Donald Trump...
versus Xi Jinping.
Saturday's meeting between Donald Trump and China's Xi Jinping
ended in a trade truce...
...or did it?!
Hi.
Welcome back to China Uncensored.
I'm your host, Chris Chappell.
The G20.
It's like going on vacation with your entire extended family
that you barely get along with.
Unlike the G7,
which is like going on vacation with your immediate family
that you...
barely get along with.
And just like my family vacations,
there were plenty of protests,
tons of security,
and loads of photo ops.
Now doesn't that just scream
"we're happy to be here!"
Anyway,
the annual G20 meeting
was held in Argentina over the weekend.
It's a forum where world leaders get together
basically to discuss ways to avoid international crises.
And in some cases,
to slap exuberant high-fives to cement their budding bromances.
I wonder if there's a backstory here.
"We meet later.
I show you how to kill many journalist."
Poison.
The trick is poison.
Anyway, as far as I'm concerned,
the G20's single most important event was
a working dinner between
US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
One of the big issues for Trump
was stemming the flow of fentanyl from China.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid drug.
And fentanyl coming illegally from China
is a big part of the deadly drug epidemic in the US.
The closed door dinner meeting
lasted an hour longer than expected,
so there was obviously no shortage of other stuff to talk about.
For example:
trade tariffs, intellectual property theft,
government subsidies, and of course,
whether you should eat steak with a fork or with chopsticks.
Of course,
the press had to leave before the steak arrived,
so we don't know exactly what Trump and Xi Jinping talked about.
But we do know how it ended.
Sort of.
OK, it's complicated.
The White House issued a press statement....
...and so did the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
And they don't exactly match up.
The US said China would
"designate Fentanyl as a Controlled Substance,
meaning that people selling Fentanyl to the United States
will be subject to China's maximum penalty under the law."
But China merely said it would
"start working to adjust related regulations."
Those two statements are not the same.
It's like your wife expects you to fix the garage door,
but technically you only agreed to start
exploring garage-door-related issues.
Now when it comes to trade,
there was also a bit of a mismatch.
Originally the US was going to raise tariffs
on 200 billion dollars worth of Chinese goods from 10% to 25%,
starting on January 1st.
After the meeting,
according to the White House,
Trump agreed to delay those tariffs for 90 days.
That aims to allow both sides to reach an agreement on
"structural changes with respect to forced technology transfer,
intellectual property protection,
non-tariff barriers,
cyber intrusions and cyber theft."
But did the Chinese Foreign Ministry admit to
any of those things?
Of course not!
They just said both sides reached consensus
and agreed not to impose new additional tariffs.
Wait,
did they not hear the "for 90 days" part?
Or did they just forget to write it down?
Also, according to the White House,
"China will agree to purchase a not yet agreed upon,
but very substantial,
amount of agricultural, energy, industrial,
and other product from the United States
to reduce the trade imbalance."
But the Chinese statement merely said
"it will work to open its market,
expand imports and resolve economy- and trade-related issues."
And they "called on the two sides to
realize cooperation for win-win results."
And of course that
"The foundation and premise of any positive moves
is a concrete agreement featuring mutually beneficial
and win-win results."
Yes, it's a win-win.
China has even said they're going to allow
Trump's speeches on state-run CCTV.
With some minor edits.
"We're gonna win-win with trade.
We're gonna win-win with health.
We're gonna win-win at so many levels.
We're gonna win-win.
You're gonna get so tired of win-winning.
You're gonna say,
'Mr. President, please!
We don't want to win-win anymore!
It's too much!'
And I'm gonna say,
'I'm sorry,
we're gonna keep win-winning.'"
I guess that's what happens when you make deals
with Win-Winnie the Pooh.
That being said,
it's possible the Chinese Communist Party
has a somewhat different definition of win-win.
China expert Bill Bishop says
it's likely that China has
no intention of making the kind of structural changes
to its unfair trade policies that the US is calling for.
"The Chinese are always playing for time,"
he says, "and any pause that involves more talking
is a victory for Beijing,
as it only adds to the chances they have
for a shift to a more favorable US domestic political environment."
This is echoed by the South China Morning Post,
which argues that now comes the hard part:
making good on China's trade war truce promises.
And that,
according to Nicholas Consonery,
director of the research firm Rhodium Group,
just doesn't seem likely.
"We've got a window now to see how serious
the Chinese government is about moving forward
with structural economic reform," he said.
"And recent history doesn't lead us to a very optimistic place."
So it would seem that it's a pretty tall order
for Chinese and American negotiators to agree
within just 90 days on the massive structural changes
China needs to make.
Especially when they can't even agree
on what they agreed on at the meeting.
Besides,
Xi Jinping may try to drag things out as long as he can.
Because he knows that while President Trump
only has another 2 to 6 years in office,
he gets to be president for life.
Provided that Xi can continue
to fend off the other Communist Party faction
that's out for his blood.
But that's another episode.
So what do you think about the G20 meeting
between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping?
Leave your comments below.
And before you go,
it's time for me to answer a question
from one of you who supports China Uncensored
through the crowdfunding website Patreon.
David Blatt asks:
"Why don't states in the middle east,
where Islam is so important it's often the official religion
and justice systems are based on it in the form of Sharia Law,
help the Uyghurs of China
from the oppression of the infidel CCP?"
Good question, David.
My simple answer is,
geopolitics are strategic,
and decisions are not always based on good moral choices,
or even based on religious alliances.
Consider this:
For most of the big Islamic countries
including Iran, Iraq, Malaysia, Pakistan, Turkey,
and the United Arab Emirates
their biggest trade partner is China.
So a lot of governments might think it's not a good idea to rock the boat.
And also countries like
Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt,
don't have the best human rights records.
Many of them are authoritarian regimes that,
like the Chinese Communist Party,
emphasize so-called "social stability",
as well as also non-interference
with the internal affairs of other countries.
Which really means that they don't want other countries
to interfere in their internal affairs.
Just like the Chinese Communist Party.
So this looks like a case where geopolitical
and strategic economic interests
are more important than religious interests.
But I would argue that even for people
who don't care about Islam,
it's important to condemn what the Chinese Communist Party
is doing to the Uighurs.
The techniques they're developing to spy on and oppress Uighurs
they're honing those skills,
and the next time they go after another group,
they'll oppress that group even more.
And if you're in China,
one day, that group could include you.
So thanks for your...
depressing question, David.
And for everyone else,
do you want help us make more episodes of China Uncensored?
Please support our growth by pledging a dollar or more per episode.
Go to Patreon.com/ChinaUncensored.
The link is below.
Once again,
I'm Chris Chappell.
Thanks for watching China Uncensored.
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