Our So-Called Foreign Policy: It’s Official. Uncle Sucker is Back

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alliances, allies NATO, America First, Biden, deterrence, Donald Trump, Japan, North Atlantic treaty Organization, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, South Korea

If you think this title is too harsh, and especially if you agree with his view that maintaining U.S. alliances must be central to American foreign policy-making, you need to ask yourself this: How can some of the major points President Biden made in his speech Friday to an audience containing heads of major allied governments accomplish anything but keep the United States needlessly paying outsized costs for these arrangements and even worse, running major risks that include nuclear attack, for no good reason whatever?

As known by RealityChek regulars, downsides of American security alliances both in Europe and Asia that arguably were acceptable during much of the Cold War period have become terrifying and – because stemming from stubbornly hidebound thinking and consequent policy inertia – downright inexcusable more recently. That’s because physically devastated allies literally helpless against aggression in the earliest post-World War II decades, but nonetheless retaining vital economic and therefore military potential, had fully recovered by the mid-1970s, and because their continued defense free-riding led Washington to station sizable military units (and their dependents) directly in harm’s way.

The idea was that this U.S. presence’s very vulnerability to superior conventional forces from the Soviet Union and North Korea would deter aggression to begin with. Forit would all but force a U.S. President to approve saving these American lives with nuclear weapons – whose use could trigger an all-out mutually devastating conflict.

This gamble could be defended when the United States enjoyed clearcut nuclear superiority over the Soviets, a nuclear monopoly and near-monopoly over the North Koreans and Chinese, respectively – and when allies and their potentially crucial assets were still down and out. But for many years, the nuclear gap has  closed in Europe and the the monopoly and near-monopoly in Asia vanished, and all allies in question have been amply wealthy enough to defend themselves. So Washington’s refusal to adjust means that the nation could well see nuclear warheads land on its soil because the Europeans, Japanese, and South Koreans have been permitted to be military deadbeats. Could any policy be more recklessly perverse, or determined to reward irresponsibility and cynicism?

Despite loudly griping about allied defense free-riding, raising the temperature in periodic defense burden-sharing negotiations, and rearranging some troop deployments in Europe, Donald Trump never frontally and comprehensively challenged the status quo, at least while President. Would a second term have been different? Who knows?

What is clear, especially from this latest speech by Mr. Biden, is that the United States will now be doubling down on this entire literal Americans Last strategy.

For not only did the President repeated the pre-Trump standard Washington endorsement of the core principle of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) that “An attack on one is an attack on all. That is our unshakable vow” – which inevitably tells the allies that they can continue free-riding militarily to their heart’s content and count on American protection no matter how potentially disastrous the consequences for the American people.

He actually praised “Europe’s growing investment in the military capabilities that enable our shared defense” even though these expenditure will be definition be utterly inadequate as long as their level leaves a military gap that American conventional and nuclear forces still need to fill.

Further, in declaring that he would not view U.S. alliances as “transactional” he assured America’s so-called partners that their relationships with Washington need involve no give and take whatever, thereby guaranteeing that these opportunistic governments would raise their chronic free-riding to much loftier levels, and that Americans would bear more of the costs and risks of these arrangements than ever.

And most foolishly of all, Mr. Biden explicitly told the Europeans (and consequently the Asians) that, after the stormy Trump years, it was up to the United States “to earn back our position of trusted leadership.” That is, the kinds (long overdue) burden- and therefore risk-sharing criticisms made by the former President were completely illegitimate, and that whatever ailed the alliances resulted from Trump’s America First words and (much more modest) deeds, not from decades of allied risk- and burden-shirking.

Of course, Mr. Biden’s words were actual U.S. policy for decades before the Trump years. That’s why these arrangements became so dysfunctional from any sensible American standpoint in the first place. But by making this approach explicit, and giving the Europeans and Asians official license for their longstanding “heads we win, tails America loses” priorities, the President has not only gravely weakened his own country’s safety and prosperity. He’s destroyed whatever legitimate hopes ever existed that multilateralism and collective security could ever adequately serve any reasonable definition of American interests.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Why China Really is Like Nazi Germany

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Albert O. Hirschman, allies, Biden, China, dumping, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, intellectual property theft, Japan, multilateralism, NATO, Nazi Germany, nuclear umbrella, Robert D. Atkinson, sanctions, South Korea, tariffs, tech industry, technology extortion, Trade, tripwire, Trump, {What's Left of) Our Economy

Because Nazi references can be so irresponsibly inflammatory, and therefore have been so often abused, I haven’t yet compared the threat posed by China to the rest of the world to that posed by Nazi Germany. (In my view, these comparisons have been used even more recklessly lately in U.S. domestic politics, chiefly to describe former President Trump and his views and policies.) So even though the People’s Republic, its ambitions, and its burgeoning capabilities do scare the living daylights out of me (and should scare you), I was nonetheless pretty surprised to see precisely this comparison just made by Robert D. Atkinson.

