The Biden administration recognizes the importance of sustained engagement in the region, but it can’t ignore Washington’s other interests around the world. Thus, the prospects for America’s Indo-Pacific Strategy are uncertain.

Some believe the U.S. has the ability to take on a two-ocean strategy — the Atlantic and Indo-Pacific — but China-Russia issues loom large. They will guide the approach to China by the West.

In the age of globalization, foreign policy sways our daily life more than people could imagine. A trade war leads to soaring price of consumer goods, which means you have to pay more for groceries, and sanctions on solar panels could mean more greenhouse gas emission, which creates greater peril of climate change. Disturbingly, Washington’s current China policy, a policy that could mean the difference between war and peace, prosperity and destitution, is based on some seriously misleading claims.

There is no need for China to overreact to the latest strategy report, but it needs to be prepared for pressure from the United States, which will likely focus on the Indo-Pacific region for decades to come.

The strategic benefit for China and Russia to maintain good relations has never been more apparent. A successful Sino-Russian foreign policy push in Ukraine and Taiwan would certainly shock the U.S. and Europe.

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.

The year 2022 will mark 50 years since US President Richard Nixon traveled to China to meet with Communist Party of China Chairman Mao Zedong and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai – a major step toward restoring relations after decades of estrangement and hostility. A half-century later, the progress they launched has been all but lost, and US President Joe Biden is partly to blame.

Oddly, President Biden has claimed on several occasions that he hoped competition with China would not veer into conflict. But Washington-style competition means a race to the bottom — and possible peril.

While tough-talk on both sides of the U.S.-China relationship has come to dominate reports on the topic - precedent shows that quiet accommodation behind the scenes may parallel the new administration’s anti-China rhetoric.

Conventional logic would say that new leadership should open a broad window to reset relationships between nations. Yet as the first 6 months of the Biden presidency shows, the story is not always so cut-and-dry.