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World Policy Journal
Washington's Smothering Strategy: American Interests in East Asia
By Ted Galen Carpenter
East Asia is the one region in the world where the interests of four major powers (Russia, China, Japan, and the United States) intersect. America's interests in many parts of the world are largely discretionary; those in East Asia are much more intrinsic. Geographically, the United States is a Pacific (although not an East Asian) power; economically, America has a large and growing stake in East Asia; strategically, the region has been and remains relevant to America's security.
That is why it is crucial for the United States to have a wise and sustainable policy toward East Asia. Yet there are warning signals that all is not well with America's current policy and that the need for a new approach is becoming urgent.
Members of the U.S. political elite have an unfortunate habit of branding all proposals for meaningful foreign policy change as harbingers of isolationism a term they almost never define with clarity. But the issue is not one of engagement versus isolationism. Few knowledgeable people would dispute the point that the United States has important strategic and economic interests in East Asia, and even fewer would suggest the adoption of a Fortress America policy or the creation of a hermit republic. Recognizing that America has significant interests in the region, however, is not the end point of an assessment of U.S. policy; it is the starting point. One must then apply a rigorous cost-benefit analysis to U.S. policy. Only if the benefits outweigh the costs and risks and do so by a decisive margin does the policy merit support.
All too many analysts focus on the benefits of Washington's East Asia policy (the fostering of regional stability and prosperity, the dampening of incentives for arms races, and so on) while ignoring or minimizing the financial burdens and the risks incurred by being East Asia's policeman. 1 Former assistant secretary of defense Joseph Nye epitomized such myopia when he stated that Washington's security role was akin to providing life-sustaining oxygen to the regional environment. Atmospheric oxygen is largely a free good; security commitments are decidedly not.
In addition to determining whether the benefits clearly outweigh the costs and risks, a serious assessment of America's East Asia policy should ask two other questions: First, is the current policy sustainable, not just in the short term (that is, the next five years or so), but over the long term? Second, even if it is theoretically sustainable, is it the optimal method of advancing America's regional interests, or are there alternative policies that would provide substantially similar benefits at a lower level of cost and risk?
America's Strategic and Economic Interests in East Asia
There are three especially important American interests in East Asia. The first is to prevent any single power from dominating the region. The nations of East Asia have a large population, significant military forces, and an impressive (and growing) array of economic and technological capabilities. A regional hegemon able to control those vast assets could pose a serious threat to America's security and economic well-being.
The second important interest is that a reasonable degree of order and stability exist in the region. An East Asia habitually convulsed by armed conflicts would be a difficult and unpleasant neighbor for America. A reasonable degree of order, however, should not be confused with the need to micromanage the region's security affairs to ensure complete order. Some instability is inherent in the international system, and East Asia will not be immune from that reality. So long as national rivalries in the region are not excessively violent and disruptive, America's interests are relatively secure. The third important interest is economic. East Asia is now the most significant region for U.S. international commerce, having surpassed Western Europe earlier in this decade. Eleven of America's 24 largest trading partners are located in the region (Japan, 2nd; the People's Republic of China, excluding Hong Kong, 5th; the Republic of Korea, 7th; Taiwan, 8th; Singapore, 9th; Malaysia, 11th; Hong Kong, 13th; Thailand, 17th; Australia, 20th; the Philippines, 22nd; and Indonesia, 24th). 2 Many of those same entities also provide important arenas for American investment. Maintaining, indeed strengthening, that array of economic ties constitutes an interest that Washington cannot ignore.
America as East Asia's Hegemon
Since the end of the Second World War, the United States has sought to protect and advance all three of its major interests in East Asia. But it has not done so (as some policy experts have alleged) by guaranteeing a stable balance of power in the region. Instead, the United States has done so by arrogating the role of regional hegemon. Preserving that position has now become something bordering on an obsession.
