Unlike the warmth it showed China during the 2008 Summer Olympics, the United States has adopted a chilly mindset for the 2022 Winter Games. In fact, relations seem headed for an extended ice age.

American anxiety about China shows that China has become a “near-peer” competitor to the United States. But the process of competition will not be dictated by the U.S. alone. The impact will only be revealed through interaction over time and the handling of key issues.

The deadline for China to reach the Phase 1 Trade Agreement targets has come and gone, and China has officially fallen short of its commitments. The two countries now must decide how to move forward.

The Biden administration’s pledge to “Build Back Better” should extend to the relationship with China - which is still straining under the tensions left behind by the previous occupant of the Oval Office.

Some of the Cold War experience, though it may not be an exact parallel, can be instructive. A pattern should be established to avoid dragging the world into a lose-lose scenario.

Given their mutual economic dependence, both China and the U.S. know they must manage relations. Nobody wants a new cold war. Rational countries are unwilling to choose sides, and there is great pressure for accommodation.

Repairing and protecting American hegemony is a central theme for the White House and Congress. To accomplish these goals they need to create the specter of an enemy at the gates, to imagine an adversary that poses an existential threat.

Germany’s newly minted Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock is laying shaky foundation with China by framing relations as a values-based competition with an “authoritarian regime.” She might want to take economic reality into account.

During the Cold War, Europe was America’s strategic priority. East Asia was largely a sideshow, even though the United States fought bloody wars in Korea and Vietnam, and also provided security for Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.

Americans like to think the United States won the Cold War and they nostalgically believe the same approach will work with China. It won’t. In fact, healthy China-U.S. relations depend on Washington’s moving away from the myth.