The mood is different in Washington
Xi Jinping is in Washington. It is Thursday 24 September 2026. This marks his first state visit to the United States in more than a decade, a period during which the global order has been profoundly shaken and then rebuilt along new, uncertain lines. The mood is different. Very different. A palpable tension hangs over the city, a stark contrast to the atmosphere of his last official trip to the American capital. That visit feels like a lifetime ago. It might as well be from another century.
The last time President Xi was formally hosted in Washington was back in 2015, an occasion of considerable pomp and ceremony presided over by President Barack Obama. It was a different era. That visit was defined by a celebratory atmosphere of managed optimism, culminating in a state dinner where the singer Ne-Yo performed for the assembled dignitaries. Peng Liyuan, Xi’s wife, reportedly sang along. The agenda was a reflection of that cooperative, if sometimes strained, partnership, with scheduled discussions covering a sprawling list of topics that included cybercrime, technology, the climate crisis and human rights. That was then.
Today there are no serenades. Donald Trump is the host. The visit is all business. Trump, now navigating his second term in the White House, has completely recalibrated America’s relationship with China, creating a new and unpredictable dynamic that oscillates between outright confrontation and cautious, transactional engagement. His first presidency was defined by hostility. This one is different. Gone are the wide ranging, almost academic discussions on human rights and the climate. They have been replaced by the stark realities of trade disputes, geopolitical leverage and military posturing. The talks on Thursday are about global power. They are about money. They are about the future of artificial intelligence. A decade ago, the White House was filled with song. Now, it is the quiet setting for a monumental transaction. The world is watching to see who pays the price.
Trump has changed his approach to China
The central puzzle is the president himself. Trump has changed. His first presidency was defined by its open hostility to China, a four year period of escalating tariffs and public accusations that reshaped global supply chains and left international alliances strained. It was a trade war. He attacked Beijing constantly. The rhetoric was aggressive, a deliberate strategy to position China as America’s primary economic and ideological rival. That approach has now been abandoned. Or at least, it has been put aside.
The change is confusing many in Washington and in capital cities across the world. His second term has been different. Very different. While the competitive language has not vanished entirely from his rallies, the actions of his administration have been significantly more conciliatory. The public antagonism has been replaced by quiet negotiation and a willingness to engage that was absent during his first four years in the White House. This is not a change of heart. It is a change of priorities. A cold calculation has been made.
The shift is transactional. It is not born from a newfound respect for Xi Jinping or a reassessment of China’s role in the world. It is born from necessity. The White House has a new list of problems, and it has decided that it cannot solve one of the most pressing without Beijing’s help. One issue in particular has forced this diplomatic pivot. That issue is Iran.
Washington wants China to use its considerable influence with Tehran. This is the key. America needs Beijing to act as an intermediary, leveraging its economic and political ties to achieve objectives the United States cannot accomplish alone. This single strategic goal has altered the entire basis of the US China relationship, transforming it from one of pure confrontation into a complex negotiation where both sides have something the other wants. Trump needs a favour. A very big favour. This need has given Xi an opportunity, presenting him with leverage that he can now use to extract his own concessions from the American government. The entire meeting is built upon this simple, powerful dynamic.
London is forced to watch and wait
And so London waits. The government is silent. Officials in the Foreign Office watch the events in Washington not as partners, but as observers. For more than a decade, British strategy has been predicated on navigating the difficult space between its two most important, and often conflicting, international relationships. The policy has always been a tightrope walk. It involved affirming the United States as the UK's primary security partner while also seeking to expand trade and investment with the very country Washington identified as its main strategic rival. This was the logic behind the 'golden era' of relations declared under David Cameron. It was a bet. The bet was that Britain could have both.
That bet no longer looks safe. The old assumptions are breaking down. When Washington and Beijing were openly hostile, Britain had a role to play, however small, as a transatlantic intermediary and a key European voice within the Western alliance. The United Kingdom could position itself as a thoughtful junior partner to a belligerent America, or as a bridge to a wary China, offering a different, perhaps more pragmatic, perspective rooted in its long history of global commerce. That role is now gone. It has evaporated. If the two giants are negotiating directly, there is no space left for a bridge.
The risk for Britain is not one of being caught in the crossfire. It is the risk of being ignored entirely. A world in which the United States and China settle their differences bilaterally is a world in which the United Kingdom's influence is significantly diminished. Decisions on global trade, technology standards, and security protocols could be settled in Washington and Beijing, leaving the government in London to simply receive the new instructions. There is no seat at the table. This creates profound uncertainty for British diplomacy, which has long relied on its special access to Washington to project influence far beyond its own economic and military weight. Whitehall must now re-evaluate its place in a world order that is being rewritten without its input. The calculations that have guided foreign policy since the fall of the Berlin Wall are becoming obsolete.
The silence from Downing Street is telling. There are no pronouncements. No confident assertions of British relevance. Instead, there is a quiet, anxious process of trying to decipher the real meaning of the handshakes taking place thousands of miles away. For a country that has for centuries prided itself on its central role in shaping global affairs, the current position is an uncomfortable and unfamiliar one. Britain is a spectator. It has become a follower. It can only wait and see what is decided for it.
Two giants will decide the future of AI
Artificial intelligence was supposed to be different. It was Britain’s chance. The government identified it as the next great technological wave and moved to place the United Kingdom at the centre of the global conversation about how to manage it. This was a strategic choice. A deliberate policy. The AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park was the centrepiece of this ambition, a moment designed to show London could convene the world’s powers and set the agenda for the twenty first century. The goal was to establish a British led framework for regulation, avoiding the extremes of either the American or the Chinese models. Britain would be the rule maker. The indispensable referee.
