By IndraStra Global Editorial Team In 2011 - The US President Barack Obama declared his new strategy for the Asia-Pacific - ‘Pivot...
By IndraStra Global Editorial Team
In 2011 - The US
President Barack Obama declared his new strategy for the Asia-Pacific - ‘Pivot
to Asia’. It was also coined as ‘Act of Strategic Re-Balancing’ which emphasizes that
the US is going to stay here and it’s going to re-infuse new ideas into its
security and economic presence in the region. The US appeared to contest the
growing influence of China by revitalizing its partnerships with its old allies
in the region and also reach out to other like-minded countries for their
support for US led initiatives.
After a decade of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, this policy shift signaled a new direction for US foreign policy in the twenty-first century. Nonetheless, existing public debates and analyses have so far tended to oversimplify key aspects of the policy. First, they have focused almost exclusively on the military dimension of the re-balance. Second, the US re-balance toward Asia has often been depicted, in a rather reductive manner, as a US “grand strategy” of military containment of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Washington, it is argued, is tightening its alliances and enhancing its military capabilities across the Asia Pacific in order to contain the rise of China, its most likely future military near peer competitor.
After a decade of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, this policy shift signaled a new direction for US foreign policy in the twenty-first century. Nonetheless, existing public debates and analyses have so far tended to oversimplify key aspects of the policy. First, they have focused almost exclusively on the military dimension of the re-balance. Second, the US re-balance toward Asia has often been depicted, in a rather reductive manner, as a US “grand strategy” of military containment of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Washington, it is argued, is tightening its alliances and enhancing its military capabilities across the Asia Pacific in order to contain the rise of China, its most likely future military near peer competitor.
In the
subsequent years, the US tried to reinvigorate its alliances with Japan, South
Korea, Philippines, and Australia, and tried to reach out to countries like
India to have a larger and effective grouping to support US positions in
regional politics. Even in the economic arena, an ambitious project in the form
of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was given more importance. As mentioned
earlier, the US ‘pivot to Asia’ was less a strategic balancing and more a
counter-measure to China’s growing political and military might, and a last
attempt to maintain the US position as the prime mover in the Asia-Pacific.
However, it might be said that the US re-entry has not been impressive because
of the lack of intensity as well as many internal rifts between the US allies
such as mistrust between Japan and South Korea, lack of consensus among other
countries of the Asia-Pacific such as India and ASEAN countries on the US move,
and more than anything else, decline in US capacity. It has led to the ‘pivot’
being less appealing in subsequent years. Till now, TPP was not able to make any clear headway - it seems
it will take more time to realise the TPP on the ground. It may be contrasted
with the Chinese project of the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB),
which has been successfully launched with wide participation by the countries
of the region, including South Korea.
To counter China
within the military realm, the Department of Defense released, in January 2012,
its new Defense Strategic Guidance (DSG) Sustaining US Global Leadership:
Priorities for 21st Century Defense, intended to reshape the Pentagon’s
priorities and capabilities in an era of budgetary constraints and after a
decade of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It unambiguously stated that “while the
US military will continue to contribute to security globally, we will of
necessity re-balance toward the Asia Pacific region” (emphasis in the original).
That same month, the Pentagon also released the Joint Operational Access
Concept (JOAC) that establishes the guiding precepts and capabilities necessary
to overcome anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD) threats. The administration has
also sought to strengthen and update existing formal military alliances with
Australia, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, and Thailand, while
diversifying and deepening its diplomatic and security cooperation with
partners such as Indonesia, New Zealand, Singapore, and Vietnam. Washington
announced, among other initiatives, the re-posturing of the US Navy from the
existing 50/50 percent split between the Pacific and the Atlantic to a 60/40
split between those two oceans by 2020, the transfer of several elements of US
forces based in Okinawa to Guam, the upgrading of its missile defense posture,
the deployment of marines to Darwin in Australia (as part of what is meant to
become a 2,500-strong rotational force), the deployment of littoral combat
ships to Singapore, and signed an enhanced defense cooperation agreement with
the Philippines. These steps aim to redistribute and disperse American forces
across the Asia Pacific, making US defense posture in the region more agile,
flexible, and financially sustainable.
There is another
unsaid but equally if not more significant ‘pivot to Asia’, which has been
gradually but very decisively taking more space in the political and economic
landscape of the Asia-Pacific: China’s ‘pivot to Asia’. China’s growing
influence in the region is undisputable, especially in the economic sphere.
