Indo-Pacific Eyes Turn to Washington and the Future of Alliances
Officials in capitals across the Indo-Pacific region are watching the U.S. presidential election closely. They are particularly interested in three questions: What is the next president’s worldview? How will the next president approach China? And how will he treat America’s allies in the region?
On the first question, Donald Trump defines US interests much more narrowly than Kamala Harris.
If Trump is not an isolationist, he is certainly iso-curious. He does not believe in the dominant tradition of American leadership. As he once said said“I am the president of the United States, I am not the president of the world.” Kamala Harris has a different view. At the Democratic National Convention in August, she said: promised to ensure that “America, not China, wins the competition for the 21st century, and that we strengthen, not abdicate, our global leadership.”
Trump is also hostile to free trade. He has promised 10% or even 20% tariffs on all imports into the United States, and even higher tariffs on Chinese imports. During the debate, Trump claimed “Other countries are finally, after 75 years, going to pay us back for all that we’ve done for the world.” While Harris is more pro-trade than Trump, that’s not saying much. She has a history of criticizing or voting against free trade agreements, and her campaign has promised “to implement targeted and strategic tariffs.” New U.S. tariffs, and the retaliation they would provoke from other countries, would be extremely damaging to Asian trading nations.
Second, how the next US president handles relations with China will matter greatly to states in the Indo-Pacific region. This is, after all, the most important bilateral relationship in the world.
Many worry that Trump is being too aggressive toward Beijing. But it is equally worrying that Trump is attracted to the idea of a grand deal with China, which could see him lose the security interests of the United States and its Indo-Pacific allies in exchange for trade concessions. After all, he is the man who has made the most progress. party Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago with ‘the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake’.
Harris would inherit from President Joe Biden a balanced policy of competition and cooperation with Beijing. But the Biden administration has been particularly focused on Asia. Typically, Democratic administrations pay more attention to transatlantic relations than transpacific relations. It is difficult to predict what kind of Asia policy President Harris would adopt.
Finally, the two candidates will not approach America’s Asian allies in the same way. Last time around, Trump treated his allies not as friends, but as profiteers. In fact, China and Russia would love to have alliance networks as powerful and profitable as those of the United States. Trump’s plans to “make America great again” neglect a fundamental pillar of American greatness: its system of global alliances.
President Biden has taken an ally-first approach to Asia. The administration has brought Japan and South Korea closer together, accelerated U.S. ties with India and Vietnam, established AUKUS (the trilateral security arrangement between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States), and convened the Quad (Australia, India, Japan, and the United States) and the Squad (Australia, Japan, the Philippines, and the United States).
As Biden’s vice president, Harris visited four of Washington’s five Asian allies — Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Thailand — with the exception of Australia. Questions remain about what she would do as president and how she would strengthen Washington’s relationships with its allies and among them.
Given the worldviews of both candidates and their likely approaches to China and alliances with the United States, officials in most allied capitals in the Indo-Pacific region would like Kamala Harris to defeat Donald Trump in November. Of course, allies don’t get to vote.