Join War on the Rocks and gain access to content trusted by policymakers, military leaders, and strategic thinkers worldwide.
The American team thought it was signaling restraint. The Chinese team saw preparations for combat. In a closed-door Sino-American crisis simulation I helped organize in the 2010s — which the U.S. military funded as part of a long-term project — the Americans repositioned an aircraft carrier away from a maritime dispute between China and the Philippines, expecting the move to reassure Beijing. Instead, the Chinese participants became deeply alarmed. They believed the carrier was now ideally positioned to launch combat operations while remaining less vulnerable to attack. The episode revealed how suspicion could turn an intended reassurance into an apparent threat. This danger becomes more intense when each side views the other primarily through the lens of strategic competition.
For nearly a decade, strategic competition has framed the U.S. approach to China, shaping military planning and operations, alliance diplomacy, trade and technology relations, investment policy, and — increasingly — scientific, educational, and cultural exchanges.
While strengthening deterrence and inspiring improvements in America’s competitive capabilities, strategic competition has become an end in itself, encouraging dangerous policies often based on rigid, worst-case assumptions about Chinese intentions and abilities. And the same dynamic operates on the Chinese side. The framework fails to answer a central question: What kind of stable and beneficial U.S.-Chinese relationship is such competition intended to produce?
Both sides require greater reassurance, positive incentives to exercise restraint and cooperation, and recognition of the need for an enduring, stable balance supported by substantive, lasting agreements. Without these, stress on strategic competition is likely to produce recurring crises, accelerating arms competition, economic and technological fragmentation, and even a full-scale war, potentially involving nuclear weapons and most likely over Taiwan. Even without such a catastrophic outcome, strategic competition will almost certainly diminish cooperation on potentially existential, global threats such as climate change and the disruptive effects of emerging technologies like AI.
The 2026 National Defense Strategy states that the United States does not seek to “dominate,” “strangle,” or “humiliate” China. It also describes the American objective as an Indo-Pacific balance of power that allows a “decent peace,” and stresses homeland and Western Hemisphere security. It also does not mention Taiwan, a major potential source of conflict. Such wording suggests the Trump administration is moving away from intense strategic competition backed by American superiority.
And yet, the same document calls for a strong denial defense against China along the first island chain extending from the Korean Peninsula to Southeast Asia, as well as an overall “favorable balance of power” in the Asia-Pacific, implying a continued need to geographically contain China through superior military power, as opposed to a stable balance based on mutual denial capabilities. The strategy does not offer reciprocal political limits or an agreed end-state for the relationship. And U.S. force modernization, alliance cooperation, and technology restrictions remain heavily shaped by concerns about a threatening China.
Despite the positive rhetoric occurring in parts of the National Defense Strategy and during both of this year’s meetings between President Donald Trump and General Secretary Xi Jinping, U.S. policy remains a largely zero-sum competitive struggle requiring clearly superior, if not entirely dominant, military power to contain or constrain Beijing. The emphasis remains on “winning” a competition over creating a stable, beneficial outcome. As a result, the relationship still lacks an operational political framework for the “decent peace” called for by the United States.
Washington should pursue a strategy that bounds bilateral competition within a relationship that protects both countries’ vital interests while reducing conflict risks and expanding opportunities for positive-sum outcomes. This process is best described by the Chinese concept endorsed by both leaders during the Beijing summit: constructive strategic stability. In an attempt to define this concept, Beijing has articulated broad principles and both governments have announced specific cooperative initiatives, but neither has publicly set out a coherent, sequenced framework linking specific political assurances to verifiable reciprocal restraint measures and, ultimately, durable agreements.
There are many reasons why a policy of strategic competition does not serve American (or Chinese) interests.
First, it offers no clear, stable, mutually beneficial political end-state. Instead, the United States largely measures success through stronger military deployments, tighter anti-China alliances, export and investment controls, tariffs, and other restrictions. Under this approach, competition becomes self-reinforcing, as Chinese trade and technological gains invite additional restrictions, military modernization justifies larger deployments and increased defense spending, and diplomatic or political advances prompt zero-sum counters. Much the same set of responses is seen on the Chinese side.
