On Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced a new partnership between the United States, Australia, and Japan to provide $113 million in economic development initiatives, including technology, energy, and infrastructure in the Indo-Pacific.
In a statement, Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corp and the Japanese Bank for International Cooperation said that “the United States, Japan and Australia have formed a trilateral partnership to mobilize investment in projects that drive economic growth and foster a free, open, inclusive and prosperous Indo-Pacific.”
Although an Australian minister said that the aim of the initiative was not to rival China’s “One Belt One Road” initiative, Pompeo’s comments hinted that the plan was to offer an alternative to Beijing development money which has often been criticized as coercive and predatory.
In his remarks, the secretary of state implicitly targeted China’s attempts to assert dominance in the region saying that the U.S. “will never seek domination in the Indo-Pacific” and adding “we will oppose any country that does.”
Even if the U.S. would like to champion the partnership as an alternative to China, Australia is correct that the initiative is not a rival to Beijing. This is not because of competing goals, however, but because $100 million is not enough to compete with the billions of dollars that Beijing has poured into the region.
This funding through the “Belt and Road” initiative is part of Xi Jinping’s goal for China, “the Chinese Dream of the Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation.” What that goal means, in part, is that China emerges as a world power, with a strong military and, as Xi said at the Nineteenth Party Congress, a country that “is resolved to never give up its own legitimate rights and interests.”
That broad and assertive goal is backed up by China’s aggressive push into to new regions, ongoing military exercises in the region and economic pressure on Taiwan and its allies, which Beijing views as being out of line.
In large part, the U.S. has failed to push back against Beijing. The Trump administration has pulled back on U.S. interests abroad, attacked international organizations like WTO, NAFTA, and NATO and withdrawn from U.N. agreements. Trump also made a point of withdrawing the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership which would have given Washington more leverage in the region.
Likewise, despite strong words from the White House about airlines dropping references to Taiwan, major airlines ceded to pressure from Beijing as Washington backed down.
A partnership that provides resources for much-needed projects in the region is surely a step in the right direction. But the U.S. needs to further back up its commitment to keeping the Indo-Pacific free and open by committing to partnerships, free trade, strengthening ties with allies and making it clear that it will not stand for bullying by Beijing.
