US Military Forces in Asia in Support of US Policy and Strategy

US Military Forces in Asia in Support of US Policy and Strategy

Vision:  The United States is a global power and must operate globally in all regions of the world.  It requires a military force that has a proper mixture of forward basing and stationing combined with an effective rotational structure and deployment capability.  This will allow for the projection of US military power whenever and wherever necessary to support the interests of the United States and to support its friends, partners, and allies. Most important, military capabilities must support the leading instruments of national power: diplomatic, economic, and informational.  The US can lead with these three instruments because they will rest on the rock solid foundation of military power.

The US cannot make its military the centerpiece of strategy in Asia.  Yet it has to be the foundation of US strategy.

The US strategy in the Asia-Pacific and around the world must be built around strategic reassurance and strategic resolve (Steinberg & O’Hanlon 2012)[1] The US will reassure its allies as well friends and partners and will demonstrate strategic resolve to defend its interests, access to the global commons, and to ensure stability and allow for commerce and economic growth.

Problem:  Despite the Asia Rebalance/Pivot shifting a small percentage of military forces to the region over the next decade, an overall diminishing US military structure, combined with unproductive rhetoric, unrealistic priorities, over commitment of US forces (in particular ground forces but air and sea as well) have undermined US strategic reassurance and strategic resolve in the Asia-Pacific. This is combined with a lack of strategy requiring balance and coherency among ends, ways, and means, with an understanding of threats, risks, and opportunities.  This prevents the US from developing effective policies and executing strategies that protect US national interests in the region.  Ultimately this leads to instability in the Asia-Pacific and globally. 

Key Ideas:

China and the US will be strategic competitors throughout the 21^st century, with competition for markets, resources, and influence.  Cooperation is possible but there will always be competition:

Competition does not have to lead to military conflict.

-       The US competes economically - it protects free market principles

-       The US competes for influence - it demonstrates strategic reassurance and strategic resolve

-       The US competes for ideas - self determination, rule of law, international standards, treaties, and organizations

-       The US competes for access - freedom of navigation is the US priority

Competition is not zero-sum.  Winning is defined based on the competitors cultural, political, and economic systems and goals and desires and definitions of winning should not be mirror imaged.

The Asian paradox as described by Korean President Park is present and growing:  Asian nations are increasingly economically interdependent yet they have unresolved political and security issues.  Despite growing economic interdependence there is growing insecurity.[2]

A vital strategic US interest is freedom of navigation.  Territorial disputes cannot impede freedom navigation in the South China Sea, the Asia-Pacific region, and throughout the world.

The US will engage bilaterally, multilaterally and through regional and international organizations and mechanisms.  No two situations are the same and therefore all means of engagement must be at the disposal of the US.

We must maintain forces to not only deter threats and defend our interests; we must have overwhelming force to stop violence wherever we are faced with it.  This especially applies to the Korean peninsula where the ROK/US alliance must have the combined forces of air, land, maritime, and special operations to be able to win the war and end the violence that will occur during either post-conflict or post-regime collapse in North Korea.

The US will not be able to increase the number of bases in the Asia-Pacific for both US fiscal constraints but also host nation domestic political challenges.

Building new permanent bases requires a minimum of a five-year lead time from a Congressional approval and resourcing and an engineering construction perspective and often longer form a political/diplomatic perspective.

Key Concepts: 

The US must lead with the diplomatic and economic instruments of power.  The concept of US leadership in the Asia-Pacific should be based on statesmanship with Statesmen leading the US strategic efforts.  A Statesman is a wise, skillful, and respected political leader and this will describe the type of men and women that will make up leaders on the US national security team both in Washington and those responsible for the US policy in the Asia-Pacific region.

The first priority for the US is to reinforce and strengthen relationships with and commitments to the five treaty allies in the Asia-Pacific: Australia, Japan, The Republic of Korea, The Republic of the Philippines, and The Kingdom of Thailand.   US Strategic Reassurance and Strategic Resolve rests on this alliance structure.

