its relationship with South Korea and Japan, potentially creating an anti-China bloc in Northeast Asia that officials say they don't want but may need." The Chinese government fears a conspiracy by the US to encircle it. China and the United States have recently led competing efforts to gain Influence in East Asian and the Greater Asian-Pacific trade and development. In 2015, China led the creation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank with the goal of financing projects that would spur the development of the lower-tier Asian economies, thus facilitating improved economic ties across the region. It has been suggested that the United States considered the AIIB to be a challenge to the US-backed Asian Development Bank and the World Bank and saw the Chinese effort as an attempt to set the global economic agenda on terms that would be formulated by the Chinese government. The Obama administration led an effort to enact the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, a multilateral trade pact between a number of Pacific Rim countries, which excluded China. According to the US Trade Representative, the agreement was designed to "promote economic growth; support the creation and retention of jobs; enhance innovation, productivity and competitiveness; raise living standards; reduce poverty in the signatories' countries; and promote transparency, good governance, and enhanced labor and environmental protections." The Partnership was anticipated to impose costs on businesses dependent on regional markets. The deal was placed on hold after the US withdrew from the agreement on 23 January 2017. The efforts are among the attempts by both the US and China to increase their influence over the Asia-Pacific by strengthening their economic ties within the region. In 2009, the United States requested China to open the Wakhjir Pass on the Afghanistan-China border, Sino-Afghan border as an alternative supply route for the US and NATO during their War in Afghanistan (2001-present), operations in Afghanistan. China refused the request. ASEAN and the various Southeast Asian states have responded to Chinese claims for sea areas by seeking closer relations with the United States. American Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that in spite of budget pressures, the United States would expand its influence in the region to counter China's military buildup. Shared concerns in the face of China have prompted the United States to step up cooperation with China's geopolitical rivals such as India, drawing greater opposition from China. In the Chinese view, the United States has broken trust in the bilateral relationship through a containment strategy implemented via the Obama administration's East Asian foreign policy of the Barack Obama administration, pivot to East Asia and the Asia-Pacific, the development of the TPP, and the First Trump tariffs, trade war launched by the Trump administration.


Cyberwarfare and election interference

The United States Department of Justice, US Department of Justice investigation into fundraising activities uncovered evidence that Chinese agents sought to direct contributions from foreign sources to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) before the 1996 United States presidential election, 1996 presidential campaign. The Embassy of China in Washington, D.C., Chinese embassy in Washington, D.C., was used to co-ordinate contributions to the DNC. In 2014, cyberwarfare in China, Chinese hackers hacked the computer system of the US Office of Personnel Management, resulting in the Office of Personnel Management data breach, theft of approximately 22 million personnel records that were handled by the office.Hacks of OPM databases compromised 22.1 million people, federal authorities say
. ''The Washington Post.'' 9 July 2015.
Former FBI Director James Comey stated, "It is a very big deal from a national security perspective and from a counterintelligence perspective. It's a treasure trove of information about everybody who has worked for, tried to work for, or works for the United States government." In October 2018, the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee held a hearing on the threat to the US posed by China. Before the hearing, Bloomberg News, Bloomberg released an article that stated that China is embedding technology in microchips that are sent to America that collect data on American consumers. However, both FBI Director Christopher Wray and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen declined to confirm that statement. Nielsen said that China has become a major threat to the US and also confirmed, in an answer to a question from a senator, that China is trying to influence US elections. In 2019, two Chinese nationals were indicted for the Anthem medical data breach. About 80 million company records were hacked, stoking fears that the stolen data could be used for Identity theft in the United States, identity theft. In February 2020, the United States government indicted members of China's PLA for hacking into Equifax and plundering sensitive data as part of a massive heist that also included stealing trade secrets. Private records of more than 145 million Americans were compromised in the 2017 Equifax data breach. According to a report by Reuters, in 2019 the United States CIA began a clandestine campaign on Internet in China, Chinese social media to spread negative narratives about the General secretaryship of Xi Jinping, Xi Jinping administration in an effort to influence Chinese public opinion against the government. The CIA promoted narratives that CCP leaders were hiding money overseas and that the Belt and Road Initiative was corrupt and wasteful. As part of the campaign, the CIA also targeted foreign countries where the United States and China compete for influence. Voice of America reported in April 2020 that "Internet security researchers say there have already been signs that China-allied hackers have engaged in so-called "spear-phishing" attacks on American political targets" ahead of the 2020 United States elections. As of 7 July 2020, the US government was 'looking at' banning Chinese video streaming application, TikTok due to national security concerns. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the Trump administration had been aware of the potential threat and has "worked on this issue for a long time". On 19 September 2020, a complaint was filed in Washington by TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, challenging the recent moves made by the Trump administration to prevent the application from operating in the US. The court documents argued that the US government took the step for political reasons rather than to stop an "unusual and extraordinary threat". In April 2024, the House of Representatives passed a bill requiring TikTok to divest from ByteDance within 9–12 months or face a potential ban, Biden signed the bill into law soon afterwards. In December 2024, Chinese state-sponsored hackers reportedly breached the U.S. Treasury Department’s security systems, exploiting vulnerabilities in the cybersecurity services of third-party provider BeyondTrust. Using a compromised digital key, the attackers accessed a cloud-based service that provided technical support for Treasury end users, enabling them to override security measures and retrieve certain unclassified documents. Treasury officials, alerted to the breach by BeyondTrust on 8 December 2024, collaborated with the FBI and CISA to investigate the incident, which was attributed to a China-linked Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) group.


