U.S. President Donald Trump had been scheduled to travel to Beijing by late March for a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, but cancelled the trip dramatically on the eve of departure, postponing the so-called "Trump-Xi summit" by approximately five weeks. As conflict continues in the Middle East, former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell has analyzed the Trump administration's strategic hand in dealing with China at the Atlantic Council, again warning that the Taiwan issue could become a bargaining chip in negotiations.
Kurt Campbell, who served as Indo-Pacific Coordinator on the National Security Council under the Biden administration and was known informally as the "Indo-Pacific Czar," is widely credited as the architect of the AUKUS security partnership among Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. He previously served as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs under President Obama, and is recognized as a driving force behind the "Pivot to Asia" policy. He later served as Deputy Secretary of State under Secretary Antony Blinken. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Against the backdrop of a series of unconventional moves by the Trump administration since its return to the White House, Campbell — now serving as Chairman of The Asia Group — offered his analysis on March 23 at an Atlantic Council forum in Washington, examining the intersection of Middle East conflict and Taiwan Strait security risks, and warning that U.S. Indo-Pacific operational capacity faces a genuine capability vacuum.
What Does the Postponement of the Trump-Xi Summit Signal?
Melanie Hart, Senior Director of the Atlantic Council's Global China Hub and moderator of the forum, opened by asking what the postponement of Trump's planned March 31–April 2 visit to Beijing signals for U.S.-China relations. Campbell said that for a sitting U.S. president to visit a country with close ties to Iran while the United States is actively engaged in Middle East conflict would itself be an extraordinary arrangement. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Campbell identified several practical factors behind Trump's decision to delay. Senior advisers likely counseled that with the Gulf conflict unresolved and U.S. military resources flowing heavily into the Middle East, the timing was not propitious for a China visit. Campbell also noted that the Trump administration's decision-making circle is exceptionally closed: the traditional functions of the National Security Council and the State Department have been significantly marginalized, with foreign policy and national security strategy effectively concentrated among a group of five to six people at the very top. While that structure limits leaks, the same small circle is visibly overloaded during high-stakes diplomatic moments — such as the Japanese Prime Minister's visit to Washington — leaving foreign counterparts frequently feeling that the U.S. side is underprepared.
Campbell suggested that while Beijing was caught off guard by the abrupt postponement, it has little choice but to interpret the delay as additional preparation time for both sides.
THAAD Redeployment to the Middle East: Campbell's Assessment
The ongoing Middle East conflict has materially affected the Indo-Pacific balance of power. Hart cited media reports indicating that the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile system previously deployed in South Korea is being redeployed to the Middle East. Campbell responded that the United States has over-invested in the Middle East for decades, which has slowed the accumulation of military and commercial assets across the Indo-Pacific. Hard-won capability gains in the region are now being redirected back to the Middle East almost overnight. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Campbell disclosed that U.S. Marine rapid-response forces in the Indo-Pacific have been withdrawn, and that the region currently has only a single aircraft carrier — still undergoing maintenance in Japan — while multiple surface-to-air missile capabilities have also been transferred out. Indo-Pacific allies, Campbell said, are conveying their anxiety to senior U.S. officials in private, urgently seeking assurances that American deterrence in Asia remains unshakeable.
Is China Watching and Winning? Beijing's Calculations and Economic Vulnerabilities
As the United States remains mired in the Middle East, the prevailing assumption in many quarters is that China is the primary beneficiary. Hart observed that oil tankers bound for China are transiting the Strait of Hormuz unimpeded — neither attacked by Iran nor interdicted by the United States — and asked whether this enhances Beijing's leverage over Washington. Campbell said China is studying U.S. and Israeli military operations under a microscope. Witnessing how quickly American and Israeli forces dismantled Iran's defense systems, he argued, has delivered a significant shock to the Chinese military, forcing it to reckon with how far the People's Liberation Army still has to go before it can project power into the Indo-Pacific and beyond. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Campbell also noted that China has observed how the United States bypassed traditional multilateral channels — the United Nations and its alliance system — in this military campaign, generating significant friction with European and Asian partners. He cited the example of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's visit to Washington last week, during which she faced intense domestic political pressure: Japanese public support for the Middle East conflict stands at only six to eight percent. Even Denmark, Campbell noted, has deployed special forces to Greenland to prevent U.S. troops from using local airfields. China, he argued, is quietly satisfied by these widening fractures between the United States and its allies.
However, Campbell cautioned against concluding too readily that China is the winner. China's economy faces severe headwinds — including elevated youth unemployment and a prolonged property sector crisis — and Beijing is acutely dependent on stable global energy markets to support its economic recovery. A Middle East conflict that disrupts global energy supplies would deliver a secondary shock to China's economy. In Campbell's assessment, Beijing is simultaneously reassured by U.S. entanglement in the Middle East and deeply anxious about Trump's unpredictability. This dual anxiety is precisely why China is prepared to spare no effort to go to considerable lengths to host Trump in Beijing, seeking even a period of bilateral stability.
A Summit Without a Script: Strongman Affinity and the Risk of Uncontrolled Outcomes
Under the Biden administration, U.S.-China summit logistics — how many steps leaders took on stage, whether a handshake occurred at the center or to the side — were calibrated meticulously by staff on both sides. Hart asked how Washington should approach the intensely variable nature of leader-level diplomacy as the Trump-Xi summit approaches in approximately five weeks. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Campbell was candid. Over thirty-five years, he said, he has participated in diplomatic engagements spanning the eras of Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping, and the high degree of preparation that characterized those meetings also produced predictable outcomes. Before the Biden-Xi summit in San Francisco, for instance, both sides already knew the shape of the results. The current situation, he said, is fundamentally different.