Second, as a result, this approach encourages both sides to securitize nearly every aspect of the relationship, from trade and technology to scientific exchanges. As a result, an increasing number of activities by either side become subject to intense restrictions or prohibitions for real and imagined “national security” reasons.
Third, this dynamic deepens mistrust and encourages worst-case planning. The trajectory points toward either a competition for predominance or an unstable balance in which both sides constantly seek leverage, increasing the danger of military confrontation and conflict. In such an environment, procedural “guardrails” will prove insufficient unless the two governments also reach substantive, reciprocal arrangements that reduce the underlying sources of conflict.
Fourth, while any lasting strategy requires realistic assessments of each side’s capabilities, strategic competition encourages inflated views of both the challenges each side poses and each side’s ability to counter them, producing unrealistic expectations.
China is a formidable economic, technological, and military power and at times uses its capabilities to counter U.S. interests, including by restricting critical-mineral exports to the United States and, according to U.S. intelligence and cybersecurity agencies, penetrating U.S. critical-infrastructure networks to prepare for disruption during a crisis or conflict. It also undermines U.S. interests by supporting both Russia and Iran with military and dual-use components in their respective conflicts with Ukraine and the United States. But such actions do not justify portraying Beijing as an existential threat in other than nuclear warfare terms, or assuming its growth and influence in every case come at America’s expense, necessitating a U.S. drive for dominance or clear superiority and zero-sum pushback on every front.
Despite efforts to reduce its vulnerability to outside pressure and its desire to stress state sovereignty and collective rights over liberal democratic ideas, China remains deeply integrated into the international economy, from which it has benefited and to which it has contributed significantly. Moreover, China faces structural constraints on its ability to achieve global normative and power dominance, such as adverse demographics, high debt and property sector weakness, and slowing productivity and growth. It also suffers under ideological constraints and a political system with limited international appeal.
While posing a military challenge to U.S. maritime predominance in the Western Pacific that requires sustained balancing, Beijing is highly unlikely to be able to assemble the capabilities needed for global military dominance in the foreseeable future — if ever — including extensive alliances, overseas bases, worldwide logistics, and broad international acceptance of Chinese leadership.
For its part, the United States is constrained in sustaining its historical predominance by steadily growing fiscal pressures, political polarization, public resistance to military escalation and prolonged wars (evident in polling on Iran), less-compliant allies, and a broader diffusion of global power.
Finally, open-ended strategic competition distorts American priorities and damages prosperity and long-term strength. The administration’s budget proposals prioritize defense spending while reducing overall funding for civilian programs, weakening investment in the domestic foundations of competitiveness and national well-being.
In rejecting strategic competition, America should not return to engagement and hedging. While producing decades of relative stability, mutually beneficial economic interaction, and normalized exchanges, that policy downplayed unavoidable competition and became associated with unrealistic expectations of Chinese political liberalization and near-complete acceptance of the U.S.-led international system. Alhough hedging was arguably a logical form of insurance against a more aggressive China, Washington never fully defined, delimited, and implemented the concept. Moreover, as with strategic competition, neither notion defined a sustainable end-state for the relationship.
The term “strategic stability” has its roots in Cold War efforts to limit the dangers of U.S.-Soviet nuclear competition. Its current usage is much broader, however, referring to the overall Sino-American relationship. American officials such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio have employed “strategic stability” in this broader sense. But the full term, “constructive strategic stability,” was apparently first used by Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders. They defined a relationship marked by cooperation as the foundation, with moderate competition, manageable differences, and a durable peace. The American side then accepted the full term (not necessarily China’s definition), adding “…on the basis of fairness and reciprocity.”
The Chinese origin and definition of constructive strategic stability might make some observers cautious, but that is not a reason to reject it. The test should be whether Washington defines the term and accepts it in ways that protect and advance American interests and constrain dangerous behavior on both sides. Washington should resist any definition equating the concept to one-sided respect for Beijing’s red lines.
As I use the term, constructive strategic stability denotes both a political process and an outcome: a stable, mutually advantageous relationship and orientation to the international order. It assumes that neither the United States nor China is an existential threat to the other in every day-to-day circumstance outside the extreme case of a nuclear war, nor on a path to inevitable decline or dominance of one over the other. It recognizes that both, through their interaction, create dangerous, virtually unbounded competition. And it posits that global and national order and prosperity require extensive bilateral cooperation and mutual benefit, which necessitate substantive accommodation and reciprocal restraint.
