What the Biden-Xi Talks Accomplished (and Didn’t)

Biden and Xi try direct diplomacy

The mood music was upbeat but pragmatic after the first face-to-face meeting in a year between President Biden and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping. There was no joint communiqué after Wednesday’s talks, but both sides issued positive statements trumpeting where they found common ground, including on tackling climate change and improving communications.

The San Francisco summit, and Xi’s banquet with American business leaders afterward, were signs of how entwined the economies remain despite years of rising tensions — and why both sides and many U.S. companies don’t want the relationship spiraling into a more serious conflict.

Biden and Xi found room for cooperation. The leaders agreed to restart military communications that were suspended last year after Nancy Pelosi, then speaker of the House, visited Taiwan. Biden said they had made progress on curbing Chinese production of the opioid fentanyl.

But there was plenty they didn’t agree upon. Xi complained that U.S. export controls on advanced technology, such as semiconductors, were intended to suppress China. Biden’s effort to enlist Beijing as a kind of peacekeeper in the Middle East — specifically, putting pressure on Iran to not escalate the Israel-Hamas war — was unsuccessful.