U.S./China Relations: Two Countries Set to Meet Tomorrow
BRIAN NELSON, CNN ANCHOR: For the first time since the release of the spy plane crew, the U.S. and China are preparing to meet face- to-face in Beijing. CNN national security correspondent David Ensor is here to tell us all about it right now -- David, good morning.</s>DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Brian. Well, this could indeed be a critical meeting, a meeting where U.S. officials say the tone of the meeting, the body language of the Chinese, whether it is confrontational in tone or practical, could determine what the U.S.-Chinese relationship will be for some years to come. The delegation has already arrived in Beijing. It is headed by a senior Pentagon official and includes people from the State Department as well. It also includes General Sealock, who became known to the public for his efforts as the military attache in Beijing when he was down in Hainan Island trying to get the crew -- trying to get meetings with the crew and help to get them out. Now, the key goals of this delegation -- of the U.S. delegation are four: first, to make clear that the U.S. believes that China is to blame for the accident; second, the U.S. wants to discuss ways to avoid future such incidents; third, it wants to ask some tough questions about the tactics that have been used in recent weeks and months by Chinese pilots; and fourth, of course, it wants to gain permission to repair and retrieve the damaged surveillance aircraft. Now, in this situation, as we stand now, the Chinese are aware the U.S. has quite a few decisions to make in the coming weeks and really holds most of the cards. For one thing, the president needs to decide whether to resume surveillance flights and when to resume them -- the U.S. officials saying they do indeed intend to resume the flights. The timing will be -- will not be announced in advance. There are a number of questions about the security of those flights. There are discussions at the Pentagon as to whether there should be ships in the area at the time the flights resume to assure their security or not -- quite a few issues for the president and others to work out. But the plan is for the flights to go ahead. The question is the timing. But there are other decisions on the block as well: what sort of arms package to offer Taiwan. That is scheduled to be announced on April 24 -- decisions about whether or not to challenge China on human rights -- a whole host of issues. So most of the cards in the coming weeks are on the U.S. side. And the Chinese has to know that -- the Chinese delegation have to know that as they go into the meeting this morning -- Brian.</s>NELSON: David, as you mentioned, there's all these other issues, but what is the ultimate goal that the U.S. has going into that meeting? Is it to get the plane back? Is it to assure that the plane -- future flights will not be in jeopardy at the hands of the Chinese military?</s>ENSOR: Well, the U.S. wants the plane back. It will live with the fact that it doesn't get it, if that's what happens. But it definitely wants the plane back. It's worth $80 million. And it's a useful piece of equipment. Plus, there's the precedent. And the U.S. would like to see what intelligence damage has been done, if any. But, yes, the U.S. does intend to resume surveillance flights and says that that's nonnegotiable at this meeting. They know the Chinese will raise the issue and try to press for the U.S. to stop the flights, but they say that is -- that is not going to be agreed to -- Brian.</s>NELSON: All right, thank you, CNN's David Ensor,at the State Department. And now for how the Chinese are approaching these talks themselves, here's our Beijing bureau chief Rebecca MacKinnon -- good morning, Rebecca.</s>REBECCA MACKINNON, CNN BEIJING BUREAU CHIEF: Good morning. Well, it appears that the Chinese government is under a great deal of domestic pressure here to take quite a hard line in Wednesday's talks, primarily because there's a great deal of feeling, particularly from the military side here, that after the U.S. said "very sorry" and secured the release of the 24 U.S. crew members, as soon as those crew members hit U.S. soil, the U.S. line changed and became much harder and harsher, especially in its criticism of China's fighter pilot and of the Chinese military, more generally. So the feeling here is that, in order to regain Chinese pride, the Chinese side needs to take a very hard line. Now, as David Ensor was noting, the U.S. very much wants to get its plane back from China. But the Chinese side has announced it has a somewhat different agenda.</s>ZHANG QIYUE, CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTRY (through translator): The talks will include the cause of the incident. And China asks the United States to stop sending military aircraft towards China's coastline for spying activities. We hope the U.S. can adopt effective measures to avoid similar events from happening again.</s>MACKINNON: Now, the Chinese government is also making it very clear that China does not accept the U.S. version of events, the U.S. claiming that the Chinese fighter pilot rammed into the U.S. plane -- China still insisting that it was the U.S. plane that caused the incident and that the U.S. plane should not have been there in the first place.</s>ZHANG QIYUE (through translator): We already noticed that some senior U.S. government officials have made irresponsible remarks. They want to ignore the facts, confusing right and wrong, and want to shift responsibility onto others. And we express our strong dissatisfaction with this.</s>MACKINNON: Now, the Chinese fighter pilot continues to be eulogized as a hero in the Chinese media, as a man who gave his life to defend China's territory. And -- but even outside the official media, on a more personal note, we've been seeing a great deal of activity on the Internet. There's a Web site set up in memory of fighter pilot Wang Wei where people can lay virtual flowers and light virtual candles. And, so far, at latest count, more than 13,000 people have done that -- Brian.</s>NELSON: Rebecca, going into this meeting with U.S. officials later today, do you get a sense that the Chinese are prepared to make any concessions whatsoever? And do you also get a sense that they may be wary at all of antagonizing the U.S. administration, and particularly Congress, in ahead of -- ahead of some important votes to come?</s>MACKINNON: Well, the Chinese side is interested in making concessions. It's not revealing any willingness going into the negotiations. In fact, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman today was asked what China's bottom line is if it's not going to budge on its demand to end surveillance flights. And she said: Well, why would I reveal China's bottom line before our talks even begin? So I think that, certainly, they're going in with a very hard line. In talks that went on last week and the week before to secure the release of the crew members, there was very harsh rhetoric publicly. And -- but behind closed doors, the rhetoric was much more pragmatic. It remains to be seen whether we'll see that same pattern in this week's talks -- Brian.</s>NELSON: All right, thank you very much, Rebecca MacKinnon in Beijing.