Nuclear security

The field of nuclear security (preventing nuclear material from being used to make illicit weapons) is a well-established area of successful U.S.-China cooperation. Precipitated by a 2010 Nuclear Security Summit convened by the Obama administration, China and the United States launched a number of initiatives to secure potentially dangerous, Chinese-supplied, nuclear material in countries such as Ghana or Nigeria. Through these initiatives, China and the US have converted Chinese-origin Miniature Neutron Source Reactors (MNSRs) from using highly enriched uranium to using low-enriched uranium fuel (which is not directly usable in weapons, thereby making reactors more proliferation resistant). China and the United States collaborated to build the China Center of Excellence on Nuclear Security, which opened in 2015. The center is a forum for nuclear security exchange, training, and demonstration in the Asia Pacific region. In May 2023, Chinese Defense Spokesperson Tan Kefei urged the United States to fulfill its commitments and adhere to the Chemical Weapons Convention by taking "concrete actions".


Opioid epidemic

According to the United States Drug Enforcement Agency in 2023, China continued to be the primary source of fentanyl being imported into the United States, killing over 100 Americans every day. Over a two-year period, close to $800million worth of fentanyl pills were illegally sold online to the US by Chinese distributors. The drug is usually manufactured in China, then shipped to Mexico, where it is processed and packaged, which is then smuggled into the US by Mexican drug cartels. A large amount is also purchased online and shipped through the US Postal Service. It can also be purchased directly from China, which has become a major manufacturer of various synthetic drugs illegal in the US. According to Assistant US Attorney, Matt Cronin: In June 2023, U.S. federal prosecutors announced criminal indictments of fentanyl precursor producers in China. In October 2023, Office of Foreign Assets Control, OFAC sanctioned a China-based network of fentanyl manufacturers and distributors.


