Mr. Clinton this week offered a strong defense of his policy of engaging China.

It would be counterproductive, having engaged China this far, to begin piling additional requirements from out of the blue onto the bargaining table.

"It's much better to engage China in a broad dialogue and we stand a better chance of achieving that objective this way," he added.

"There's no debate about whether America should engage China," he said.

The President noted that the attacks provided a great opportunity to engage Russia and China.

I believe that the United States should continue to engage China in an ongoing dialogue.

Shouldn't we find a way to engage Russia, China, and the rest?

It's part of an effort to engage China, to open a dialogue that may influence their policies in other areas.

Firstly, we want to engage China further through an upgraded political dialogue into the international community.

In order to engage China on economic issues, Obama didn't press very hard on human rights.