Thursday, August 25, 2011 | 5:30 PM EDT - 5:30 PM EDT
Vice President Joseph Biden completed his eight-day trip to China, Japan, and Mongolia on August 24, 2011.
A day later, Dr. Jeffrey Bader, recently retired senior director for East Asian affairs at the National Security Council and special assistant to the President, discusses the China portion of the Vice President’s trip in a conference call moderated by National Committee president Stephen Orlins.
The trip, occurring immediately after the Congressional action raising the debt ceiling, gave the Vice President, with decades of experience in the Senate, the opportunity to reassure our worried creditor about the credit worthiness of the United States and raise concerns about market access issues in China. In addition, the Vice President met five times with president-in-waiting Xi Jinping, giving him more contact with China’s fifth generation leader than any senior American leader. Jeff sheds light on these as well as political and security issues that arose during the Vice President’s trip.
Bio
Jeffrey Bader is President and sole proprietor of Jeffrey Bader, LLC, which provides advice and assistance to American companies with interests in Asia. He also is a Visiting Scholar at the Brookings Institution.
From January 2009 until April 2011, Bader was Special Assistant to the President of the United States for National Security Affairs and Senior Director for East Asian Affairs at the National Security Council. In that capacity, he was the principal advisor to President Obama on Asia. Before assuming these positions, Bader was chief advisor on Asian issues to Senator Obama during his campaign for the Presidency in 2007-2008.
Bader served from 2005 to 2009 as the Director of the China Initiative and subsequently the John L. Thornton China Center at the Brookings Institution, where he also was a Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies.
During his three decade career with the U.S. Government Bader was principally involved in U.S.-China relations at the State Department, the National Security Council, and the United States Trade Representative’s office. In 2001, as Assistant U.S. Trade Representative he led the United States delegation in completing negotiations on the accession of China and Taiwan into the World Trade Organization.
Bader served in the People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Namibia, Zambia, Congo, the United States Mission to the United Nations, and Washington DC. During the 1990’s, he was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State responsible for China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia, Director of Asian Affairs at the National Security Council, and Director of the State Department’s Office of Chinese Affairs.
He served as U.S. Ambassador to Namibia from 1999 to 2001.
Bader was Senior Vice President of the global strategy group Stonebridge International LLC from 2002 to 2005. Bader subsequently served as a Senior Director of Stonebridge International from 2005 to 2008, as well as a member of the Policy Advisory Board of the Asia Society and of the Academic Advisory Group of the U.S. House of Representatives Working Group on U.S.-China Relations until 2008.
Born in New York, Bader received a B.A. from Yale University and an M.A. and PhD from Columbia University. He speaks Chinese and French. Bader is married to Rohini Talalla. They live in Chevy Chase, Maryland.