Atkinson is the head of a technology-focused Washington, D.C. think tank who I’ve known since the early 1990s. I’ve admired some of its work and haven’t been so crazy about other examples of its output, but I’ve never, ever considered him a boat-rocker, much less a rhetorical bomb thrower. In fact, my criticisms of the numerous studies and articles issued by his Information Technology and Innovation Foundation stem from my view that they’re way too cautious when it comes to countering China’s wide range of predatory economic practices (which include predatory technology policy practices like the theft and extortion of intellectual property).

And I’ve attributed much of this caution to the Foundation’s donor base – which is dominated by the U.S. and in some cases foreign tech and manufacturing companies that have worked so hard to send so much production and employment, and (voluntarily) so much technology to China for decades. It’s true that many of these firms are now crying foul as Beijing in recent years has aimed to strengthen its own entities’ positions at the foreigners’ expense. Yet their stubborn opposition to the unilateral Trump tariffs and some key sanctions on the Chinese tech outfits that have been major customers made clear their vain hope that they could somehow have their China cake and eat it, too.

Yet here comes Atkinson in the Fall issue of The International Economy (a publication that’s as – proudly – establishment oriented as they come) with a piece titled “A Remarkable Resemblance” likening China’s international economic policies to those of “Germany for the first forty-five years of the twentieth century” – which of course include the twelve Nazi years (1933-1945).

As the author argues, Germany during these decades was:

“a ‘power trader’ that used trade as a key tool to gain commercial and military advantage over its adversaries. Likewise, China’s trade policy is guided neither by free trade nor protectionism, but by power trade, with remarkably similar strategy and tactics to those of 1940s Germany. Understanding how Germany manipulated the global trading system to degrade its adversaries’ capabilities, entrap nations as reluctant allies, and build up its own industries for commercial and military advantage, just as China is doing, can shed light and point the way for solutions to the China challenge.”

Atkinson reports that this description of German policies came from a 1945 book by the important economist Albert O. Hirschman, which concluded that “[I]t’s is possible to turn foreign trade into an instrument of power, of pressure, and even of conquest. The Nazis have done nothing but exploit the fullest possibilities inherent in foreign trade within the traditional framework of international economic relations.”

The author rightly observes that

“Hirschman’s key insight was that some countries— in this case Germany under three very different government regimes from 1900 to 1945—focus not on maximizing free trade or even on protecting their industries, but on changing the relative power of nations through trade to achieve global power. Germany’s policies and programs were designed not only to advance its own economic and military power, but to also degrade its adversaries’ economies, even if that imposed costs on their own economy relative to a free trade regime.”

Germany also consistently sought, as the author points out “to make it more difficult for its trading partners to dispense entirely with trade with Germany, thus creating dependency.” And if that’s not enough to convince you about the comparison with China today, Atkinson himself notes that the German policy recipe also included massive industrial espionage, and Hirschman identified a major element as the equally massive dumping (selling at prices way below production costs) of goods into foreign markets to destroy overseas competition.

Atkinson’s diagnosis of the problem is so spot-on that it makes his recommended solution especially disappointing. Kind of like President Biden, he believes that the best internationally oriented option by far (on top of more effective support for U.S. industry, which I strongly support) is forming a “NATO for trade” that would be

“governed by a council of participating [free trading] countries…if any member is threatened or attacked unjustly with trade measures that inflict economic harm, DATO [the “Democratically Allied Trade Organization] would quickly convene and consider whether to take joint action to defend the member nation.”

I’ve already pointed out that the consensus on standing against China economically among America’s allies is way too weak to enable such multilateral approaches to succeed. But as long as we’re talking in terms of NATO – the military alliance between the United States and much of first Western and now Eastern Europe – and the Cold War, let’s not forget two other big problems. First, NATO (and this also goes for America’s security ties with South Korea and Japan) was never so much an alliance as a protector-protectorate relationship. The vast bulk of the heavy lifting was always done by the United States.