Although the alliance and basing structures evolved over the Cold War it does not mean that they are anachronistic.  As long as the US and our five treaty allies have sufficiently aligned interests we must sustain and strengthen our relationships.  The bases that we have in Japan and Korea, as well as the US territory of Guam and the access we have in Australia, Thailand and the Philippines for rotational forces provide the US with strategic flexibility and agility.  The one law that the US cannot violate is the law of physics that controls time and distance.  Until we can overcome that law we suffer from the tyranny of distance.  To ensure our strategic reassurance and strategic resolve we must have presence and persistence.  Our forces must be present and we must persistently improve the military interoperability of the US and its treaty partners as well as friends and partners with like-minded values and interests.  In terms of maintaining our basing structure we should borrow the adage of the combat infantryman on patrol – “never give up the high ground” because once you do you may not be able to get back to the top.

Forces based and stationed in the region provide a critical capability to support humanitarian assistance when needed and requested.  These capabilities have been demonstrated for decades with recent examples in response to tsunamis in Southeast Asia and Japan, and typhoons and volcanic eruptions in the Philippines and other disasters in other countries.  Providing humanitarian assistance reinforces US strategic reassurance and strategic resolve.

The US will support Korean unification as the only long term and permanent solution to the North Korean nuclear program and human rights atrocities and crimes against humanity being perpetrated by the Kim Family Regime.  The US will develop joint military and interagency plans to support the ROK in achieving the United Republic of Korea (UROK – pronounced “You Rock”)[3]

Lastly, the US cannot be deterred by threats whether they are economic, diplomatic, or military.  The US will protect its interests in the Asia-Pacific, defend it allies, support friends, and partners, and ensure regional and global adherence to international laws and norms.

Key Force Concepts:

The first priority is to maintain the current force structure in Japan and Korea as well as in Guam and Hawaii as the baseline force structure for the Asia-Pacific.  There can be no reduction in US presence in the region. 

An aircraft carrier battle group must always be home ported in Japan.

Intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets must be properly deployed throughout the region to provide the US with unparalleled situational awareness, situational understanding, and early warning.

The development of an integrated missile defense system is vital to protect the US, its forces in the region, and US allies.  This system will be land, sea, and space based.

Ground forces in the Pacific will be postured for defense of the ROK/US Alliance and then interoperability throughout the Asia-Pacific region, first with US allies and then with like-minded friends and partners.

David S. Maxwell

Associate Director, Center for Security Studies

Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service

Georgetown University

Phone and email:  202-687-3834; david.maxwell@georgetown.edu 

---

[1] James Steinberg and Michael O’Hanlon, Strategic Reassurance and Resolve: US China Relations in the 21^st Century, (Princeton University Press, 2014) Borrowed and adapted from the title of their book.

[2] Park Geun-Hye, “A Plan for Peace in North Asia,” Wall Street Journal, November 12, 2012 http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887323894704578114310294100492?alg=y

[3] Center for New American Security, INFOGRAPHIC: The Geopolitical Implications of Korean Unification, October 16, 2015, http://maxoki161.blogspot.com/2015/10/infographic-geopolitical-implications.html

Special Operations in PACOM

For those with an interest in Special Operations in PACOM the latest edition of Special Warfare Magazine can be downloaded at the link below.  There is a lot of current information on OEF-P and the Typhoon response in the Philippines as well as the MNLF rebellion in Zamboanga among many other important subjects (to include UW)  per the table of contents below.

V/R
Dave

http://static.dvidshub.net/media/pubs/pdf_14790.pdf

08 1st Special Forces Group in the PACOM AOR
16 Q&A with COL Robert McDowell and CSM Brian Johnson
21 1st Special Forces Group Support Battalion
26 Relationship Building
30 1st SFG(A) Operational cycle
34 The Case for India
38 Zamboanga Crisis
46 Operation enduring Freedom - Philippines
52 Operation Damayan
59 Preparing for ODA level initial entry UW Operations in Korea
62 Foal Eagle
66 A Company in the LSF
68 UW in Cyberspace

Excerpts:

The Asia security system is to be constructed atop the foundations of the US hub-and-spokes of alliances in Asia—the San Francisco system, which is enjoying a burst of health and regional affection in its seventh decade.

The longevity of the US alliance system is a tribute to its ability to change colour and form according to the needs of the Asian ally. Similarly, the US military guarantee to Asia has vitality and endurance because it has a chameleon capacity—adjusting colour, weight and contours to suit different Asian partners.

Conclusion:

The adaptability of the US military guarantee makes it easier for the concert to rise on Asia’s existing foundations and not attempt the far more difficult task of displacing or replacing the US system.

