Photo Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Getty/Reuters
The soundtrack for the China mission of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken might well be “I Can’t Quit You Baby” by Led Zeppelin or “You Can’t Quit Me Baby” by Queens of the Stone Age.
The past couple of years have seen both the U.S. and China test the resilience of their highly charged and complicated relationship. But despite the inclination of those who would like to see a New Cold War between the two countries, both sides have looked the worst-case scenarios in the eye and said, “We don’t want to go there.”
Blinken’s exact words during a Monday press conference that followed his meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping were, “I stressed that direct engagement and sustained communication is the best way to responsibly manage our differences…we both agree on the need to stabilize our relationship.”