Can Trump and Xi build ‘responsible great powers’ relationship?

At the request of Xi, Trump agreed to maintain the “one China” policy, under which Washington considers Taiwan as part of China. Xi, for his part, told Trump that China intends to make efforts together with the United States towards advancing the bilateral relationship.
The Trump administration probably had the aim of balancing, prior to the Japan-US summit talks, its diplomatic ties between Japan and China, by reaffirming Washington’s basic position in place since the normalization of US-China relations in 1979.
Before his administration was inaugurated, Trump said, “I don’t know why we have to be bound by a ‘one China’ policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things, including trade,” thus questioning whether his country should keep its “one China” policy. Breaking with the conventional custom of successive U.S. presidents, Trump also talked over the phone with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen.
It can be welcomed that with the latest US-China telephone talks, further escalation of antagonism between the two countries has been avoided at least for now.
Trump had repeatedly accused China of stealing American jobs with its unfair trade practices. It is worrisome that Trump may also have the intention to get concessions from China in trade talks in return for Washington accepting the “one China” principle.
Trump said with emphasis that he and Xi were “in the process of getting along very well, and I think it will be very much of a benefit to Japan”. A situation should not be allowed to happen in which Washington uses security issues as a bargaining chip to gain economic benefits.
During the Japan-US summit talks, both leaders affirmed that Article 5 of the Japan-US Security Treaty applies to the Senkaku Islands in Okinawa Prefecture and confirmed the importance of “freedom of navigation” in the East and South China seas. It is essential for the United States to steadfastly maintain its stance of engaging itself in Asia.
The new US administration should deploy its naval vessels for patrol activities in the South China Sea more actively than the previous administration led by President Barack Obama.
It is problematic that while the Trump administration’s Asian policy has yet to be fixed, China is trying to intensify its control in the waters with the use of force and to make its maritime expansion a fait accompli.
Earlier this month, it was confirmed that, just as the militarisation of artificial islands is advancing in the Spratly Islands, there is newly reclaimed land in the Paracel Islands as well, and such facilities as harbors and helicopter landing areas have been built up further there.
In the air above the South China Sea in the vicinity of the Scarborough Shoal near the Philippines, there was an incident recently in which a Chinese airborne early warning aircraft came abnormally close to a US Navy patrol plane, as close as about 300 metres.
China is off base if it moves to build great power relations on an equal footing with the United States under the Trump administration, while at the same time failing to control itself in a series of high-handed actions.