Carter honored for China relations work

Cui quoted President George H.W. Bush as saying, "I do not mistrust the future; I do not fear what is ahead. For our problems are large, but our heart is larger."

"I believe that as long as we have a big heart, we will overcome any difficulties and stay on the right track of our bilateral relations," Cui added.

The ambassador also said that any attempt to seek a zero-sum outcome, or to turn the other country into a copy of itself was not only futile, but also harmful.

Bush China Foundation founder and chairman Neil Bush, the third son of President George H. W. Bush, said, "President Carter holds the view that my father held firmly until his last breath: that China is not the enemy of our nation, but rather, an indispensable partner and vital stakeholder in America's future."

He said his father "emphatically rejected the idea that China is our enemy" and he understood that people need to view the relations through a long-term lens.

"To see the amazing benefit that is accrued to both China and the United States over the past 40 years from the normalized relations is a great tribute to the vision of George H. W. Bush and Jimmy Carter, and it was discouraging to me that as China has now risen to become the second-largest economy in the world, some elements in the United States view China as a threat to our economy and to our national security," he said.

As a result, there's a lot of anti-China rhetoric floating around and there are "very few" voices like those of George Herbert Walker Bush and Jimmy Carter showing that a better China-US relationship benefits both sides "deeply and tremendously".

In answering a China Daily question regarding what statesmanship is expected in Washington to steer US-China relations, Neil Bush said, "I wish there were more statesmen."

He said there are challenges in the relationship, but rather than addressing them in the way they're currently being addressed, the current leadership could learn that a "respectful, engaging" dialogue, having an established personal communication in a way that can get to the heart and core of problems, can lead to a resolution of those problems.

"In the meantime, this relationship has deep roots and will continue to go forward," he said. "But we need to overcome this current period of history where there's vitriol and angst being expressed (that) is really unfounded in the US dialogue at this stage."