Yves here. Perhaps we’ll seem some positive surprises for a badly-needed change over the coming weeks, but the consensus so far over the Xi-Trump summit was that the Chinese were unfailingly polite but nothing much of consequence was settled. That includes the US posture on Taiwan. Recall that Biden, who was generally less frontally dishonest than Trump, invited top Chinese officials to a summit in Alaska soon after he took office and the US side verged on being rude. After repeated instances of the Biden making noises to Xi reaffirmed US support for the “one China” policy and then very rapidly walking them back, Xi effectively called Biden a liar in one call. So as Brian Berletic would say, we have continuity of policy and that includes South Korea as a major element of the US containment policy. Admittedly, the US is too weak and too far away to defend Taiwan in the highly unlikely event China felt it necessary to go the kinetic route in response to US interference.…