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| Image: Flickr User - Official U.S. Navy Page |
By Van Jackson
There’s still time to pursue options that eschew both war posturing and unreciprocated conciliation.
The unifying theme of U.S. Asia policy has been the maintenance of a stable, liberal regional order. Yet a number of regional trends now militate against that goal: trust among regional neighbors is low; military modernization investments are rampant; territorial nationalism is growing in salience; and China continues to press its peripheral claims in ways that risk inadvertent conflict.
The current configuration of U.S. policy does nothing to arrest any of these problems, yet their continuation threatens longstanding U.S. interests in Asia. So what can be done? Today, there’s still time to pursue options that eschew either war posturing on the one hand or unreciprocated conciliation on the other.
Restoring Imbalances
The first option to shape better future conditions without either appeasement or war is to significantly enhance the military capabilities of China’s potential adversaries. The most likely conflict scenarios with China run through a U.S. ally or partner — Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, or the Philippines, for example.
One of the background conditions that makes these conflicts plausible is an extreme capability asymmetry between China and its potential opponent. If the balance of local military capabilities favors China so strongly, U.S. allies and partners may be discouraged from contesting Chinese preferences when faced with the prospect of coercion. Improving the military strength of local allies and partners enhances general deterrence by simultaneously making the weaker states more capable of defending themselves while discouraging any coercive opportunism by Beijing.
The goal is not for these smaller states to achieve military parity with China — that would be impossible and probably undesirable — but rather to mount a reasonable self-defense effort sufficient to bolster their confidence and induce a modicum of caution in Beijing.
Read the full story at The Diplomat