V/R
Dave 

Asia Essentials: the US military chameleon

http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/

9Sep 2013

By Graeme Dobell

 Print This Post

The Asia security system is to be constructed atop the foundations of the US hub-and-spokes of alliances in Asia—the San Francisco system, which is enjoying a burst of health and regional affection in its seventh decade.

The longevity of the US alliance system is a tribute to its ability to change colour and form according to the needs of the Asian ally. Similarly, the US military guarantee to Asia has vitality and endurance because it has a chameleon capacity—adjusting colour, weight and contours to suit different Asian partners.

Envisage the US alliance system as three layers. The top layer holds the formal alliances expressed by treaty. Below the formal layer sits the de facto or virtual alliances. And in the lowest layer sit the partial or quasi-military relationships. In this lowest level are the partnerships or relationships, but it’s no stretch to call them quasi alliances. This is the beauty of the US military chameleon, adapting as it shifts through the different layers and colours. If the champion chameleon is one that can merge while walking across a kilt, then the US military can just about do tartan.

Along with its formal treaties, the US has slowly developed informal alliances to add in these other layers. Singapore is an obvious example of a de facto ally—so true blue it’s edging towards the top layer. The one-way US pledge to Taiwan, enshrined in US law, means it reaches beyond the virtual category towards formal status—but for obvious reasons it has to stay in the de facto category. New Zealand has shifted between all three categories, but it’s now back to near the top of the de facto class.

The lowest layer of the system – and in many ways the most fascinating—is where the quasi allies dwell, based on the half or partial nature of the relationship and the fluctuating level of commitment. Malaysia has sat there for decades, but is being joined by others now more willing to accept the US embrace, such as Vietnam and Indonesia. India has emerged quickly as one of the most important quasi allies. The speed with which India moves towards de facto status will tell much about Asia’s strategic temperature.

The chameleon nature of all this is expressed by how US military approaches have evolved since the act of creation in San Francisco. In 1951, the San Francisco system was both the formal resolution of WW2 in Asia, but also a reflection of what had happened in the six years since the end of the war: the division of Europe, the Cold War, the communist victory in China and, crucially, the Korean War.

The US needed Japan as an ally and—at that point the one developed economy in Asia—to start firing on all cylinders. To get Japan as an ally, Washington had to reassure the rest of non-communist Asia: thus the chain of treaties that stretches from Hokkaido to Hobart.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/

CINCPAC Interview: Admiral Samuel J. Locklear

(Aside)  I know that Rumsfeld banned the use of CINC to refer to any military command as there is only one Commander-in-Chief, the President.  But I think there is something to be said for tradition so I prefer CINCPAC).  

The Admiral provides his description of the Asia Rebalance covering China, the Chinese military, the War on Terrorism, transnational crime, Indochina, Indonesia, and Cyber.  Excerpt on his view of countering terrorism:

In the long run, I believe the solution to countering terrorism lies in the professional and capable security services of our partner nations, good governance, and a general sense of prosperity for the people which will make extremist ideology less appealing and create an environment where terrorist organizations don't get the support they need and are no longer able to thrive.

V/R

Dave

The Interview: Admiral Samuel J. Locklear

http://thediplomat.com/2013/01/11/the-interview-admiral-samuel-j-locklear/?all=true

January 11, 2013

By Sergei DeSilva-Ranasinghe

America's rebalance towards Asia has many talking. The U.S. Navy will be at the forefront of such efforts. Admiral Samuel J. Locklear gives us his take.

As the United States military’s most important and largest overseas command, U.S. Pacific Command, otherwise known as PACOM, covers a jurisdiction that is half the Earth’s surface, 50 per cent of the world’s population and has one-fifth of the U.S. military’s total strength under its command. PACOM Commander,Admiral Samuel J. Locklear, spoke to Sergei DeSilva-Ranasinghe on what the upgraded U.S. presence in the region will imply, including initiatives to neutralize the growing transnational challenges like violent extremism; the impact of the pivot on relations with Indonesia and Indochina; and, importantly, the likely reverberations for U.S.-China relations.

When you say that the U.S. is rebalancing towards the Asia-Pacific, what was different about the activities of PACOM prior to the global war on terrorism?

Admiral Locklear: After the end of World War II and before 9/11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States had a continual presence in the Asia-Pacific. This presence enabled the growth and sustainment of a secure environment that I believe engendered economic prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region. It also facilitated th

e rise of competent militaries that are participating broadly in the security environment today.