COVID-19

In relation to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on politics, the Trump administration referred to the coronavirus as the "Wuhan virus", terms which have been criticized for being racist and "distract[ing] from the Trump administration's failure to contain the disease". In return, some Chinese officials, including Zhao Lijian, rejected an earlier acknowledgement of the coronavirus outbreak starting in Wuhan, in favor of Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic, conspiracy theories that the virus originated in the U.S.''The Daily Beast'' obtained a US government cable outlining a communications strategy with apparent origins in the United States National Security Council, National Security Council, quoted as "Everything is about China. We're being told to try and get this messaging out in any way possible". Multiple United States Intelligence Community, U.S. intelligence agencies have reportedly been pressured by the Trump administration to find intelligence supporting conspiracy theories regarding the origins of the virus in China. According to a New York Times report in April 2020, the United States Intelligence Community, U.S. intelligence community says China intentionally under-reported its number of coronavirus cases. Some outlets such as ''Politico'' and ''Foreign Policy'' have said China's efforts to send aid to virus-stricken countries is part of a propaganda in China, propaganda push for global influence. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned there is "a geo-political component including a struggle for influence through spinning and the 'politics of generosity'". Borrell also said "China is aggressively pushing the message that, unlike the U.S., it is a responsible and reliable partner." China has also called for the US to lift its United States sanctions, sanctions from Syria, Venezuela and Iran, while reportedly sending aid to the latter two countries. Donations of 100,000 masks to Cuba made by Chinese businessman Jack Ma was blocked by US sanctions on 3 April. Trade in medical supplies between the United States and China has also become politically complicated. Exports of face masks and other medical equipment to China from the United States (and many other countries) spiked in February, according to statistics from Trade Data Monitor, prompting criticism from ''The Washington Post'' that the United States government failed to anticipate the domestic needs for that equipment. Similarly, ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'', citing Trade Data Monitor to show that China is the leading source of many key medical supplies, raised concerns that China–United States trade war, US tariffs on imports from China threaten imports of medical supplies into the United States. By May 2020, the relationship had deteriorated to the lowest point as both sides were recruiting allies to attack the other regarding guilt for the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic.Kate O'Keeffe, Michael C. Bender and Chun Han Wong, "Coronavirus Casts Deep Chill Over U.S.-China Relations: Pandemic has brought relations between the two to a modern-day nadir as they try to outmaneuver one another to shape the world order
''The Wall Street Journal'' May 6, 2020
/ref> In September 2020, the trade war between China and the US alongside Beijing's behavior during the COVID-19 crisis combined to worsen American public opinion about China. This also affected American perceptions of China-Taiwan tensions as a serious national security concern. On 22 September 2020, President Donald Trump called on the United Nations to "hold China accountable for their actions", in a speech to the world body's General Assembly. President Trump blamed the Chinese government for the global spread of COVID-19, which had infected 31 million people worldwide and killed more than 965,000, by then. On 26 May 2021, Joe Biden tasked the US intelligence community with investigating the origins of the pandemic. By August 2021, the intelligence probe assessed that the Chinese government did not have foreknowledge of the outbreak, yet the investigation did not render conclusive results on the origins. Of eight United States Intelligence Community#Organizational structure and leadership, assembled teams, one (the Federal Bureau of Investigation) leaned towards a COVID-19 lab leak theory, lab leak theory, four others (and the National Intelligence Council) were inclined to uphold a zoonotic origin, and three were unable to reach a conclusion. In February 2023, the U.S. Department of Energy revised its previous estimate of the origin from "undecided" to "low confidence" in favor of a laboratory leak. Following the Energy Department's revised conclusion, the Chinese foreign ministry called on the United States to "stop defaming China" with the lab leak theory, adding that the US was politicizing a scientific issue. In January 2025, after John Ratcliffe (American politician), John Ratcliffe became its director, the Central Intelligence Agency revised its previous estimate of the origin from "undecided" to "low confidence" in favor of a laboratory leak. According to a report by Reuters, the United States ran a Propaganda in the United States, propaganda campaign to spread disinformation about the Sinovac Biotech, Sinovac Chinese COVID-19 vaccine, including using fake social media accounts to spread the disinformation that the Sinovac vaccine contained pork-derived ingredients and was therefore ''haram'' under Sharia, Islamic law. The campaign was described as "payback" for COVID-19 misinformation by China, COVID-19 disinformation by China directed against the U.S. The campaign primarily targeted people in the Philippines and used a social media hashtag for "China is the virus" in Tagalog language, Tagalog. The campaign ran from the spring of 2020 to mid-2021.


