President Biden’s US-China Guard Rails Concept Implementation Challenges
Executive Summary
1. President Biden’s strategic vision for the China-US relationship initially appeared focused on a grand bargain concept. It is in this context that Biden’s initial 2021 reference to guard rails should likely be understood.
2. The fundamental focus of guard rails is to implement a mutually agreed upon strategic framework with Beijing that enables competition without the accompanying risk of uncontrollable escalation or nuclear war.
3. In July 2022, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi appeared to downplay the relevance of Biden’s guard rails and stated that the three China-US Joint Communiqués from 1972, 1979 and 1982 are already the most reliable guard rails for the two countries.
4. China appears to fundamentally distrust the Biden Administration’s approach on the grounds that it is designed to limit China’s freedom of action and force Beijing to play by America’s own rules that prioritize Washington’s interests over Beijing’s.
5. In February 2023, China held security talks with Japan for the first time in four years. At the end of March, a defence hotline between the Japanese Self Defence Forces and the People’s Liberation Army had already been established.
6. When the Helsinki Act of 1975 between the United States and the Soviet Union is directly compared to the China-US guard rail concept proposed by the Biden Administration, fundamental differences become clear.
7. Despite being declared enemies for decades, the United States was still able to conduct complex, sustained negotiations from 1972-1975 with the Soviet Union to establish Cold War-era guard rails across political and military affairs, trade, scientific cooperation and human rights.
8. These areas are virtually identical to the current challenges in the China-US bilateral relationship that the Biden Administration has attempted to unsuccessfully construct guard rails around.
9. Biden’s unliteral establishment of national security guard rails around America’s own advanced semiconductor sector while overtly referring to China as the key justification has likely furthered concerns around the China-US guard rails concept in Beijing.
10. These various challenges are symptomatic of a broader issue in China-US relations. China and the United States have completely different and mutually incompatible forms of government and views on the structure of the international order.
