US is not completely unable to offer any benefits for China. China has greater direct power, but US still has legitimacy, especially among the colonized world.
There's a lot of avenues China can explore to increase its legitimacy by siphoning it off America. Issuing dollar bonds for its own development is for example just 1 example which strengthens China at the expense of US while also relying on "keeping the enemy close".
It all depends on if Beijing thinks they want to explore this path, imho it is neither inherently bad nor good.
It only costs pride for China to publicly lower itself to US' level, if the result is increasing China's grip on the world, it is mostly justified. It's not like China is a prideful or face obsessed civilization (if it was, it wouldn't have survived and stayed powerful for so long). It's always focused on improving it's position, both civilian and military.
