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A lot happens every day. Alliances shift, leaders change, and conflicts erupt. With In Brief, we’ll help you make sense of it all. Each week, experts will dig deep on a single issue happening in the world to help you better understand it.***Last week, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan traveled to China and met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Central Military Commission vice chairman Gen. Zhang Youxia. The visit was touted by both sides as aimed at stabilization of the U.S.-Chinese relationship, which has grown increasingly contentious over issues including Taiwan and the South China Sea. However, even as Sullivan was in Beijing, the United States is shoring up its capabilities in the Indo-Pacific – including with dispersed Air Force bases and airfields and a missile deployment to the Philippines.We asked for experts one simple question: despite diplomatic overtures, is the United States preparing for imminent war with China? Read more below.Gregory Poling Senior Fellow and Director Southeast Asia Program Center for Strategic and International StudiesChina’s military modernization and willingness to risk escalation compels the United States and its allies to rethink how they can deter or, if necessary, fight despite considerable disadvantages. In any conflict within the first island chain — the South China Sea, Taiwan Strait, and East China Sea — the Chinese military would overmatch the United States in surface, air, and missile capabilities. That math will only get worse over the next decade. However, the U.S. military does have ways to offset China’s advantages thanks to its allies, especially Japan and the Philippines. Both rely on U.S. forward presence to help defend their national interests and both are working hard to bolster it.China can’t deny access to the first island chain if U.S. and allied forces already have capable and survivable platforms inside