Has Trump’s ‘Art of the Deal’ met its match in Xi Jinping’s long game? FBI’s former crisis negotiator breaks it down
- Former FBI crisis negotiator says he is not convinced Trump has ‘appreciation for the strategic instruments that successful international relations require’
US President Donald Trump lacks the negotiating talent needed to resolve the US-China trade war in America’s favour, according to James Chip Massey, a former crisis negotiator at the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who now advises CEOs on business negotiations.
Massey, who spent weeks of intensive training to join the FBI’s crisis negotiations team and once worked on espionage cases, told the South China Morning Post that he holds little hope for Trump, given the president’s famed inattention to detail and disdain for intelligence gathering.
Massey pointedly disagreed with Trump’s assessment of Chinese President Xi Jinping as a “world class poker player”.
“Xi is a world-class chess player,” Massey said, who has been a featured speaker at the Carnegie New Leaders programme, the US Military Academy at West Point, and to law enforcement and business organisations around the US.
“He is well-versed in strategy and [can read] the mind of his opponent. And he is patient. From what I’ve seen so far, I’m not convinced that President Trump has an equivalent amount of discipline or patience, or an appreciation for the strategic instruments that successful international relations require.”
Massey said that Trump relies on the force of his personality to achieve his aims.