A prominent justification for continuing the large-scale U.S. military presence in the region is to prevent a power vacuum that might be exploited by an expansionist state. That is hardly a new rationale for Washington's policy. Throughout the Cold War, U.S. forces guarded East Asia's security against Soviet (and for a time Soviet/Chinese) threats. The removal of Japan as a significant political and military factor (because of the destruction of Tokyo's military forces in the Second World War and Washington's insistence on a minimalist Japanese military capability in the postwar era) meant that the United States was the only credible strategic counterweight to the Soviet Union and its communist allies.
Despite the collapse of the Soviet Union, the rationale for a dominant U.S. military role in East Asia remains largely the same. The Pentagon's 1995 security strategy report for the East Asia-Pacific region, for example, contended that forward-deployed U.S. forces ensure a rapid and flexible worldwide crisis response capability, but it also stated that they are there to discourage the emergence of a regional hegemon.
Although U.S. officials are vague about what rival might aspire to that status, a passage in the report offered an enticing hint about the target of Washington's apprehension. If the United States does not provide the central, visible, stabilizing force in the Asia and Pacific region, the report cautioned, it is quite possible that another country might but not in a way that meets America's fundamental interests. 3
While it is conceivable that the comment referred to possible Chinese hegemonic ambitions, the reference to a stabilizing force points to a different interpretation. Given its territorial claims involving the Spratly, Paracel, and Diaoyu islands (not to mention its claims to Taiwan), China would more likely be a disruptive, revisionist power than a stabilizing, conservative power.
There is really only one credible candidate to supplant the United States as regional stabilizer: Japan; and that point is understood by U.S. policymakers. Washington continues, as it has since the end of the Second World War, to discourage Japan from playing an activist political-military role in East Asia. Even the outcome of the much-touted April 1996 summit between President Clinton and Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto was consistent with that long-standing policy. The joint declaration that emerged from the summit meeting indicated that U.S. officials had finally accepted the need to modestly increase Japan's involvement in the region's security affairs, but the revised blueprint still conceived of Tokyo as Washington's very junior partner. There is no indication that U.S. leaders want Japan to be an ally with a responsibility equal to America's for preserving stability in East Asia much less that they want Japan to assume the lead role. 4
That same attitude is reflected in the revisions to the defense guidelines for the U.S.-Japan alliance announced in September 1997. The principal change authorizes Japanese logistical support for U.S. military operations in areas surrounding Japan a phrase that is never defined that are relevant to Japan's own security. Until now, Japanese officials have argued that Article 9 of Japan's constitution precludes such involvement unless Japan itself is under attack.
Despite the hype on both sides of the Pacific, the reforms fall far short of establishing an equal security partnership between Japan and the United States. In the event of an East Asian conflict that does not involve an attack on Japanese territory, Japan will merely provide nonlethal logistical support for U.S. troops and allow U.S. forces to use facilities in Japan for their operations. (Even those changes are dependent on implementing nearly two dozen pieces of legislation that must be approved by a bitterly divided Diet.) There is no suggestion that Japanese Self-Defense Forces will participate in combat missions alongside their U.S. allies. American military personnel will still be expected to risk their lives to repel any act of aggression that threatens the security of East Asia while Japan merely provides such things as fuel, spare parts, medical supplies, and body bags for American casualties. The new defense guidelines do nothing to end Japan's status as an American military dependent; they merely allow Japan to be a slightly more active and helpful dependent.
Washington's policy toward Japan is just the most visible manifestation of overall U.S. East Asian policy. The heart of that policy is to prevent the rise of any political and military rival. In other words, it is a policy to preserve American hegemony. The objective of discouraging other powers from even aspiring to play more active political and military roles was perhaps most candidly expressed in the preliminary draft of the Pentagon's planning guidance document that was leaked to the press in 1992. 5 That document is not the only evidence of a hegemonic policy, however. Statements by various military and civilian officials over the years and the substantive features of Washington's East Asia policy since 1945 point to the same conclusion.
