Chinese pilot Wang Wei gave U.S. President George W. Bush his first critical foreign-policy test. Wei's collision over the South China Sea with a Navy reconnaissance plane, which dropped 24 U.S. military personnel into the hands of the Chinese military on Hainan Island, provided an excellent course in crisis management for the new president.
So far, so good. The military personnel have been returned. The Chinese seem satisfied that the language used by the administration was an apology. The Bush administration maintains that the Chinese pilot caused the crash.
With the exception of some of our most conservative commentators, most analysts give the president high marks for his navigation of this tricky course. China policy is the most delicate and difficult for a U.S. president. As China has emerged as a world power, it has provided Americans with a number of differing faces. To the conservative commentator, China is a godless dictatorship, inimical to American principles. To the liberal viewer, China's totalitarian government deprives its citizens of human rights. To the businessman, China is the land of opportunity -- a market of more than a billion consumers ready to buy American products. But to the American clothing manufacturer, China's ability to produce quality goods at cheap prices provides unbeatable competition.