US and China are locked into a cycle of competition, plan is just repetition of tired geopolitical narratives about cooperation.

With U.S.-Chinese relations worse than they have been in over 50 years, an old fairy tale has resurfaced: if only the United States would talk more to China and accommodate its rise, the two countries could live in peace. The story goes that with ample summitry, Washington could recognize Beijing's redlines and restore crisis hotlines and cultural exchanges. Over time and through myriad points of face-to-face contact--in other words, reengagement--the two countries could settle into peaceful, if still competitive, coexistence. Talk enough, some analysts contend, and the United States and China might even strike a grand bargain that establishes stable spheres of influence and something akin to a G-2 to solve global problems such as climate change and pandemics. From this perspective, the dismal state of US.-Chinese relations is not an inevitable result of two ideologically opposed great powers clashing over vital interests. Rather, it is a mix-up between partners, blown out of proportion by the United States' overreaction to counter China's overreach, as Susan Shirk, a Sinologist and former U. S. deputy assistant secretary of state, has put it. For the past two decades, the thinking goes, China has simply been doing what rising powers usually do: flexing its muscles and demanding a greater say in global affairs. Although many of China's actions, such as its menacing of Taiwan, worry advocates of reengagement, the main target of their critique is the United States--specifically, its relentless pursuit of primacy and the self-serving actors behind it. In this dark imagining, grandstanding politicians, greedy defense contractors, sensationalizing pundits, overzealous human rights activists, and belligerent bureaucrats fan the flames of rivalry for profit, creating an echo chamber that crowds out different perspectives. Some individuals are supposedly repeating hawkish narratives to protect their careers. The result, the journalist and author Fareed Zakaria has argued, is that "Washington has succumbed to dangerous groupthink on China." The fact that most Americans also hold hawkish views on China just provides more evidence of how irrationally aggressive U.S. policy has become. "The problem today isn't that Americans are insufficiently concerned about the rise of China," the historian Max Boot has insisted. "The problem is that they are prey to hysteria and alarmism that could lead the United States into a needless nuclear war." For those advocating reengagement, the solution to this cycle of hostility is straightforward. First, defuse tensions through vigorous diplomacy, commerce, and people-to-people exchanges. Next, create a new forum where officials from each country can meet regularly to hash out agreements. According to the historian Adam Tooze, regardless of the exact structure of negotiations, the basic objective is the same: "accommodation of China's historic rise." For some advocates of reengagement, accommodation would merely entail reducing trade barriers to China, a move U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen proposed earlier this year. Other observers, however, favor more drastic concessions. The political scientist Graham Allison, for example, has urged in these pages that the United States accept China's traditional sphere of influence in Asia. Presumably, that would mean giving Beijing greater freedom in the South China Sea, letting go of Taiwan, and relinquishing American power in the region. It is an enticing vision. The world would certainly be better off if great powers could settle scores through diplomacy rather than by squaring off in a security competition. Yet the history of-great-power rivalry, and of US.-Chinese relations in particular, suggests that greater engagement is unlikely to mend ties between the countries and, if performed hastily, could actually catalyze violent conflict. Of the more than two dozen great-power rivalries over the past 200 years, none ended with the sides talking their way out of trouble. Instead, rivalries have persisted until one side could no longer carry on the fight or until both sides united against a common enemy. For example, the United States and China paused their rivalry to ally against the Soviet Union during the latter half of the Cold War, a contest that ended only when the Soviet Union sputtered into terminal decline. In every case, shifts in the balance of power were preconditions for sustainable settlements. Before those shifts, periods of détente were usually just chances to regroup and reload for the next round of competition. In some cases, such as when the United Kingdom sought to improve relations with Germany from 1911 to 1914 and again in 1938, pursuing détente paved the road to war. The United States and China are unlikely to buck this pattern. Their vital interests conflict and are rooted firmly in their respective political systems, geographies, and national experiences. Many of the connections binding the countries together, such as their extensive trade, are also driving them apart by giving policymakers additional reasons to fight and pressure points to exploit. Neither side can make major concessions without exposing itself. And after decades of dealing with each other, both governments have accumulated long lists of grievances and view the other with deep mistrust. The United States tried to work with China repeatedly from the 1970s to the 2010s, yet top Chinese leaders consistently viewed US. outreach, especially the American attempt to integrate China into the U.S.-led liberal order, as an insidious form of containment-a plot designed to weaken the grip of the Chinese Communist Party and lock China into economic dependence and political subservience to the West. American outreach to China during this period was more extensive than the proposals being seriously considered by US. policymakers today. Nevertheless, these overtures failed to fundamentally change Chinese assessments of American intentions or dissuade efforts by the CCP to dominate East Asia and beyond. The fact is that the US.-Chinese rivalry is unlikely to wind down without a significant shift in the balance of power. The United States needs to make policy choices based on this reality and not get caught up in a fantasy. This does not mean cutting off diplomacy or shutting down talks completely, but being clear eyed about what that type of engagement can realistically achieve. There are reasons to hope for a medium-term mellowing of Chinese power that might open space for a real diplomatic breakthrough. To get there, however, the United States and its allies must deter Chinese aggression in the near term and avoid concessions that disrupt favorable long-term trends. BAD BLOOD 'The United States and China have become what political scientists call "enduring rivals," meaning countries that have singled each other out for intense security competition. Over the past few centuries, such pairs have accounted for only one percent of the world's international relationships but more than 80 percent of its wars. Think of the repeated clashes between India and Pakistan, Greece and Turkey, China and Japan, and France and the United Kingdom