The United States wants to expand military cooperation with China to intensify collaboration in the areas of humanitarian exercises, disaster relief and counter piracy. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said that he is preparing to embark on a trip to China to resume the suspended military dialogue.Gates is scheduled to leave for China tomorrow for his first official visit to the country since 2007. The dialogue was stopped last year by China after the US announced arms package to Taiwan and US President Barak Obama met the Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama, despite strong protest by Beijing.Talking to reporters at a Pentagon news conference in Washington, Gates said that expanding the dialogue is important, and so is to explore areas of partnership in military-to-military cooperation. He said that training and exercising forhumanitarian assistance, disaster relief, counter piracy are the various areas where their interests coincide and where they can explore working together as equal partners and develop the relationship further.Gates also plans to discuss specific military issues that could be contentious, including nuclear missile defense, space and cyber operations, and containing threats from North Korea. He further said that they have an extraordinary opportunity to define their relationship not by the obstacles between the two countries, but by their common interests.