Clean energy and climate change

The United States and China are the highest greenhouse gas emitters among developed countries and developing countries, respectively. Clean energy and climate cooperation were generally viewed by both China and the United States as a relative safe harbor for cooperation, even during many of the most contentious periods in the bilateral relationship. A record number of bilateral cooperation agreements, including related to climate issues, were signed during the tenure of US President Barack Obama. However, cooperation on clean energy and climate change issues were also limited by lack of consistent funding and lack of dialogue at high political levels, and ended almost entirely after US President Donald Trump de-prioritized environmental issues during his term. The subsequent Joseph Biden administration ended the U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center (CERC) established under Obama. CERC had been the most ambitious clean energy cooperation platform between the two countries, and one of the few cooperation mechanisms to have survived the Trump administration. On 18 July 2023, U.S. climate envoy John Kerry emphasized the goal of redefining the China-U.S. relationship through climate cooperation. The subsequent day's discussions centered on climate financing, coal consumption, and methane reduction. Kerry's visit signifies the renewed focus on high-level climate diplomacy between the two nations. In November 2023, The representatives of the United States and China issued the "''Sunnylands Statement on Enhancing Cooperation to Address the Climate Crisis''" published immediately in both countries. The statement contains a plan of further cooperation on climate issues between the sides. In the statement both countries pledged among others to: * Make common efforts to stop climate change, limit temperature rise to 1.5 degrees as defined in the Paris agreement. * Make the common efforts as at national so at the subnational level (cooperation between districts, cities in the 2 countries) including information exchange, dialog. The 2 countries will meet regularly for discussing the problem. * Activate a US-China climate group named "''Working Group on Enhancing Climate Action in the 2020s''" that will regularly coordinate those efforts. * Push for climate action at 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference. Ensure climate finance to low income countries, including the long-awaited 100 billion dollars per year, increase 2 times adaptation finance and create new financial pledges in COP 29. * Reactivate the US-China Energy Efficiency Forum, for coordinate bilateral efforts on energy conservation in the industry, buildings, transportation, equipment sectors, including cooling equipment. * Make efforts to triple global renewable energy capacity by 2030, deploy it in the US and China replacing fossil fuels, so the emissions from energy sector will decline in the 2020s. * Reduce methane emissions and create immediately a special group dealing with this. * Manage nitrous oxide emission and implement the Kigali Amendment to zero emissions from hydrofluorocarbons. * Support efforts to achieve resource efficiency and circular economy. * End plastic pollution, fight Air pollution, * Stop and reverse deforestation by 2030, including by stopping illegal imports. * Create new, economy wide Nationally determined contribution, NDC for the year 2035, with targets, compatible with the Paris Agreement goals.


Cultural relations

The United States used to have substantial soft power in China. However, with China's rise in the 21st century, American culture has declined in popularity in China.


Cuisine


Sports

A major element of China's modern sports policy is to surpass other nations, particularly the United States, in Olympic gold medals. In the 2024 Olympics, the two countries tied at 40 gold medals.


Education

Chinese students constitute about one-quarter of international students in the US, second largest after Indians, contributing significantly to university funding. While many return to China after graduation, science and engineering doctorate holders often remain in the U.S. The number of Chinese students in the US peaked in 2019–2020 at 372,532, and has been declining significantly since. In May 2025, United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the U.S. government would "aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students, including those with connections to the
Chinese Communist Party The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
or studying in critical fields". He also announced the U.S. would increase scrutiny of all future visa applications from China and Hong Kong.


