Most likely, Taiwan will face pressure to move a certain amount of its semiconductor business elsewhere, but the “magic number” that will make it sustainable in the face of the Chinese military threat cannot yet be predicted, Schieffer said.
Don’t expect a big victory for Trump
Experts agree that the US and China will likely extend the temporary trade truce established during Trump’s last meeting with Xi, as both sides would benefit from that stability. But it is unclear how much trade Trump might be willing to trade as China uses its leverage to push forward its biggest demands. These would likely include a change in the US position on Taiwan, easing of export restrictions to give China access to more high-end technology, and possibly removing Chinese companies from the US sanctions list.
In particular, Trump no longer has emergency tariffs or even his global tariffs to threaten China, so Xi may get more leverage from the bargain than Trump.
However, Kennedy said China does not need to achieve even one of its biggest requests to emerge from the summit as a winner. “As long as there’s no chaos in the meeting and President Trump doesn’t go away and try to escalate tensions again, China basically comes out stronger,” Kennedy said.
The best outcome for Trump “might be to come out of Beijing with some pomp and show, but nothing that harms the United States or harms our allies and partners,” Schieffer told Ars.
Schieffer said, “It may be a bit like subverting expectations, but I would consider it a win at this point.”
Experts agree that, at the very least, Trump needs to score a symbolic victory over Beijing if he wants Republicans to have something to campaign on ahead of the midterm elections.
But if he is truly invested in US dominance in AI, he really can’t afford to be short-sighted at the summit, especially after making “massive” cuts to US science funding and research, which prompted China to begin recruiting top US scientists last year, Kennedy suggested.
“That’s really where the competition is going to be won or lost,” Kennedy said.
<a href