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You mentioned Iran as well as something that's rather top of mind for President Trump and of course that's a reason this whole summit was delayed in the first place. So on the Iran issue, I think it's really interesting that on the one hand the US is accusing China of being a key uh financial lifeline to Thran by buying Iranian oil but also asking China on the other hand to use its influence on Thran. So, what do you expect President Trump uh to ask or press President Xi about and will he likely succeed on that front?
>> Well, again, difficult to tell, but good question. President Trump said when he was uh leaving Washington that he didn't need any help on Iran. He was going to be able to handle this by himself. I think that's a bit of bravado. If I look and see where he is now on Iran, I believe he's in a culde-sac and he's struggling to find a way out. Uh he could imagine and hope that President Xi might help in that regard. And there's no question that President Xi has considerable influence with Iran, not just because a departurer of oil, but because of a long-standing relationship. Uh actually uh President Xi and uh and the foreign minister Wang Yi were the ones that brokered a rough push between Iran and Saudi Arabia last year. So uh this is an arena that where China has some competence. But if you think about it from the point of view of the Chinese analysts uh and I think that's always a place to start uh is this bad? Is the war in Iran bad for China? to which answer is yes. It raises the price of of energy. But is it worse for China than it is for the US? I don't think so. Is it worse for China than it is for most of the Asian neighbors? Not so. Actually, President Xi and his team uh in January and February were the only country that made major uh increases in their strategic petroleum reserve. So I think uh I suspect that in the same way that President Trump has tried from time to time or suggested from time to time to President Xi that he could be helpful in bringing an end to the war in Ukraine and President Xi has uh smiled but not done very much. I suspect that'll be the case in Iran as well.
>> Yeah. And why do you think Beijing uh takes that position? On the one hand, saying that it wants to play an active role ending hostilities in the region, but you know, when Trump uh credited China for getting Iran on the negotiation table, Beijing never really directly responded to that. So why do you think that is where Beijing stands?
Well, I I simply again start with a rational analyst uh and ask what he or she would do in the situation. So, here's a war that President Xi and the Chinese government has said is uh un illegal uh was unnecessary uh and is causing great harm to the world. Uh I think about 90% of the leaders in the world agree with that assessment. So you made a mess. Well, this is your mess. Why is it my problem? And that's I would say that's tough, but that's life. Secondly, the continued impact of this uh if it were to end end up leading President Trump to make a further mistake and dig deeper into Iran could come to look like the US as it invaded uh mistakenly and tragically Iraq and Afghanistan back at the beginning of the 21st century. That was the decade or or so after 2003 and that was a period in which the US was consumed focused on the you know endless windless wars in the desert and uh essentially neglecting China as it went about proceeding with its agenda. Uh so benign neglect uh or distraction because you're uh off in some other uh quagmire uh from the perspective of a rational actor in China might seem like a pretty good option.
>> Professor Allison of course today and things have changed haven't they 180 over the last 80 years or so in terms of that China US relationship. Um, in that context, you wrote a piece for the National Interest and in that you you you rather made me laugh a little bit because you said if SNL were to do a skit about this summit, they might call it make wealth not war, which I found slightly amusing, but at the same time it leads onto my next question, which is, can President Trump get commercial success from this without compromising defense priorities?
A very good question. Uh I think the for President Trump the bilateral trade deficit is one of the key indicators that he's interested in and actually that's declined significantly as a result of the combination of his tariffs and the chaos that followed from that. Uh, I believe that I I would not be surprised actually I say in that article if I as President Trump loves uh, you know, big headline announcements that he might announce that China is going to buy an additional $1 trillion dollar of American goods that would include a big buy of Boeing aircraft and a big buy of soybeans and a big buy of beef and maybe uh, the and the buy of some more advanced semiconductors and and related technologies that China's been interested in. So as you look at the people who were there with him at the meeting, this is as I said earlier an all-star cast and these are companies that are doing business in China and would like to do a lot more business in China. So I I'm suspecting that'll be the centerpiece of the agreement. And President Trump has said frequently that you know what he really wants to do uh is be a president of peace and peace can be achieved as he tried to suggest in you know the Gaza uh ceasefire and others by the parties actually behaving like rational actors engaging in economic activity that will improve the wealth and the well-being of themselves and their citizen. So, it's a little bit of a joke, as I said, about make wealth, not war. But I think that's one of the uh one of the elements in what's special about President Trump's attempted uh business-like or, you know, business uh style uh statecraft.
