In countering China, Indo-Pacific countries rely less on US: Pentagon official for region

Nato joins American officials in lauding regional players like Japan, the Philippines and Australia as they tackle ‘shared challenges’

Nato

Robert DelaneyandKhushboo Razdanin Washington

Published: 6:21am, 12 Jul 2024

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Indo-Pacific countries are starting to rely less on US leadership as they increasingly pursue initiatives to counter threats they see in China on their own, American and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation officials said on Thursday.

Responses within the region to incidents like the recent attack by Chinese vessels on Philippine forces within the island nation’s exclusive economic zone support goals the administration of US President Joe Biden set forth when it began building cooperative frameworks, the Pentagon’s top official for the region said.

“The new convergence in the Indo-Pacific won’t always start or include the United States … nor should it,” said Ely Ratner, the US assistant secretary of defence for Indo-Pacific security affairs, at a Centre for Strategic and International Studies event.

“That’s why … we are really encouraged by the important opportunities that will emerge from the reciprocal access agreement announced just this week between Japan and [the] Philippines.”

Ely Ratner is the US assistant secretary of defence for Indo-Pacific security affairs. Photo: Reuters

Annual meetings between the defence chiefs of Australia, Japan, the Philippines and the US in Hawaii – the countries’ first joint naval exercises – and other American-led engagements with all four in different formats have “reached an escape velocity of its own that is creating even more momentum and new opportunities”, Ratner added.

The Pentagon official also cited the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness – established last year by the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue comprising Australia, India, Japan and the US – as an effort helping to spawn new partnerships in the region independent of Washington.

The IPMDA aims to provide Indo-Pacific countries with an integrated and cost-effective, near-real-time method of monitoring their surrounding waters.

Ratner on Thursday said plans were under way to launch “IPMDA 2.0”, which would potentially offer new capabilities as well as training for some of the host countries “to be able to use and absorb the information”.

Much of Biden’s foreign policy has focused on strengthening existing alliances, including Nato, and building new international partnerships to counter Chinese influence while maintaining dialogue with Beijing.

That effort became more urgent after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

Biden’s top officials have increasingly pointed to China’s trade relationship with its northern neighbour as a key support for Moscow’s continued military campaign against the former Soviet-bloc country.

The acknowledgement of Indo-Pacific powers’ strategic importance in supporting Euro-Atlantic countries in countering Russia and China figured prominently at this week’s annual Nato summit in Washington.

The transatlantic security alliance’s four Indo-Pacific partners – South Korea, Japan, New Zealand and Australia – have been regularly invited to high-level Nato events since the start of the Ukraine war.

On Thursday, Nato launched four new projects with the Asia-Pacific powers. They harness capabilities in cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and fighting disinformation as well as extend support to Ukraine.

“Our security is not regional, it is global,” said Jens Stoltenberg, Nato’s secretary general, during his meetings with IP4 leaders.

With its partners, Nato “will address our shared challenges, including Russia’s war against Ukraine, China’s support for Russia’s war economy and the growing alignment of authoritarian powers”, he added.

Stoltenberg called for the allies and partners to work together “ever more closely”, describing security in East Asia and Europe as “inseparable” while thanking Japan for its support for Ukraine.

Tokyo has emerged as one of Kyiv’s most important allies, spending billions in aid.

This week, the first shipment of four mine-clearing vehicles from Japan reached Ukraine. About 20 more units are due to be delivered this year. Japan has also signed a security pact with the war-ravaged country.

South Korea, which has pledged to provide about US$300 million this year in short-term aid to Ukraine and US$2 billion in long-term assistance, signed an airworthiness certificate with Nato on Thursday.

The first deal of its kind between Nato and an Asian country, the pact is expected to boost interoperability in air combat. Both sides further agreed to enhance intelligence sharing on North Korea.

A screenshot of Bec Strating (centre) of Australia’s La Trobe University speaking at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, on Thursday.

The IP4 leaders also met with Biden on Thursday. According to a White House read-out, the leaders discussed their “shared concerns” relating to China’s support for Russia’s defence industrial base.

Earlier in the summit, Stoltenberg said Nato and its Indo-Pacific partners were “carefully watching” what Russian President Vladimir Putin was offering China, North Korea and Iran in exchange for their help against Ukraine.

The Nato chief noted that Nato countries were seeking cooperation in defence production and more naval exercises with IP4 countries.

However, at the Nato Public Forum on Thursday, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol spoke of his country’s long history of economic and social exchanges with China, despite “different” systems and institutions with the mainland.

Seoul would continue to communicate on a strategic level with Beijing, he said, and based on mutual respect, reciprocity and international norms, “we’re going to continue to have that relationship with China”.

Bec Strating of Australia’s La Trobe University said concern had been building among some policymakers in her country about how far Washington would back initiatives like Aukus, a security alliance between the US, Britain and Australia, if Biden were to lose his re-election bid in November against former US president Donald Trump.

Trump has threatened to pull the US out of Nato and has spoken sceptically of the bloc. Many within and outside the alliance worry the Republican would drop American support for any or all of the international partnerships Biden has championed.

“There’s uncertainty about what a returned Trump administration might look like, what this would mean for alliance structures, what this mean would mean for US commitment and resolve in the region,” said Strating at the CSIS event.

Policymakers harbouring such fears were “trying to develop a plan B that hedges against dependence by building relations between the other spokes, such as the Philippines, Japan and [South] Korea”, she added.