Public perceptions

Despite tensions during Barack Obama's presidency, the Chinese population's favorability of the US stood at 51% in Obama's last year of 2016, only to fall during the Trump administration. American public opinion of China and of General secretary of the Chinese Communist Party
Xi Jinping Xi Jinping, pronounced (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (China), chairman of the Central Military Commission ...
has deteriorated sharply since the start of the China–United States trade war and during the COVID-19 pandemic, with many expressing economic, human-rights, and environmental concerns. In 2024, 81% of US adults viewed China unfavorably, according to the Pew Research Center. In 2023, a Gallup, Inc., Gallup survey showed above 50% Americans are most likely to mention China as the United States’ greatest enemy in the world since 2021. In 2024, that percentage dropped to 41 percent, yet China remained the biggest enemy. A February 2023 Gallup survey found that a record-low 15% of Americans view China favorably, marking a five-percentage-point, one-year decline in this rating, which Gallup has measured since 1979. A 2024 poll by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs found that Americans' perceptions of China hit a record low, with 55 percent saying that the United States should actively work to limit the growth of China's power. Despite the mutually negative views, the public on both sides overwhelmingly want the relationship to improve. Two-thirds of US respondents in a The Harris Poll, Harris poll published in 2023 agreed that the US should "engage in dialogue as much as possible to reduce tensions" with China. US public support for engaging in dialogue increased by five percentage points since 2021. According to 2023 polling by ''The Economist'' and YouGov, Americans aged 18–44 are much more likely than older age groups to have a friendly view of China.


Resident diplomatic missions

;Chinese Missions in the U.S. * Washington, D.C. (Embassy of China, Washington, D.C., Embassy) * Chicago (Consulate General) * Los Angeles (Consulate-General of China, Los Angeles, Consulate General) * New York City (Consulate General) * San Francisco (Consulate General) ;U.S. Missions in China *
Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...
(Embassy of the United States, Beijing, Embassy) * Guangzhou (Consulate General of the United States, Guangzhou, Consulate General) *
Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...
(Consulate General of the United States, Shanghai, Consulate General) * Shenyang (Consulate General of the United States, Shenyang, Consulate General) * Wuhan (Consulate General of the United States, Wuhan, Consulate General) **
Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
(Consulate General of the United States, Hong Kong and Macau, Consulate General)The U.S. Consulate-General in Hong Kong reports directly to the U.S. Department of State, instead of the U.S. embassy in Beijing File:Embassy of China in Washington, D.C.jpg, Embassy of China in Washington, D.C. File:Chinese Consulate Chicago.JPG, Consulate-General of China in Chicago File:PRCConsulateLA.JPG, Consulate-General of China in Los Angeles File:Consulate General of China in SF.JPG, Consulate-General of China in San Francisco File:US Embassy in Beijing illuminated with blur and yellow to stand united with Ukraine (4).jpg, Embassy of the United States in Beijing File:Consulate General of the United States in Guangzhou.jpg, Consulate-General of the United States in Guangzhou File:Shanghai US Consulate Main building.jpg, Consulate-General of the United States in Shanghai File:US Embassy of Shenyang in 2019.jpg, Consulate-General of the United States in Shenyang File:North Entrance of Wuhan Minsheng Bank Building.jpg, Building hosting the Consulate General of the United States in Wuhan File:HK US Consulate General.jpg, Consulate-General of the United States in Hong Kong


See also


Geostrategic

* American espionage in China * Blue Team (U.S. politics) * Chinese espionage in the United States * China Lobby * Chinese Century * China–United States trade war * United States sanctions against China * Clash of Civilizations * Foreign relations of China * Foreign relations of the United States * List of Chinese spy cases in the United States of America * Cox Report * Group of Two (G2) * Group of Three (G3) * G20 * Peaceful Evolution theory * Quadrilateral Security Dialogue * String of Pearls (Indian Ocean) * Thucydides Trap


General

* Americans in China * Anti-American sentiment in mainland China * Anti-Chinese sentiment in the United States * Beijing–Washington hotline * Chinese Americans * Document Number Nine * Group of Two * Strategic Economic Dialogue * Taiwan–United States relations * U.S.–China Strategic and Economic Dialogue


Historic

* History of Chinese Americans * History of the Republic of China * History of the People's Republic of China * History of China–United States relations * East Asia–United States relations * 1996 United States campaign finance controversy * China Hands, American experts on China *
Hainan Island incident The Hainan Island incident was a ten-day international incident between the United States and the People's Republic of China (PRC) that resulted from a mid-air collision between a United States Navy EP-3E ARIES II SIGINT, signals intelligence a ...
* Operation Beleaguer * Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China, Nixon in China * Ping-pong diplomacy * United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission * U.S. immigration policy toward the People's Republic of China * US Department of Defense China Task Force * Xenophobia and racism related to the COVID-19 pandemic


