During the Cold War the scales fell slowly from American eyes. "Monolithic communism" was a corpse difficult to keep buried. Nixon, of all people, drove a stake through its heart. The argument for the opening to China was that it was in America's interest to attempt to leverage the wedge that existed between the PRC and the Soviet Union. There is consensus, though not unanimity, that rapprochement with China has been good for America. I am among those who make the consensus non-unanimous but that is done with the perfect vision of hindsight.
We have an opponent in China, which is competent. But she is unsure of herself. This is so new to her that she is still looking for guidance. She does not respect the US, nor does she trust the US. Those three, lack of complete confidence in herself, lack of respect for the US and mistrust, feed each other.
We have another opponent in Russia that is incompetent. She is sure of herself, though. She believes herself to be a competent, great power. She relishes the days when she was the great enemy of the United States for the imprimatur of greatness ran wide.
And so China is now more open to Russian influence and Russia is open to any agreement with anyone, but especially with competent, independent China, to frustrate any aim of its great enemy, the United States.
The view here is, on the whole, this is not a wholly bad thing.
