Why US-China relations will be poorer for Branstad’s exit as China ambassador

The departure of Branstad, whose ties with Xi Jinping go back to the 1980s, may signal the end of personal diplomacy. And, with US-China relations cooling, his successor is likely to hold more hawkish views

Chi Wang

Published: 3:30am, 25 Sep 2020

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US Ambassador to China Terry Branstad announced last week that he would resign from his position and return to the United States in October. It is unclear exactly why Branstad is leaving. There are rumours he may be taking an active role in the Trump re-election campaign, though it remains to be seen how effective he could be as the presidential race enters its last stage and many Americans have already begun filling out their ballots.

Others have pointed to a recent editorial written by Branstad that was rejected by the Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily as evidence that Branstad has soured on China. Regardless of the justification, Branstad’s departure is a big blow to US-China relations and may be the end of the era for personal diplomacy as the bilateral relationship increasingly comes to be defined as a new cold war.

To appreciate why Branstad’s departure is so significant, it is necessary to look at why the former governor of Iowa was selected as ambassador. Branstad’s home state played a starring role in Xi Jinping’s narrative and his rise to power.

In 1985, Xi spent two weeks in the town of Muscatine, Iowa, as part of an agricultural delegation learning about pig farming techniques. In 2012, mere months before he was slated to take over the party leadership, Xi returned to the town.

According to Joe Biden, then the US vice-president, the return to Muscatine was suggested by Xi. He visited the same family that hosted him back in 1985 and heralded the impact this experience had on shaping his view of America and his future career.

Xi Jinping cracks a joke in the home of Roger and Sarah Lande, with whom he stayed during his first visit to Muscatine in 1985. Photo: AFP

Yet, like many things with Xi, the significance of Muscatine was embellished. His 1985 stay was not, as he described it, his first visit to the US.

He had in fact visited Washington in 1980 as an aide to Geng Biao, a top Chinese general. Xi’s position was so junior at the time that he did not appear on the protocol lists – perhaps why he prefers the Muscatine visit in his official biography as his first exposure to the US.

The difference between Xi’s narrative and reality did not matter to Biden, to the people in Muscatine, nor to US officials in 2012. They welcomed him warmly. He vowed to create better ties between Iowa and China during his leadership – which came as music to the ears of farmers of soybeans and other agricultural products.

It was under this veneer that Trump’s eventual decision to name former Iowa governor Branstad as ambassador to China came into play. Despite bombastic rhetoric towards China, Trump followed the playbook established by his predecessors in naming as ambassador to China neither a career diplomat nor a politician with harsh views about the country. He instead chose a governor from a state with key agricultural ties to China.

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Prior ambassadors to China under Barack Obama and George W. Bush – such as former Montana senator Max Baucus, former Washington governor Gary Locke, and former Utah governor John Huntsman Jnr – came from similar backgrounds and emphasised US trade priorities with China.

But now Branstad is leaving, and it remains to be seen whether China can expect his successor to share this background. It is unlikely that a successor will be named until after the results of the November presidential election. If Trump wins a second term, it seems unlikely he will continue to follow this paradigm in choosing the next ambassador to China.

Instead, he is likely to feel forced to follow up on the anti-China rhetoric he has campaigned on and used to deflect criticism of his response to the coronavirus pandemic.

He might instead choose someone with much more hawkish views on China, closer to those of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

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China should not anticipate a much better selection if Biden wins. He has also vowed to take a tougher approach to China, and he might select an ambassador with a human rights background, such as Suzan Johnson Cook, the former ambassador at large for international religious freedom, whom Chinese officials refused to meet in 2012.

We do not know, nor are we likely to ever fully understand, the rationale behind Branstad’s decision to leave. If Branstad is leaving to join the Trump campaign, then China should expect to hear him bashing China on cable news promptly after he returns.

This will be just another escalation of the increasing animosity between the US and China, which has affected journalists, diplomats and students in both countries.

China, however, bears the brunt of the blame for these restrictions by failing to allow freedom of the press and by relying on propaganda and disinformation in its engagement with the US. Ironically, the Branstad article that People’s Daily refused to publish aimed to call China out for these very problems.

With his departure imminent, it appears unlikely that he will try again to get his opinion published in China. The Chinese may well find that his words in his next position, where he will be untethered from both Chinese censors and the formalities of the ambassadorship, are far more damaging.

Chi Wang, a former head of the Chinese section of the US Library of Congress, is president of the US-China Policy Foundation.

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