After Nixon's visit to China, the U.S. largely pursued a policy of what was then called engagement. But as China's military power grew, the United States invested more in efforts at deterrence. It wasn't until the Trump administration that the US started to characterize the relationship in especially adversarial terms.
There’s rare bipartisan consensus in Washington: China is a threat to be countered. Cornell professor Jessica Chen Weiss says the American approach could lock both countries into an escalatory spiral.
This episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlin, edited by Matt Collette, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Paul Robert Mounsey and Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Noel King.
Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained
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