By Dr Jitendra Uttam
A recently concluded historic summit meeting between the US, Japan, and South Korea at Camp David signals a distinct resolve to face the growing unpredictability in the international system. Underscoring the importance of the changing world politics, first-time leaders of the United States, South Korea and Japan gathered for a standalone trilateral summit and not on the sidelines of multilateral fora like in the past. The meeting of the Cold War era trilateral alliance partners symbolises a profound hardening of attitudes in the Pacific. Though for different reasons, all three alliance members see a compelling context to embrace much deeper strategic engagement.
The US is not only worried about the rising power of China, which is seemingly in direct contest to the established hegemonic order but a parallel concern that the Global South is increasingly wary of the US-led world order. The US credibility was seriously dented due to its role in causing unprecedented turmoil in the Arab world and unleashing unpredictability in the global financial system. For Japan, the Camp David agreement marks another significant milestone in its carefully charted journey away from postwar pacifism towards becoming a full-fledged, fully armed member of the Western democratic alliance. For South Korea, the trilateral pact reminds of a moment when it finally moved on from the bitter feud with Japan over its harsh colonization of the peninsula in the 20th century. Overall, the summit has tried to put together a dynamic policy to institutionalize a trilateral mechanism to better coordinate strategic commitments and work to create newer areas of converging interests.
A joint statement affirmed their collective resolve to immediately consult and coordinate responses to regional challenges, provocations and threats affecting their common strategic interests. The statement also called for peace and stability in Taiwan and condemned what it called China’s ‘dangerous and aggressive actions’ in the South China Sea. The two key documents released from the summit: the “Camp David Principles” and the “Spirit of Camp David,” outlined the scope of future cooperation ranging from holding regular trilateral meetings at various levels involving leaders, foreign and trade ministers, and defence chiefs. Focusing on enhancing economic security, the three countries affirmed to work closely by launching ‘early warning system pilots’ to enable swift information sharing to avert disruptions in global supply chains. The underlying sentiment that the joint statement hints at is the US determination to give practical shape to a vigorous policy aimed at designing ‘containment of China’.
Though at present it seems that leaders in Camp David have limited their pronouncement to promote trilateral cooperation, not building the basis for a long-haul great power contest. However, it’s common knowledge that US efforts in the meeting were aimed at containing increasingly assertive and economically challenging China. Underlining the true intent of the summit, Beijing has warned of the repercussions of turning the Asia-Pacific region into a geopolitical rivalry. Commenting on the trilateral summit at Camp David, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that ‘trying to mobilize circles and create military blocs will certainly arouse the vigilance and opposition of the countries of the region’. Taking a highly antagonistic posturing, Chinese state media described Camp David as the launch of a ‘mini-NATO’ that will threaten regional security and exacerbate tensions. Chinese news agency Xinhua Commented, ‘The United States must abandon its military motivations in the Asia-Pacific area. As for Japan and South Korea, both should refrain from being lackeys of U.S. hegemony, lest they find themselves at loggerheads with most regional nations.’
Analysts believe that the US-Japan-South Korea cooperation, together with the QUAD involving the U.S., India, Japan, and Australia, the US-Australia-Japan trilateral, and AUKUS consisting of Australia, the UK, and the US – all part of a grand US strategy to uphold the ‘rules-based liberal order’ in the Indo-Pacific. A shift from an economically inclined ‘Asia-Pacific’ guided by organizations like APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation) to a geo-politically leaning ‘Indo-Pacific’ concept reminds us that political fault lines cannot be bridged only by conversing economic interests. This paradigm shift from converging geo-economics to diverging geo-political interests has roots in the West’s own historical experience of dealing with the rising power of Germany contesting the established Anglo-French hegemony. The US policy planners have always been persuaded and guided by Western experience fraught with two World Wars. Thus, Western countries see the future of Asia only as conflict-ridden, not upholding prospects for any meaningful cooperation.