China has emerged as the Asia-Pacific hub, being the number one trading partner
of almost all the countries. With the successful launch of the AIIB and
One-Belt One-Road (OBOR) initiative, China has almost become a pivot of the
entire region in the economic sphere. In security affairs also, undeterred by
US moves, China has become more assertive and has been making its intent and
design more open. It has deliberately discarded its old policy of ‘hide your capabilities’
and asserted its foreign policy goals. It has made it clear that it would not
accept any code of conduct for the South China Sea and in 2013 declared an Air
Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) in the East China Sea. China probably wants
to make its claim for the ‘pivot’ known and open at this point of time, though it
might not be eager to execute them immediately.
Japan, under the
current Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, has also its own ‘pivot to Asia’ intent. An
important shift in Japan’s approach in recent years has been an aggressive
policy to erode its peaceful constitution and unlock all the restrictions on
Japan’s military role in regional politics. By citing China’s growing
assertiveness and the need for an Asia-Pacific response, Japan has been able to
convince the US that a changed Japanese posture is a much needed stance. Japan
is aware that the neighboring countries would not be happy with this attempt
to become a ‘pivot’ to Asia and has thus been trying to reach out other,
distant countries in Asia, including India, to garner support.
In the past one
and half years, more specifically after the Ukraine crisis, Russia has also
been trying to engage more with Asia. At this point in time, Russia has neither
capacity nor intent to become a regional pivot in the security sphere, though
it has been trying to be a player, at least, in East Asia via its cooperation
and connections with North Korea. Moscow has signed a nuclear agreement with
India and has been strengthening its relationship with China. Russia’s renewed
interests in Japan, Thailand, Malaysia, and Vietnam are also reported to be
part of its agenda to build a Russia’s ‘pivot to Asia’. Russia is more
interested in the economic landscape of the region, and in April 2014, Moscow
announced a special economic zone in Vladivostok to reach out to Asia-pacific
countries.
Few other
‘pivots’ such as ASEAN’s as a collective entity, which tries to offer a ASEAN
way in regional politics, as well as India’s growing regional interests, could
also be cited as important variables that are going to shape the future of the
region. However, they are nascent and less influential at this point of time.
Amidst all the
‘pivots to Asia’, the region has become an arena of contest between the various
players of ‘pivot politics’. A multiplicity of ‘pivots’ means that there is no
one who has substantial influence over the regional security and economic
dynamics, leading to complex scenarios. It has resulted in less predictability
and more instability in the region. The interplay of these ‘pivots’ - their
contest as well alliances – is going to shape the future of regional political
and economics, and must be keenly observed.
United States is
redirecting its foreign policy attention, priorities, and resources—in the
post–Iraq/Afghanistan wars period—toward the world’s most strategically
sensitive and economically dynamic region. In the words of former secretary of state
Hillary Clinton, “The future of politics will be decided in Asia, not
Afghanistan or Iraq, and the United States will be right at the center of the
action.” China’s strategic and economic clout certainly is a central concern
for US policymakers, the American pivot to the Asia Pacific is driven by a much
broader and complex set of political, strategic, and economic objectives.
The overarching
ambition of the US re-balance is to preserve American supremacy in world
politics while avoiding a major power tussle with the PRC. In order to do so,
Washington does not seek to contain China – as this strategy is deemed to be
hopeless and ineffective. The re-balance seeks to sustain US pre-eminence by
re-adjustment in the complex “web of linkages” between the diplomatic, military
and economic components of American presence in the Asia Pacific since the end
of WWII.
References:
References:
1. What exactly does it mean US Pivoting to Asia - XML,The Atlantic , April 13, 2015 [Link]
2. The Obama Administration's Pivot to Asia - Video, The Foreign Policy Initiative [Link]
3. Obama puts the Asia Pivot on Pause - XML, The National Interest, October 14, 2015 [Link]
4. Explaining the US 'Pivot' to Asia - Pdf, The Chatham House, August 2013 [Link]
5. Pivot to Asia: US Strategy to Contain China or to Rebalance Asia - XML, The Washington Review of Turkish and Eurasian Affairs, February 2015 [Link]
6. Whatever happened to Obama's Pivot to Asia ? - XML, Washington Post, April 2015 [Link]