Notes


References


Further reading

* Burt, Sally. "The Ambassador, the General, and the President: FDR's mismanagement of interdepartmental relations in wartime China." ''Journal of American-East Asian Relations'' 19.3-4 (2012): 288–310. * Chang, Gordon H. ''Fateful Ties: A History of America's Preoccupation with China.'' (Harvard UP, 2015)
excerpt
* Cohen, Warren I. ''America's Response to China: A History of Sino-American Relations'' (5th ed. 2010
online
* Dulles, Foster Rhea. ''China and America: The Story of Their Relations Since 1784'' (1981), general surve
online
* Fairbank, John King. ''The United States and China'' (4th ed. Harvard UP, 1976)
online
* Michael Green (political expert), Green, Michael J. ''By more than providence: Grand strategy and American power in the Asia Pacific since 1783'' (Columbia UP, 2017)
online
725pp; comprehensive scholarly survey. * Hunt, Michael H. "Americans in the China Market: Economic Opportunities and Economic Nationalism, 1890s-1931." ''Business History Review'' 51.3 (1977): 277–307
online
* Jackson, Carl T. "The Influence of Asia upon American Thought: A Bibliographical Essay." ''American Studies International'' 22#1 (1984), pp. 3–31
online
covers China, India & Japan * Matray, James I. ed. ''East Asia and the United States: An Encyclopedia of relations since 1784'' (2 vol. Greenwood, 2002)
excerpt v 2
* Pomfret, John. ''The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom: America and China, 1776 to the Present'' (2016

* Schaller, Michael. ''The United States and China: Into the Twenty-First Century'' 4th ed 2015) * Song, Yuwu, ed. ''Encyclopedia of Chinese-American Relations'' (McFarland, 2006) * Spence, Jonathan D. ''To Change China: Western Advisers in China'' (1980
excerpt
* Spence, Jonathan. "Western Perceptions of China from the Late Sixteenth Century to the Present" in Paul S. Ropp, ed.''Heritage of China: Contemporary Perspectives on Chinese Civilization'' (1990
excerpts
* Sutter, Robert G. ''Historical Dictionary of United States-China Relations'' (2005). * Varg, Paul A. "Sino-American Relations Past and Present." ''Diplomatic History'' 4.2 (1980): 101–112
online
* Wang, Dong. ''The United States and China: A History from the Eighteenth Century to the Present'' (2013) * Westad, Odd Arne. ''Decisive encounters: the Chinese civil war, 1946-1950'' (Stanford University Press, 2003)
excerpt


