But my point was never that the US was a friend (a highly subjective term). All countries act to advance their own national interests. China doesn't expect the US to act against their own interest just for China. What China does is to argue and convince the US to act in a certain way (that benefits China) for US's own interests. That to me is what engagement and diplomacy is all about. When countries engage, they are all committed to a stage that allows them to influence each other by learning what others think/want and vise-versa and BE influenced. If we don't genuinely give others a chance to change us, we don't get an opportunity to change others for our own benefit either. But how everything end up playing out is up to the strength of our own hand and our diplomats' skills.
It's obvious when we got what we wanted diplomatically, it was good for us. But what about when others want something from us? When Russia annexed Crimea, China initially opposed it. But we let Russia change our mind because it serves our interest better to protect Russia's core interest to solidify an ally than to uphold a principle. Now I think it's clearly a good call given the west can't let go of the Crimea issue. Another case is when the Qing Emperor didn't let the first British envoy to change his mind to open China up for trade. We all know how that turned out.
Ultimately, our national interest is the result of our leaders' and people's wisdom and diligence. It's good to have some good hearted foreigners (and there were). But it is more important to self-strengthen rather complaint about others (unless as a tool, which everyone uses).
In terms of Orlin, I think the engagement camps in both China and the US (Orlin included) did a great service to their respective countries and really advanced both countries' interests. The difference is that China did other things that helped China to become stronger, while the US engaged in endless wars and neglected their own workers. They can't blame engagement or China. I think China is still working with the US engagement camp to get China-US back to a less hostile relation because China cares more about China being strong than US being strong. But China hawks in the US are willing to slow US down to stop China's growth because their goal is hegemony. So China works with Americans that are pro-engagement (we work with China friendly factions in every country, just like everyone else).
Last, I would caution against using terms like 'western sympathizer.' We Chinese people around the world are facing enough racism and repression by foreign powers, the last thing I want to see is Chinese people hurting each other with these toxic online comments. Part of China's diplomatic success is attributable to the fact that there so many Chinese speak native level English and truly understand how westerners think, their strengths and weaknesses (we just don’t want people to radicalize). I sometimes watch US think tankers analyze China and marveled by how childish they could be because they can’t put themselves in our shoes. To me what matters is not what my compatriots’ political views but their hearts (Are we all on Team China?) We Chinese people say 和而不同, harmonious but different. Don’t we Chinese people feel lucky that Yang Jiechi, a factory worker, somehow decided to do something different by learning English (easily counter revolutionary) when the whole country was in Cultural Revolution with anti-American imperialism in full swing? Now Team China is more harmonious and more diverse than ever. That's a strength, not weakness. The US got diversity down, but they lost harmony. That makes them weak. When China weakened to the lowest point after decades of civil wars, Japan launched full scale invasion.