Some level of rivalry and competition are unavoidable, given the two powers’ contrasting political systems and search for security and prosperity amid scarce resources. Nonetheless, Beijing and Washington should not allow rivalry to overshadow the obvious need to create lasting stability in their relationship and address those major, sometimes existential threats demanding cooperation, including climate warming, pandemics, AI governance, global financial stability, and nuclear conflict.
Building constructive strategic stability should not depend on a severe, restraint-inducing crisis or different, more restraint-oriented political leaders. The present administration has provided the political language needed to begin this process, including the National Defense Strategy’s call for strategic stability and a “decent peace” with China, the Beijing summit’s endorsement of a constructive relationship of strategic stability based on fairness and reciprocity, and similar comments made during Xi’s September 2026 visit to Washington.
The political constituency for this relationship, in both the United States and China, could begin with officials who favor strong deterrence but want to avoid an open-ended crisis and address common concerns, as well as military professionals interested in reducing the risk of accidental escalation and conflict. It could also include business and technology constituencies that favor a predictable, profitable relationship and resist its expanding securitization.
Constructive strategic stability cannot emerge through a single summit, a comprehensive “grand bargain,” or declarations of goodwill. Nor can it rest on unilateral concessions followed by expectations of reciprocity. It should develop gradually through concrete, mutually beneficial, verifiable interactions.
The purpose of such interactions is to test intentions through behavior, convert successful exchanges into lasting institutionalized commitments, and move from zero-sum strategic competition with guardrails toward reciprocal restraint, negotiated accommodation, and binding cooperation that does far more than just avoid war.
This effort thus moves beyond an argument I made in War on the Rocks in 2024 about the inadequacy of existing crisis-management mechanisms, and revisited after the May summit in June 2026. Improving crisis management should be only one step toward a basic shift in the relationship’s framework.
The process should move through four overlapping stages: political communication, operational reassurance, reciprocal restraint, and institutionalization. These stages should cover three main policy arenas: Taiwan and Asian security; economics and technology; and nuclear, cyber, and AI. Early measures are to be limited, verifiable, and generally reversible. More consequential steps should come only after less costly ones have shown their value. Failure in one area should not destroy cooperation elsewhere.
Communicate Clear Political Boundaries and Test Reciprocity
The August 2022 crisis following then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan illustrated the danger of contradictory U.S. policy signals without clearly understood political boundaries. Pelosi, a highly provocative figure in U.S.-Chinese relations, took what her office described as an “official visit” to Taiwan, despite the supposedly unofficial nature of the U.S. relationship with the island. The crisis demonstrated the need to communicate consistently and clearly what political actions are deemed intolerable and what assurances are expected.
The first step in building constructive strategic stability should thus be an authoritative (perhaps joint) statement by the two leaders defining the relationship they desire and the dangers they intend to avoid. It should clearly state that neither will seek the strategic subordination, economic collapse, or political weakening or disintegration of the other, and that both nations will remain to some significant extent mutually dependent to ensure mutual benefit.
Regarding Taiwan, Trump has moved partway toward these assurances. After the Beijing summit, he clearly reemphasized a longstanding U.S. policy by publicly cautioning against a Taiwan declaration of independence, while declining to say — in contrast to Biden’s remark — whether the United States would defend the island and stating that he had made no commitment to Xi regarding Taiwan. However, Trump also created concern in Taiwan and the United States by questioning the viability of defending the island and casting doubt on a pending arms sale package.
In place of this ambiguity, the president should consistently provide a balanced set of deterrence and assurance signals, such as: The United States will oppose any unilateral attempts by either side to change the status quo in fundamental ways, toward either independence or unification, as defined and interpreted by Washington. This would go beyond the existing “do not support” statement of U.S. policy regarding Taiwan’s independence, to convey Washington’s clear and strong resolve to actively oppose such an action when necessary. Such attempts could include a formal effort by Taipei to endorse or codify a One China, One Taiwan policy, or, regarding China and unification, a direct Chinese use of force (however limited) against Taiwan.
