Indo-Pacífico

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (left), NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg (second from left), and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida (right) arrive for a meeting with NATO's Indo-Pacific partners during the NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 12. Jacques Witt/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

The recent NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, was watched closely for the outcome of Sweden’s bid for membership—Turkey agreed on the eve of the summit to ask its parliament to approve Sweden’s membership—and the alliance’s response to Ukraine’s formal application to join—NATO maintained that Ukraine would become a member “when allies agree and conditions are met” without setting out a time frame for the country’s entry after the war. In Asia, another aspect of the meeting was scrutinized: how NATO positioned itself on China.

There were three developments ahead of and in Vilnius on this front. First, as with the NATO summit held in Madrid in 2022, NATO extended invitations to four Indo-Pacific countries: Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea.…  Seguir leyendo »

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, U.S. President Joe Biden, and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaking in San Diego, California, March 2023. Leah Millis / Reuters.

At the end of July, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin traveled to Brisbane, Australia, for a series of high-level meetings with top Australian officials. It was the latest indication of the stepped-up security cooperation that has emerged since the 2021 signing of AUKUS, the tripartite defense collaboration among Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

This spring, U.S. President Joe Biden met with his Australian and British counterparts, Anthony Albanese and Rishi Sunak to announce the way forward for AUKUS. At a U.S. naval base at the edge of the Pacific Ocean with the USS Missouri, an attack-class submarine looming behind them, the three leaders detailed how they would work together to help Australia acquire, build, and maintain conventionally armed nuclear-powered submarines—a centerpiece of the AUKUS deal.…  Seguir leyendo »

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak hold a press conference after a meeting Monday in San Diego, California. (Leon Neal/Getty Images)

Monday’s announcement of the AUKUS partnership is a “present at the creation” moment for U.S. strategy in the Indo-Pacific. But despite China’s fears, the agreement isn’t a NATO-style containment pact. It’s the hub of something more flexible and adaptive.

President Biden didn’t discuss China’s growing military power, the obvious motivation for AUKUS, in announcing the pact Monday in San Diego. He was flanked by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, with an immense submarine, the USS Missouri, in the background. “This first project is only beginning. More partnerships. More potential. More peace and security in the region lies ahead”, Biden said.…  Seguir leyendo »

Chinese and Russian ships conducting joint naval drills off the coast of Guangdong Province, China, September 2016. Reuters

In December 2022, Japan released its first national security strategy in nearly ten years. The document committed Tokyo to strengthening the U.S.-Japanese alliance “in all areas”. And Japan is not alone. Over the last half decade, almost all U.S. allies across the Indo-Pacific have deepened their partnerships with Washington and formed new networks with one another.

At first blush, this might seem puzzling. Chinese President Xi Jinping has voiced his desire for the United States to withdraw from the Indo-Pacific, and his government has upheld China’s long tradition of expressing hostility toward Washington’s alliances, which form the foundation of the U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

U.S. President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Tokyo, May 2022. Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

Many foreign-policy analysts regarded former U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2017 decision to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—a trade pact between 12 Pacific Rim economies and the United States—as a blunder of historic proportions. The deal, which would have lowered tariff barriers between countries that collectively account for roughly 40 percent of global GDP, would have expanded the United States’ economic reach and security alliances and represented an opportunity for Washington to counter Beijing’s primacy in the Indo-Pacific.

In 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden negotiated what could be seen as the equivalent of a do-over of the TPP: the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF), which would unite 13 countries in the region and the United States.…  Seguir leyendo »

La OTAN y China, ¿cita en el Pacífico?

El mundo visto desde el prisma de las potencias occidentales no muestra la misma representación gráfica que visto desde Asia. El eje central que marca el Atlántico para la visión occidental cambia en el caso de los países asiáticos, sustituyéndose por la proyección que configura el Pacífico o, desde un prisma más amplio, el Indo-Pacífico. Un cambio de perspectiva que la OTAN ya comienza a compartir, convirtiéndose en el mayor desafío planteado hasta el momento.

En el nuevo esquema de análisis geoestratégico, los treinta aliados que integran la Alianza Atlántica han acordado incorporar por primera vez la referencia a China en el recién adoptado Concepto Estratégico.…  Seguir leyendo »

U.S. President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi attend a meeting of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity at the Izumi Garden Gallery in Tokyo on May 23. SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

The Biden administration’s recently announced Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF), which aims to strengthen cooperation between the United States and multiple Asian nations on economic, trade, and technology issues, has elicited a fairly consistent response both domestically and internationally: Nice job, but try again. IPEF is a trade partnership, not a formal trade agreement, and foreign nations say what they really want is access to U.S. markets that the latter would have guaranteed. Many in the U.S. trade policy community agree, arguing that IPEF is a well-meaning but largely hollow effort.

