Busan: US President Donald Trump's high-stakes meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping is being hailed by experts as a 'good beginning' that could help ease years of tension between the world's two largest economies, even as mistrust continues to cloud the relationship.

According to Anadolu Agency, the two leaders met last week in the South Korean port city of Busan - a symbolic location bridging US influence in East Asia and China's expanding regional footprint. The summit marked the climax of Trump's whirlwind three-nation tour across Asia, where he sought to reassert American influence through a mix of trade deals, personal diplomacy, and sharp transactional bargaining.

While Trump publicly lauded the talks as 'fantastic,' announcing that Beijing had agreed to purchase more US agricultural and energy products, analysts say the true significance of the meeting lies less in the deals themselves and more in the fact that the two sides were talking at all.

'Trump and Xi's meeting has been a good beginning for US-China bilateral ties,' Jagannath Panda, a professor and head of the Stockholm Center for South Asia and Indo-Pacific, told Anadolu. 'It has opened a gateway for their bilateral negotiation and to be a continuous negotiation channel, from here on.'

But he cautioned against premature optimism, suggesting the outcome of the first meeting should not necessarily be seen as 'positive or productive.' Kenzo Fujisue, a former Japanese senator and minister, offered a similar note of tempered expectation, noting that the situation may not change in one or two years due to deep-rooted rivalry.

Despite the public show of goodwill, contentious issues such as Taiwan continue to loom large over the relationship. In a CBS interview aired Sunday, Trump said he has a 'clear understanding' with Xi that Beijing would refrain from attacking Taiwan during his presidency. He added that the issue never came up during the Busan meeting because the Chinese leader 'understands it very well.'

That combination of public cooperation and private warning leaves Washington's regional allies walking a diplomatic tightrope. Many Asian governments, from Japan to the Philippines, remain wary of being caught between an assertive China and a transactional US. According to Panda, Asian nations are watching 'very closely.' Most, he said, will 'take a very careful and conservative approach in dealing with the Trump administration, because they know that President Trump is very unpredictable.'

The Busan meeting capped a tour analysts describe as an exercise in transactional diplomacy - a hallmark of Trump's foreign policy both in his first term and since returning to office. Panda noted Trump's direct and transactional approach, especially regarding the imposition of tariffs, using economic tools not just for profit but as strategic leverage. However, he said Washington's aim is not to alienate partners but to clarify that America wants business and its money back.

This approach was evident across the tour, during which Trump announced a string of bilateral trade agreements focused on tariff adjustments, technology transfers, and access to critical minerals - all key to securing US supply chains and curbing Chinese influence.

In Tokyo, his second stop, Trump met Emperor Naruhito and Japan's new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, signing a series of accords covering shipbuilding, technology cooperation, and defense. Washington also approved missile sales for Japan's F-35 fighter jets, signaling deepening military coordination amid growing concerns about China's naval and air buildup.

Fujisue called the US-Japan relationship 'very good,' describing it as essential to counter China's rapid military expansion. He added that Japan does not view Trump's tariff policy as punitive but 'a very good opportunity to make a good relationship with the US.'

For now, analysts view the Trump-Xi summit as a cautious reopening of dialogue rather than a breakthrough. While economic deals and diplomatic gestures dominate the headlines, the underlying competition - over technology, security, and global leadership - remains tense. Still, as Panda put it, the meeting 'has opened a gateway' - one that could, if maintained, keep the world's most consequential rivalry from sliding into deeper confrontation.