Wealth and power, not opposite ends of a spectrum; if the Chicoms can reduce our wealth by forfeiting some of their wealth based upon our wealth, they gain leverage power with what they have remaining in holding our debt. Thier power goes up markedly while we struggle to remain solvent as they hold the blade over our collective necks.
American politicians - of course - can only see to the next poll and the next election.
(Then again, the Chinese were the ones that sent a fleet to India, returned to China with trade goods and information and maps, got turned down by the conservative bureaucrats in China, and never went back.)