US President Barack Obama's decision this week to pour 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan looks set to complicate Sino-US ties, forcing Washington to push Beijing harder to open its strategic border to the country and to co-operate over infrastructure investments.
US officials say that Obama's most dramatic military move to date will be accompanied by a diplomatic offensive to draw in greater longer-term regional support for reconstruction efforts that will help stabilise Afghanistan once US forces start to withdraw in 2011.
In the near term, China's short but vital border with Afghanistan on the mountainous Wakhan Corridor will get considerable attention as Washington seeks to open supply lines for its surge, which will see its forces expand to 100,000 troops.
State Department spokesman Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley said that unlike Iraq, the Afghanistan mission was hampered by difficult supply lines that ran up through Pakistani ports. Insurgents have repeatedly attacked convoys.
'It remains of great concern to us,' Crowley told the South China Morning Post yesterday. 'We are looking at how to create alternative supply lines. This is something we will be talking to China and neighbouring countries about.'
Speaking generally, he added: 'We are having discussions with China on Afghanistan and we want to see China play a constructive role.'