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On Friday, US President Joe Biden will participate, virtually, in the first meeting of leaders of the so-called “Indo-Pacific Quad” grouping, which includes the US, India, Japan and Australia.
The informal association has long grappled with conflicting priorities and different strategic and economic ties with China, but some have seen it as a bulwark against Beijing’s economic and military assertiveness in the region.
The four countries worked collectively for the first time in 2004, in response to the devastation of an earthquake and tsunami in the Indian Ocean. In 2007, countries lined up to promote a vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific, but were largely inactive amid pressure from China.
In recent years, the quartet has again increased cooperation, bolstered by a campaign of support from the administration of President Donald Trump, which saw the Quad, short for Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, as the regional cornerstone of its confrontational approach to Beijing. .
That increased cooperation came as bilateral relations between most Quad countries and China have taken a “pretty tense turn,” said Benoit Hardy Chartrand, an East Asia analyst at Temple University in Tokyo.
The four foreign ministers have met regularly in recent years and the four countries carried out a massive joint military drill in the Indian Ocean in November 2020.
“The fact that the quadruple meeting is now at the leadership level is certainly an illustration of the seriousness and importance that the four partners place on this partnership,” Hardy-Chartrand told Al Jazeera.
Historical: This is the first meeting of the #Courtyard at the leader level. @POTUS and this administration is committed to working with our allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific to ensure peace, uphold our shared values, and promote our prosperity. pic.twitter.com/ImlJvLeAVW
– National Security Council (@WHNSC) March 9, 2021
Sentiment among Quad countries toward China has changed over the past decade as Beijing rapidly modernized its defense forces and increased its military presence in the disputed waters of the South China Sea and the East China Sea.
Clashes between Indian and Chinese troops across the two countries disputed the Himalayan border and trade sanctions against Australia have further soured ties.
Human rights abuses against the Muslim Uyghur minority in Xinjiang province and against pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong, and China’s growing sphere of economic influence, with an increasing number of countries depending on the Chinese development and technology have further eroded relations with the Quad countries. .
While the Quad countries have emphasized that China is not their main motivator, “there has definitely been a greater willingness to cooperate on all sides, driven, in large part, by their problems with their relationship with China,” Hardy-Chartrand said. .
China ‘looms large’
At a Quad summit in October 2020 in Tokyo, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urged the foreign ministers of the other three countries to “work together to protect our people and partners from exploitation, corruption and coercion. of the CCP (the ruling Chinese Community Party). “
The blunt approach contrasts with that of Japan, Australia and India, which have often tried to downplay the group’s possible role as a counterweight to Beijing, or what the Chinese state tabloid Global Times has derisively called “the Asian version of the NATO”.
In remarks announcing Friday’s summit, Washington, New Delhi, Tokyo and Canberra once again took measured tones, with little reference to China, rather than emphasizing, as India’s Foreign Ministry said, that the summit would focus on find “practical areas of cooperation to maintain a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific region”.
Washington’s change of tone, in particular, underscores Biden’s change from his predecessor, increasingly emphasizing confrontation with China, while also finding areas of cooperation where possible.
“Biden has said that meeting the challenge [of China] it’s going to be one of the administration’s top priorities, ”Hardy-Chartrand said. “At the same time, he does not want to unnecessarily increase tensions, as Trump and Pompeo seemed to do in the four years of his administration.”
‘China-centric four club’
Others have criticized the group for its apparent concern for China, with Evan A Feigenbaum and James Schwemlein of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace writing on Thursday that the Quad has “sought a purpose” and needs to “evolve from a China-club of four focused ”to focus on“ specific functional challenges ”in the region.
They envisioned a model in which the Quad could “reconceptualize itself as the nucleus of a set of ad hoc coalitions that bring in a changing cast of partners, when needed, based on ability and willingness.”
Meanwhile, they wrote that the US, India, Australia and Japan could “act as pioneers and pioneers on … important issues where regional actors have been too reluctant, or too politically limited, to move forward.”
Still, Dane Chamorro, a former US diplomat and partner at risk consultancy Control Risks, said balancing China’s influence is unlikely to cease to be the Quad’s tacit motivation.
However, he said the group should use its first leaders meeting to focus on a specific area where countries can agree to focus their resources.
“I think it should [the Quad] really prioritize what is most important to these four countries to ensure a free and open Indo-Pacific. Is it the South China Sea, for example? Ok, let’s focus on that. And let’s really put resources into it, ”he said.
“When everything is thrown into this kind of ‘anti-China basket’ … just by the nature of having four parties in this … they will inevitably be drawn in in different ways,” he said.
Deep ‘signaling effect’
The agenda for Friday’s meeting is expected to include a variety of topics spanning the coronavirus pandemic, climate change, maritime safety, the economy, and the safety of rare earth metals used in essential electric car motors.
An expected result, as reported by the Reuters news agency, is the announcement of a financial boost for the manufacture of vaccines in India.
New Delhi has long urged the other Quad members to invest in its vaccine production capacity in an attempt to counter China’s growing influence of so-called “vaccine diplomacy.”
Nicholas Szechenyi, principal investigator and deputy director of the Japan Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that commitment to the vaccine could be “reassuring for countries in Asia.”
While he said Friday’s meetings would result in a list of priorities and some concrete steps, he predicted it would be the first of many.
“The signaling effect of this initial meeting of leaders is very profound at a time when the region is concerned not only with the leadership of the United States, but also with Chinese assertiveness,” he told Al Jazeera.
“I think it’s the ideal way for the new US administration to substantially demonstrate its commitment to leadership in Asia,” he said.
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