Pompeo continued to criticize China, saying that Washington and its allies must "have more creative and powerful ways" to force China to change.

"The truth is that our policies have revitalized China's impoverished economy, and then Beijing returned to take revenge," US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on July 23 at the Nixon Library in

"We, the nations that love freedom in the world, must make China change ... in more creative and powerful ways, because Beijing's actions threaten its people and their prosperity.

Pompeo acknowledged that Nixon's worry of opening the world to China in the 1970s was a "prophecy".

Nixon, the US president in 1969-1974, paved the way for establishing diplomatic relations between the United States and China through a series of contacts, including a historic visit to Beijing in 1972.

In this important speech this week, after Washington demanded that Beijing close the Chinese Consulate General in Houston, Pompeo reiterated previous U.S. allegations about China, including trade policy discontent.

He said that the Chinese military had "become stronger and more threatening" and that the US and its allies needed to "doubt and verify" China instead of "believing but verifying", the slogan used by the late president.

The top US diplomat also said that an ally of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) did not dare to stand up for Hong Kong's freedom and fear losing the Chinese market, but did not state.

Washington-Beijing relations are at their lowest level in years.