Recent

* Blackwill, Robert D., and Richard Fontaine. ''Lost Decade: The US Pivot to Asia and the Rise of Chinese Power'' (Oxford University Press, 2024) covers Clinton to Biden years
online reviews of this book.
* Blanchard, Jean-Marc F., and Simon Shen, eds. ''Conflict and Cooperation in Sino-US Relations: Change and Continuity, Causes and Cures'' (Routledge, 2015) * Brazinsky, Gregg A. ''Winning the Third World: Sino-American Rivalry during the Cold War'' (U of North Carolina Press, 2017)
four online reviews & author response
* Chang, Gordon H. ''Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972'' (Stanford UP, 1990)
online
* Jacques deLisle, deLisle, Jacques. "International law in the Obama administration's pivot to Asia: the China seas disputes, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, rivalry with the PRC, and status quo legal norms in US foreign policy." ''Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law'' 48 (2016): 143
online
* Del Rosso, Stephen J. ''Ask the Experts: How to Stabilize U.S.-China Relations'
online
* Doshi, Rush. ''The Long Game: China's Grand Strategy to Displace American Order'' (Oxford UP, 2021
online review
* Foster Rhea Dulles, Dulles, Foster Rhea. ''American policy toward Communist China, 1949-1969'' (1972)
online
* Dumbaugh, Kerry. "China-U.S. relations: current issues and implications for U.S. policy." (Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs, Congressional Research Service, 2009
online
* Fenby, Jonathan and Trey McArver. ''The Eagle and the Dragon: Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and the Fate of US/China Relations'' (2019) * Foot, Rosemary. ''The practice of power: US relations with China since 1949'' (Oxford UP, 1995)
online
* Foot, Rosemary, and Amy King. "Assessing the deterioration in China–US relations: US governmental perspectives on the economic-security nexus." ''China International Strategy Review'' 1.1 (2019): 39–50
online
* * Fravel, M. Taylor. ''Active Defense: China's Military Strategy since 1949'' (Princeton UP, 2019
online reviews
* * Garson, Robert. "The Road to Tiananmen Square: The United States and China, 1979-1989" ''Journal of Oriental Studies'' .ISSN 0022-331X (1992) 30#1/2 pp. 119–135 * Garver, John W. ** ''China's Quest: The History of the Foreign Relations of the People's Republic'' (2015), 59–91, 232–58, 286–314, 557–578. 607–673. ** ''Foreign relations of the People's Republic of China'' (1992
online
* Goh, Evelyn. "Nixon, Kissinger, and the 'Soviet card' in the US opening to China, 1971–1974." ''Diplomatic history'' 29.3 (2005): 475–502
online
*
Pdf.
* Haddick, Robert. ''Fire on the Water: China, America, and the Future of the Pacific'' (2nd ed. Naval Institute Press, 2022)
online review
* Hilsman, Roger. ''To move a nation; the politics of foreign policy in the administration of John F. Kennedy'' (1967) pp 275–357; on 1961–63
online
* Hu, XueYing. "Legacy of Tiananmen Square Incident in Sino-US Relations (post-2000)." ''East Asia'' 33.3 (2016): 213–232
abstract
* * Isaacs, Harold R. ''Scratches on Our Minds: American Images of China and India'' (1958
online
* Henry Kissinger, Kissinger, Henry. ''On China'' (2011
online
* Lasater, Martin L. ''The Taiwan Issue in Sino-American Strategic Relations'' (Routledge, 2019). * Li, Cheng. "Assessing US-China Relations Under the Obama Administration" (The Brookings Institution, 30 August 2016
online
* Li, Hongshan. ''Fighting on the Cultural Front: U.S.-China Relations in the Cold War'' (Columbia University Press, 2024
online review of this book
* MacMillan, Margaret. ''Nixon and Mao: the week that changed the world'' (2008)
online
* Kishore Mahbubani, Mahbubani, Kishore, "What China Threat? How the United States and China can avoid war", ''Harper's Magazine'', vol. 338, no. 2025 (February 2019), pp. 39–44. "China could... remain a different polity—... not a liberal democracy—and still not be a threatening one." (p. 44.) * Mann, Jim. ''About face: A history of America's curious relationship with China, from Nixon to Clinton'' (Knopf, 1999) * Mastanduno, Michael. "A grand strategic transition?: Obama, Trump and the Asia Pacific political economy." in ''The United States in the Indo-Pacific'' (Manchester UP, 2020
online
* Meltzer, Joshua P. "The U.S.-China trade agreement – a huge deal for China." ''Brookings'' (2017
online
* Rich, Wilbur C. ed. ''Looking Back on President Barack Obama's Legacy: Hope and Change'' (2018
online
* Roach, Stephen S. ''Unbalanced: the codependency of America and China'' (Yale UP, 2015). * Roberts, Priscilla. "New Perspectives on Cold War History from China," ''Diplomatic History'' 41:2 (April 2017
online
* Rose, Robert S. et al. ''Re-examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973'' (2002) * Kevin Rudd (Prime Minister of Australia June - September 2013): ''The Avoidable War: The Dangers of a Catastrophic Conflict between the US and Xi Jinping's China'' (PublicAffairs, March 2022, ISBN 978-1541701298) * * Schmitt, Gary J. "The China Dream: America's, China's, and the Resulting Competition." ''AEI Paper & Studies'' (American Enterprise Institute, 2019), p. 1J+
online
* Douglas E. Schoen, Schoen, Douglas E. and Melik Kaylan. ''Return to Winter: Russia, China, and the New Cold War Against America'' (2015) * James Steinberg, Steinberg, James and Michael E. O'Hanlon, eds. ''Strategic Reassurance and Resolve: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century'' (Princeton UP, 2014). * Robert Suettinger, Suettinger, Robert. ''Beyond Tiananmen: The Politics of US-China Relations, 1989–2000'' (Brookings Institution Press, 2004)
online
* Tucker, Nancy Bernkopf, ed. ''China confidential: American diplomats and Sino-American relations, 1945-1996'' (Columbia University Press, 2001). * Tyler, Patrick. ''A Great Wall: Six Presidents and China'' (1999
online
* Wang, Dong. "Grand Strategy, Power Politics, and China's Policy toward the United States in the 1960s," ''Diplomatic History'' 42:1 (April 2017): 265–287; * Odd Arne Westad, Westad, Odd Arne, "The Sources of Chinese Conduct: Are Washington and Beijing Fighting a New Cold War?", ''Foreign Affairs'', 98#5 (September / October 2019), pp. 86–95. "If some unifying factor does not intervene, the decline in the United States' ability to act purposefully will, sooner than most people imagine, mean not just a multipolar world but an unruly world – one in which fear, hatred, and ambition hold everyone hostage to the basest instincts of the human imagination." (p. 95.
online
* Wheeler, Norton. ''Role of American NGOs in China's Modernization: Invited Influence'' (Routledge, 2014) 240 pp
online review
* Worden, Robert L. et al. eds. ''China: a country study'' (Federal Research Division, U.S. Library of Congress, 1986) comprehensive Library of Congress Country Studies 732pp report on Chinese history, society, economy, military and foreign relations; as a US government document it is not copyright. The Library produced separate reports on 82 countries; it ended the program in 1989
online
* Xia, Yafeng and Zhi Liang. "China's Diplomacy toward the United States in the Twentieth Century: A Survey of the Literature," Diplomatic History (journal), Diplomatic History 42:1 (April 2017): 241–264. * * Yim, Kwan Ha. ** ''China and the US: 1955-63'' (1973)
online
** ''China 1964-72'' (1975)
online
** ''China since Mao'' (1980) pp 129–6
online
* Zhang, Biwu. ''Chinese Perceptions of the U.S.: An Exploration of China's Foreign Policy Motivations'' (Lexington Books; 2012) 266 pages; Chinese views of America's power, politics, and economics, as well as the country as a source of threat or opportunity. *


