Wanted: Some Diplomatic Choreography to End China Standoff

We'd better hope that somebody's working behind the scenes on a face-saving formula to end the spy-plane standoff, because right now it's dangerously deadlocked. President Bush, facing perhaps the most complex crisis of his life, used measured — but obviously exasperated — tones Tuesday to reiterate his insistence that the Chinese send home the damaged EP-3 surveillance plane and its 24 crew members. (There no longer appears to be much point in adding "without further tampering," now that satellite images reportedly show Chinese officials all over it, tinkering with wrenches and the like.) Bush hasn't set any deadlines, although he and his administration are trying to signal to Beijing that U.S. patience is running out and that further delay may seriously damage U.S.-China relations. "We have allowed the Chinese government to do the right thing," he said. "But now it is time for our servicemen and women to return home and it is time for the Chinese government to return our plane."

But judging by President Jiang Zemin's response, that's not something the Chinese government feels easily able to do right now. While U.S. diplomats are increasingly frustrated in their efforts to engage officials in Beijing on the subject, Jiang responded to Bush's comments by repeating his demand that the U.S. apologize and accept full responsibility for the collision between the U.S. plane and a downed Chinese F-8 fighter. And that's a price Washington has no intention of paying. "There's nothing to apologize for," said Secretary of State Colin Powell. In other words, stalemate.

The problem, especially for the Chinese, is one of "face." Jiang was strongly criticized for letting the U.S. off the hook too easily over the Belgrade embassy bombing two years ago, and he's clearly under pressure from the hawks in Beijing to hang tough. Some China analysts have warned that although Jiang may wish the problem would simply go away, the fact that the U.S. leadership has publicly put pressure on Beijing makes it all the more difficult to simply cave in to Washington's demands. And yet, from a U.S. perspective, a new president who has been doing his best to cultivate a tough and resolute image in international affairs is being made to look anxious and uncertain — and he, too, can't afford to project weakness, which probably rules out an apology.

President Bush's discomfort is exacerbated by the sense that Washington has few immediate options at its disposal for pressuring the Chinese — and it's palpably clear that visible forms of pressure are more likely to make them dig in their heels. But he may be helped by the fact that President Jiang may share an interest in speedily resolving the crisis, because a drawn-out standoff will likely harden both Chinese and American public opinion, further diminishing the leaders' room for maneuver.

Still, bridging the gulf between Beijing's and Washington's minimum requirements for ending the standoff may require some particularly creative diplomacy that allows each side to give a little without appearing — at least to their own public — to be giving anything. The kind of formula that in some parts of the U.S. might be called "lawyering."