Anticipating contest and conflict as a given reality, the dominant ‘realist’ reading of international relations sees ‘balance of power’ as a time-tested solution. This policy recipe was applied successfully to combat the first Cold War between the US and the USSR. A new round of East-West bipolarity would once again compel others to align either with the US or China. This realistic policy package will not only help the US to operationalize the policy of ‘containment’ to China, but it shows the promise to undercut or tame the resurgent Global South increasingly wary of the so-called ‘rule-based liberal order’. Considering the intended and unintended ramifications of the Camp David gathering, a consensus among the strategic thinkers seems to be emerging that a re-run of the Cold War is in offing. It appears that to effectively manage twin contests to the US power, a time-tested old formula based on trilateral alliances has once again come to the fore. A new strategic imagination in the form of ‘Indo-Pacific’ is a political posturing but small and highly focused trilateral arrangements can deliver better in terms of quick military responses with high precision.
Taking clues from the earlier era impact of Cold War conditions, many scholars are concerned that a new round of great power rivalry would impose an artificially created bipolar contest that would not allow the Global South to sort out its most pressing issues like poverty, inequality, unemployment, malnutrition, etc. Rather, interests and contests of great powers may not leave any space for other issues concerning the well-being of the wider Global South to take centre stage. At the very least, great power rivalry pushes ‘economics at the backburner’ and facilitates ‘politics to take command’. This paradigm shift from ‘economics to politics’ has the potential to damage the key interests of developing economies.
How does the outcome of the Camp David summit possibly impact India’s foreign policy priorities? Interpreting the implications of the summit, one can see underlying strategic preparation guided by realistic assumptions that the ‘power transition’ from West to East or from the US to China cannot be peaceful. With India inching closer to non-aligned era neutrality to strike a balance between the US and Russian positions in Ukraine, QUAD has already lost its initial lustre. At this juncture of unpredictability, the US has more compelling reasons to move back its time-tested trilateral strategic arrangements. Additionally, India’s infatuation with the Global South has alarmed many realist thinkers that East-West superpower bipolarity may be contested once again by India – a country that was the founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) back in 1961. Indian worldview traditionally sees superpower-led East-West bipolarity as an artificial arrangement aimed at the continuation of colonialism in other means. India firmly believes that in this great game of superpowers, the political-economic interests of the Global South can be easily sacrificed.
Indian policy planners fear that in any re-run of the Cold War, the anti-China posturing of the US and its allies will leave no options for China but to become much more aggressive. Given the history of the disputed border with China in the long Himalayan mountainous region, a real possibility of conflict can become much more pronounced. Thus, what has happened in Camp David has broader global significance impacting not only China or the US and its allies but the entire Global South, specifically India which has emerged as a bridge between the two opposing poles.
Carried away from the possibility of dangerous conflicts and contests, specifically Russia’s ‘special military action’ in Ukraine, many Asian countries are getting nervous. Adding to this worry, US-NATO reluctance to militarily confront Russia’s actions in Ukraine is making Asian allies look for a much more militarily engaged US to safeguard their vital interests in the face of any Chinese or North Korean aggression. Not only Asian allies but the US itself is consumed with the growing threat from the combined Sino-Russian power play aimed at increasing the cost of US military presence in this part of the world. Looking back to its own actions when European powers were forced to move out of the Americas, the US sees a real possibility that China & Russia may try to repeat the same to push American forces out of Asia. Adding to this worry, sentiments among the local population against the presence of US troops have always been there but in consolidating democratic values, public opinion could play a significant role.
Certainly, new challenges emerging in this part of the world cannot be meaningfully handled by an earlier era ‘hub & spokes’ model based on the bilateral treaties binding allies like Japan in 1951 and Korea in 1953 to form a trilateral military alliance. The looming spectre of simultaneous war at the Western and Eastern fronts has compelled the US to realistically plan a NATO-like military alliance in Asia. This type of multilateral strategic arrangement will be met by counter-assertions and aggressive pronouncements, leading to a Cold War-like situation. The Camp David Summit seems to be an initial response to the looming Cold War era great power rivalry.
The author is Associate Professor, Centre for East Asian Studies, School of International Studies, JNU, New Delhi.
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