Equally important, the Trump administration should also clearly reverse efforts to undermine the One China policy and unambiguously reaffirm its commitment to that policy. Specifically, the president should state that he will not place combat units on the island or take other actions suggesting a military alliance with Taipei and will emphasize only defensive capabilities in U.S. assistance to Taiwan. He should also clearly assert, as the One China policy stipulates, that Washington remains open to any peaceful, uncoerced resolution of the Taiwan issue acceptable to people on both sides of the strait, and should press Taipei to stop undermining that policy by portraying Taiwan as a vital U.S. strategic asset that, by implication, must remain separate from China. Even Taiwan’s possession of high-technology semiconductor fabrication capabilities does not justify such a portrayal.
On the Chinese side, Xi Jinping should reiterate unambiguously that peaceful unification remains China’s preferred objective, state unequivocally that there is no fixed timetable for unification, and assert a willingness to significantly reduce military activities around Taiwan as part of a larger tension-reduction effort.
Although unlikely to end distrust, these baseline declarations would establish political benchmarks for behavior and test both sides’ willingness to engage in reciprocal assurances and accommodations.
Reinforce Political Assurances with Operational Activities
Political assurances have little value unless they shape the conduct of military and other instruments of state power.
On Oct. 24, 2023, a Chinese J-11 fighter intercepted an American B-52 over the South China Sea and, according to U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, passed within roughly 10 feet at night, creating a serious collision risk. This was not an isolated incident. Unsafe encounters have continued involving U.S. allies: According to Australia’s Department of Defence, a Chinese naval helicopter maneuvered dangerously close to an Australian helicopter over the Yellow Sea on March 4, 2026, forcing its crew to take evasive action. The 2023 incident showed the limitations of a 2014 memorandum and a 2015 air-to-air safety annex on safe U.S.-Chinese air and maritime encounters, whose rules have not consistently prevented unsafe encounters.
Washington could propose a 90-day trial period — following the authoritative presidential assurances outlined above and marked by immediate, reciprocal obligations that both militaries avoid unsafe encounters — in which the two sides would routinely employ designated emergency communications channels, investigate reported violations within an agreed period, and exchange advance notification of unusually large exercises and major missile tests.
During the same period, the Pentagon could conduct a classified review, without yet implementing its recommendations, of close-in reconnaissance missions to determine whether a significant number could be conducted at greater distance, lower frequency, or with different platforms without materially reducing intelligence collection.
None of these steps would require Washington to abandon deterrence, change its one-China policy, curtail lawful military operations, or concede a Chinese red line.
During the 90-day trial period, Chinese forces would have to consistently meet the above observable benchmarks before Washington proceeded to reconnaissance reductions. If Beijing persistently failed to meet these benchmarks while insisting that Washington alone must demonstrate “respect,” the initiative should stop at the reassurance stage, without the United States having altered its military posture.
In economics and technology, Washington and Beijing should work both independently and together to distinguish genuine security requirements from commercial competition. Each should explain the national-security rationale behind major technology and investment restrictions and consult, when feasible, before enacting new ones. Although dual-use capabilities present challenges, more can be done to reverse expanding securitization. Both sides should evaluate technologies with possible indirect applications against transparent, mutually understood criteria.
In addition, the two governments should establish regular, results-oriented dialogues on industrial subsidies, investment screening, intellectual-property protection, scientific cooperation, and AI, as well as cyber and nuclear operations. The latter three areas ought to include procedures for notifying one another of major incidents that appear accidental or unintended. These dialogues would identify red lines and opportunities for mutual assurances and sustained cooperation.
Finally, the two sides should strengthen crisis-prevention and management mechanisms through an official military and civilian Track One dialogue supported by unofficial Track Two discussions addressing both the political and military sources of crises and the guidelines and communication channels needed to manage them. My recently published crisis management manual addresses these and other issues in detail.
Move From Reassurance to Concrete Restraint Measures
The economic and technological relationship between Beijing and Washington demonstrates why reassurance should eventually produce concrete restraint. On Oct. 7, 2022, Washington announced sweeping controls on China’s access to advanced computing chips and semiconductor-manufacturing equipment, and subsequently expanded those restrictions. Beijing responded by requiring licenses for exports of materials important to semiconductor, defense, and battery supply chains.
