At a press conference on March 30, Chinese spokesperson Lu Kang announced that Chinese President Xi Jinping would visit U.S. President Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago property in Florida from April 6-7.

"I didn’t want this job. I didn’t seek this job. My wife told me I’m supposed to do this.” These are the words of Rex Tillerson, the U.S. Secretary of State, the nation’s highest ranking diplomat. Tillerson’s candid comments come in light of his first trip to Asia where he met with leaders in Japan, South Korea and China.

Could Trump like Richard Nixon “echo like thunder” by unilaterally announcing a high tariff regime to balance U.S. trade deficit and break the WTO system? While some of Trump’s advisors would wave their heads affirmatively, the institutional and commercial leverage of the U.S today is much inferior from Nixon’s America that bended Europeans to follow her unilateral demands.

Trump’s ascension to power was bad news for Beijing, especially because his “Make America Great Again” vision collides with Xi’s “Chinese dream” to make this the “Chinese century.” Yet China thus far has not only escaped any punitive American counteraction on trade and security matters, but also the expected Trump-Xi bonhomie at Mar-a-Lago could advertise that the more things change, the more they stay the same in U.S. foreign policy.

The stakes for the first Xi-Trump summit are high—but so also is the opportunity to stabilize relations and set a positive tone for future interactions. President Xi and the Chinese side will come to the summit extremely well prepared on a wide range of complex issues confronting the two governments. The question is: how well prepared will the new American president be?

As an experienced businessman, Trump may not use words as thoughtfully as a typical politician, which sometimes is his strength rather than weakness. Words can be used as a tool in negotiations in different ways. The real question will be: How steadfast is his word when making deals?

Most of Trump’s rhetoric and new thinking about foreign relations have not materialized, and he basically has returned to the old track of conventional US diplomatic thinking. “Obsolete” NATO is once again the “unbreakable alliance”, and his attitude toward China is also now in line with previous US policy.

While many issues are on the table, China hopes to work with America to assure the DPRK’s legitimate security while persuading Pyongyang to come down from the nuclear ladder. The upcoming summit meeting holds promise for a workable new type of great-power partnership.

Developments in the realms of outer space and energy/environment now present us the opportunity for three of the world’s great powers – China, Russia and the United States – to increase significantly international cooperation in the long run for two of the four global public commons: space and energy/environment. However, such improvements will not happen unless leaders in Washington, Beijing, and Moscow rethink historical notions of competition and conflict among them.

The new Trump administration is well aware of the significance of China-US relations for the US, and the Chinese side is also eager to see a rapid and smooth transition of bilateral ties. Both sides, therefore, share a desire to have their leaders meet as soon as possible, and Secretary Tillerson’s visit this week has created a sound atmosphere for the meeting.