It's a change of tactics, not strategy, Biden was heard saying when a microphone caught his words after he and leaders from India, Japan, and Australia had made some introductory remarks ahead of a meeting in Biden's home turf.
The overall top-level meeting between the four countries is intended to discuss, among other things, China's role in Asia and its actions there. However, without directly mentioning China by name. But Biden did, off the record, so to speak.
China continues to act aggressively and test us in the region (read: China's neighborhood). It concerns the South China Sea, the East China Sea, southern China, southern Asia, and the Taiwan Strait, Biden said to the others when he, presumably, thought he was out of microphone range.
The three others at the so-called Quad meeting – India's, Japan's, and Australia's prime ministers Narendra Modi, Fumio Kishida, and Anthony Albanese – got to hear the US interpretation of the whole thing:
We see it as Xi Jinping trying to focus on economic challenges at home and minimize diplomatic struggles. But he's also trying to create some room for maneuver on the foreign policy front by aggressively safeguarding China's interests.