Both governments invoked national security, but neither defined a mutually understood limiting principle, a process for consultation, or conditions under which they might narrow or remove restrictions. The result was a self-reinforcing cycle in which each side’s attempt to reduce vulnerability increased the other’s incentive to retaliate. Constructive strategic stability must therefore move beyond verbal reassurance and temporary “truces” to reciprocal, verifiable, and enduring restraints on the activities each side finds most destabilizing.
In security, after Beijing has demonstrated consistent compliance during the 90-day military-safety trial outlined above, Washington could implement the classified review’s recommendations to reduce close-in reconnaissance operations, especially those providing marginal intelligence value relative to their political and crisis-instability costs. These adjustments would preserve essential deterrent and intelligence capabilities and remain reversible.
Beijing would have to sustain safe intercept behavior and measurably reduce coercive military activities around Taiwan (including frequent median-line crossings, large-scale encirclement exercises, and simulated blockade operations) before further steps, such as reciprocal exercise observations, are taken. Washington could invite Chinese observers to selected military exercises, including the major multinational Rim of the Pacific exercise, subject to applicable statutory restrictions. Beijing could reciprocate U.S. invitations by inviting American observers to People’s Liberation Army exercises.
Economic and technology policies should reduce securitization, with Washington narrowing or removing those export controls whose demonstrated security benefits do not justify their costs to civilian production, research, and beneficial exchange. Restrictions affecting semiconductor manufacturing and biotechnology equipment deserve particular scrutiny, with controls tailored to specific security risks. Beijing should narrow politically motivated market access restrictions, strengthen protections against forced technology transfer, reduce critical mineral export controls, and provide more equal treatment for foreign companies in China.
In nuclear, cyber, and AI policy, Washington and Beijing should curtail, if not end, provocative operations that raise fears of nuclear escalation, removal of human control over nuclear use, or attacks on critical civilian infrastructure. As verification capabilities develop, they should negotiate a formal cyber noninterference declaration prohibiting peacetime attacks against nuclear command-and-control systems, civilian electrical grids, hospitals, and other critical civilian infrastructure, while establishing incident-notification and consultation procedures. And they should establish a clear link and protocol for the AI-incident communication channel created when Xi Jinping visited Washington.
Make Restraint Durable
The 2015 cyber agreement illustrates both the value and the fragility of institutionalized restraint. President Barack Obama and Xi agreed that neither government would conduct or knowingly support cyber-enabled theft of intellectual property for commercial advantage. Independent cybersecurity researchers reported a marked decline in intrusions attributed to China-based groups beginning in mid-2014, even before the agreement. But the improvement proved difficult to sustain as enforcement remained uncertain and the broader relationship deteriorated.
The episode suggests that restraint in any policy area becomes durable only when a commitment defines the prohibited behavior, establishes a baseline and reliable means of assessing compliance, requires regular review, and specifies proportionate consequences for violations without allowing one dispute to destroy the entire arrangement. The goal is not to make cheating impossible. It’s to make noncompliance visible enough that reciprocal restraint remains politically defensible.
In this entire process, verification would vary by issue. U.S. and allied surveillance, commercial satellite imagery, ship and aircraft tracking, and agreed exercise notifications can reveal military behavior around Taiwan. Published regulations, licensing data, customs data, and company experience can track export controls and critical-mineral restrictions. Because responsibility for cyber violations is harder to establish, initial arrangements should focus on incident consultation, protection of clearly defined categories of infrastructure, and patterns of behavior, rather than unverifiable prohibitions. These verifications can have a preceding 12-month baseline, involve a sustained level of compliance across successive review periods, and and draw on a U.S. interagency assessment on the American side, ideally involving American allies. Such a process should also exist on the Chinese side.
As confidence develops and tensions abate, both governments should eventually reach parallel, independently adopted restraints limiting particularly destabilizing military capabilities, including certain intermediate-range missile deployments, offensive antisatellite systems, large concentrations of missile forces opposite Taiwan, and U.S. defense assistance to the island. As always, American adjustments should occur only as Chinese restraint becomes substantial and verifiable.