Both are wrong. The United States can no longer afford to trade U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

The last time most Americans paid attention to the Solomon Islands was in the middle of World War II, when the United States and Japan waged a prolonged naval battle in the waters and skies surrounding Guadalcanal. That grinding fight had outsized strategic effects—halting the Japanese advance into the South Pacific, ensuring that allied nations such as Australia and New Zealand were neither surrounded nor cut off from supply by hostile forces, reversing the war’s momentum in the Pacific, and providing a base to launch a counteroffensive against a totalitarian enemy. Pointing to the hundreds of small islands spread across the Pacific, U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

La región Indo-Pacífico concentra algunas de las más importantes potencias innovadoras en manufacturas tecnológicas, además de albergar una rica base de reservas de minerales estratégicos. La disrupción de alguna de estas piezas clave de la geopolítica de la tecnología podría suponer para las potencias tecnológicas retrocesos nada deseados en la carrera por el liderazgo global. El Indo-Pacífico acapara el interés económico mundial a la vez que se acentúa el juego de poder geopolítico entre las potencias con intereses en la región.

El impacto de la invasión rusa de Ucrania sobre la geopolítica global ha venido centrando los asuntos de seguridad y defensa sobre territorio europeo.…  Seguir leyendo »

Como buenos herederos de la cultura grecolatina que hoy, aun decadente, todavía impregna gran parte del pensamiento global, en Occidente nos suponemos el centro del universo. Sumamente lógico en lo histórico, mas sumamente erróneo en la actualidad.

El mundo gira inexorable. Y en los últimos tiempos ha variado su eje de interés y de toma de decisiones a las lejanas aguas del Índico y el Pacífico. Ni siquiera cambia esta realidad la cruenta guerra de Ucrania. Prefacio, quizás, de enfrentamientos futuros mucho más terribles.

Con China como gran behemot de la región y aspirante al título de peso pesado mundial que todavía ostentan los Estados Unidos de América, los movimientos geopolíticos se suceden a una velocidad casi frenética.…  Seguir leyendo »

UK prime minister Boris Johnson (L) with French president Emmanuel Macron ahead of the 2022 G7 summit in Brussels. Photo by THOMAS COEX/AFP via Getty Images.

The war in Ukraine has dramatically refocused attention on Euro-Atlantic security. As European nations – alongside the US – have imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia and increased military support to Ukraine, this war will further complicate the already limited ability of Europeans to play a meaningful security role elsewhere.

It could be tempting to conclude that the renewed threat from Russia spells the end of Europe’s embryonic involvement in the Indo-Pacific. For example, the UK’s Integrated Review in 2021 had identified Euro-Atlantic security and Russia itself as the priority for London – and the outbreak of war in Europe seems only to further confirm this.…  Seguir leyendo »

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken discusses the Biden administration's Indo-Pacific strategy at the Universitas Indonesia in Jakarta. Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/POOL/AFP via Getty Images.

Coming almost one year after the UK government’s Integrated Review which introduced a ‘tilt’ to the Indo-Pacific, it is worth taking a critical look at the content and process behind the corresponding policy from Washington, alongside how the US Indo-Pacific strategy (IPS) may be received in the Indo-Pacific region.

In February 2022, President Joe Biden’s administration released its own IPS following those of predecessors Barack Obama and Donald Trump. This new IPS projects a narrative of American support to the Indo-Pacific in various areas, but particularly as part of a collective response to a growing and malign influence of China, which is said to be transforming beneficial rules and norms and pursuing a sphere of influence in this region where its ‘coercion and aggression…is most acute’.…  Seguir leyendo »

F-35A survolant la Corée du Sud. 2014. — © Keystone

L’Asie-Pacifique se militarise à une vitesse foudroyante depuis plusieurs années, et la tendance s’accélère. Le Japon transforme actuellement deux porte-hélicoptères en porte-avions pouvant transporter des F-35B américains, et son nouveau premier ministre envisage de doubler le budget de la défense; la Corée du Sud prévoit de déployer son propre porte-avions en 2033 et a testé son premier missile mer-sol balistique stratégique, lancé d’un sous-marin, en septembre dernier; l’Australie a décidé mi-décembre de renouveler sa flotte d’hélicoptères et, quelques jours plus tard, signe un contrat d’armement de plus de 700 millions de dollars avec… la Corée du Sud.

Sans surprise, la Chine et la Corée du Nord sont pointées du doigt comme sources principales de cette militarisation régionale: Pékin continue de moderniser ses forces armées, entretient des conflits territoriaux avec une dizaine de pays, dont le Japon et la Corée du Sud, et étend son influence dans le Pacifique Ouest, aux portes de l’Australie; Pyongyang persiste dans le développement d’armes nucléaires et de missiles balistiques, menaçant Séoul et Tokyo.…  Seguir leyendo »

President Joko Widodo of Indonesia, left, and President Xi Jinping of China in 2017. Credit Kenzaburo Fukuhara/Getty Images

When President Biden met his Indonesian counterpart, Joko Widodo, last month in Glasgow, he praised Indonesia’s “essential” leadership in the Indo-Pacific and “strong commitment” to democratic values.

