Five takeaways from Trump’s summit with Xi in Washington

STRATEGIC RISK

Xi, not for the first time while meeting Trump, invoked the “Thucydides Trap”, an academic theory that competition between a rising power and an established one tends toward war.

While the Chinese leader said the risk “can be overcome,” his reference underscored how concerns about a potential US-China military conflict continue to shadow relations between the world’s two largest powers.

Xi argued that both nations stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation, and he called for regular military dialogue and stronger crisis-prevention mechanisms.

Trump, for his part, drew on the two nations’ shared history to emphasize the potential for cooperation. They could accomplish much by pursuing common interests, he said, invoking their wartime alliance against Japan.

DIFFERENCES ON AI

The two leaders expressed diverging views about artificial intelligence.

Trump, who has declared that AI should be called super intelligence, or SI, said in a social media post that he wants “to leave it exactly where it is” and rely on the US Department of Justice rather than impose any new guardrails. He insisted that China held the same position.

But Xi said on Thursday that, as leading nations on AI, China and the US must manage its growth.

“We have both the capability and responsibility to develop and manage AI for good, and ensure that the development of AI is always under human control and serves the well-being of the people,” Xi said.

Some of the biggest names in AI were expected to attend ⁠Trump’s state dinner ​at the White House on Thursday for ​Xi, including Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Sundar Pichai, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Nvidia’s (NVDA.O) Jensen Huang.