Historiography

* Brazinsky, Gregg. "The Birth of a Rivalry: Sino-American Relations During the Truman Administration" in Daniel S. Margolies, ed. ''A Companion to Harry S. Truman'' (2012) pp 484–497; emphasis on historiography. * Sutter, Robert. "The Importance of the 'pan-Asian' versus the 'China-first' Emphasis in US Policy toward China, 1969-2008: A Review of the Literature." ''American Journal of Chinese Studies'' (2009): 1–18. * Sutter, Robert. "US Domestic Debate Over Policy Toward Mainland China and Taiwan: Key Findings, Outlook and Lessons." ''American Journal of Chinese Studies'' (2001): 133–144. * Zhu Yongtao. "American Studies in China" ''American Studies International'' 25#2 (1987) pp. 3–1
online


Primary sources

*Lyman Van Slyke, ed. ''The China White Paper: August 1949'' (1967: 2 vol. Stanford U.P.); 1124 pp.; copy of official US Department of State. ''China White Paper: 1949'
vol 1 online at Googleonline vol 1 pdf
vol 1 consists of history; vol 2 consists of primary sources and is not online; se
library holdings via World Cat
Excerpts appear in Barton Bernstein and Allen J. Matusow, eds., ''The Truman Administration: A Documentary History'' (1966) pp. 299–355 * May, Ernest R. ed. ''The Truman Administration and China 1945–1949'' (1975) summary plus primary sources
online
* {{DEFAULTSORT:China-United States relations Bilateral relations of the United States Bilateral relations of China, United States China–United States relations,