That ambition now looks desperately exposed. It is being tested. The future of AI will not be decided at a conference in Buckinghamshire, but in a closed room in Washington. The two real AI superpowers are the United States and China. They have the vast datasets, the giant tech companies, the state funding and the university research programmes that dwarf anything the United Kingdom can muster. They are the only players that truly count on a global scale. Everyone else is a client or a spectator. The source reports confirm that artificial intelligence is a major item on the agenda for Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. They are talking about it now.
When two such powers begin to negotiate directly, the space for smaller actors disappears almost instantly. There is no room. Any agreement reached between Washington and Beijing on the development or deployment of AI will become the de facto global standard. It will not be a proposal. It will be a reality that other nations, including Britain, will have to adopt or risk being locked out of the entire technological ecosystem. A US China agreement on AI safety protocols would make the Bletchley process obsolete overnight. The work would become history. The British framework would be a footnote.
The consequences for the UK are profound. A technology sector that was told it would operate under a bespoke, British designed regulatory system will instead find itself subject to rules written in rooms it cannot enter. The government's claim to be shaping the future of global technology would be hard to sustain. Britain’s influence would shrink. It would be a rule taker, not a rule maker. The entire strategy rests on Britain’s ability to act as an influential middle power. But in a world defined by a new accommodation between two giants, there is no middle ground left to occupy. There is only the long shadow they cast together.
A deal will have a global price
Every deal has a price. This one is no different. The reports from Washington make the central bargain clear. Xi Jinping wants the United States to stop selling arms to Taiwan. In return, Donald Trump wants China to use its significant leverage to restrain Iran. The outlines of a grand accommodation between the world’s two most powerful nations are visible, and each concession would create profound and immediate consequences for the United Kingdom. It is a transaction with a global cost. Britain will help to pay it.
A deal on Iran would reshape the Middle East. For London, the effects would be direct. A China that successfully pressures Tehran into curbing its nuclear ambitions or its regional proxies could bring a form of stability to the Gulf. This might lower the risk to vital shipping lanes in the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway the Royal Navy helps to patrol. It could ease pressure on global oil prices, benefiting the British economy. But this stability would come from Beijing, not from the traditional Western alliance. It would formalise China’s role as the indispensable power broker in a region where British and American influence has been dominant for a century, leaving the UK as a secondary actor in its own sphere of interest.
The price for that stability would be paid elsewhere. It would be paid in the Indo Pacific. An American decision to halt arms sales to Taiwan would be a complete reversal of a policy that has defined the region’s security for decades. This is the area where the British government has staked its post Brexit foreign policy. The AUKUS security pact ties the UK to Australia and the United States in a clear effort to balance Chinese power. Britain’s new aircraft carriers have been sent on deployments to the South China Sea to demonstrate this commitment. If Washington abandons its long held position on Taiwan, the central pillar of that entire strategy collapses.
The questions for Whitehall are stark. What is the purpose of an Indo Pacific tilt if the region’s primary security guarantor changes its entire posture overnight. A deal forged between Trump and Xi would not just sideline Britain on artificial intelligence. It would create a strategic reality where the UK’s most significant military and diplomatic project of the last decade is rendered incoherent. There are no easy answers. The ripples from a Washington handshake will reach every part of the government. They will be felt from the Treasury to the Ministry of Defence.
What happens after the handshakes
The handshakes are done. The meetings have concluded. Now the real work begins, far from the cameras in Washington. The world will watch for signals, for the small print in policy documents that reveals the true nature of any agreement between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. The first signal will concern artificial intelligence. Watch for a joint statement. The critical point will be whether it contains vague platitudes about safety and ethics, or if it outlines specific, technical standards for developing and deploying new systems. A deal between the two dominant AI powers, one setting the rules of the road for the technology that will define this century, would instantly make Britain’s own regulatory ambitions obsolete. The Bletchley Park summits would become a historical footnote. This is the new reality. If America and China agree on the future of AI, everyone else must follow their lead.
The second signal is trade. The tone is what matters. Trump’s first presidency was built on a trade war with China, imposing billions of pounds worth of tariffs on goods from steel to solar panels. A genuine détente would require him to reverse course. Observers will be looking for specific actions, not just warm words about cooperation. The key indicators will be whether the United States quietly drops the tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, and whether Beijing reciprocates by easing its own restrictions on American agricultural imports. These are the kinds of granular policy shifts that show a real change in direction, a quiet reordering of global supply chains that would have profound effects on inflation and investment in the United Kingdom. It is a complex process. The details will be buried in trade notices.
The final signal is military. It is the most important. The future of Taiwan’s security is the central piece of this grand bargain. The evidence of a deal will not be found in a press conference. It will be found on the water. Observers will look for changes in the pattern of US Navy freedom of navigation operations, the patrols by American warships through the sensitive Taiwan Strait. A reduction in frequency would be one sign. A change of route would be another. The world will also watch for announcements from the Pentagon about future arms sales to Taipei, which have for decades been the bedrock of the island's defence strategy. A halt or a significant delay to these sales would be the clearest sign that Washington has traded its long term security commitments in the Pacific for short term gains with Iran. A new era would begin. The old certainties would be gone.
Sources. Channel 4 News: Trump meets Xi: US and China leaders talk global power, money and AI. Guardian Technology: Trump-Xi live updates: leaders of US and China to talk AI and trade in major Washington meeting.
Analysis. Drafted with AI assistance from the sources listed above and reviewed by an editor before publication. Jnews links to the organisations it writes about.
