No. of Recommendations: 4
Last night, Donald Trump gave Xi Jinping a state dinner at the White House. The room held American billionaires and senior officials of the Chinese Communist Party. Military musicians played. The tables glittered. Trump had assembled the symbols of American power to honor the leader of the country most determined to displace it.
There is an old word for the impression the evening left: kowtow. It comes from the Chinese practice of kneeling and touching one’s head to the ground in a gesture of deference. No one had to perform the ritual last night. Trump had arranged an American version, with all the splendor of the presidency at his disposal.
A president can welcome an adversary with dignity. He can offer a formal dinner, speak courteously, and make the hard demands his country requires. The question is what the ceremony serves. Last night’s display served Trump’s hunger to be admired. Xi received the honors. Trump appeared thrilled to bestow them. I wonder what the Chinese delegation made of the American billionaires gathered around the table, each aware of the value of access to China.
The guest list captured the strange character of Trump’s politics. He calls his domestic opponents “communists.” When the leader of the most powerful Communist Party on Earth arrived, Trump offered him a glittering evening among some of America’s richest people. Billionaires and communists seem to be the core of his base these days.
Xi came to this dinner with the knowledge of what his government and the companies operating under it have done. Donald Trump’s own State Department sanctioned Chinese companies for providing satellite imagery that it said enabled Iranian military strikes. Iran has attacked American bases. American soldiers have died under Iranian fire. I would be careful about claiming that Beijing ordered a particular strike or caused a particular death; the public evidence does not establish that. The documented conduct is grave enough. Chinese companies helped Iran identify American military targets.
China also helps sustain Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine. NATO calls Beijing a decisive enabler of Russia’s war, and points to its support for Russia’s defense industry. Putin wages that war on Europe’s doorstep while his government threatens NATO allies. Xi can see the pressure this places on the United States and the alliance it leads. He can also see how Donald Trump chose to receive him: with ceremony, praise, and an audience drawn from the heights of American wealth.
This is a moment of historic American weakness because the presidency has become so exposed to the appetites of the man holding it. Trump wants the prestige of the office to reflect upon him. He wants the photograph, the procession, the famous guests, the foreign leader’s attention. He confuses the ability to summon these things with the authority to command respect. Xi understands the difference. So does every government watching the visit.
American power has never rested on chandeliers or military bands. It rests on commitments that other nations believe, alliances that can act together, and a president capable of placing the country’s interests above his own desire for applause. Those qualities cannot be put on for an evening. An adversary judges them over years, through decisions made when keeping a promise is costly.
That is why Taiwan hangs over this dinner. Xi does not need an invitation to study American resolve. He is studying it already: in every delayed decision, every public slight to an ally, every sign that Trump views a security commitment as another item to bargain away. The danger does not depend on Xi deciding to invade tomorrow. It grows if he comes to believe that Washington’s promises are becoming less reliable and that time is working in his favor.
I cannot know what Xi thought as he looked across the table. I can ask what he saw. He saw the American president honoring him, while Chinese companies faced American sanctions for helping Iran target U.S. forces. He saw a president who attacks communists at home and courts the leader of the Chinese Communist Party at the White House. He saw American wealth eager for a seat in the room. These are observations Xi’s advisers will carry home, whatever polite words the two men exchange in public.
There was a time when a foreign envoy’s willingness to kowtow before a Chinese emperor became a question of national standing. The ritual mattered because it announced a relationship between powers. Our age has its own rituals. An airport greeting, a military review, a guest list, a toast: each tells a visiting leader something about how a president wishes to be seen. Trump may believe last night showed Xi the magnificence of America. I fear it showed him how easily the American presidency can be made to flatter him.
The United States remains a formidable country. Its soldiers, workers, scientists, institutions, and allies did not lose their strength at a dinner. That is what makes the spectacle so painful. A great country entrusted its highest office to a man who seems unable to distinguish its dignity from his own vanity. The weakness Xi witnessed was presidential debasement, performed in the name of American greatness.
No one in the East Room put his forehead to the floor. Xi had no need to ask. The world watched an American president spend the symbols of his office to win the approval of a rival. And from Taiwan, the question must have looked terrifyingly clear: if Xi decides to test America’s resolve, who, exactly, will answer him?
Steve Schmidt