This allied security dependence in turn has produced the second major obstacle to a DATO’s effectiveness. Because the United States coddled allied defense free-ridingcand opened its markets one-sidedly for so long, the allies’ protectorate status was substantially cost-free economically, and even came with trade rewards no other country could remotely offer. (In addition, as I’ve also written, the creation of an American nuclear umbrella combined with the stationining of U.S. “tripwire” forces on the NATO frontlines in Germany also greatly minimized the military risks of siding with Washington.)

Today, however, economic power between the United States and the allies is more evenly distributed, and the allies’ profitable trade with and investment in China has, as noted in my aforementioned writings, greatly increased the economic price they would pay for lining up against China.

Still, by comparing the China threat to the Nazi threat, Atkinson’s article significantly bolsters the case for the United States escalating its response to the “all of society” level – or at least intensifying it qualitatively. Let’s just hope, as the author writes, that this time around the United States fully awakens a lot faster.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Trumply Deranged Coverage of a Trump Security Policy Win

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alliances, allies, America First, burden sharing, deterrence, Financial Times, globalism, James White, Joe Biden, military spending, North Korea, nuclear weapons, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, South Korea, tripwire, Trump

I know that there’s lots more to say about last week’s outrageous Capitol Hill riot and its political and even broader fallout, but sometimes a news development comes along that’s so underappreciated and at the same time so poorly reported that I just couldn’t resist weighing in right away.

I’m talking about decisions being made in South Korea to become more militarily self-reliant, and the way they were reported in the Financial Times a week ago. The article, by Edward White, had it all as far as my Trump-y, America First-type worldview is concerned: an (apparently unwitting account) of signs of a clearly emerging potential triumph for this approach to U.S. foreign policy; a comparably stinging (and unwitting) rebuke of its globalist counterpart; a complete failure to mention the benefits for the United States (as opposed to the impact elsewhere) coupled with  attempts by globalist supposed experts focusinf singlemindedly on the downsides and ignoring the consequences for Americans; and just plain sloppy journalism.

As known by RealityChek regulars, the news that long-time military ally (or protectorate, depending on your point of view) South Korea is revving up its defense spending is an unalloyed good for Americans. For decades, Seoul’s skimpy military budgets, which remained modest despite the country’s phenomenal economic progress, required the United States to supply the conventional forces needed to defend it against a North Korean attack.

The large American troop contingent stationed right at the Demilitarized Zone, directly in the North Koreans’ invasion path, might have made sense when Washington had no reason to fear any conflict going nuclear, and indeed viewed its possession of these arms as a pillar of its strategy of protecting South Korea by deterring aggression (because North Korea had no nukes of its own that could hit the U.S. homeland in retalition). But since North Korea is at the least so close to possessing this capability, the American units have turned into a tripwire all too likely to expose Americans to these risks, thereby rendering the U.S. nuclear guarantee a prime example of policy masochism. (This post described the changing Korean peninsula and overall Asian security environment, and its implications for U.S. strategy, back in 2014.) 

As also known by RealityChek regulars, President Trump has displayed some awareness of this situation, and, as White has reported, has pressed the South Koreans to get their self-defense act together – though in his often typically incoherent way, focusing almost entirely during his term on securing more South Korean financing of the expenses of deploying the U.S. forces on the peninsula than on planning to withdraw, and thereby eliminate the nuclear risk to America that their presence creates.

But White’s article cites evidence that Seoul has interpreted Mr. Trump’s harangues about rip off-obsessed allies as a clear sign that the United States is no longer a reliable ally, and that South Korea needs to build the manpower and especially weaponry it will need if the United States flies the coop. Especially interesting is the apparent South Korean conviction that these preparations must be made even though alliance fetishizer Joe Biden will become President on January 20.

Clearly, nothing could be better for the United States, and just as clearly, Trumpian impatience – following decades of coddling free-riding by globalist American leaders – deserves most of the credit. Even if Biden has no intention of withdrawing the American troops and bolstering his own country’s security, at least one major argument against such a step would be eliminated if South Korea became self-reliant.

But none of this side of the equation will be found in the article. Instead, South Korea’s stated new strategy is depicted as an regrettably inevitable result of “Mr Trump’s treatment of long-term allies.” And of course, grave risks abound, including the chance that “The build-up could send unintended signals of aggression or weakness, inviting miscalculations or adventurism from countries including North Korea, China and Russia.”