Washington's Smothering Strategy
U.S. officials have zealously guarded America's hegemonic prerogatives in an attempt to smother the political-military ambitions of other powers in East Asia. For example, when Japanese prime minister Toshiki Kaifu made a surprise proposal in summer 1991 for a security dialogue formal regional meetings on defense issues between Japan and the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Washington reacted negatively. In a speech to the annual meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers, Secretary of State James Baker III warned them against adopting new arrangements that would replace tried and true frameworks involving the United States. We have a remarkable degree of stability in this region, Baker said. We ought to be careful about changing those arrangements and discarding them for something else. Privately, U.S. officials expressed strong opposition to the Japanese proposal because it might weaken the bilateral arrangements between the United States and various nations in East Asia and the Pacific. 6 In other words, Tokyo's modest initiative was seen as a challenge to Washington's political and military primacy.
The Clinton administration has been less clumsy in implementing the smothering strategy. It has even cautiously encouraged the kind of regional security dialogue that its predecessor so tenaciously opposed. But the administration has also emphasized that the United States must be an active participant in such initiatives; there is no sympathy whatever for measures that the East Asian countries might pursue without U.S. input. Moreover, administration officials seize every opportunity to emphasize America's determination to maintain a large military presence in the region and to continue the role of stabilizer. The comments of Secretary of Defense William Cohen during his April 1997 trip to East Asia epitomized that approach.
Korean Power, American Interests
Another manifestation of Washington's smothering strategy is the ongoing military commitment to South Korea. When the mutual security treaty was approved in 1954, South Korea was a poverty-stricken country that had been devastated by more than three years of war. The population was demoralized, and the military (although somewhat stronger than it had been when North Korean troops invaded in June 1950) was still decidedly inferior to its communist adversary in training, equipment, and morale. Moreover, Seoul had to confront not only the hostility of North Korea but the knowledge that Chinese or Soviet forces might support Pyongyang's units in the event of war. The security treaty with the United States was a tangible guarantee that South Korea would not have to deal with such powerful enemies by itself. Given the geo-strategic realities in the mid-1950s and for many years thereafter, South Korea could not have provided for its own defense.
That is no longer true. South Korea has become one of the world's great economic successes, achieving a per capita GDP of more than $10,500 in 1995. That dynamism and rapid growth contrast sharply with North Korea's stagnation and have given the South an overwhelming economic advantage over its communist nemesis. South Korea's GDP in 1995 stood at more than $455 billion compared to the North's meager $22.3 billion. 7 In other words, South Korea has an economy more than 20 times as large as that of its enemy. It also has a decisive edge in population some 45.6 million versus 23.5 million.
In addition to such quantitative advantages, it enjoys important qualitative advantages. Technologically, South Korea's economy is light years ahead of North Korea's. South Korean firms compete successfully in global markets for a variety of products, including automobiles, computers, heavy machinery, and electronics. North Korea, meanwhile, teeters on the brink of famine.
Most defenders of the security treaty and the U.S. troop presence on the Korean peninsula now grudgingly concede that South Korea could build the conventional forces needed to defend itself against North Korean aggression. They increasingly cite another justification for Washington's status quo policy: that the U.S. military presence is an essential component of Washington's general policy of promoting stability in East Asia, preventing the reemergence of national rivalries and arms races that could once again plunge the region into conflict. Secretary of State Warren Christopher summarized the thinking of U.S. policymakers when he described the alliance with South Korea and the American troop deployment in that country as a linchpin of America's engagement in the region. 8 More recently, Secretary of Defense Cohen stated bluntly that U.S. troop levels in both Japan and South Korea would remain unchanged even if the Korean peninsula were peacefully reunified. 9
Why the Smothering Strategy Is Obsolete
Washington's post Second World War smothering strategy has been based on the assumption that if the United States took care of the security needs of East Asia, the various countries in the region would forgo the option of building large military establishments and acting as normal great powers (or even midsized powers) have acted throughout history to protect their own interests. The resulting environment of stability would not only reduce the chances of armed conflict but maximize the opportunities for economic growth something that would benefit the United States as well as East Asia.
