Jia Qingguo on Taiwan, Trump and US-China Relations

"If Trump is re-elected, I believe it will be very difficult for China to engage in rational and pragmatic exchanges with him.”

Today’s edition begins with an introduction by Rick Waters, managing director of Eurasia Group's China practice. Rick was until recently the U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for China and Taiwan and the inaugural head of the State Department’s Office of China Coordination (“China House”).

What follows is a relatively wide-ranging interview with Jia Qingguo (贾庆国) discussing the prospects of cross-Strait relations, a potential Trump presidency and US-China ties more broadly. Jia has been a long-time foreign policy adviser in the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and is the former Dean of Peking University’s School of International Studies. He has recently been outspokenly critical of the restrictions on Chinese scholars’ engagement with foreign counterparts. Among the highlights of this piece – his advocacy of “patience” in the Taiwan context so long as the incoming leadership does not pursue independence; his preference to see Biden re-elected rather tha…