Bush's Big Test: Saving Face

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It was Powell who finally splashed through the verbal puddles and repeated for the cameras his earlier, little noticed expression of "regret" for the loss of the Chinese plane and pilot. The letter that accompanied his statement signaled even more movement. It raised the possibility of a joint investigation into what had happened or an exchange of explanations. "Once we said 'regret' and 'exchange explanations,' they came back to us still saying 'apologize, investigate,' but also saying, 'Let's discuss how this can work.' Now they're talking mechanisms," said the State Department official.

By Thursday, when Bush stood before a bundle of newspaper editors, he was broadening his vocabulary. While affirming that China was a "competitor," he added, "But that doesn't mean we can't find areas in which we can partner. The economy's a place where we can partner." Progress picked up Friday as the diplomats began hammering out language for an exchange of drafts of a letter that might pave the way for the crew's release. When Bush met with Rice and Cheney to dissect the regret/apology language for the letter to be signed by Ambassador Joseph Prueher, he wanted everyone in the room to know that he would have the final word on whatever they came up with. "If I don't like what the letter says, it's not going," he told Rice. Later, when Sealock briefed Bush and Powell on his latest talks with the Chinese, Bush made it clear that he didn't want to play the blame game. "We don't need to be pointing fingers," he said. "This is a delicate moment."

Still, the whole exercise put Bush at odds with some in Congress and the Pentagon who had no use for subtlety. "After we get our people out, we should denounce all these equivocal statements we made to spring them," a senior Navy officer griped. "And then we should bomb the damn plane on the tarmac." The White House saw that it was also still dealing with competing constituencies on the Chinese end. After 48 hours of thaw, Vice Premier Qian Qichen declared Saturday that the expressions of regret were "still unacceptable." The U.S., he said, must "apologize to the Chinese people. This is the key issue to solving the problem."

Former U.S. ambassador to China James Lilley says the whole standoff reveals the fault line in U.S.-China relations: "They have extended sovereignty; we have forward deployment." Clashes like this are going to happen until an arrangement similar to the one between the Soviets and Americans can be worked out. "This could be therapeutic, especially if it forces both sides to work out rules of engagement," Lilley says. "They don't want this to happen again, and we don't want it to happen again."

--Reported by Jay Branegan, Massimo Calabresi, John F. Dickerson and Mark Thompson/Washington, Hannah Beech/Hainan Island and Matthew Forney/Beijing