>> That said, Professor Allison, we find ourselves at a really interesting point in history, don't we? Because there was a piece recently in foreign affairs about you know any any action by China visav Taiwan might manifest it was it was the think piece might manifest as a naval blockade. Um and we know how crucial the South China Sea is. We know that this has been an area of contention for decades. In the meantime, in the last half an hour that this has hit the wires, that in Cuba, the energy minister has said that Cuba has now run out of diesel and fuel oil amid a US oil blockade. And what it shows is that the US is still willing to use its levers to get what it wants. Well, China is in the same position. Where does that leave us if we just consider that as a backdrop for a second?
>> Good, good, good for you. I would say your analytics uh uh antenna are working. uh if you were to ask if you were to get a Martian analyst who uh I have as a uh a concept in my class and we invite her to come to come to class from time to time and help clarify things for for us here earthlings but and a Martian analyst might look at it and say now wait a minute let me see what I what's going on here there's a little island about 90 miles offside offshore US that the US has not been prepared uh uh whose government the US has not been prepared to recognize now for more than whatever 60 years and you seem to be blockading it or quarantining it to prevent it receiving oil and other items that it wants. Are there any other islands that are close to any other big powers and could they do anything similar? I'd say that's a good question. Second good question even more uh if this uh uh if the reason why China has not done this is that the US is a major military factor in the region and they fear that if it should try to quarantine or even invade Taiwan the US would come to the rescue. Uh well, what has happened to US military capabilities in the region as the result of the war in Iran? And the again the the details are classified, but just from reading the papers, you can see that the the system that was in South Korea has been moved to the Middle East. That most of the Tomahawks who are the crucial elements have been moved to the Middle East. that the Patriot defense missiles that would defend have been moved to the Middle East, that the delivery of the weapons that were sold more than a decade ago to Taiwan, most of them have been delayed or not not arrived. So militarily the situation is, I would say, very attractive from a from a the Martian would say from the from Beijing's point of view. I think the reason why this is unlikely is not that the military balance hasn't shifted importantly in China's favor, but first that she has a long-term uh strategy for basically the resolution and ultimately reunific reintegration they say or reunification of Taiwan. And secondly, I would give some credit to President Trump. President Trump and President Xi have talked about this at some considerable length privately and agreed that they neither want a war between the US and China. Each understands that given the structural rivalry that's inevitable in this relationship, the the the downward spiral into war is always a huge risk. And therefore that they are not going to allow a third party's provocation, for example, something that might happen in Taiwan to provoke them into a war. But in addition, as President Trump has said, President Xi has told him that under no circumstances, absent such a provocation would China take military action against Taiwan during his term. So I think the relationship between the two parties and their understanding that this issue can be resolved on a longer term path that the two parties are prepared to make to to uh to cooperate and trying to manage is some part of the reason why if I were making a bet tonight I would say uh absent some extreme provocation by Taiwan uh that's less than a 1% chance of a Chinese uh quarantine or embargo of Taiwan this year.
>> Uh very quickly um Professor Allison, I could tell you that while you were speaking there, we saw uh certainly members of the US delegation gather on the steps um outside uh the venue and we can clearly see defense secretary Pete Hex there. We can see some of the CEOs that we know are in that delegation as well. Um they're all gathering. I do I I am curious. I wonder how they're all feeling because it's it's pretty high stakes definitely from um the point of view that we're all watching this from around the world. Um what's going to be a win for this US delegation coming out of this?
Professor, >> again, my bet is that the deals the business deals that will be announced will probably amount to something like a trillion dollars, which would be a amazing thing and that uh many of these companies will be uh you know the leaders in the in those deals. So these are deals that have been being negotiated for some considerable period of time and as I said I think Secretary Bassant and Vice Premier Ha have set this up in such a way that there's unlikely to be any big surprises. It would be interesting and actually be exciting if there turned out to be a surprise or two. President Trump loves surprises, but it's possible that I mean, President Trump has said he would welcome Chinese investments in America to help build factories and create jobs here. Now, it's possible that there would even be an announcement in that arena, but I think the executives are there, you know, happy or excited to be part of part of history and part of what's ultimately the most important bilateral relationship in the world in which the business deals that they are part of uh can be part of the stabilizing factors in the overall relationship.