Trump’s victory casts pall of uncertainty over Asia Middle powers weigh American unpredictability

BEIJING: President-elect Donald Trump’s vague and ambiguous foreign policy positions have cast a pall of uncertainty over whether American influence will decline in Asia, or if it will remain a force to be reckoned with, analysts say. The real estate tycoon-turned-politician frequently savaged China on the campaign trail, even calling it America’s “enemy” and pledging to stand up to a country he says views the US as a pushover. But he has also indicated he is not interested in getting involved in far-off squabbles, saying America is sick of paying to defend allies like Japan and South Korea, even suggesting they should develop their own nuclear weapons.

“Trump could play the isolationist card and strike a deal with China to share regional influence,” said Ashley Townshend of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. “But he might equally decide to adopt a firm military stance on a country he thinks regards America as weak.” Trump has offered no clear prescriptions for the geopolitical issues that plague the relationship between Washington and Beijing, from Beijing’s territorial claims in the South China Sea to North Korea’s nuclear program and the future of Taiwan. “At this juncture, governments around the world cannot depend on any particular set of US policies, since Trump’s sometimes flip foreign policy statements were often contradictory,” said Graham Webster, a US-China expert at Yale Law School.

Isolationist US?

In recent months, despite President Barack Obama’s foreign policy “pivot” to Asia the US has seen some of its regional allies begin to drift into Beijing’s sphere of influence-attracted by the economic appeal of the neighborhood’s biggest player. Newly elected Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte cosied up to China during a trip to the country last month, and has threatened to sever military relations with Washington. Malaysia, too, has seemingly begun to eye improving relations with the world’s secondlargest economy.

The prospect of an isolationist US under President Trump could quicken that trickle as the developing countries of Southeast Asia see Beijing-with its fiscal largesse and huge consumer base - as a better bet than a protectionist US. Meanwhile, Trump’s assertions that he will require Japan and South Korea to pay more for US defense assistance has led those countries, too, to worry about how the new presidency may reshape long-established relationships, said Rory Medcalf, head of the national security college at the Australian National University.