No Deal Left
There
are no prospects for a “grand bargain” between Washington and either Moscow or
Beijing. The United States has nothing meaningful to offer Russia or China.
That means one thing: rising tension is inevitable. Having run out of carrots,
America now holds only sticks.
The
Mirage of a Breakthrough
Donald
Trump emerged from his recent meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping glowing
with enthusiasm, calling it “a 12 out of 10” and describing Xi as “a great
leader of a very powerful country.” Xi, more restrained, also called the talks
constructive. Soon after, Trump told reporters that he expected a trade deal
“very soon,” insisting that the two countries had “few real disagreements” - aside
from one: Beijing’s export restrictions on rare-earth metals.
Under
the proposed framework, China would suspend those restrictions for a year, with
the deal subject to annual review. In exchange, Washington would reduce tariffs
on Chinese goods from 57% to 47%.
But to
call this a breakthrough would be misleading. Export limits on rare-earth
elements are only one fragment of the trade war that has raged since early this
year. Beijing imposed them in October; Trump retaliated by announcing 100%
tariffs on Chinese imports starting November 1. Earlier, in the spring, the two
powers had exchanged tariffs of 145% and 125% respectively - then lowered them
in summer to 10% and 30% during a brief truce meant to pave the way for a
summit that never happened.
Xi
declined to meet. Both sides, it seems, had little to offer and even less to
concede.
The
Empty Calendar of Diplomacy
Last
week, Trump abruptly canceled a planned meeting with Russian President Vladimir
Putin in Budapest, explaining that “the leaders would not get where they needed
to go.” A frank admission that no deal was possible.
Just
days earlier, the White House had radiated optimism, hinting that Trump was
seeking a “deal” with Moscow. Something changed. The same thing that shifted
between Washington and Beijing.
Consider
the sequence: immediately after China imposed its rare-earth restrictions,
Trump canceled the planned summit with Xi in South Korea, saying there was now
“no reason” to meet. Six days later, he called Putin to propose a meeting.
In
Russia, that potential Budapest summit was widely discussed in the context of
Ukraine. Trump had again pushed for a freeze along the front line - and again
received a predictable “no” from Moscow. Perhaps he hoped persistence would pay
off. Or perhaps Ukraine was merely the surface issue, masking a deeper agenda:
the Russia-China partnership that continues to irritate Washington. On that
front too, consensus proved impossible.
Within
a week of that phone call, the U.S. canceled the meeting altogether and imposed
the first energy-sector sanctions of Trump’s current term. The same day, White
House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that Trump would meet Xi on
October 30 in South Korea. Bloomberg quickly reported that the president hoped
to discuss ending the war in Ukraine and China’s purchases of Russian oil - expecting
Xi to be “receptive.”
But
Ukraine was never the real issue. For Trump, the goal was to loosen the
Moscow-Beijing alignment - the increasingly solid axis that defines today’s
anti-Western, anti-hegemonic world.
A
Strategic Dead End
Trump
has long blamed Barack Obama and Joe Biden for driving Russia and China closer
together. Before his Asia tour, he repeated the point, insisting that “China
and Russia are not natural allies.” Curiously, when planning talks with Xi, he
criticized Nixon for “opening China,” and when preparing to meet Putin, he
attacked Biden for “uniting China and Russia.”
The
contradiction isn’t personal; it’s structural. Washington sees Sino-Russian
cooperation as its central global problem. Breaking it apart would require
offering one side a bargain - either neutrality or complicity. But such a deal
is impossible. For Russia, the price is Ukraine. For China, it’s Taiwan. No
American president, Republican or Democrat, can trade on those terms.
Tellingly,
Trump admitted that Taiwan was not discussed at all with Xi, while Ukraine came
up only superficially. Both leaders expressed a vague desire for peace, but the
key U.S. concern - China’s purchases of Russian oil - remained untouched. Nor
did Trump secure any promise on limiting Beijing’s supply of dual-use
technology to Moscow. The result: a temporary cooling of the trade war, nothing
more. Two exhausted boxers retreating to their corners for breath.
Nothing
to Offer
There
are, in truth, no prospects for Washington’s “grand bargain.” The United States
has nothing either Russia or China needs - and both know it. Their partnership,
built as a reaction to the unipolar order, is expanding across trade, energy,
technology, and defense. Pausing that momentum for a handshake photo with
Washington would be irrational.
No one
takes America’s word at face value anymore, regardless of who sits in the Oval
Office. The era of trust has ended.
A
multipolar world may not yet be fully realized, but it is visibly forming - and
Moscow, Beijing, and others are moving toward it deliberately. That fact
enrages Washington, and the impotence to stop it enrages even more.
Thus
the U.S. oscillates between gestures of conciliation - tariff cuts, sanction
relief - and threats of escalation, from renewed nuclear testing to new proxy
wars. The pattern is clear, and the conclusion unavoidable: tension between the
United States and both Russia and China will intensify.
Washington
has run out of deals to make - and out of tools to use.