That may have been a valid assumption during the first two or three decades after the Second World War, but several factors have been eroding the foundations of U.S. strategy since that time. Until the mid-1970s, the noncommunist East Asian powers (including Japan) did not have economies large enough to fund military establishments capable of supporting independent, self-reliant security policies even if their governments had been so inclined. (At least they could not have done so without endangering their newly vigorous economic growth rates a price none of them wished to pay.)
That factor has changed markedly in the last two decades. Japan is the world's second-largest economic power, and South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand have all emerged as serious players in the global economy. (The recent currency turmoil involving some of those economies will likely slow their extraordinarily rapid growth rates for a time, but the long-term prospects remain quite positive.) Several East Asian countries now have the economic wherewithal to fund credible national security forces, and although the growth in their military capabilities has thus far been modest, East Asia has become a lucrative arena for arms sales.
There are other subtle but significant indications that the East Asian states are beginning to hedge against the day when the United States might be unwilling or unable to maintain its position as the regional hegemon. Japan's decision to develop a robust intelligence apparatus instead of continuing to rely on information from U.S. agencies is one example. Tokyo's buildup of plutonium stocks, combined with its development of reprocessing facilities and a sophisticated rocketry program, may also be evidence of a hedging strategy. The willingness of Taiwan and South Korea to make major arms purchases from non-U.S. suppliers (for example, Taipei's purchase of Mirage fighters from France) and the development of more extensive domestic armaments industries are other signs.
The growth of economic power has been accompanied by more assertive behavior on territorial matters and other issues of national pride. Such jingoistic spats as those between Japan and South Korea over Toktu Island and the three-way quarrel involving Japan, Taiwan, and the People's Republic of China over the Senkaku (Diaoyu) islands are only the most visible and recent incidents.
A Waning Strategy
All of this suggests that America's ability to satisfy the security needs of the East Asian states through a smothering strategy is already waning and that the decline is likely to accelerate in the coming years. It was one thing for weak, poor, and insecure countries to accept the protection of a benign distant protector; the price may have involved the swallowing of national pride on occasion, but U.S. hegemony spared the regional powers from spending large sums on their own military establishments and enabled them instead to devote scarce resources to their developing economies. It is quite another matter for societies flush with prosperity to continue accepting such a humiliating dependency. Sooner or later their behavior will likely evolve until it conforms to the historical norm of nations that possess serious economic and military capabilities.
There is yet another visible weakness in Washington's smothering strategy. Because it developed during the early years of the Cold War, the danger that there would be serious quarrels between American allies seemed relatively remote. For example, despite the historical legacy of Japanese colonialism and the resulting antipathy of Koreans toward Japan, both Tokyo and Seoul recognized that they confronted the same communist adversary. Without the looming presence of that mutual threat to their security, they have far greater latitude to pursue other grievances including those against each other.
In addition to its confrontation with Japan over the Toktu issue, South Korea's decision to purchase submarines (which are hardly essential for dealing with the North Korean threat) and its vigorous cultivation of political as well as economic ties with China suggest that a confrontational relationship between South Korea and Japan is more than a remote possibility. Pacifying a region and maintaining a hegemonic position will be decidedly more challenging in a volatile environment with shifting agendas and relationships than it was in the bipolar Cold War setting.
A related point is that Washington could previously operate with confidence that its security clients would not have extensive economic ties with America's strategic adversaries. In other words, there would not be a tension between the economic interests of those allies and their security relationships with the United States. The situation is now more ambiguous. For example, a chilly relationship (to say nothing of an armed skirmish) between the United States and China would put the other East Asian countries in an extremely difficult position. Many of them have extensive investments in China and maintain lucrative bilateral trade relations with that country.