A bilateral economic security agreement should define restricted technologies, specify a process of consultation before major restrictions, and codify regular reviews of export controls, sanctions, tariffs, investment screening, and critical-mineral policies. Each action should specify its objective, criteria for success, and conditions for lifting or escalating controls.
As suggested above, formal cyber and AI agreements should take place at this stage, establishing reliable consultation mechanisms and protections against attacks on nuclear command-and-control and critical civilian infrastructure. The two nations should also restore mutually beneficial scientific, educational, and technological exchanges and protect them from short-term political fluctuations.
In all of the above stages, close consultation with America’s allies and key partners should occur to the extent possible, including Taiwan. Washington should explain the need to move from open-ended strategic competition to a stability-centered, mutually beneficial relationship requiring clear agreements and understandings with Beijing, based in part on concessions and accommodations. Washington should make it clear that these agreements would not undermine the security of other countries. Indeed, a stable bilateral relationship of mutual benefit would bolster region-wide security.
Washington must also consult Congress from the outset and at each stage along the way. The executive branch could initiate the military-safety trial period under existing authority, but later measures — especially adjustments involving congressionally mandated economic restrictions or U.S. arms policy toward Taiwan — should not occur solely through executive action. Early and consistent consultation would make subsequent steps more politically defensible and durable, reducing the risk that commitments would collapse with a change of administration.
Agreements on reciprocal military restraint regarding Taiwan could appear to violate the Six Assurances and the Taiwan Relations Act. While the Taiwan Relations Act is a law, the Six Assurances are legally non-binding policy commitments. Neither rule out voluntary U.S.-Chinese understandings to reduce military tensions. That said, adjustments in arms assistance must meet the act’s requirements. The act requires defense articles and services sufficient to maintain Taiwan’s self-defense capability, with their nature and quantity determined by the president and Congress “based solely upon their judgment of the needs of Taiwan.” It also requires review of those needs by U.S. military authorities. Following this wording, verified reductions in the Chinese threat through the above-outlined mutual tension reduction process could lower Taiwan’s defense requirements and thus justify independently determined adjustments in U.S. assistance.
The Six Assurances state that the United States “Has not agreed to consult with the PRC on arms sales to Taiwan.” This wording does not literally prohibit future understandings. Moreover, the accompanying 1982 cables also contemplated reductions in arms sales conditioned on continued Chinese peaceful behavior, with Taiwan’s defense needs remaining the U.S. benchmark. Any adjustment should therefore be an independent, reversible American response to verified Chinese restraint, without instituting prior consultations with Beijing over specific arms sales or granting it control over Taiwan’s defenses.
Constructive strategic stability is not a call to blindly trust Beijing, abandon deterrence, or accept a Chinese sphere of influence. It is an attempt to embed competition and deterrence within a stability-centered political framework and test whether limited reassurance can produce reciprocal restraint and enduring agreements. If China refuses meaningful reciprocity, the United States loses little from low-cost, reversible measures and gains evidence about Beijing’s intentions. If China responds, both gain a basis for larger steps.
Building constructive strategic stability will require sustained political leadership in both countries and, to the fullest extent possible, support from U.S. allies. Neither Washington nor Beijing can create a stable relationship unilaterally. Each must demonstrate through repeated behavior that it can defend its own vital interests while recognizing that the other possesses legitimate interests that require accommodation.
The choice is therefore not whether the United States will compete with China. Competition is unavoidable. The choice is whether that competition becomes an increasingly self-sustaining struggle for predominance or operates within a broader political strategy designed to produce a stable, beneficial peace over the long term.
That distinction could determine far more than who wins the next round of U.S.-Chinese competition. It could determine whether the world’s two most powerful countries learn to live with one another at all.
Michael D. Swaine is a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Formerly a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the RAND Corporation, Swaine is a specialist in Chinese defense and foreign policy, U.S.-Chinese relations, and East Asian international relations. His work has focused on Sino-American crisis management and the Taiwan issue. He has authored and edited more than a dozen books and monographs as well as many journal articles and book chapters in these areas. Swaine directs security-related projects with Chinese partners and advises the U.S. government on Asian security issues. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in government from Harvard University.
Image: The White House via Wikimedia Commons
.jpg){kind=link}