But the reality of American engagement with the world’s third-most-populous democracy has been more tepid than these warm words imply, belying Indonesia’s position as the leading Southeast Asian power and a vital balancing force in the geopolitical contest of our time between the United States and China.

The Biden administration has spent much of its first year in office shoring up support among allies and partners who share Washington’s concerns about Beijing but were bruised by four years of Donald Trump.…  Seguir leyendo »

Submarinos de la Armada china

Olvídense de Oriente Medio. Ya no le interesa a nadie. Por eso se producen huidas y abandonos tan vertiginosos como poco estéticos. Las imágenes de la entrega de Kabul no fueron un descuido, sino la constatación de que ya ha cambiado el eje sobre el que ahora pivota el mundo.

¿África? Obviamente no. ¿Europa y Occidente? Por favor, menos chistes.

Hay que irse más al este. Concretamente, a la zona del Indopacífico, vastísima región donde vive prácticamente la mitad de la población mundial y por la que transita el 30% del mercado global como parte del megaproyecto de la Nueva Ruta de la Seda.…  Seguir leyendo »

El acuerdo entre Estados Unidos, el Reino Unido y Australia (Aukus), ha generado multitud de reacciones, incluido el temor a una proliferación nuclear.

Desde China ha sido recibido como lo que es: un acuerdo para contener eficazmente a China en su crecientemente agresivo expansionismo, a través de la disuasión por la fuerza militar. Su reacción ha sido, pues, coherente y predecible. Y ha querido contrarrestar el movimiento presentando su candidatura al Acuerdo Transpacífico firmado por 11 países de las dos orillas del Pacífico, después de la retirada de Estados Unidos. La contraofensiva será, además de militar, económica y comercial. Conviene no olvidar que China, excepto Rusia, no tiene aliados importantes y necesita ganar complicidades.…  Seguir leyendo »

The immediate diplomatic crisis between the United States and France may have been declared over after a 30-minute phone call between Presidents Joe Biden and Emmanuel Macron Wednesday. But I'm far from convinced that the brief conversation, along with an anodyne press release, has resolved a host of differences on China -- one of the most substantive and profound issues between France and the US.

The saga erupted last week after Australia announced it would withdraw from a multi-billion dollar defense deal to acquire conventional submarines from France and work instead with the US and United Kingdom to obtain nuclear-powered ones.…  Seguir leyendo »

The HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier heading to the Indo-Pacific region. Photo by ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP via Getty Images.

The announcement of the AUKUS agreement between Australia, the UK and the US, which put an end to the Franco-Australian submarine contract that constituted one of the pillars of the French Indo-Pacific strategy, has created a legitimate anger in France and clearly dealt a serious blow to trust and cooperation between France and the UK in a relationship already strained by years of post-Brexit disputes. Some senior figures have called for a rethink of France’s approach to the region, and even to alliances more generally.

Even though Paris has downplayed the role played by the UK in the new pact, which it sees mostly as exploiting the situation to score a post-Brexit political win, it has postponed the scheduled meeting between the French and British defence ministers – a sign that the wider relationship between France and the UK cannot be insulated from AUKUS.…  Seguir leyendo »

Australian Defence Force, via Getty Images

Make no mistake. This is a crisis, not a spat.

The new partnership announced last week between the United States, Britain and Australia, in which Australia would be endowed with nuclear-powered submarines, has left the French angry and in shock. And not just because of the loss of their own deal, signed in 2016, to provide Australia with submarines.

French officials say they have been stonewalled and duped by close allies, who negotiated behind their backs. The sense of betrayal is so acute that President Emmanuel Macron has uncharacteristically opted to keep silent on the issue, delegating the expression of a very public rage to his otherwise quiet foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian.…  Seguir leyendo »

A ferry passes by the Royal Australian Navy's Collins-class submarine HMAS Waller as it leaves Sydney Harbour on May 4, 2020. (Reuters Photographer/Reuters)

Culture and tradition matter. The Anglosphere is a real grouping that comprises elements of trust going back decades and centuries. The agreement between the United States, Britain and Australia to build the latter nation eight nuclear-powered submarines effectively erects a core Anglo-Saxon military alliance fitted to a multicultural and globalized world. This is nothing less than the Atlantic Charter finally extended to the Pacific, eight decades later. Just as Britain has served since before World War II as a geopolitical platform for the United States close to mainland Europe, Australia, situated at the confluence of the Pacific and Indian oceans, will now do the same for the Indo-Pacific region close to mainland China.…  Seguir leyendo »