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Reassessing US policy in Asia
By Liu Shih-chung 劉世忠
Over the last six months or so, US President Barack Obama’s administration has
taken advantage of North Korea’s alleged sinking of the South Korean corvette
Cheonan to persuade those who were calling for US forces to withdraw from Asia
to ask for reinforcements instead.
This trend is conducive to deepening the security partnership between the US and
its allies in the Asia-Pacific region, and it has helped to counter China’s
aggressive promotion of what it calls its “core interests” — specifically its
objections to US arms sales to Taiwan and its territorial claims over the South
China Sea.
Earlier this month, Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan defeated challenger Ichiro
Ozawa in a contest for leadership of the Democratic Party of Japan. After
consolidating his own political position, Kan appointed pro-US, China hawk Seiji
Maehara as Japan’s new defense minister to strengthen the Japan-US security
alliance and ease tensions that characterized bilateral relations under Kan’s
predecessor, former Japanese prime minister Yukio Hatoyama.
US foreign policy in Asia is now shifting away from the strategic ambiguity that
characterized Obama’s first year in office. In a recent speech, US Secretary of
State Hillary Rodham Clinton set out the three core principles of US policy in
Asia.
First, the US intends to strengthen its partnership with traditional allies such
as Japan, South Korea and Australia.
Second, it recognizes China and India as rising powers and plans to remain
engaged with them.
Third, it will seek to strengthen mechanisms for cooperation with countries in
the Asia-Pacific region, including the ASEAN summit, the ASEAN Regional Forum,
the East Asia summit, APEC meetings and a proposed trans-Pacific partnership
agreement that the Obama administration plans to announce when it hosts the APEC
meeting in Hawaii in November next year.
This shift in US strategy in the Asia-Pacific region has in turn influenced the
administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and affected its strongly
pro-China policies.
Faced with pressure from Beijing to engage in political negotiations following
the signing of the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) in late June,
Ma sent Mainland Affairs Council Minister Lai Shin-yuan (賴幸媛) to Washington,
where she called on Beijing to forsake “the policy and law that sanction the use
of force against Taiwan” — referring to China’s “Anti-Secession” Law.
The Chinese government did not respond directly to Lai’s remarks, instead
mobilizing media and academics to criticize her speech. Ma, speaking through the
media, denied that he had authorized Lai’s speech, but at the same time
responded to Beijing’s pressure for political negotiations by saying talks
between the two sides had gone far enough for the time being.
Though frustrated by Ma’s go-slow attitude, Beijing cannot openly criticize his
“three noes” policies of “no unification, no independence and no use of force”
for fear of alienating the Taiwanese public and fueling the electoral momentum
of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
Nevertheless, China is no doubt frustrated that after making so many
concessions, Ma has not responded by agreeing to start political negotiations.
One reason why Ma has opted for this wait-and-see policy, is the ruling party is
uncertain how the five special municipality elections for mayors and councilors
in November will turn out.
It is also likely that the US has signaled to the Ma administration that
cross-strait relations should go forward gradually and that Taiwan and China
should not get too close, too fast. The US may have further urged Taiwan to take
note of the adjustments it has made to its overall foreign policy strategy in
the Asia-Pacific region.
One incident that has put Ma’s government in a predicament is the dispute
between China and Japan over the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台).
While the government is obliged to defend its position that the islands come
under the sovereignty of the Republic of China (ROC), it is also tethered by the
notion of “one China, with each side having its own interpretation.”
The sensitive nature of this issue makes it hard for the Ma government to back
down and expose itself to criticism from all sides. If Taiwan aligns itself with
China against Japan, that will bring it into conflict with the recently
strengthened US-Japan security alliance. The government’s handling of the latest
Diaoyutai incident is markedly different from the pugnacious approach Ma and
other Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) figures took when the DPP’s Chen Shui-bian
(陳水扁) was president. At that time they said that Taiwan should not be afraid to
fight and called for gunboats to be sent to guard the islands. Now, in contrast,
Ma finds himself with little room to maneuver given pressure from the US.
The US reportedly intends to restart talks on a trade and investment framework
agreement with Taiwan following November’s municipal elections. Talks between
Taiwan and Singapore about a free-trade agreement are also ongoing.
These prospective agreements, plus the ECFA, may be useful foreign policy
achievements that could work in Ma’s favor in his campaign for re-election,
which is likely to start next year. Mindful of this, Ma is clearly willing to
proceed at a pace acceptable to the US.
What bears watching now is how long Beijing will tolerate Ma’s refusal to talk
politics.
The difficult choice facing Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) is whether he
should keep doing Ma favors to help him get elected for a second term and
prevent the DPP from building on its momentum from the year-end municipal
elections to win the presidency in 2012.
Perhaps he will try to twist Ma’s arm a little, in which case Ma could take
advantage of next year’s 100th anniversary of the ROC to promote the notion of
ROC sovereignty and use it to deflect Beijing’s pressure to start talks on
political issues.
Liu Shih-chung is a senior research fellow at the Taipei-based
Taiwan Brain Trust.
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