This paper explores the characteristics of trade policy in US and China and highlights their FTA strategies in terms of economic statecraft, especially their implications for the cross-strait relationships. US is the most important initiator of international trading system. The establishment of NAFTA in 1994 served as the catalyst for the recent regionalism. US is the leader in FTA globally, however, US has left behind the trade arrangements in East Asia, such as ‘ASEAN plus one” and “ASEAN plus three.” In this sense, US plays the defensive role or a follower in East Asia. All three trade policies now are available for China as the surge of regionalism in East Asia (bilateralism, FT A for example), the entrance into WTO in 2001 (multilateralism), and the reform and opening (unilateralism) since 1978 as well as the membership of APEC (concerted unilateralism) in 1991. Meanwhile, the rise of China combined with its high openness in terms of trade and FDI has made China become an important trading partner for neighboring countries. It paves therefore the way for China to become a potential leader in East Asian regionalism, compared with its role as a follower in the global FTA games. Under the threat of exclusion in East Asian regionalism, US has launched more FTAs plans in this area in a more active way. However, Taiwan seems to be ignored, despite US has singed an FT A with Taiwan's competitor South Korea. Moreover, China seems to finds the FTA as the new instrument to isolate Taiwan in international arena. This paper concludes that both FTA policy of US and China might well marginalize Taiwan, whose demand for normalization of cross-strait economic relationships might increase.