Xi Jinping meets Trump: who holds the cards?, podcast

AI, Iran and Taiwan, there will be no shortage of topics when the two most powerful men in the world meet in Washington. But what do they both want? Jonathan Czin explains

You know when world leaders ring each other up for a chat? It’s never just them on the line. Eavesdropping silently on another extension, just out of sight, there is always someone like Jon Czin listening in.

Czin was the director for China on Joe Biden’s national security council from 2021 to 2023, having honed his expertise as the CIA’s in-house expert on Xi Jinping. He dealt with a lot during his two years working for the White House, but as Donald Trump prepares to welcome Xi Jinping to Washington today, the stakes are arguably even higher.

Trump has started a war he cannot seem to stop, and the Chinese are helping his enemy. There’s the small matter that Xi still has his eye on invading Taiwan.

The two men could not be more different, Czin tells Helen Pidd . “President Trump thinks of himself as the consummate deal maker. I think it’s much better to think of Xi Jinping as operating like a jack-in-the-box. This guy winds up for years, sometimes for decades, and he is just waiting for the right moment to pop.”

How will this odd couple of the world’s most powerful men get on, and what could it mean for the rest of the world?