Before 9/11, much of the resources of the U.S. military were dedicated to ongoing operations in the Asia- Pacific. Although we did pivot away from the Asia-Pacific for over ten years, we still had assets dedicated to combat operations in the region.

When you say "rebalancing", what precisely do you mean?

Admiral Locklear: U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan is coming to a close, and President Obama and the Secretary of Defense are looking to the future at what our defense force will look like post-Afghanistan and our global priorities. They recognize that the most significant national interest of the United States, and the interests of five of our seven allies and emerging partners, lies here in the Asia- Pacific.

Through rebalancing in the next few years, we want to have the right forces in the right mix in the right places in the Asia-Pacific, so that peace and security can continue to prosper in this region.The U.S. forces operating in this region, both rotational and forward stationed, are crucial to our strategy in this part of the world and ensure we have the right formal presence and are ready to provide the right assistance to our allies and partners.

At some level we are providing the right level of deterrence so we can ensure peace and security in the region. This is a continuum of our security role in northeast Asia, which is still a critical element of the overall PACOM strategy, and it will require us to take a different view of how we operate with our allies and partners and how we rotate our forces in and out with our partners and allies in several locations. For instance, in Australia we have been pursuing the cooperation between our Marine Corps and the Australian forces, specifically in Darwin. That is a good example of how we are working differently in the region in positioning ourselves to build a better collective security environment.

The United States puts together a calendar of events where countries with whom we have ongoing dialogue come together. These events include dialogue at the chiefs of defense level and at lower tiers. There can be dozens of such events and they extend from high-level talks to individual unit exercises. We host an annual Chief of Defense conference one year in Hawaii and co-host it another year in another country. In 2012, we co-hosted the conference with Australia in Sydney. We invited the Chiefs of Defense from most of the countries in this region, including India, China, Russia, Pakistan, France, and the United Kingdom, to get together and have frank discussions on their security interests. These are the type of discussions that help with commerce and lead to peace. When these don’t occur that’s when we have problems.

(Continued at the link below)

http://thediplomat.com/2013/01/11/the-interview-admiral-samuel-j-locklear/?all=true

In Asia, Ill Will Runs Deep

I think most of us in the west cannot comprehend these conflicts (of course most in Asia probably cannot comprehend our current political system with the fiscal cliff and sequestration either).

But I think with the Asia rebalance we do need to understand these conflicts and the historical, cultural, nationalistic, and emotional reasons for them.

V/R

Dave

January 6, 2013

In Asia, Ill Will Runs Deep

By ODD ARNE WESTAD

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/07/opinion/why-china-and-japan-cant-get-along.html?smid=tw-nytimesworld&seid=auto&_r=1&&pagewanted=print

London

THERE are few economies and societies on earth more complementary than China’s and Japan’s. The Chinese are relatively young, poor and restless and fiercely committed to economic growth. The Japanese are relatively old and sated, but technologically advanced and devoted to guarding their high standard of living. Proximity would seem to make the two nations ideally suited to benefit from each other.

But Japan is afraid of China’s rise, because the Chinese economy is so much more dynamic than Japan’s. And China is troubled by Japan, because the island nation seems to act as an unsinkable American aircraft carrier just off its coast.

Over the last year, nationalists in both countries have fought a war of words over the disputed islands that Japan calls Senkaku and China calls Diaoyu. Japan’s new right-wing prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has alarmed Chinese leaders with his calls for revisiting its commitment to pacifism, enshrined in the American-imposed postwar constitution, and for making the school curriculum more patriotic.

The long shadow of history continues to haunt relations between the two countries. In Asia, World War II started in 1937 as a Sino-Japanese war; millions of Chinese were killed as a result of Japan’s expansionism. But that does not explain why young people in China and Japan today are more inimical in their views of one another than their forebears — even immediately after the war — were.

The real explanation lies further back. Japan’s rise in the late 19th century was seen as an affront by China, which had always felt entitled to the mantle of regional leadership. Mao Zedong and other founders of the Chinese Communist Party adopted these views and bequeathed them to their successors.

