When you’re in the business of selling security to your allies, an olive branch is a terrifying weapon of mass distraction.

(Originally published March 8 in “What in the World“) China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang echoed concerns expressed in this space yesterday, warning that the U.S. policy of checking China was putting both nations on a path toward conflict.

China doesn’t help matters, of course, by rising to every morsel of bait U.S. politicians toss into the water with military exercises. But Qin’s comments amplify remarks this week by China’s President Xi Jinping that the U.S. is trying to suppress and contain China. Western media are already interpreting these observations on stated U.S. foreign policy as new evidence of Chinese hostility that ends an attempt at rapprochement. After last fall’s 20th national congress of the Chinese Communist Party gave Xi Jinping a third 10-year term as the party’s general-secretary, there were signs Beijing was trying to patch things up with Washington.

The war in Ukraine, meanwhile, has exposed the weakness of Europe’s own defenses, the unpreparedness of its defense industry and, if anything, increased its reliance on the U.S. for defense, according to a new analysis in Foreign Affairs.