Speaking in Washington on Nov 15, US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon laid out a policy of "balancing cooperation and competition" with China through US President Barack Obama's second term in office. Donilon said the US president was determined to strengthen trade ties and cooperation with China. He even explicitly said in answer to a question that the US government did not believe a significant conflict with China was inevitable or desirable, because China was a rising power and the US a status quo one.

The question of course remains whether Donilon was being too optimistic, because he did not address in his presentation the question of what tough, if any, choices Washington may have to make to achieve these ends.

In his remarks at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies, Donilon acknowledged that Obama's tour of Southeast Asia - Myanmar, Thailand and Cambodia - this week was a deliberate sign that Asia now ranked far above the Middle East in strategic significance for the US. There are already a number of signs that the second Obama administration may be easier for China to deal with than the first.