On a grey, windy afternoon at a military air base in Maryland yesterday, Donald Trump donned black gloves and waited patiently at the foot of the stairs to Xi Jinping’s huge “zhuan ji”, his “special plane”.

He was about to grant China’s leader a rare honour, on his first visit to the US in a tumultuous decade.

Precisely on cue, Xi appeared from the plane, holding hands with his wife Peng Liyuan. He peered down at the the massed military lining a 100-foot-long red carpet with fixed bayonets, and spotted the US president standing by with Melania. He smiled, clearly pleased, and gave a little wave.

There followed plenty of handshakes, more smiles, flowers presented by children, some friendly chats and the two countries’ national anthems. Cannons fired and two supersonic B-1 bombers screeched overhead, causing Trump to wince then chuckle.

Xi is used to pageantry. But he would have been especially happy with the presence of that one man, Donald Trump, and what that signified.

Was it weakness, strategy, desperation or canny politics in search of a trade deal? Whatever the implications, it was clearly intended to send a message to Xi: Trump was very glad he was here, and keen to make him feel welcome.

A historic gesture

When leaders of great powers meet, it’s usually replete with diplomatic power plays. World leaders coming to the US usually land to a formal reception but their counterpart stays at the White House, making the visitor come to the centre of American power before granting an audience.

And, of course, vice versa. When Trump flew to Beijing in May, Xi did not greet him at the airport.

This was the model, too, for King Charles’ visit to DC in April. The King and Queen were greeted at the air base by the UK ambassador, flowers and a military cordon of honour, but made their own way into town for tea at the White House with the Trumps.

There have been some variations to the rule.

Ronald Reagan, George W Bush and Barack Obama went to meet visiting popes at the airport: call it a divine exception. Trump greeted Russia’s Vladimir Putin on the tarmac at Anchorage in Alaska last year ahead of their summit over Ukraine: Nixon did the same for Japanese Emperor Hirohito at the same venue in 1971.

But, according to US media reports, popes aside, you need to rewind to 1962 for the last time a US president made the short hop from Washington down to Joint Base Andrews to honour the arrival of a head of state.

A jaunty British Pathe reel explains the context: President John F Kennedy met British PM Harold Macmillan at the airport and gave him a lift back to the White House in his helicopter, to begin a weekend of conferences to discuss major world issues such as Cold War negotiations with Krushchev as Russia resumed nuclear testing.

Macmillan said such meetings were “the basis of the cooperation between our countries which has great value for the future of the world”.

How did it go?

The last time Xi visited the US was early in Trump’s first term in 2017, when he came to Mar-a-Lago in Florida. This is the third time the men have met in the last year.

The stakes are high. Both hope to cool their tit-for-tat tariff war, which saw China’s trade with the US fall by 25% last year. China hopes Trump will keep his finger on the pause button of a $14bn arms deal with Taiwan. The US wants China to dial back its support for Iran, from whom it buys oil and to whom it sells weapons.

And both need to thrash out where they stand on AI, which poses increasing security risks and economic opportunities, with the US still holding out on providing its competitor with the latest silicon chips that power the frontier models.

The arrival was a relaxed and instantly warm occasion, despite the geopolitical tensions and surrounding formalities. There were long minutes spent chatting, more handshakes (Trump kept his gloves on and did not attempt his iconic “death grip”) and smiles. At one point Trump gave Xi a friendly pat on the shoulder as Melania spoke with Peng.

Finally, as Xi got in his car to leave, the Trumps waited by it to give the leader one more wave goodbye, before heading back to their car for a short drive across the runway to Marine One, the helicopter taking them back to the White House.

The event was not covered by many news cameras however: major networks including Fox, CBS and NBC continued their boycott of pooled events following Trump’s banning CNN from the White House.

What does it mean?

Trump said on Wednesday that the state dinner with Xi on Thursday would be a “packed house… everybody wanted to be there. I would say we have the entire tech world, the entire banking world and a lot more”.

But officials have kept a lid on expectations of anything substantial to come from the trip.

But Wang Hui Yao, a former counsellor to the State Council of China, told the BBC that the aim of the visit was “to really promote more friendly and more cordial bilateral relations”, and Trump’s welcome meant this was “half done already”.

Former Republican staffer, now political adviser and strategist Rina Shah told LBC that the “choreography” of the welcome showed that Beijing wants equality and “Washington wants a deal”.

“Both men need a picture that says ‘we can manage the rivalry’,” she said. “This is not a reset, it is damage control. The two biggest economies on earth cannot keep lurching from tariff spike to tariff spike and then from AI scare to AI scare.

“It is grown up to try to stabilise the relationship [without] pretending the strategic competition disappeared. You roll out the red carpet for Xi because you have to manage the relationship.

“But don’t confuse the carpet with trust.”

Not everyone was happy, however – including some from Trump’s side of politics.

Four Republican lawmakers, including former Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, wrote to the administration expressing concern over the US’s failure to move ​ahead with $300 million in foreign military financing that Congress appropriated for Taiwan, and the ​administration’s decision to withhold approval for a $14 billion package of foreign military sales to the island.

“We are concerned by President Trump’s description of Taiwan as ‘a very good negotiating chip’ in engagements with Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party,” the letter said.

Barrett Marson, an Arizona-based GOP strategist. told Politico that Xi’s state visit would annoy Maga loyalists, just a short while before the midterm elections.

“The in-your-face arguments from Republicans this election cycle is that Democrats want to bring socialism or communism to America,” Marson said. “Trump warmly embracing two of the most outspoken leaders of those ideologies [referring to Xi and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani] makes it that much harder for the message to resonate with voters.”

Republican Ted Budd said Trump “can’t forget that China is also a competitor and an adversary”.

And Republican Senator Roger Wicker said had the White House asked him for advice, he would have suggested President Trump “not invite Xi Jinping to Washington for such a lavish welcome, based on all of the troubling issues we have with President Xi and the Chinese Communist Party”.

Just a few hours before Xi’s arrival, the usually staunch Trump loyalist did not hold back.

“Perhaps some progress will be made,” Wicker said. “But … during every minute of dialogue, our commander in chief should keep in mind that his guest is a brutal, unelected and oppressive dictator who seeks to dominate his neighbours and whose massive military arsenal is aimed directly at the United States of America.”