Access deal with Phl is centerpiece of Obama Asia trip

WAS INGTON S President Barack Obama is e pected to announce an agreement with the Philippines ne t Monday that would give S ships and planes the most e tensive access to bases there since the nited States relin uished its vast naval installation at Subic Bay in .

The deal, which will be the centerpiece of Obama’s long-postponed trip to Asia that starts Tuesday, is a modest step to reassert America’s military presence in Asia. But it could nonetheless antagonize China, which has stepped up its claims in both the South and East China Seas and is currently enmeshed in a standoff with the Philippines over a disputed clump of rocks known as Scarborough (Panatag) Shoal.

For Obama, it is the latest e ample of the deepening comple ities of his efforts to shore up the strategic shift to Asia he announced three years ago and has struggled to maintain because of political pressures at home and a cascade of crises elsewhere in the world.

At a moment when Asia appears more rattled by China’s behavior than it has in decades, America’s fractious allies uestion its repeated assurances that the nited States will be there for them. But the more Obama repeats his commitments, the more he plays into China’s narrative that his real motive is to contain its rise.

The premise of Obama’s strategy that American power must follow its economic interests in a region where a growing middle class yearns for everything from iPhones to the new Ford Mustang still makes sense, his advisers say. But they acknowledge that it faces acute challenges, which will demand a delicate balancing act.

“The countries in the region want the nited States to be present and to be a stabilizing force, but they also don’t want tension between the nited States and China, certainly not at a high pitch,” said Benjamin Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser.

Obama’s second- term focus on Iran, Syria and the Middle East peace process has left Asian officials to wonder whether Washington is really committed to a larger footprint in the region.

“If there’s real rebalancing, it is hard to find,” a Japanese official said recently.

Further complicating Obama’s challenge, Japan and South Korea, the economic engines that anchor America’s Pacific alliance, are barely talking to each other, as they rehash 70-year-old grievances. North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs are more active and, arguably, more successful, than ever.

The president will have to address all these issues in the ne t week, including the sensitivities in the Philippines to a renewed S military presence. Much like the 0 agreement to deploy Marines to Darwin, Australia, such a presence would theoretically give America more capacity to help its allies in territorial disputes with the Chinese.

There is little mystery to how the Chinese will likely respond to such an agreement. On a visit to Beijing this month, Defense Secretary Chuck agel listened as the Chinese defense minister, Gen. Chang Wan uan, said that China would “make no compromise, no concession, no treaty” in disputes with Japan.

“The Chinese military can assemble as soon as summoned, fight any battle and win,” the general added.

Much of that is most likely bluster the Chinese have shown no desire for direct confrontation. But administration officials and some outside e perts say the Chinese may be calculating that the nited States does not have the wherewithal to change its focus, particularly as it wrestles with new threats in Eastern Europe.

“If the S- Russia relationship goes downhill, the Chinese will get a much easier ride,” said Min in Pei, a prominent China scholar now at Claremont McKenna College. “The S cannot afford to be tough on both Russia and China at the same time.”

Obama has been forced to cancel two trips to the region because of battles with Congress (this week’s visit will make up for one postponed in October). Over time, that has e - acted a cost.

“In Asia it’s not just uality time, it’s uantity time,” said Christopher ill, a former assistant secretary of state for East Asia. “The president has been pulled in too many different directions, and I don’t think he’s developed the relationships that would show a ualitatively different S approach to the region.”

Stephen Bosworth, Obama’s coordinator for North Korea in his first term, agreed. The rebalancing concept, Bosworth argued, “was illconceived and bungled in its implementation.”

“What the announcement did was set up e pectations that we would have a hard time fulfilling,” he said. Within the administration, there is debate about how much bigger a presence in the region the nited States can afford. When Katrina McFarland, the assistant secretary of defense for ac uisition, said this year that because of budget pressures, “the pivot is being looked at again, because candidly, it can’t happen,” she had to retract the statement.