Typically, however, these experts ignore the screamingly obvious: If the U.S. troops leave, any miscalculations or adventurism would be problems for South Korea and its neighbors, not for the United States.

As for the sloppy journalism, that comes in when White tries to show that South Korea has already been an impressive military spender:

“South Korea’s annual defence bill is already high compared with those of many countries of a similar size and wealth. Military spending as a percentage of government expenditure was 12.7 last year, according to Stockholm Peace Research Institute data, ahead of 9.2 per cent in the US and the UK’s 4.5 per cent.”

To which the only serious response is, “Seriously?” Because why should anyone except an apologist care how Seoul’s defense spending compares with similarly sized or wealthy countries, much less with the United States’? After all, almost none of these countries lives in what’s probably the world’s most dangerous neighborhood, with an utterly deranged, nuclear-armed regime right next door for starters? Given South Korea’s (great) wealth, and North Korea’s impoverishment, the only important gauge of the adequacy of Seoul’s military budget is whether it can meet South Korea’s needs. And obviously, there’s a long way to go in this respect.

Moreover, even anyone who puts any stock in the numbers mentioned by White needs to ask themselves why the emphasis is on percentages of government spending? What actually counts is percentage of gross domestic product (GDP, or the entire economy). Because it’s the share of total national resources devoted to defense that genuinely makes clear the priority it enjoys. And with 2.7 percent the figure for highly insecure South Korea, according to the latest available data, and 3.4 percent that for the highly secure US of A, the only accurate way to describe defense as a South Korean priority is “not real high.”

Don’t get me wrong: As a sovereign country, Seoul has every right to skimp on defense spending. It also has every right to try to make another country bear an outsized measure of cost and risk for this decision. But the equally sovereign United States has every right to refuse to keep playing Uncle Sucker, especially when North Korea’s nuclear weapons make the stakes so potentially catastrophic. America’s outgoing President understood this, however imperfectly. Anyone believing that America’s security (especially from nuclear attack) needs to come first for Americans should be hoping that the nation’s incoming President quickly gets on this wavelength.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Out of the Mouths of Generals

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alliances, America First, Associated Press, Blob, China, deterrence, globalism, Jim Mattis, Joe Biden, Mark Milley, North Korea, nuclear umbrella, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, Poland, South Korea, Soviet Union, tripwires, Trump

Here’s one that genuinely justifies that over-used term, “You can’t make this up.”

Practically ever since President Trump assumed office, his globalist foreign policy critics have been attacking his claims that maintaining the status quo with U.S. security alliances couldn’t be a top priority of American foreign and national security policy. In this vein, they contemptuously derided as “transactional” his belief that rather than viewing these arrangements as vital ends in and of themselves, Washington needed continuously to make sure that they were creating at least as many benefits as problems for the nation.

Indeed, fetishizing alliances was so deeply embedded in the consciousness of the globalist bipartisan U.S. foreign policy Blob that Jim Mattis, the retired Marine Corps General who served as the first Trump Secretary of Defense, based his resignation largely on the argument that the President did not share his “core belief…that our strength as a nation is inextricably linked to the strength of our unique and comprehensive system of alliances and partnerships.”

So imagine my surprise upon reading an Associated Press story Thursday reporting that U.S. Army General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff (the nation’s top military office), has recommended that Washington – obviously meaning the probably incoming Biden administration – should reconsider “permanently positioning U.S. forces” overseas in instances where these servicemen and women are not actively engaged in combat.

Now it’s true that Milley, at least reportedly, was never especially tight with Mattis in particular. But in this age of political generals and admirals, he couldn’t have risen through the ranks this high had he dissented significantly from the globalist line. And Milley has spoken of the need for U.S. alliances in pretty urgent terms himself.

But there he was this past week, giving a speech on the future of warfare that not only called for more selectivity in creating and maintaining an American military footprint abroad, but basing this proposal largely on his unhappiness – and this is the real shocker – that the so-called forward deployment of these units has usually been accompanied by the families of soldiers, sailors, and airmen, and therefore places them in harm’s way.

His position is a shocker because, as I’ve explained before, stationing spouses and children so vulnerably has been a linchpin of globalist strategy toward alliances. They play a crucial role in turning the units they’re linked with into genuine tripwires – forces whose likelihood of defeat at the hands of much larger and stronger invaders like the Soviets or the North Koreans would give an American President little choice but to use nuclear weapons to avert disaster.

