ARTICLE: “Policy Convergence on China: Washington and Brussels Line Up Goals on Trade, Defense Issues,” by Neil King Jr. and Marc Champion, Wall Street Journal, 4 May 2006, p. A4.

ARTICLE: “U.S. Says No to Overnight Stay for Taiwanese Leader,” by Joseph Kahn, New York Times, 4 May 2006, p. A6.

HOT TOPIC: “Sudan: Nexus of Oil, Terrorism and Civil War,” by Lauren Etter, Wall Street Journal, 6-7 May 2006, p. A6.

ARTICLE: “China Breaches Vatican Accord By Naming Two Catholic Bishops,” by Andrew Batson, Wall Street Journal, 4 May 2006, p. A6.

OP-ED: “How rotten politics feeds a bad loan crunch in China,” by Minxin Pei, Financial Times, 8 May 2006, p. 11.

Sad to see that about the only big “security” issue we can reach agreement on with Europe anymore is that we both don’t like New Core powers getting uppity--like China and Russia. So we see a “convergence” on such subjects that’s more rhetorical than real.

As one expert (Adam Ward) on China puts it, the Euros still focus on and fear China’s failure while the U.S. still obsesses on and fears China’s successes. Reminds me of the basic Euro-U.S. split on Russia over the 1990s.

Still, the Bush Administration, for all the bluster and bad spending decisions at the Pentagon, still hews to a pretty sensible line on China: like denying Chen Shui-bian his desired victory lap in the U.S. following the White House’s shabby treatment of Hu Jintao. Instead, the White House welcomes Ma Ying, head of Taiwan’s Nationalist Party, who pushes a less confrontational line with the mainland, as this article notes.

Yes, people are starting to wake up to the notion that we need China across the board: to help us in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, North Korea. You name it. We need it. China is ready to become a stakeholder in the international community. I just don’t think this administration can move to the dialogue that will uncover that capacity. Probably doesn’t matter though, in the sense that the current Fourth Generation of leaders in China don’t seem up to the strategic dialogue either. Thus alliance advocates on both sides wait for the next generation of leaders to emerge.

China really only gets intransigent on two things: Party rule and Taiwan. That’s where the non-negotiable cuts were made on my Chinese edition PNM (before Beijing U Press reneged on that deal and demanded cuts on a load of everything else).

And the two issues are so often obviously tied together, like this latest tussle between the Vatican and Beijing, two autocratic dictatorships that are like oil and water together. The Vatican can’t wait to meddle in other countries’ internal lives and Beijing’s Party bosses have an obsessive fear of such transnational organizations to begin with.

Me, I would tell Benedict to get the relations (ditching Taiwan is a given) and work the soft-kill of connectivity over time, rather than try any John Paul on Beijing. Reality is that the marketplace has shifted a lot in the past twenty years in such matters. The Protestants and evangelicals are the hot property in China, not Catholics. Benedict should want to get the Vatican in the game, because the sidelines won’t do right now when other faiths are going like gangbusters there.

The Party isn’t going away any time soon, as evidenced by how it keeps its faithful members well embedded within state enterprises that are propped up by bad loans. Minxin Pei, in a great piece that’s also built off his new book (see, I knew he had it in him), notes that non-performing loans in China approach $1T.

How can the regime survive with that amazing exposure? Well, I guess one trillion in U.S. currency reserves helps.

So one begins to see how much the Chinese need us at home like we need them abroad.