Could Washington count on support from its friends and allies in the region for a hard-line policy directed against Beijing, when such support might cost them their multibillion-dollar economic stakes? A positive answer is far from certain. Indeed, given the reaction of the East Asian powers to the brouhaha in the Taiwan Strait in early 1996, U.S. policymakers have reason to worry about the prospect of such support. A Japanese scholar's explanation for his country's unwillingness to publicly endorse the U.S. deployment of the Seventh Fleet to waters near Taiwan was most revealing. He did not cite the danger that a military collision between the United States and China might lead to Chinese attacks on Japanese territory because of the U.S. bases there. Rather, he emphasized concerns that an endorsement of American policy might jeopardize Japanese investments in China. 10 (The decision of Japan and Australia to defy U.S. wishes and oppose a U.N. Commission on Human Rights resolution condemning Beijing for its treatment of political dissidents is another, more recent, example of the ambivalence of America's East Asian allies when it comes to dealing with China.) Indeed, those countries might even use a deterioration in U.S.-Chinese relations to expand the market share of their companies at the expense of U.S. firms.
A final reason for the increasing inviability of the smothering strategy is that the United States now encounters a power whose security needs and policy objectives Washington is not in a position to satisfy. That power is China. The reemergence of Japan as a great power (at least economically) has posed problems for the smothering strategy. But Japan's security interests and those of the United States are at least reasonably compatible, and Japan is a status quo power. Tokyo has been the principal beneficiary of the existing political and economic system in East Asia. (Indeed, Japan has achieved by peaceful economic penetration and subtle political influence many of the objectives that it unsuccessfully pursued by force in the 1930s and 1940s when it sought to create the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere.) The Japanese have no incentive to disrupt the current arrangement; nor have they shown any desire to do so.
The situation with respect to China is different in crucial ways. Although Beijing's expanding economic ties with its East Asian neighbors (and with the United States) are an important incentive for status quo behavior, there are other factors that produce incentives for aggressive revisionism. Most important, China is still nursing grievances about the territorial amputations that occurred during its period of weakness in the nineteenth century. That is why the return of Hong Kong in the summer of 1997 acquired an importance that transcended the territory's (admittedly substantial) economic value. It was a powerful symbol of China's restored national pride. The scheduled return of Macao in 1999 is another stage in that process. But it is not at all certain that the process will be complete in the view of China's leaders and population until Taiwan is regained, the land taken by the Russian empire is recovered, and Beijing's claims in the South China and East China seas are vindicated.
Some experts argue that China does not harbor expansionist ambitions. 11 That is possible, but the existence of such an extensive array of unresolved matters points to a less sanguine conclusion. So too does the history of international relations. Rising great powers, especially those with territorial grievances and claims, typically pursue assertive, and often abrasive, policies. One need only recall the behavior of the United States during the nineteenth century or Wilhelmine Germany during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
That poses an enormous dilemma for the United States. It is difficult to see how Washington can appease China on any of the outstanding issues without causing massive dislocations to the other components of U.S. policy in East Asia. An attempt to appease China would rapidly undermine the smothering strategy, since the other East Asian powers would conclude that the United States was unwilling to protect or was incapable of protecting their vital interests. Yet an attempt to thwart Chinese ambitions would entail its own dangers. As China's economic and military power grew, Beijing would likely see a resistant America as an intolerable impediment to the achievement of legitimate Chinese goals. Again, history suggests that a rising great power sooner or later tries to become the dominant player in its region. Such a power does not generally get on well with the incumbent regional hegemon. The structure of the international system tends to produce bitter, and often violent, rivalries in such situations. For all of those reasons, the smothering strategy appears to be unsustainable. Indeed, even attempting to preserve it may pose serious dangers to America.
The Downside to Policing East Asia
America's dominant position in East Asia has contributed to the region's stability, but the policy also entails mounting costs and risks. The financial burden alone is substantial. It costs at least $35 billion to $40 billion a year to maintain the military forces needed to carry out America's security commitments in East Asia in a credible fashion. 12 Yet there is scant evidence that Washington's security commitments give the United States significant leverage in securing access to important East Asian markets. The difficulties encountered in attempting to open the Japanese market have been discussed at length, but the problem is not confined to Japan. Even South Korea, a much smaller client heavily dependent on its alliance with the United States and on the U.S. troop presence, has been surprisingly recalcitrant and exclusionary. The evidence is, at the very least, ambiguous on whether Washington's security policy in East Asia is effectively promoting its economic interests.
