Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi / Bloomberg
Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi / Bloomberg
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The Trump administration declassified its strategy to ensure continued dominance over China, which focuses on accelerating India’s rise as a counterweight to Beijing and its ability to defend Taiwan against attack.
National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien announced Tuesday publication of the document, entitled “United States Strategic framework for the Indo-Pacific. ”Approved by President Donald Trump in February 2018, it provided the“ general strategic direction ”for U.S. actions over the past three years and was released to show the U.S. commitment to“ keep the Indo-Pacific region free. and open for a long time, ”O’ Brien said in a statement.
“Beijing is increasingly pressuring Indo-Pacific nations to subordinate their freedom and sovereignty to a ‘common destiny’ envisaged by the Chinese Communist Party,” O’Brien said in an expanded document statement. “The American approach is different. We seek that our allies and partners, all those who share the values and aspirations of a free and open Indo-Pacific, can preserve and protect their sovereignty. “
The paper sets out a vision of the region in which North Korea no longer poses a threat, India is predominant in South Asia, and the U.S. is working with partners around the world to resist Chinese activities to undermine sovereignty through coercion. He assumed that China will take “increasingly affirmative action” to force unification with Taiwan and warns that its dominance in cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence “will pose profound challenges for free societies.”
China said the report had “sensationalized China’s” threat theory “and showed that the United States had” opposed its own promise on the Taiwan issue. “
“The content only demonstrates the US’s malicious motives for containing China and sabotaging regional peace and stability,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said in a briefing on Wednesday. “We must ensure that Asia-Pacific is a stage for China and the United States to improve mutually beneficial cooperation. It should not become a field where a zero-sum game is developed. “
Where a clash can occur between the United States and China in the South China Sea
Although the timing of the release just a week before President-elect Joe Biden raised doubts about the reasons, the Trump administration’s actions to counter China in Asia have largely enjoyed bipartisan support. Incoming Biden officials have spoken of the need to work more with allies and partners against China, which is also a key part of the strategy, especially to strengthen security ties with Australia, Japan and India.
Rory Medcalf, a professor and head of the National Security College at the National University of Australia, said the paper shows that U.S. policy on Asia was driven by efforts to “strengthen allies and counter China.” But he pointed out that the strategy was so ambitious that “failure was almost assured” on issues such as disarming North Korea, maintaining “primacy” in the region, and finding international consensus against harmful Chinese economic practices.
“The declassified framework will have lasting value as the start of a government plan to manage strategic rivalry with China,” Medcalf wrote in site for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute research group. “If the United States is serious about this long-term competition, it will not be able to choose between tidying up its home and projecting power in the Indo-Pacific. It will have to do both.”
Highlights of the report include:
China
- He assumes that China “intends to dissolve American alliances and alliances in the region. China will exploit the gaps and opportunities created by these diminished ties.
- “China is trying to master the most advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence and bio-genetics, and take advantage of them in the service of authoritarianism. Chinese dominance in these technologies would pose profound challenges for free societies.”
- “China will take increasingly affirmative action to force unification with Taiwan.”
- Acting to “counter Chinese predatory economic practices that freeze foreign competition, undermine American economic competitiveness, and foster the Chinese Communist Party’s aspiration to dominate the 21st century economy.”
- “Building an international consensus that China’s industrial policies and unfair trade practices are harming the global trading system.”
- “Work closely with allies and countries with similar ideas to avoid the acquisition of Chinese strategic and military capabilities.”
India
- Desired Outcome: “India ‘s preferred security partner is United States. The two are cooperating to preserve maritime security and counteract Chinese influence in South and Southeast Asia and other regions of mutual concern. “
- “India continues to be preeminent in South Asia and plays a leading role in maintaining the security of the Indian Ocean.”
- “Accelerate India’s growth and capacity to serve as a net security provider and key defense partner; solidify a lasting strategic partnership with India, which is based on an Indian military stronghold.”
- “Strengthen the capacity of emerging partners in South Asia, including the Maldives, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, to contribute to a free and open order.”
Taiwan
- “Design and implement a defense strategy capable of, among other things,: (1) denying China sustained air and sea domination within the ‘first chain of islands’ in a conflict; (2) defending the nations of the first island chain, including those of Taiwan, and (3) dominate all domains outside the first chain of islands “.
- “Enabling Taiwan to develop an asymmetric defense strategy and effective capabilities that will help it ensure its security, freedom of coercion, resilience and the ability to engage China on its own terms.”
North Korea:
- Objective: “To convince the Kim regime that the only way to survive is to give up its nuclear weapons.”
- “Maximize pressure on Pyongyang through economic, diplomatic, military, police, intelligence and intelligence tools to paralyze North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction programs, stifle foreign exchange flows, weaken the regime and establish the conditions for negotiations aimed at reversing its nuclear core and missile programs, ultimately achieving the complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization of the Peninsula. “
- “Do this: (1) helping South Korea and Japan acquire conventional and advanced military capabilities; (2) bringing South Korea and Japan closer together.”
Southeast Asia
- Objective: “To promote and strengthen the central role of Southeast Asia and Asean in the security architecture of the region and encourage it to speak with one voice on key issues.”
- “Promote an integrated Indian-Pacific economic development model that provides a credible alternative to One Belt One Road; create a working group on how best to use public-private partnerships ”.
– With the assistance of Philip Heijmans, Iain Marlow and Jing Li
(Updates with China’s response from the fifth paragraph.)