One China is a phrase describing the relationship between the People's Republic of China (PRC) based on Mainland China,and the Republic of China (ROC) based on the Taiwan Area. "One China" asserts that there is only one de jure Chinese nation despite the de facto division between the two rival governments in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War. The term may refer,in alphabetical order,to one of the following:
The relationship between the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the United States of America (USA) has been complex and at times tense since the establishment of the PRC and the retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan in 1949. Since the normalization of relations in the 1970s,the US–China relationship has been marked by numerous perennial disputes including the political status of Taiwan,territorial disputes in the South China Sea,and more recently the treatment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. They have significant economic ties and are significantly intertwined,yet they also have a global hegemonic great power rivalry. As of 2025,China and the United States are the world's second-largest and largest economies by nominal GDP,as well as the largest and second-largest economies by GDP (PPP) respectively. Collectively,they account for 44.2% of the global nominal GDP,and 34.7% of global PPP-adjusted GDP.
Cross-strait relations are the political and economic relations between China and Taiwan across the Taiwan Strait. Due to the existing controversy over the status of Taiwan and the Chinese legitimacy question,they are also not defined as diplomatic relations by either side.
The United States foreign policy toward the People's Republic of China originated during the Cold War. At that time,the U.S. had a containment policy against communist states. The leaked Pentagon Papers indicated the efforts by the U.S. to contain China through military actions undertaken in the Vietnam War. The containment policy centered around an island chain strategy. President Richard Nixon's China rapprochement signaled a shift in focus to gain leverage in containing the Soviet Union. Formal diplomatic ties between the U.S. and China were established in 1979,and with normalized trade relations since 2000,the U.S. and China have been linked by closer economic ties and more cordial relations. In his first term as U.S. president,Barack Obama said,"We want China to succeed and prosper. It's good for the United States if China continues on the path of development that it's on".
Michael Jonathan Green is an American Japanologist currently serving as CEO of the United States Studies Centre and senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). He is also a member of Radio Free Asia's board of directors and Center for a New American Security (CNAS)'s board of advisors.
Victor D. Cha is an American political scientist currently serving as president of the Geopolitics and Foreign Policy Department and Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
Kurt Michael Campbell is an American diplomat and businessman who served as the United States deputy secretary of state from 2024 to 2025. He previously served as deputy assistant advisor to President Biden and National Security Council coordinator for the Indo-Pacific from 2021 to 2024. In this capacity,Campbell had been referred to as the Biden administration's "Asia coordinator" or "Asia czar"—chief architect of Joe Biden's Asia strategy.
After the United States established diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1979 and recognized Beijing as the only legal government of China,Taiwan–United States relations became unofficial and informal following terms of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA),which allows the United States to have relations with the Taiwanese people and their government,whose name is not specified. U.S.–Taiwan relations were further informally grounded in the Six Assurances in response to the third communiquéon the establishment of US–PRC relations. The Taiwan Travel Act,passed by the U.S. Congress on March 16,2018,allows high-level U.S. officials to visit Taiwan and vice versa. Both sides have since signed a consular agreement formalizing their existent consular relations on September 13,2019. The US government removed self-imposed restrictions on executive branch contacts with Taiwan on January 9,2021.
Paul Thomas Haenle is an American analyst and China specialist currently serving as Maurice R. Greenberg Director’s Chair at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Yasuhiro Matsuda is a Japanese professor of international politics at the University of Tokyo.
Jacob Jeremiah Sullivan is an American attorney who served as the U.S. National Security Advisor from 2021 to 2025 under president Joe Biden.
Bonnie S. Glaser is an American foreign policy analyst currently serving as managing director of the Indo-Pacific Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. She was previously a senior adviser for Asia and the founding director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Glaser is also a non-resident fellow with the Lowy Institute,a senior associate with CSIS Pacific Forum,and a consultant for the U.S. government on East Asia. Glaser writes extensively on Chinese policy,including its foreign and military policy towards the United States.,Cross-Strait relations,China's relations with Japan and Korea,Chinese perspectives on missile defense,and multilateral security in Asia.
Mira Rapp-Hooper is an American political scientist currently serving as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for East Asia and Oceania at the White House National Security Council (NSC) in the Biden administration. She is the White House's top advisor for and responsible for coordinating US government policy towards the region. From 2021–2023 she served as Director for Indo-Pacific Strategy at the NSC where she was responsible for the White House's Indo-Pacific Strategy,the management of the Quad partnership among Australia,India,Japan,and the United States,and US-Japan-ROK trilateral relations,among other initiatives. In 2021 she briefly served at the State Department on the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff.
Matthew Forbes Pottinger is an American former journalist and U.S. Marine Corps officer who served as the United States deputy national security advisor from September 22,2019 to January 7,2021. Previously Asia director on the National Security Council since 2017,his tenure was unusual among senior aides serving under President Trump for its length,given an administration marked by high turnover. Pottinger worked to develop the Trump administration's policies towards China.
The People's Republic of China emerged as a great power and one of the three big players in the tri-polar geopolitics (PRC-US-USSR) during the Cold War,after the Korean War in 1950-1953 and the Sino-Soviet split in the 1960s,with its status as a recognized nuclear weapons state in 1960s. Currently,China has one of the world's largest populations,second largest GDP (nominal) and the largest economy in the world by PPP.
Tsai Ming-yen is a Taiwanese political scientist and diplomat who currently serves as the director-general of the National Security Bureau.
The 2022 Chinese military exercises around Taiwan were a series of military exercises by the People's Republic of China (PRC) that encircled Taiwan,officially the Republic of China (ROC). They initially lasted from 4–7 August 2022 and involved live-fire drills,air sorties,naval deployments,and ballistic missile launches by the People's Liberation Army (PLA). The exercises started in response to US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan.
Rush Doshi is an American political scientist currently serving as an assistant professor of security studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. He is also senior fellow for China and director of the Initiative on China Strategy at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). He served at the White House National Security Council (NSC) in the Biden administration as Director and later Deputy Senior Director for China and Taiwan from 2021 to March 2024.
Ryan Hass is an American foreign policy analyst currently serving as director of the Brookings Institution's John L. Thornton China Center and the Chen-Fu and Cecilia Yen Koo Chair in Taiwan Studies.
Thomas J. Wright is an American international relations scholar currently serving as Senior Director for Strategic Planning at the United States National Security Council (NSC) in the Biden administration. He was part of a team instrumental in putting together the 2022 U.S. National Security Strategy,released in October 2022.
United States Marine Corps 
Lieutenant Colonel [1]