America's China brigade: a Washington insider offers the lay of the land. Hu's up, hu's down in U.S. China policy.

• Author: Nelson, Chris

At the geostrategic level, U.S.-China relations have never been stronger, with surprising levels of coordination on Iran at the United Nations, and very close cooperation on the North Korea nuclear crisis. But trade relations, under the burden of continual pressure from both Capitol Hill and the emerging contradictions of the global economy, are now trending toward the "difficult."

This should not have been a surprise.

A little more than a year ago, then-U.S. Trade Representative and former Congressman Rob Portman warned the People's Republic of China that with its five-year World Trade Organization membership anniversary coming up, the Administration was heading toward a much more robust enforcement approach to trade disputes, if bilateral negotiations continued to lag on everything from currency and foreign exchange rates to intellectual property rights and export subsidies.

Suddenly this spring, the White House, USTR, and Department of Commerce jointly declared "time's up," and a series of carefully drawn WTO cases have been initiated in all but the currency/exchange rate debate--especially a controversial decision to declare China "eligible" for countervailing duties cases, even while maintaining the country's "non-market economy" status.

Beijing has reacted sharply, but so far in words only. It remains to be seen whether bilateral consultations can head off a formal WTO dispute resolution process, and if not, whether taking things to the international level will affect the non-trade aspects of the relationship, including the tone and results of upcoming, high-level bilateral consultations.

Looking back, we can see that current events are what was expected, back when George Bush was inaugurated president in January 2001. At that time, most experts, pundits, and inside-the-Beltway types who make their living being clever about China were confident there would be a change in style, rhetoric, and substance from the Clinton Administration.

We didn't doubt that the basic business-focused approach would continue to dominate day-to-day relations, especially as the complex dance surrounding China's entrance into the WTO would require concerted attention to complete.

But it seemed obvious that Bush would pursue the broader Asia policy outlined by his long-time weight lifting partner and friend, Richard Armitage: a focus on boosting the rearmament and international position of Japan, and refurbishing U.S. alliance relationships across Asia, and over to India and Central Asia, as a hedge against what has come to be called China Rising.

Armitage argued that the Clinton Administration had been a little too soft on China, but so aggressive in its trade policy that the critical importance of the larger U.S.-Japan strategic relationship was being neglected.

It's Congress, of course, that provides a constant drumbeat of pressure on trade. Even during the halcyon days of U.S.-People's Republic of China trade promotion and working with Beijing to gain membership in the World Trade Organization, it was Congress that applied a constant reality check on what even then were seen as the risks of China's low-wage, increasingly sophisticated export machine to the globalized economy.

The President may be in charge of the "relationship," but it's Congress applying the whip on "enforcement" of trade deals--a marching song which has increased, since 2001, into a constant roar today.

Back in 2001, on the always thorny issue of Taiwan, all the experts were confident that this Republican president would be tougher on China, and far more accommodating to the then newly elected Democratic Progressive Party government of Chen Shui-bian.

And on dealing with China's client state, North Korea, all took at face value the promises of Armitage, and his friend and patron, Secretary of State Colin Powell, that Clinton's forward-looking engagement with Pyongyang would continue, but with sharper elbows, and more focus on results-oriented diplomacy on conventional military threats and human rights.

Except for the Japan alliance part, and the ring of potential bases around China, boy were we wrong. In private, and in terms of attitude, Bush has been almost as tough on Taiwan's Chen as he has been on an obviously very different actor, North Korea's Kim Jong-il. (Although while he basically junked the Clinton policy of engagement with the DPRK, he has been forced by the reality of Kim's nuclear bomb to try and revive it.)

Even more than by trade and geopolitics, U.S.-China relations are often defined by the situation between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan, and especially on Beijing's sense of whether the United States is keeping its promise not to encourage formal, legal independence for the former Republic of China.

At some risk to relations with Beijing, Bush has continued the traditional, comprehensive arms sales to Taipei of his pre decessors. These are based on the moral and strategic obligations of the Taiwan Relations Act, and the realpolitik calculation that in the absence of an unexpected rapprochement, a semblance of military balance in the Strait dividing the island from the mainland is required to maintain the peaceful status quo.

All of Bush's subsequent policies and attitudes must be viewed through that prism: Do nothing to upset the status quo, the delicate and ambiguous "peace" between Beijing and Taipei on...