Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s meeting on Monday in New York with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, regarding artificial intelligence (AI), was described by Bessent as a diplomatic accomplishment, but Chinese officials have had no comment on it. Bessent’s own self-described success was stated by him to CNBC-TV in an interview after the meeting. Apparently Bessent proposed an open line of communications, only between himself and He, and official China is thinking about it, according to coverage Tuesday in Politico and other media. The outlet quoted one cybersecurity expert to the effect that “the scientific, technical term is BS.” Bessent’s proposal evidently did not refer to any expert teams from the two nations which could jointly tackle an AI “incident” such as those recently reported, but only the potential for communication between himself and He if a problem arises. However, Bessent said that this “China-U.S. AI dialogue” would be repeated in two months in Shenzen.

Clearly Bessent hadn’t heard then, that Trump at the United Nations on Sept. 22, with a considerable flourish, would rename AI “super-intelligence, SI”; and would tell the UN that “We’re way ahead of China, and we intend to keep it that way.”