Trump Has Hinted at a Xi Visit. China Is Still Wondering What He Wants.

President Trump fueled new speculation this week about a meeting with China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, when he told reporters that Washington needed to be cleaned up to prepare for a summit between the two leaders in the “not too distant future.”

Mr. Trump provided no details, and China has said nothing publicly about any such meeting. The stakes of a visit would be high: President Trump has imposed 20 percent tariffs on China’s shipments to the United States, and may order another round next month. China wants to try to head off further escalations in the trade war that would set back its efforts to revive the country’s beleaguered economy, experts say.

But before any summit can take place, China still needs answers to two pressing questions: What does Mr. Trump want? Who can Beijing talk to in Washington who Mr. Trump might listen to?

To try to answer these questions, China sent scholars to the United States to take part in unofficial diplomatic talks last month with Trump administration officials and American foreign policy experts. China has grown concerned that the officials Beijing have been dealing with at the State Department and the National Security Council, who are outside Mr. Trump’s inner circle, are not conveying their messages to him, some of the scholars said.

“We talk through the diplomatic channel. That’s the normal channel. But can that reach President Trump? Do those people we talked to really know what President Trump is thinking?” said Da Wei, the director of the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University in Beijing, who was among the scholars.

China has also been publicly signaling its interest in talks. The Chinese commerce minister said earlier this month that he wrote a letter to the U.S. commerce secretary and U.S. trade representative inviting them to meet. And Chinese officials describing Beijing’s efforts to curtail the production of fentanyl last week urged the United States to return to dialogue.

Beijing wants to know what Mr. Trump wants from China in a potential trade deal as well as how he might respond to China’s wish list. China likely wants Mr. Trump to lift the tariffs; loosen restrictions on U.S. technology exports and Chinese investment in the United States; and offer assurances that he will not provoke Beijing over Taiwan, the self-governed island claimed by China.

At the same time, China has been trying to hold firm against the Trump administration. Beijing responded to the tariffs with counter measures like levies on U.S. agricultural imports that are calibrated to exact some pain, but also leave the door open for future trade negotiations. A Chinese official said Beijing would “fight to the end” in a “tariff war, trade war or any other war” with the United States.