‘This combination of Chinese assertiveness and U.S. ambivalence has left the Indo-Pacific region in flux.'
‘A strategy for the Indo-Pacific today would benefit from satisfying three needs:’
- ‘the need for a balance of power;’
- ‘the need for an order that the region’s states recognize as legitimate; and’
- ‘the need for an allied and partner coalition to address China’s challenge to both.’
‘Such an approach can ensure that the Indo-Pacific’s future is characterized by balance and twenty-first-century openness rather than hegemony and nineteenth-century spheres of influence.’
- ‘The challenge for U.S. policy is not to create order out of chaos, but to modernize and strengthen elements of an existing system.’
‘The Indo-Pacific has evolved an “operating system,” that is as much about promoting commerce as preventing conflict.’
- ‘Constructed in the aftermath of World War II, the region’s system is a combination of legal, security, and economic arrangements that liberated hundreds of millions from poverty, promoted countless commercial advances, and led to a remarkable accumulation of wealth.’
- ‘At its heart are time-tested principles: freedom of navigation, sovereign equality, transparency, peaceful dispute resolution, the sanctity of contracts, cross-border trade, and cooperation on transnational challenges.’
- ‘The United States’ long-standing commitment to forward-deployed military forces, moreover, has helped underscore these principles.’
‘Two specific challenges, however, threaten the order’s balance and legitimacy.’
‘The first is China’s economic and military rise.’
- ‘China alone accounts for half the region’s GDP and military spending, a gap that has only grown since the COVID-19 pandemic.’
- ‘And like any rising state, China seeks to reshape its surroundings and secure deference to its interests.’
- ‘The way Beijing has pursued these goals—South China Sea island building, East China Sea incursions, conflict with India, threats to invade Taiwan, and internal repression in Hong Kong and Xinjiang—undermines important precepts of the established regional system.’
- ‘This behavior, combined with China’s preference for economic coercion, most recently directed against Australia, means that many of the order’s organizing principles are at risk.’
‘The second challenge is more surprising because it comes from the original architect and longtime sponsor of the present system—the United States.’
- ‘Despite determined efforts by the Trump administration’s Asia experts to mitigate the damage, President Donald Trump himself strained virtually every element of the region’s operating system.’
- ‘He pressed allies such as Japan and South Korea to renegotiate cost-sharing agreements for U.S. bases and troops and threatened to withdraw forces entirely if he was unsatisfied with the new terms.’
- ‘Both moves undermined alliances the Indo-Pacific needs to remain balanced.’
- ‘Trump was also generally absent from regional multilateral processes and economic negotiations, ceding ground for China to rewrite rules central to the order’s content and legitimacy.’
- ‘Finally, he was cavalier about support for democracy and human rights in ways that weakened the United States’ natural partners and emboldened Chinese authorities in Hong Kong and Xinjiang.’
‘This combination of Chinese assertiveness and U.S. ambivalence has left the region in flux.’
- ‘The contemporary Indo-Pacific feels like prewar Europe—drifting out of balance, its order fraying, and with no obvious coalition to address the problem.’
- ‘If the next U.S. administration wants to preserve the regional operating system that has generated peace and unprecedented prosperity, it needs to begin by addressing each of these trends in turn.’