The tensions between China and Taiwan in late 1995 and early 1996 illustrated that the policy has an even more disturbing drawback in terms of risk. Although the most recent China-Taiwan crisis has receded, there is a serious possibility of similar imbroglios in the coming years. Not only could the United States find itself entangled in a perilous military confrontation, it might have to wage the ensuing struggle virtually alone. Taiwan would undoubtedly contribute to its own defense, but the reaction in various East Asian capitals to Beijing's menacing behavior indicated that assistance from Washington's other friends would be problematic, at best.
Indeed, virtually all of the East Asian governments made a concerted effort to distance their policies from that of the United States as the Clinton administration dispatched two aircraft carriers to the western Pacific to demonstrate concern about the rising tensions in the Taiwan Strait. South Korea and the Philippines both stressed that their mutual defense treaties with the United States did not cover contingencies in the Strait. Such countries as Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Australia contented themselves with the banal response of urging restraint on all sides, conspicuously declining to endorse Washington's moves. Indeed, they echoed Beijing's position that Taiwan is merely a renegade province. Even Japan, the principal U.S. ally in the region, merely expressed understanding of the naval deployment.
Seeking the Best of Both Worlds
That lack of support suggests that Washington's encouragement of dependency on the part of the noncommunist East Asian countries has created a most unhealthy situation. Those nations seek the best of both worlds: they want the United States to protect them from Chinese aggression or intimidation, if that problem should become acute, but they do not want to incur Beijing's wrath (or even jeopardize their commerce with China) by allying themselves with a hard-line U.S. policy. That may be a good, albeit cynical, strategy for them, but it puts the United States in a precarious position. If China does make a bid for regional hegemony at some point, there is literally no power other than the United States that is positioned to block that bid. That is a blueprint for a U.S.-Chinese war in which China's neighbors conveniently remain on the sidelines.
And it is not just the Taiwan issue toward which Washington's East Asian allies have displayed that attitude. For example, Tokyo rejected an American request at the height of the crisis over North Korea's nuclear program in 1994 to dispatch mine-sweepers to assist American naval forces should the confrontation with Pyongyang escalate. Again, the free riding of the East Asian states on security issues is not merely financial.
The smothering policy has outlived whatever usefulness it may once have had. Instead of creating a situation in which the only alternative to a dangerous power vacuum is America's continuing willingness to be point man in every East Asian crisis, the United States should move toward fostering a reasonably stable balance of power in East Asia. A new policy with that aim would view Japan as the primary strategic counterweight to an increasingly assertive China a role that the United States will otherwise be pressured to fill by default. America has important strategic and economic interests in East Asia and cannot be indifferent to the region's fate. But the current strategy, based on America's being the regional military hegemon, is proving increasingly difficult to sustain. (The closing of U.S. military bases in the Philippines and the growing friction between American military personnel and the Japanese and South Korean civilian populations are only the most visible symptoms of trouble.) More important, it is neither a necessary nor the best method of securing America's interests. The costs and risks of Washington's smothering strategy are beginning to far outweigh the benefits.
Most disquieting are the risks the United States continues to incur because of its role as the guarantor of East Asia's security and stability risks that would normally be borne primarily by Japan and other regional powers. Japan's reluctance to play even a supporting military role in regional crises is especially disturbing. Whatever the relevance of Korea, Taiwan, or the Spratlys to the economic and security interests of the United States, their importance to Japan is far greater.
It is highly unusual for a major power to choose to remain catatonic in the face of significant security problems in its own region. But Japanese leaders know that they do not have to incur the costs and risks of playing a more active role to protect their country's interests. The United States has obligingly agreed to incur them. Americans have every reason to ask, however, whether U.S. military personnel should be put in harm's way to deal with problems that are or at least ought to be much more important to Japan than they are to the United States. The prospect of American troops dying in an East Asian war, while the Japanese (and other nominal allies) merely provide moral and financial support (if that), is not very appealing. Yet that is the possibility that American security policy in East Asia has created.
