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Direct News:Jake Sullivan, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, will visit China from August 27 to 29 to hold a new round of strategic communication between China and the United States.To thisAny observations?

Special commentator Zhang Sinan：Before leaving office, most US presidents will increase the frequency of foreign visits by senior government officials. This has two obvious purposes: first, to consolidate the "Political legacy", to ensure that the foreign strategy of this US government becomes an established agenda and an established fact as much as possible, so that it can be inherited and retained by the next US government, achieving a certain continuity of foreign policy; the second is to demonstrate foreign achievements. Through high-profile diplomatic activities, the outgoing US president hopes to show the diplomatic achievements of his tenure to the domestic and international community.

So we have seen that in recent times, US Secretary of State Blinken has been flying around the world, with a frequency of foreign visits significantly higher than in the previous three years, especially in the Middle East and Ukraine, international hot spots, as well as the node countries of the US alliance system around China. And today, the US President's Assistant for National Security Affairs, Jake Sullivan, who believes that "China's development of high-tech industries is a mistake", will also make his first visit to China during his tenure; of course, I believe this will also be Sullivan's last visit to China during his tenure.

So what is Sullivan going to talk about? Bloomberg News made it clear in its report on August 23, according to an anonymous senior official:There are three core issues: one is China's role in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the second is the Taiwan issue, and the third is the dispute over the South China Sea.In a sense, the positive consensus reached between Biden and China on these three issues during his tenure is not very good, and I don’t believe that Sullivan can talk about anything different during this visit; unless the Biden administration suddenly changes its course, at least on the surface, it is difficult for us to have any expectations for Sullivan’s visit to China. In contrast to what I just said, is Sullivan here to consolidate some kind of "political legacy" of the Biden administration? Obviously not, without consensus results, how can there be any "legacy" to speak of. Is he here to take the opportunity to show some kind of foreign achievements? Of course, the US side can announce how Sullivan expressed concerns to China or even issued warnings, but the US side is destined to gain nothing on these three core issues. In fact, according to Bloomberg, even the Biden administration itself has tried its best to downplay the "possibility of significant results" from Sullivan's visit, and is very low-key.

Direct News:But does this mean that Sullivan’s trip to China is just part of Biden’s “garbage time”?

Special commentator Zhang Sinan：Not necessarily.Some US media said that Sullivan is an official of the Biden administration and he will not represent the next US government, regardless of whether the winner is Harris of the Democratic Party or Trump of the Republican Party. How is this possible? Sullivan is here to test China's bottom line on behalf of Harris and the Democratic Party.

It is noted that both Harris and Trump are catering to the nationalist sentiment in the United States and advocating a tough policy toward China. At the Democratic National Convention on August 22, Harris declared: "We want to ensure that it is the United States, not China, that wins the competition in the 21st century, and that we strengthen rather than abandon our global leadership." On the other hand, we all know that Trump has threatened to impose a 60% general tariff on Chinese imports.

Both sides want to exert extreme pressure on China, but the problem is that extreme pressure is a technical job. Pressure is a means for the Americans, not an end. The United States only wants to maximize its benefits through extreme pressure, but does not want to push China into a corner. So Americans have been looking for such a point, a theoretical intersection of maximizing benefits and the maximum tolerable risk for the United States, a so-called "safe point" that is theoretically infinitely close to China and will let go. So how to find this point? So Sullivan came. As an absolute "hawk" against China in the Biden administration, Sullivan has long led the pressure on China. He is a "professional counterpart" to find out the bottom line.

The purpose of Sullivan's survey is to serve Harris' election and provide Harris with specific support and reference for designing China policy.

Of course, Sullivan's visit to China shows the determination and efforts of China and the United States to control differences and avoid conflicts. It is better to have something to talk about than nothing to talk about. The United States may not be the kind of friend that China wants, but at least the United States does not want to be China's worst enemy. Sullivan wants to test China's bottom line, and China can also take the opportunity to test the bottom line of the United States in turn, to find the theoretical "safe point" to maximize pressure on the United States. The game between countries has always been relative. No matter how cunning, it will ultimately rely on strength to speak.

Author: Zhang Sinan, special commentator of Shenzhen Satellite TV's "Live Broadcast of Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan"