Too anodyne to be utilitarian
Early this year, the White House released America’s Indo-Pacific Strategy. It is dated February 2022. U.S. President Joe Biden had referred to it earlier, at the 24 September 2021 QUAD Leaders’ Summit, saying: “The future of each of our nations – and indeed the world – depends on a free and open Indo-Pacific enduring and flourishing in the decades ahead.”
That is top-notch praise and self-assurance from President Biden. However, it does not meet the critical standards of others. Lyle Goldstein of DefenseNews.Com, for example, wrote last February: “Acute issues ranging from the Sino-Indian border to the reefs of the South China sea to the ultimate flashpoint of Taiwan are simply glossed over with anodyne references to ‘rules-based approaches’ and ‘integrated deterrence.’
As this article will explore, the anodyne description offered above is more wide-ranging than meets the eyes.
Some Pacific Islands leaders have castigated it from the perspective that there were no consultations with them in formulating the Strategy. That, however, is nothing new. The QUAD members did not consult the Pacific Island Countries (PICs) when they formed their Indo-Pacific agenda in 2018. This is disgraceful when you consider that all QUAD members: Australia, India, Japan, and U.S. are current Dialogue Partners for the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) and in Australia’s case, a full and foundation member. Credit to Japan, however. It took the opportunity of its 2018 Pacific Leaders Meeting (PALM) merely to inform leaders about the agenda. There was no consultation regardless.
Australia could have taken the opportunity to consult its fellow PIF members when it launched AUKUS, an Indo-Pacific appendage in 2021. Obviously, this was too much to hope for.
Goldstein’s appraisal of the U.S. strategy as anodyne is interesting. It may have been intended. The strategy is essentially for the U.S. alone: not for the whole Indo-Pacific membership. It raises the question whether we should expect subsequent national strategies from each of the other members. Time will tell.
On the other hand, was it a misprint? The country-specific formulation of the strategy’s title is clear. As such, its anodyne slant may have been aimed for wider acceptance by the membership through its blandness. In international diplomacy, it is often politic to err on nebulousness rather than on precision.
The strategy is preceded by ‘The Indo-Pacific’s Promise.’ Its rationale is clear when you delve into the text which states: “This intensifying American focus is due in part to the fact that the Indo-Pacific faces mounting challenges, particularly from the PRC.” It is obvious then to anyone that global geopolitical considerations are the principal driver of this initiative. As such, its precious humanistic elements can easily be lost, or downplayed, in the turmoil of contradictions that often accompany the execution of these considerations.
The strategy itself has five elements/sections. The first is: ‘Advance a free and open Indo-Pacific.’ I can recall when ‘Free and open Indo-Pacific’ was an indelible feature of Japanese extra-regionalism and multilateralism in the mid to late 2010s. This current version, of course, is a replica of the Japanese model. The strategy, whilst allowing governments to ‘make their own sovereign choices, consistent with their obligations under international law,’ will however respond harshly and retributively to any Pacific Island Countries, for instance, that applies its sovereign rights to establish bilateralism and or partnership with PRC. Where is the sovereignty, one may ask?
The second element of the strategy is ‘Build connections within and beyond the region’. It provides for: ‘the alliances, organisations, and rules that the United States and our partners have helped to build must be adapted; where needed, we must update them together.’ The plea by the U.S. for togetherness under its own Strategy is anticipated. As stated above, such togetherness in terms of the Indo-Pacific membership, but not parties to the strategy, is abetted by the anodyne nature of the various aspects of the strategy.
This only goes to show that PICs are essentially marginal in any discussions relating to Indo-Pacific. PICs’ takeaway from all this is that they will continue to be treated as pawns in global geopolitical discussions, under existing political alignments and partnerships. This opens up the prospects of new and political alignments and partnerships, not only at the national levels but also at the subregional, regional and extra-regional levels.
‘Drive Indo-Pacific Prosperity’ is the third element of the strategy. This section is effusive as regards its plan for close economic integration, increased foreign direct investment and the US as an investment partner, broad-based economic growth under its Indo-Pacific economic framework, rapid technological transformation, new approaches to trade and closing infrastructural gaps.
All very nice. However, in reading the text, one gets the idea that all these are being focused ‘on both sides of the Pacific.’ The reference in quotes in the previous sentence actually gets two mentions in the text. The large expanse of the Pacific that constitutes the area’s centrality does not draw any mention at all.
Having said that, and to be fair, the Pacific Islands did get a mention under the Strategy’s 10-point ‘Indo-Pacific Action Plan’. It features as the eighth element of the plan, and it factors in: ‘Partner to Build Resilience in the Pacific Islands.’
The fourth element of the Strategy is: ‘Bolster Indo-Pacific Security’. Under Indo-Pacific, security is essentially military threats. This is totally opposed to the security conceptualisation of PIF which sees security as all forms of threat; and the most existential of which is climate change. This is highlighted under PIF’s Boe Declaration.
So you can imagine the antipolarity of the two positions held by the US vis-à-vis the PICs. In such a situation, any cooperative effort to formulate solutions is destined to fail.
The other interesting point under this section is the implied consistency of the U.S.’ One China policy as against its Taiwan Relations Act. Ordinarily, this seems an irreconcilable contradiction. All global activities that are polarising the world currently will only tend to lend this contradiction irreconcilability. That spells global disquiet.
The Strategy’s fifth and final section is: ‘Build regional resilience to 21st century transnational threats.’ This section focuses on climate change. The big question here is what will the U.S. do, if anything, to get Australia to toe the line as regards compliance of the Boe Declaration and its existential threat of climate change?
The prospect of any bilateral initiative to get Australia on-line with the Declaration is nil. There are no positive signs on the horizon. The signs, one sees, however, are all discouraging. The U.S., for example, is party to AUKUS, the newly established appendage to Indo-Pacific, bringing UK into the group. This move to sanction AUKUS and its activities is directly in defiance of the positions of PIF as regards all nuclear activities, as per the provisions of the Treaty of Rarotonga 1985.
This only goes to show that PICs are essentially marginal in any discussions relating to Indo-Pacific. Pacific Islands Forum countries’ takeaway from all this is that they will continue to be treated as pawns in global geopolitical discussions, under existing political alignments and partnerships. This opens up the prospects of new and political alignments and partnerships, not only at the national levels but also at the subregional, regional and extra-regional levels.
The author is a former Fijian Ambassador and Foreign Minister and runs his own consultancy company in Suva, Fiji.