Toward a Sustainable Strategy
Several steps need to be taken to establish a more sustainable policy. First, the United States should inform Japan and South Korea that it intends to withdraw its forces from both countries within the next few years, and that upon completion of the withdrawals it will terminate the mutual security treaties. At that point, both Japan and South Korea will be expected to provide for their own defense. Washington should implement its withdrawal strategy without rancor and state explicitly that the move is not motivated by traditional complaints about burden sharing or by the more recent trade disputes. Under no circumstances should Washington seek to use the security commitments as a bargaining chip. It would be ill-advised to imply that if sufficient concessions are forthcoming on trade matters, the United States will maintain the defense shield, and conversely, if concessions are not made, the shield will be withdrawn. That approach would be a blueprint for resentment, and the damage to America's relations with South Korea and Japan could be substantial and long-lasting.
Second, Washington should indicate to Tokyo that it no longer objects to Japan's assuming a more active political and military posture in East Asia. Quite the contrary, American officials ought to adopt the position that, as the principal indigenous great power, Japan will be expected to help stabilize East Asia, contribute to the resolution of disputes, and contain disruptive or expansionist threats that might emerge. Washington should also use its diplomatic influence to encourage political and security cooperation between Japan and its neighbors, but U.S. policymakers must not let East Asian apprehension about a more assertive Japan dictate American policy and keep the United States in its role as regional policeman.
Third, discussions should begin immediately about a new, more limited security relationship between the United States and Japan. Japanese and American security interests are likely to overlap in the coming decades, and it is reasonable to explore avenues of cooperation in those areas where there is a sufficient convergence of interests. That cooperation should not, however, take the form of a new alliance. An on-going security dialogue and occasional joint military exercises would be more appropriate.
Elaborate, formal treaty commitments are a bad idea in general. They are excessively rigid and can lock the United States into commitments that may make sense under one set of conditions but become ill-advised or even counterproductive when conditions change. Beyond that general objection, a U.S.-Japanese alliance would be likely to create special problems in the future. Such an alliance would provide tangible evidence to those in Beijing who contend
Balancer of Last Resort
America can still have a potent power pro- There are numerous benefits to such a shift. The first is financial, since a minimalist policy would cut the $35 billion to $40 billion annual cost of U.S. security commitments roughly in half. It would also end a lucrative subsidy to economic competitors. Japanese officials have admitted that Tokyo would need to increase its military spending by $25 billion to $50 billion a year to offset the departure of U.S. forces and the end of the security treaty.
15
South Korean officials have conceded that South Korea would have to increase its military spending by $10 billion to $13 billion a year if the United States withdrew its forces and terminated the defense pact.
16
The U.S. security commitment thus provides a financial bonanza to the Japanese and South Korean economies (and a smaller subsidy to other East Asian countries that indirectly benefit from the U.S. military presence). By compelling Washington's security clients to internalize the full cost of their own defense, the United States would achieve a multibillion-dollar savings for American taxpayers and would help level the playing field in the arena of international economic competition. The second benefit would be to reduce America's risk exposure in the event of an armed conflict in East Asia. As the self- Finally, a lower-profile security policy promises to be more sustainable in the coming decades. America's preponderant position in East Asia arose because of the convergence of unusual circumstances. Japan's total defeat in the Second World War, China's continuing weakness and political turmoil, the death throes of decrepit European colonial empires (and the initial economic weakness of the independent successor Whatever the value of that policy in The United States has been rightly described as the world's sole remaining superpower, and it is indisputably the single strongest nation, both economically and militarily. Nevertheless, as the 1990s draw to a close, the United States has less than 5 percent of the world's population and accounts for barely 20 percent of global economic output. And both percentages are declining. In two decades, America will likely have only 3.5 percent of the world's population and account for no more than 15 or 16 percent of global economic output. By that time, China may well be on the verge of having the world's largest economy and Japan will probably be a strong third in that race. Is it really credible that the United States can continue to dominate a region thousands of miles from its homeland a region that has an enormous edge in population and is rapidly acquiring the economic clout to match? Instead of vainly trying to sustain an ebbing hegemony, the United States should restructure its policy to protect its important interests in a new East Asia characterized by multiple power centers. America can play a meaningful role in East Asia's
Note 1:
A graphic example of that tendency can be found in the comments of Secretary of State Made-
Note 2:
U.S. and Asia Statistical Handbook, 1996, compiled and edited by John T. Dori and Richard D. Fisher, Jr. (Washington, D.C.: Heritage Foundation Asia Studies Center, 1996). Back.
