“There is an important distinction between decoupling, on the one hand, and on the other hand, diversifying critical supply chains or taking targeted national security actions,” she said.
The Biden administration maintains that the recent limits it has placed on high-tech exports to China, notably of the most advanced semiconductors, are narrowly focused on American military security. The administration has tried to characterize its actions as building a high fence around only a small yard of technologies.
But even after Ms. Yellen’s visit, many in China are skeptical. As the United States presents policies as “just for national security, then the question is how big is the yard of national security,” said Wu Xinbo, dean of international studies at Fudan University in Shanghai.
She offered no new policies. Nor did China.
Conspicuously missing from a news conference Ms. Yellen held on Sunday, and from a separate statement by China’s official news agency, Xinhua, was any suggestion that even one of the many trade, investment and technology issues between the two countries had been resolved.
China placed restrictions last Monday on the export of two critical metals, gallium and germanium, used in computer chips. China produces almost all of the world’s supply of both materials. The export controls were widely seen as retaliation for American limits on semiconductor exports to China, although Beijing did not characterize its measure as retaliation. Ms. Yellen, speaking Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” said the move was “potentially” retaliatory.
Beijing is also bracing for the long-discussed possibility that the Biden administration may limit American investment in certain high-tech sectors of the Chinese economy. China imposed its own curbs on outbound investments in 2015. Beijing steered the country’s companies and households away from speculating on American real estate and European soccer clubs and pushed them instead to buy overseas businesses in aircraft production, heavy manufacturing, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and other strategic sectors.
Ms. Yellen nonetheless tried on Sunday to put an optimistic spin on her visit, as she sought to rebut speculation that conflict may be inevitable.
“Navigating the contours of the relationship between the United States and China is no easy task, but we must never forget that, despite the challenges, our path is not predestined,” she said.
Alan Rappeport contributed reporting.