Most Chinese today therefore regard Japan’s wealth, and its position as America’s main ally in Asia, as results of ill-gotten gains. Even when the Chinese state was at its weakest, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, its elites felt that the Confucianism China had exported to its key neighbors — Korea, Japan and Vietnam — was the root of a common culture. Other countries in the “Confucian zone” were supposed to simply accept China’s natural leadership.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/07/opinion/why-china-and-japan-cant-get-along.html?smid=tw-nytimesworld&seid=auto&_r=1&&pagewanted=print

Four Surprises That Could Rock Asia in 2012

I think Michael or his headline writer means 2013.  But he has 4 interesting scenarios (though I would still try to get policy makers to pay attention to the Korean peninsula beyond nK nuclear weapons and missiles as well).

Taiwan Independence 

Jihadists Attack China 

The U.S. Navy Can't Save the Day 

The King of Thailand Dies

V/R

Dave

Four Surprises That Could Rock Asia in 2012

Are we paying attention to the wrong crises?

BY MICHAEL MAZZA | JANUARY 3, 2013

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/01/03/four_surprises_that_could_rock_asia_in_2012?page=full

As the world's center of economic gravity shifts from the Atlantic to the Pacific, it's moved from a region of enduring peace to one of pervasive friction. Last spring, China and the Philippines nearly came to blows over a small shoal in the South China Sea. In mid-December, Japan dispatchedeight fighter planes after a small Chinese plane entered Japanese airspace, near a group of disputed islands in the East China Sea. North Korea tested another missile in mid-December, and appears to be preparing for a third nuclear test. Peace between India and Pakistan remains elusive, while Indonesia and the Philippines continue to wrestle with Islamic terrorism.

But there are quieter threats to Asia, potentially more explosive than a North Korean missile. Here are four underappreciated threats to the world's most popular region:

Taiwan Independence

Since President Ma Ying-jeou came to power in 2008, Taipei and Beijing have improved ties and deepened their economic integration: cross-strait trade reached $127.6 billion in 2011, an increase of more than 13 percent from 2010. Some national security experts misinterpret this trend, thinking that growing economic interdependence will overwhelm factors pushing the two sides apart, and that interdependence will provide Beijing with leverage it can use to compel unification. But while Taiwan's businesspeople enjoy closer ties with China, the average Taiwanese voter continues to move toward independence. Over the last 20 years, the portion of citizens of Taiwan identifying as "Taiwanese" has increased from 17.6 percent of those polled in 1992 to a whopping 53.7 percent today; those identifying as "Chinese" has declined over the same period from 25.5 percent to just 3.1 percent today. Support for independence has nearly doubled over the last two decades, from 11.1 percent to 19.6 percent. Support for immediate or eventual unification, meanwhile, has more than halved, from 20 percent in 1992 to 9.8 percent in 2012.

Economic integration is apparently failing to halt what Beijing sees as a troubling trend. With a cross-strait trade agreement and a slew of other, easier deals already on the books, Beijing now expects Ma to discuss political issues. But Ma doesn't have the domestic political support to pursue political talks -- in March 2012, two months after his reelection, 45 percent of those polled said the pace of cross-strait exchanges was "just right," but the share of respondents answering "too fast" had increased to 32.6 percent, from 25.7 percent before the election. Any Chinese shift toward a more strident Taiwan policy could portend a new crisis in the Taiwan Strait sooner than many expect, as a lack of progress on these issues may buttress hawks in the new Xi Jinping administration. And America would surely be dragged in: Even low-level coercive measures against Taiwan -- a top 10 U.S. trading partner and security ally -- could throw U.S.-China relations into a tailspin.

Jihadists Attack China

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/01/03/four_surprises_that_could_rock_asia_in_2012?page=full

Wave of nationalism sweeps through Northeast Asia

This could be one of the biggest challenges in the coming years.

V/R
Dave

Wave of nationalism sweeps through Northeast Asia

China, Japan and North and South Korea grapple for position during a time of transition and with a new set of leaders with more hawkish backgrounds.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-asia-nationalism-20121223,0,7335539,full.story

By Barbara Demick, Los Angeles Times

December 23, 2012

BEIJING — Both Koreas soon will be governed by the progeny of Cold War strongmen. China is in the hands of the son of one of Mao Tse-tung's revolutionary comrades. The incoming prime minister of Japan is a long-standing hawk and the grandson of one of Japan's war cabinet leaders.

The future is looking uninspiringly like the past in NortheastAsia. And although few (other than doomsday theorists) are predicting another war, the alignment of new leaders seems likely to cause some bumps in the year ahead.

"In the short term, I take a pessimistic view. Some kind of new Cold War-type confrontation could happen," said Han Yong-sup of the Korea National Defense University, speaking inSeoul this month at a conference on China's transition.