Campbell argued that both Trump and Xi now operate entirely free of internal institutional constraints. Trump faces no meaningful domestic political checks and no longer consults hawkish Republican China advisers with the regularity of the past. Xi, having entered an unprecedented third term, has systematically dismantled the Chinese Communist Party's collective leadership structures. Two leaders of unchecked authority walking into a room alone together, without institutional guardrails, Campbell said, creates both extraordinary opportunity and grave risk.
Campbell further observed that Trump harbors a deep personal affinity for cultivating close relationships with authoritarian leaders — whether Xi, Russian President Vladimir Putin, or North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Trump's advisers, Campbell noted, are well aware of this tendency and are actively facilitating the restoration of those personal bonds. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Where Does Taiwan Stand?
Hart raised the fact that Trump recently disclosed publicly that he had discussed U.S. arms sales to Taiwan with Xi Jinping — a disclosure that drew alarm in Washington, raising questions about whether Taiwan's security interests were being placed on the negotiating table. Campbell said that if asked what keeps him awake at night, Taiwan is near the very top of the list.
Campbell identified two specific concerns. First, Trump is quite likely to seek an entirely new framework for redefining U.S.-Taiwan relations and cross-strait relations more broadly. Trump, Campbell argued, does not consider himself bound by decades of U.S. Taiwan policy. The carefully calibrated diplomatic formulations around "not supporting" and "opposing" Taiwan independence are, in Trump's view, mere mere bureaucratic red tape.
Campbell noted that Trump has repeatedly claimed China would not attack Taiwan on his watch, while simultaneously displaying what Campbell described as the dangerous logic that major powers should naturally have primacy over their surrounding regions — a logic already visible in Trump's approach to the Russia-Ukraine war and U.S. policy toward Latin America. Campbell said he does not believe China will use force against Taiwan in the near term, but he is deeply concerned that China could extract from Trump a fundamentally new framework for discussing Taiwan — one that would generate profound anxiety and insecurity in Taipei and could trigger unpredictable political consequences within Taiwan itself. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
Campbell's second concern is the Trump administration's technology policy. He said some technology advisers around Trump hold what he regards as a naive view: that the United States should sell China advanced semiconductors and artificial intelligence technology, charge premium prices, and thereby make China "addicted" to the U.S. technology ecosystem in a way that would undermine China's indigenous development capacity. Campbell flatly rejected this logic, arguing that Xi Jinping's long-term strategic objective is precisely to seize the commanding heights of technology — and thatthe last thing Beijing would ever accept is a long-term dependence on U.S. technology.
Campbell argued that Trump, in pursuit of short-term political gains — including selling more agricultural products to China to recover lost farm-state voters, selling Boeing aircraft, and potentially reopening Chinese investment into the United States in ways that reverse recent bipartisan consensus — risks providing a temporary respite without strategic benefit. He invoked the Russian term "Peredyshka" — meaning a brief breathing spell — to describe this dynamic, questioning whether such a brief pause could deliver genuine stability or whether it merely delays an even more intense confrontation to come. （Related： The Pain Threshold: Why a US Stock Market Drop Is Required for a Ceasefire ｜ Latest ）
An Interdependence That Cannot Be Severed: The U.S.-China Equilibrium
On the business dimension, Hart asked what message Beijing is sending to the global business community through its current high-level forums. Campbell said large numbers of U.S. and international corporate executives are converging on China, and Beijing's signal is unambiguous: China is open, come back and do business. Yet foreign firms operating in China privately report pervasive difficulties — intellectual property theft, harsh treatment of senior managers, and commercial data collection routinely characterized as espionage. Campbell noted that most multinational companies are quietly executing a "China-plus-one" strategy, redirecting new investment toward India, Vietnam, or Mexico, even as China's infrastructure and manufacturing capacity make a clean break genuinely difficult.
Campbell predicted that Trump would very likely bring a delegation of Wall Street executives to Beijing — individuals with substantial asset management interests in China who need stable U.S.-China relations to protect their positions. On the question of U.S.-China-Russia dynamics and tariffs, Campbell said some within the Trump administration believe the United States can drive a wedge between China and Russia, but he regards this as unrealistic.
Trump's desire to maintain his relationship with Russia, combined with what Campbell described as Xi Jinping and Putin's deliberately chosen strategic alignment, makes that separation implausible. Campbell also assessed that Trump will likely press China to help restart U.S.-North Korea denuclearization negotiations.
On tariffs and trade conflict, Campbell argued that China has, since Trump's first term, developed a precise understanding of how Trump operates. China's approach is to offer Trump lavish personal deference and respect publicly, while — if the United States imposes tariff sanctions — retaliating with severity and surgical precision, targeting America's industrial pressure points through measures such as restricting rare earth exports.
Campbell observed that the United States and China constitute the most economically interdependent major relationship in the world, while simultaneously being the relationship most uncomfortable with that very interdependence. Both Trump and Xi are straining to reduce reliance on each other. Yet this "suffocating mutual dependence," Campbell concluded, is likely to remain the defining relationship in international diplomacy for the next ten to fifteen years.
