US strategy must include development not just defence, Senate panel told
Washington’s strategy for the Indo-Pacific is heavily focused on defence and lacks a robust economic agenda for regional development, an influential US Senate panel heard on Wednesday.
The US should present “alternatives to what our competitors are offering”, said Ben Cardin, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, referring to partnerships China has forged with countries in the region.
A commitment to promoting better infrastructure and investment in the Indo-Pacific was necessary to remind US partners that “America’s leadership in the world has never been more important”, Cardin added.
Harry Harris, a former ambassador to South Korea, echoed the call, arguing that the US was missing “great opportunities”. The US put “adequate emphasis” on diplomatic, military and economic components, he testified, but he was not convinced “we’re advocating all the time for the right things in those three buckets”.
Harris, who previously served as commander of the US IndoPacific Command, said this perception fuelled his advocacy for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement championed by former US president Barack Obama and rejected by his successor, Donald Trump.
“I did it because of the security relationship between the TPP countries that I felt would have been strengthened,” he said. “We lost that opportunity.”
Harris further testified that Washington should consider joining the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos), a treaty signed by 168 countries and the European Union regulating maritime matters like exclusive economic zones and the principles of naturalresource exploration.
For decades, the US has resisted joining Unclos, largely owing to conservative members of Congress opposing the environmental and legal obligations it stipulates for ratification.
“If you look at the nations that are not signatories, it starts to resemble an axis of stupidity because we’re not signatories to this thing that China, Russia and others are signatories to,” Harris said. “And they are taking economic advantage from all these things. That is, in my opinion, shooting ourselves in the foot.”
The hearing took place as the Biden administration strives to boost defence engagement with partners in the Indo-Pacific.
On April 7, US troops carried out a major military exercise in the South China Sea with allies Japan, Australia and the Philippines. The drills were aimed at showing “our collective commitment to strengthening regional and international cooperation in support of a free and open Indo-Pacific”, according to a joint statement from the countries.
Walter Russell Mead of the Hudson Institute, a US think tank, said that while military engagement was essential, “the best way to ensure the long-term stability of a free and open Indo-Pacific without Americans going to war is to encourage and support the economic growth of countries” in the region. “As these countries are more dynamic, powerful and wealthy, even in Beijing they’ll understand that their dream of dominating the Indo-Pacific is simply not realistic,” he said.
“The United States needs to be absolutely clear about our commitment to the region on a multidimensional basis – military, economic, cultural – and in every possible way to deepen our links.”