WASHINGTON — As Congress debates the direction of economic policy in the Pacific, the main country worried about an American-led trade deal has gone nearly silent: China.

Two years ago, the prospect of the deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, evoked fears in China of commercial encirclement, particularly as the initiative followed the Obama administration’s strategic turn to Asia. Meeting with President Obama in California in 2013, President Xi Jinping of China made a point of asking that the United States keep him informed on the negotiations, even though Beijing did not want to join the nascent trade agreement.

The tempo of negotiations has accelerated considerably since then, with people involved saying that an agreement is close. Michael Froman, the United States trade representative, flew to Japan last week for talks. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who arrived in the United States on Sunday, is scheduled to discuss the pact in Washington and address a joint meeting of Congress. And Congress is deciding whether to give the president fast-track authority for such trade agreements, which would put a deal to a vote without allowing amendments.

As the deal has come to the forefront again, the Chinese government has changed its view.

Some of China’s leading trade policy intellectuals now say that they have few concerns about the agreement. They also say that the pact could even help China, by making it easier for Beijing to pursue its own regional agreements without facing criticism that it should instead pursue ambitious global free trade pacts that would require significantly opening its markets to Western competition.