Any transition is a sensitive period, as new leaders try to establish their nationalist bona fides with their own public, and Northeast Asia is going through three simultaneously.

The Chinese Communist Party last month installed Xi Jinpingas general secretary amid an unexpectedly robust campaign to assert Chinese sovereignty in the South China and East China seas. He is to become president in March. Japan and South Korea conducted elections three days apart last week, selecting conservative governments.

North Korea's leader, 29-year-old Kim Jong Un, has been in power only a year and directed a satellite launch Dec. 12 in what many believe was an effort to assert his legitimacy as the heir to his late father, Kim Jong Il, and grandfather, Kim Il Sung.

Foreign policy analysts say that as the leaderships go through transitions, the countries are also jockeying for position in a changing world order in which China plays a newly dominant role.

China's rapid growth has it on course to become the world's largest economy by the end of this decade, and its projection of newfound power is putting pressure on all the other countries in the region.

"There is potential for rising tensions and mishandling of important relationships from every direction," said Scott Snyder of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Though family legacy may not be destiny, it is at least an interesting coincidence that all four of the new Asian leaders have significant nationalist bloodlines.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-asia-nationalism-20121223,0,7335539,full.story

The Asian Century Crumbles

Excerpt:

Second, there is a problem with the very concept of an Asian Century. Asia is not a civilization – it is a diverse region. Previous eras of far-reaching influence were characterized by the influence of a dominating culture such as the American Century, the British Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Tang Dynasty, the Roman Empire, and Classical Greece. 

To be sure, culture is a tricky concept. But what is “Asia” and can its culture dominate like previous cultures did? The odds are unlikely as “Asia” is a Western concept with thin resonance in the region and no cultural coherence. In Japan, for example, Asian denotes things foreign. The notion of Asia was manufactured by the ancient Greeks to refer to people living to the east of their civilization – the Persians and the Turks[8]. The continent of Eurasia thus became arbitrarily divided between Europe and non-Europe. Even the idea of an Asian Century had its origins in 1985 in Washington, D.C.[9]

Conclusion:

Mahbubani once said, “If you want to see the past, go to Europe. If you want to see the future, come to Asia.” That future has not arrived. Until a rival idea emerges, the present belongs to America and its universal values.

V/R

Dave

The Asian Century Crumbles

By Devin Stewart on December 22, 2012 

http://www.e-ir.info/2012/12/22/the-asian-century-crumbles/

A few years ago, New York University appointed me to teach a course on East Asian politics. At the time, experts were sounding the alarm that America was in decline, Asia was on the rise, and China was “eating our lunch.”[1] Works reflecting this anxiety included Charles Kupchan’s The End of the American Era (2003), Parag Khanna’s “Waving Goodbye to Hegemony” (2008), and Fareed Zakaria’s The Post-American World(2008). As I pointed out in 2007,[2] however, predictions of American decline go back decades[3] and have been consistently proven wrong.

But beyond the flaws in the narrative of American decline, the anticipation that an Asian Century would replace the American Century was also misguided. I used the semesters at NYU to deconstruct the notion of a rising Asia and reconstruct an appropriate U.S. foreign policy. Back then, such skepticism was counterintuitive. But just a few years later, several factors turned those doubts about the dawn of an Asian Century into common wisdom.

First, East Asia has witnessed the recent ascent of conservative leadership amid territorial tensions – signaling not a futuristic vision for international harmony but a return to past rivalries. China’s new leader Xi Jinping has already vowed to strengthen its military, creating what U.S. Admiral Michael McDevitt identifies as a “security dilemma” in Asia[4]. While China understandably wants to increase its combat readiness and project its naval power outward, doing so increases the insecurity of its neighbors.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.e-ir.info/2012/12/22/the-asian-century-crumbles/

A Sobering Assessment (Asia and the Global Trends 2030 report)

As I have mentioned before the importance of Global Trends 2030 is not its predictive nature (the measure of effectiveness of past Global Trends reports is not whether they have "got it right" or if their forecasts came true, but rather if the reports have been used by policy makers and strategists as a catalyst for critical thinking and the development of policies and strategies to attempt to either support and reinforce positive or desirable trends or counter or alter those negative or undesirable trends.  If the assessment is sobering then we should be asking what we can do from a policy and strategy perspective?  When our plans don't work out the way we want we are fond of saying "the enemy has a vote" implying that his actions (usually unforeseen) unhinged our plans.  Global Trends 2030 gives us an opportunity so that we can say "we have a vote" and execute plans, policies, and strategies to support our interests.  

