The number of visits from Western heads of state and federal may surprise or annoy Chinese officials. Italy’s Giorgia Meloni does believe that her five-day visit to China was something unique. To the Chinese, but, it will have felt very regular.
China does, in fact, refer to itself as” the Middle Kingdom,” the region where the earth revolves, just as the Mediterranean was known as the sea in the Earth’s core in antiquity. Therefore, Chinese governments have often anticipated guests to come and, using their own old phrase, “kowtow” or arrow at their feet. To them, a stream of Europeans kowtowing maybe seems normal.
And the movement has been good. Only counting from the beginning of April, President Xi Jinping and his associates have received visits from Olaf Scholz, chancellor of Germany, from Andrzej Duda, chairman of Poland, from Viktor Orban, prime minister of Hungary, and now from the prime minister of Italy.
The unique additional point is that on June 13-15, partway through this channel of German visits, Meloni hosted the annual summit of the Group of Seven, supporting Italy, Germany, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Japan and Canada, at the beautiful Borgo Egnazia resort in Italy. The officials of the West were nowhere near as welcoming to China as this flow of European tourists to Beijing may suggest.
In the mountain communiqué, the G7 leaders declared their opposition to “actors in China” that “materially help Russia’s war equipment” in its war against Ukraine, and expressed their” concerns about China’s consistent business targeting and complete non-market policies … undermining our workers, industries, and economic endurance and protection”.
Did Meloni reiterate and reinforce these statements during her private meetings with President Xi and the public meetings held by Italian and Chinese businesses during her visit? Supposedly she did repeat the point about Russia’s war machine, though we do n’t know how seriously.
However, we are aware that the public meetings were more focused on signing agreements than raising concerns. And we know that some of the deals, including on electric vehicles, artificial intelligence and shipbuilding, appear on the face of it to be at variance with EU policies and not likely to please the United States, either.
This is why more likely than not to be confused, the Chinese will likely be more excited about European leaders ‘ visits. These visits, which Meloni and others have won, confirm the deeply held notion that European policy toward China is unbalanced, incoherent, and always driven by a desire to make money.
Admittedly, Meloni’s visit exhibited less of that incoherence than had the one a few weeks earlier by Hungary’s Viktor Orban, current holder of the rotating presidency of the European Council, who took pleasure in contradicting the EU’s foreign and security policies toward both Russia and Russia’s “no-limits” strategic partner, China, at every opportunity. However, everyone is aware that Orban is an ilk.
In her nearly two years in office, Meloni has sounded keen to emphasize her close ties to NATO, the EU, and the US. Some aspects of that alignment were questioned by this China visit.
Washington is unsure whether EU member states are serious about addressing China’s security and economic threats as a result of all these dealmaking visits by European leaders.
Because of this, both Republicans and Democrats will benefit from Meloni’s Beijing visit, which will have no effect on her standing up against Kamala Harris, the candidate who is most likely to be seen as the frontrunner for the November election.  ,
Given how little of a part do Italy’s military forces play in defending Europe and ensuring the security of the Indo-Pacific, both of which will be pressing questions for presidents if elected in January 2025, is played, this is especially important.
Given that Italy has a chance to greatly benefit from efforts to improve the security of both regions with the joint project to develop and build a next-generation fighter jet, it is unfortunate.
However, assuming Leonardo, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, and BAE Systems ‘ Global Combat Air Program survives domestic and international politics, its contribution wo n’t be until 2030.
After five days of kowtowing and dealing with Russia, Meloni now needs to consider how she can make a stronger, immediate and positive contribution to Western, and specifically European, security policy. One such piece of symbolism is close by because she seems to enjoy political symbolism.
While visiting important allies in Australia and Japan, the Cavour aircraft carrier and an accompanying strike group of Italian and other NATO vessels are currently traveling through the Indian Ocean and the Pacific.
When the Cavour is scheduled to depart from Japan to the Philippines later in the year, Meloni should direct the ship to conduct a “freedom of navigation operation” by sailing through areas of the South China Sea where China is attempting to pressure the Philippines into ceding control.
If the Cavour links itself to the suffering of the Philippines, Xi will be offended, which would serve as a reminder that at least Meloni can defend some principles among these European visitors.
Beyond that, the main objective is to gain EU support for a sizable increase in defense spending, which is both necessary to protect the continent from Russian aggression and to allow America to concentrate on maintaining peace in Asia.
That American-led effort in Asia is arguably the most important peace-keeping effort of our era, for its aim must be to prevent the first war in history between two nuclear-armed superpowers– as I have just written in a new book for the London-based think-tank, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, called” Deterrence, Diplomacy and the Risk of Conflict over Taiwan“.
Making things even harder for European leaders is when they travel to Beijing and veer away from the EU’s own policies and undermine their efforts to collaborate with the US.
Formerly editor-in-chief of The Economist, Bill Emmott is currently chairman of the , Japan Society of the UK, the , International Institute for Strategic Studies , and the , International Trade Institute.
This article is the English translation of a piece that La Stampa published Sunday morning in Italian and was first published on Substack Bill Emmott’s Global View.