[The Hill] Former national security adviser H. R. McMaster on Sunday said Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to China "may portray a bit of weakness" amid heightened tensions between Beijing and Washington."I think China’s sending a message, ’Hey, we’re in charge now. You’re finished’ to the West and to the United States. And, and I think it’s indicative of what they hope to achieve ... which is to create kind of an exclusionary area of primacy across the Indo-Pacific region. They’ve laid claim to the ocean in the South China Sea, for example," McMaster, who served in the Trump administration, said on CBS’s "Face the Nation."
"So I think this really calls for us to have a strong response, I think ... with Secretary Blinken’s visit there, it may portray a bit of weakness," he said.
Pressed on what he meant by the comment, McMaster said he thinks China is hoping to, with Blinken’s trip, "create a perception that we’re going there to pay homage to the Chinese Communist Party, because they want to use that kind of perception of China’s strength relative the United States to bludgeon countries in the region and say, ’Hey, time to bandwagon with us. This is our era,’ what they call the ’new era of international relations.'"
Blinken on Sunday kicked off meetings with Chinese officials that a U.S. State Department spokesperson called "candid, substantive, and constructive."