Since this report is "grimmer" regarding the Indo-Pacific Asia region than past reports perhaps the US rebalance to Asia will have an effect on this trend (positive I hope!)

V/R
Dave

A Sobering Assessment

By Rory Medcalf

December 21, 2012

http://thediplomat.com/flashpoints-blog/2012/12/21/a-sobering-assessment/

There are plenty of big stories in Asian security this month – the North Korean rocket test, China-Japan tensions, and the implications of the Japanese and South Korean elections for regional order.  But taking the long view, there is one story that the region's security watchers should not ignore — the release of the U.S. National Intelligence Council's 2030 report on global futures, titled Alternative Worlds. 

This document is full of thoughtful and in many instances worrying assessments about where the Asian strategic order is going, and about the risks of instability and conflict in the years ahead.  It may in theory be a global report, but many of its more troubling projections have an Asian angle, unsurprisingly given the shift of economic and strategic centrality to this region.

To be fair, much of the document is occupied with an impartial examination of megatrends, and some of this is good news, for instance the growth of the global middle-class. But one of the key so-called game changers highlighted in the survey is about the potential for increased conflict. And here, although there is the usual homage paid to the war-constraining qualities of economic interdependence, we find some grim observations.

“The risks of interstate conflict are increasing owing to changes in the international system”: that is, power shifts, notably but not only the rise of China, are upsetting the Asian power equilibrium.

“If the United States is unwilling or less able to serve as a global security provider by 2030, the world will be less stable”: this is an honest but also exceptionally forthright point to make by an American intelligence community which has traditionally analyzed the external world while suspending judgment about the consequences of America's own policy behavior. It is a clear warning against American retrenchment from maritime Asia’s strategic affairs.

While the Middle East and South Asia may remain more conflict prone regions than East Asia, “a conflict ridden East Asia would constitute a key global threat and cause large-scale damage to the global economy”.

(Continued at the link below)

http://thediplomat.com/flashpoints-blog/2012/12/21/a-sobering-assessment/

Global Trends 2030: Pathways for Asia’s Strategic Future

Some people are taken aback but the analysis of trends that arrive at potential Global scenarios for 2030.  Some of the headlines over the last day or so have been relatively sensational and of course there are those who scoff at China becoming the world's largest economy.  I think we should keep in mind that Global Trends 2030 is not a prediction (though from some of the headlines and articles there are those that think it is).  It is merely an analysis of the trends forecasted into the future to provide a look at potential scenarios.  There are a lot of things (as the report notes) that could alter these trends.  For some perhaps the report should be a wakeup call.  The timing of the report right before the holidays might be instructive, perhaps we need to have a talk with Scrooge and assessment Christmas Past, Present, and Future and figure out what we need to do in the present to have a better outcome in the future.  We should not get all worked up about the report because if does not "predict" what might make us feel good and instead use the report as one tool to assist in strategic planning (as I think it is intended to be).  I think Dan Twining lays out some interesting pathways for Asia below.

V/R

Dave

Global Trends 2030: Pathways for Asia’s Strategic Future

Posted By Dan Twining  Monday, December 10, 2012 - 4:37 PM   Share

http://shadow.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/12/10/global_trends_2030_pathways_for_asia_s_strategic_future

Today the U.S. National Intelligence Council releases its Global Trends 2030: Alternative Worldsreport, authored by the NIC's resident thought leader and global futurist par excellence, Mat Burrows. Several of us in the Shadow Government stable contributed to the report in various ways over the past few years of its development .

Because Asia is the cockpit for so many macro drivers of the international system over the coming decades, it's worth considering the outsized role Asia's evolution will play in shaping the future world described in GT2030 -- and how that evolution in turn will impact key variables like the resilience of American power and the future of democracy.

At the macro level, four broad pathways for Asian order are possible through 2030. Which order prevails will have determinative effects on the kind of international system our children inherit.

