Obama leaves solid Sino-US legacy

Obama leaves solid Sino-US legacy

By Zhang Jiadong | Global Times

Published: 2016/9/5 | http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1004795.shtml

The G20 summit in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang Province, has seen US President Barack Obama visit China as a head of state and meet with his Chinese counterpart for the last time. It's time now to review the Sino-US relationship during Obama's presidency.

Obama was elected into the White House when the US was confronted with grave challenges. At the time, the international community began talking about the post-US era as the superpower, mired in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, saw a decrease in its national strength and creditability. And other countries, including some US allies, began to engage more with emerging countries like China that had developed rapidly.

Under this circumstance, Obama adjusted the US' national security strategy. He adopted the rebalancing to the Asia-Pacific and put more emphasis on conventional security threats than unconventional ones like terrorism. He also gathered efforts to deal with the so-called challenges from China.