Note 3:
Department of Defense, Office of International Security Affairs, United States Security Strategy for the East Asia-Pacific Region, February 1995,
Note 4:
Following the summit, U.S. officials stated that although they hoped for greater Japanese logistical support for U.S. military missions in East Asia, Japan was far from ready to send troops into battle alongside U.S. forces, adding that that was not something the United States wanted anyway (Kevin Sullivan and John F. Harris, Clinton Hails Partnership with Japan, Washington Post, April 18, 1996).
Note 5:
Excerpts from Pentagon's Plan: Prevent
Note 6:
Philip Shenon, Baker Asks Asians to Move Warily on New Pacts, New York Times, July 25, 1991. Back.
Note 7:
U.S. and Asia Statistical Handbook, 1996,
Note 8:
Warren Christopher, Strengthening Ties between the United States and South Korea, remarks at the inaugural reception for the Korean-United States Twenty-First Century Council, Washington, D. C., February 17, 1994, U.S.
Note 9:
Japan: Anger As Pentagon Chief Kicks Off Visit, South China Morning Post, April 8, 1997. Back.
Note 10:
Hideshi Takeshida, a professor at Japan's Institute for Defense Studies, noted that his country is always nervous when a problem arises with China. An important root of that nervousness, he contended, is the fear that China will retaliate against Japanese investors on the mainland. Quoted in Willis Witter, U.S. Gets No Help from East Asians in Backing Taiwan, Washington Times, March 14, 1997. Back.
Note 11:
Examples of the argument that China's objectives are defensive rather than offensive include Charles W. Freeman, American Economic and Security Interests in China, paper presented to the fourth meeting of the Study Group on American Interests in Asia: Economic and Security Priorities, sponsored by the Economic Strategy Institute, Washington, D.C., January 16, 1997; and Andrew J. Nathan and Robert S. Ross, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security (New York: Norton, 1997). Back.
Note 12:
Georgetown University professor Earl
Note 13:
Beijing reacted badly even to the meager changes in the U.S.-Japan defense guidelines. See Willis Witter, Japan's Hints of Defense of Taiwan Enrage China, Washington Times, August 25, 1997; Chalmers Johnson, Who Is U.S.-Japan Pact Aimed At? Los Angeles Times, September 8, 1997; and China Warns U.S., Japan on Security Pact, Washington Post, September 1997. Back.
Note 14:
That strategy would require the reversal of recent policies that envision the closing of some installations on Guam. It is a measure of the perversity of U.S. strategy in the western Pacific and East Asia that Washington contemplates drawing down forces stationed in American territories while it maintains, or in the case of South Korea actually strengthens, forces used to subsidize the defense of allies and clients. Back.
Note 15:
Author's conversations with Japanese Foreign Ministry and Defense Agency officials, Tokyo, July 10 14, 1995. Back.
Note 16:
Author's conversations with South Korean Defense Ministry officials, Seoul, July 18, 1995. Back.
When asked what help the United States could expect from Japan, in light of the Clinton-Hashimoto summit, if a conflict were to break out in East Asia, former assistant secretary of defense Joseph Nye had extremely limited expectations. If there were a war in Korea, I'm confident that we would have Japanese support, the use of Japanese bases, and help with supplies and so forth. Nye added that if the conflict were instead in the Taiwan Strait or the South China Sea, Washington would expect