A Lockean order

In the first scenario, continued American maritime preeminence and the U.S. alliance system sustain a security order in which China's "Prussianization," North Korea's nuclear mischief, and other potential security dilemmas in Asia are mitigated by the preponderance of power enjoyed by the United States and its allies, thereby deterring aggressive revisionism on the part of Beijing or Pyongyang and continuing to supply the public goods that underlie wider Asian prosperity. In such an order, Asian institutions could continue to sink roots, but on the basis of a trans-regional outlook in which the United States remains what then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates called a "resident power," with economic integration oriented around a Pacific rather than an exclusively Asian axis.

Great powers like Japan and India, secondary powers like South Korea and Australia, and the states of Southeast Asia could continue to engage economically and diplomatically with China, confident that their security ties with the United States constituted a hedge against falling under Beijing's sway. In turn, China's development would be shaped by the combination of engagement with the United States and its friends in Asia and Europe, and by the deterrent effect of America's forward military presence and alliance commitments. These raise the costs of Chinese adventurism, allowing Beijing to focus its resources on internal development and peaceful external engagement -- rather than on wielding its growing power to revise Asia's order through coercion.

(Continued at the link below)

http://shadow.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/12/10/global_trends_2030_pathways_for_asia_s_strategic_future

Why Asia’s Insurgencies Are Europe’s Shame

I wonder what the author would recommend to replace the system of nation-states in Asia since the European model is the reason for all the problems in Asia?

Excerpt:

The European idea of the nation-state, realized after much horrific bloodshed in Europe itself, was always a poor fit for Asia’s diverse mosaic.
…
For Asian nations beset by their own present and potential ethnic cleansers, it is even more important to remember the relative youth of sectarian nationalism on the continent -- and the long centuries when it did not exist.

He seems to argue for secessionist movements.  That seems fine but groups like the MILF have to secede from a nation-state and the nation-state still exists after succession.  And he does not mention that the earlier successionist insurgency in the Philippines, the MNLF has not been very successful and still depends on the nation-state as the MILF will likely as well..  It would be interesting to hear from the author what he thinks should replace the nation-state.  I guess I will have to read his book to find out.

Of course the fundamental US value does apply here and that is self determination – the right of the people to determine how they should be governed. It will be interesting to see how things play out in Asia and what the MILF example portends for other insurgent groups and the governments (nation-states) they are rebelling against.

V/R

Dave

Why Asia’s Insurgencies Are Europe’s Shame

By Pankaj Mishra 

December 10, 2012 6:30 PM EST

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-10/why-asia-s-insurgencies-are-europe-s-shame.html

It wasn’t an incredible photo-op, and it’s unlikely to be included in this month’s valedictory roundup of 2012 highlights. In fact, it was barely reported.

One of this year’s most remarkable events, however, was the agreement between the Philippine government and the insurgent group Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

If successful, it may not only terminate decades of secessionist violence in Mindanao, the second largest island in the Philippines; it may also inspire hope in a wide swath of Asian countries damaged, politically as well as economically, by internecine conflicts.

Divide-and-rule European imperialists, favoring one ethnic group and persecuting or neglecting another, or drawing arbitrary lines in the sand or the grass, originally transformed social and religious differences into political antagonisms within Asian societies. Their local opponents -- mostly educated natives -- hardened religious and ethnic identities by turning them into a basis of anti-imperialist solidarity.

In the end, the principle of self-determination was widely exported from relatively homogenous Europe to multicultural Asia, where it was embraced by rising native elites. The result was the proliferation of hastily and poorly imagined national communities -- unwieldy nation-states where patchworks of relatively autonomous groups and individuals with multiple, overlapping identities had existed.

Since then, postcolonial rulers eager to hold on to their inheritance -- centralized states, administrations and large, resource-rich territories -- have made the map of Asia bleed red.

Tamils in Sri Lanka, the Pattani Muslims in Thailand, Baloch secessionists in Pakistan, Uighurs in China’s Xinjiang province, India’s Kashmiri Muslims and northeastern minorities - - there is barely an Asian nation-state where centralizing governments haven’t fought, often with brute military force, to hold down religious and ethnic minorities.

The secessionists have occasionally succeeded, if after much horrific bloodshed, as in East Pakistan and East Timor. More often they have looked to be upholding doomed causes. But the tremendous strain of fighting them has had uniformly devastating results, whether in Indonesia, Thailand or Sri Lanka: an enhanced political and economic role for men in uniform, the diminishment of rule of law and the loss of civil liberties.

(Continued at the link below)

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-10/why-asia-s-insurgencies-are-europe-s-shame.html