US-China relations are in danger of being further led "astray" due to the problematic perception of China among many in Washington, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi told United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken during their latest meeting on the sidelines of the G20 foreign ministers' meeting in Bali, Indonesia.
Due to the rampant Sinophobia in Washington, the Joe Biden administration has been saying one thing and doing another when it comes to China as it tries to keep relations from veering into confrontation while appeasing those in Congress who want it to adopt a harder line.
US officials had said before the talks that the meeting was aimed at keeping the difficult US-China relationship stable and preventing it from veering inadvertently into conflict.
The fundamental guardrails to prevent that are the US administration upholding the assurances that Biden has given that the US does not seek a new Cold War with China; it does not aim to change China's system; the revitalization of its alliances is not targeted at China; it does not seek to change the status quo across the Taiwan Straits.
The lists that the Chinese foreign minister presented his US counterpart and the vision of sound interaction between China and the US in the Asia-Pacific region that he expounded on should help clarify the behavioral problems the US needs to rectify.
Along with Wang's reiteration that the three joint communiques between the two countries serve as the cornerstone for stable bilateral relations, the Biden administration has a clear blueprint to follow to build a less volatile relationship.
Since both sides agreed that the meeting was "substantive and constructive", it is to be hoped that it has been conducive to enhancing mutual understanding and has paved the way for the mooted first face-to-face meeting between the leaders of the two countries. That highly anticipated meeting would surely serve as a badly needed counterweight against the forces threatening to drag the two countries into a dangerous conflict.
To some, the most meaningful part of the Wang-Blinken talks may have been the repeated shared commitment to conducting cooperation.
Its real significance, however, is more immediate and practical as it lies in the two sides' display of commitment to keeping channels of communication open. These are essential to manage the risk factors in bilateral relations.
The troubles in China-US relations have their roots in the two countries' divergent world outlooks. The two sides need to maintain their high-level communication to prevent mutual mistrust from transforming that divergence into an "iron curtain" between them. Or worse increasing the friction between their views since that will eventually produce a spark.