By:-Michael Auslin
THE President should bring together leading liberal nations in the region.
PRESIDENT Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron are in Asia this week, dragging large business delegations on visits to India and China, respectively.
They will meet in Seoul at the G20, after which Obama will continue on to Japan for the APEC annual meeting.
He is visiting Asia for the first time since Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reasserted US maritime interests at the ASEAN regional forum in Hanoi last July.
Such are the contours of the new world order: jobs, politics and security, all increasingly coalescing in the Asia-Pacific region.
Washington is touting a new strategic partnership with India, and reaching out to an Indonesia that hopes to become a more influential player in the region. And behind all this political and economic engagement, America is quietly trying to shore up its security position in the region, with Defence Secretary Robert Gates negotiating more access for US military forces in Australia.
Yet with only two years remaining in his term, Obama is quickly losing the chance to put his own imprint on America’s relations with the most important region in the world.
Coming into office with a strong desire to elevate the Sino-American relationship, he has struggled with Chinese assertiveness on the sea, political bullying (most recently over the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Liu Xiaobo), and economic tension over the devalued nature of the yuan. Perhaps symbolically, Obama is visiting only democracies this trip, from Asia-Pacific’s largest and oldest, to its most vibrant and one of its newest.
What is missing from Obama’s trip is the big picture of both Asia’s future and America’s role in it. Unlike George W. Bush, who strongly pushed a freedom agenda early on in his administration, Obama has never offered a compelling vision for dealing with the region.
Worse still, relations with countries other than China have been rocky as well. Japan and the US are just recovering from a damaging row over relocating US military bases in the country. India has been peeved by the lack of attention paid to it in comparison with the Bush years. Australia has had the President cancel three visits, with no trip currently scheduled.
The only major nation that has seen a clear improvement in its relations with Washington has been South Korea, where President Lee Myung-bak has eagerly embraced a larger global role, signified by his hosting of the G20 this week.
It isn’t clear whether these troubles and the lack of clarity on the part of America’s leader have emboldened the Chinese. Whatever the reason, nations large and small throughout the region are keenly feeling the weight of China’s growing military and economic clout. Most worrying to China watchers has been the crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Japan’s arrest of a Chinese fishing boat captain in September.
Even in Britain, officials I spoke with were closely watching China’s actions, trying to work out what lessons they held. They were just as eager to get more insight into Washington’s policy towards China.
London’s overriding interest is in growing its trade with China, hence Cameron’s visit. Yet the British feel they have no security role to play in Asia, leaving the maintenance of stability to America.
But the British also recognise that closer trade ties may well leave them open to the type of economic bullying Japan is undergoing. They have also watched Japan turn to its only ally for support in the dispute with China, underscoring that only America’s continuing presence in Asia gives confidence that problems will be solved peacefully.
That brings us back to America’s Asia policy. Obama’s 10-day trip is an uneven amalgam of bilateral outreach and multilateral participation. In neither case is he driving events or providing the type of leadership that many Asians say they expect from the US.
While the President talked about free trade in India and democracy in Indonesia, his words are disconnected from a concrete policy of actively helping to create a more liberal Asia. And in multilateral settings, the agenda is so watered down that no realistic action plan for enhancing trade or promoting economic recovery is likely to emerge.
Moreover, what is most on the minds of many in Asia – security and concern over Chinese assertiveness – was all but absent from discussions. This is particularly true for Japan, whose officials express private disappointment that Obama will focus on APEC, and not extend his visit to talk about other issues.
While ably staffed on Asian issues, Obama needs to draw together the pieces of his policy. What is it that links jobs and security? It is a reaffirmation of the liberal values expressed through free trade, civil society and commonly accepted norms of behaviour.
This is highlighted by the constant presence of US forces in the region.
But it is not enough simply to hold the line or to sermonise about freedom’s importance.
The President should bring together leading liberal Asian nations including India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia and Australia to craft principles of regional behaviour, explicitly condemn actions that go against the grain of co-operation, and co-ordinate an approach to strengthening civil society.
He should also augment US forces in the region, placing more submarines, surface ships and aircraft in allied bases, thereby sending a clear signal of resolve to China and to other nations that seek to reorder patterns of regional behaviour.
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