As Air Force One took off from South Korea’s Busan airport after U.S.-China talks on Thursday, Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s Hongqi N701 limousine whisked him off to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit some 50 miles (80km) away.

The split-screen moment captured a shift in global economic leadership: U.S. President Donald Trump heads home after a 24-hour visit, while China’s leader settles in for a festival of multilateral diplomacy that America now sees as an afterthought.

This encapsulates a change in the contest for influence across the Asia-Pacific, home to the world’s fastest-growing economies and critical supply chains rattled by Trump’s tariffs.

MULTILATERALISM, VERSUS ‘AMERICA FIRST’

As Washington embraces barriers and bilateral deal-making, Beijing positions itself as th

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