Of course, this approach didn’t stem from itchy nuclear trigger fingers in Washington. Quite the opposite: The working assumption was that the high probability of U.S. nuclear weapons use would deter conventional military aggression to begin with. And the probability that their attacks would wind up killing American non-combatants as well as troops was seen as an even stronger forcing event for nuclear weapons use – a situation that, in strategic parlance, would make this contingency more credible, thereby further inhibiting (or, again using strategy-ese, deterring) enemies from striking.

Skeptical? This is exactly why countries like Poland have been urging recent American Presidents to replace the policy of rotating various U.S. units in and out of their lands with big, permanent deployments. And weirdly and alarmingly, Mr. Trump has taken some steps in this direction.

I’ve concluded that, although the creation of such so-called nuclear umbrellas was defensible during the Cold War, when it was used to protect genuinely vital regions like Western Europe and Japan, and when its use in Asia was aimed at prospective foes that lacked nuclear retaliatory forces, it’s recklessly dangerous today. For the Soviet Union is an increasingly distant memory, many major U.S. allies are amply capable of their own defense, Asian adversaries have become able to strike the American homeland with their own nuclear weapons, and the security of South Korea in particular is no longer crucial for the United States’ own safety and well-being (as opposed to Taiwan, which, as I’ve recently argued, has moved into this category because of its world-class semiconductor manufacturing capability).

Not even the America First-y President Trump has gone remotely this far in actually changing U.S. alliance policy. Yet there was Milley, including in his remarks the statement that if war came with North Korea, “we would have a significant amount of non-combatant U.S. military dependents in harm’s way….I have a problem with that.”

The General didn’t make the needed follow-on case that the presence of these civilians has turned these alliances into “transmission belts of war” that could easily go nuclear and bring on the incineration of entire American cities. But an administration that followed his recommendations would greatly reduce this unnecessary potential danger.

So whether Milley recognizes the full implications of his stance or not, all Americans should hope that he keeps pushing this position as he continues as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs past Inauguration Day, and that even some of the globalist enthusiasts of the Biden administration start listening.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Already, a Biden Misstep

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alliances, allies, Asia, Asia-Pacific, China, Demitri Sevastopulo, East China Sea, Financial Times, globalism, Japan, Joe Biden, Northeast Asia, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, Senkaku Islands, South Korea, Taiwan, Takeshima Islands, Yoshihide Suga

Now wait a second! For decades we’ve been hearing that possible President-elect Joe Biden is a foreign policy genius! Or at least that during his (47?) years in public life, he’s gained encyclopedic knowledge of the world and especially its flashpoints. (See, e.g, here.)

And just last night came the news that the former Vice President may have needlessly thrown the Northeast Asia security scene into major confusion over whether his administration will or won’t defend the Senkaku Islands.

Never heard of the Senkaku Islands? I’m tempted to forgive you. After all, they’re little than a bunch of uninhabited islets and rocks in the East China Sea. Although the surrounding fishing grounds seem to be fertile and there may or may not be undersea energy resources nearby, in and of themselves, their economic importance at present appears marginal.

Their strategic importance, in terms of controlling sealanes close to the economic goliath of Northeast Asia could be greater. But if so, we begin approaching why the Senkakus should be closer to your radar screen. For the islands are claimed by no fewer than three countries: Japan (which currently “administers” them, China, and Taiwan. The first is a formal U.S. treaty allly, the second has become arguably America’s chief strategic rival both in the Asia-Pacific region and globally, and the third an historical part of China that Beijing seems increasingly determined to regain – and by force if necessary.

Moreover, since the Obama administration clarified the matter in 2014, it’s been U.S. policy to regard the Senkakus as Japanese territory that, under the terms of the two countries’ security arrangement, the United States is bound to help Tokyo defend against attack. And in principle, this includes nuclear weapons use – a major concern since the likeliest attacker these days, China, has lots of nukes of its own capable of reaching the U.S. homeland.

Or is this still U.S. policy? As widely reported yesterday, Biden issued a statement reaffirming the 2014 commitment (made of course when he was Vice President). At least that’s what new Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga claims Biden told him in a phone call. But as alertly caught by the Financial Times‘ Demitri Sevastopulo,

“In a summary of the call provided to the media, the Biden transition team said the president-elect had ‘underscored his deep commitment to the defence of Japan and US commitments under Article V’ [of the security agreement] but did not refer specifically to the Senkaku. A transition team spokesperson declined to comment beyond the content of the summary.”

Isn’t this exactly the kind of confusion an experienced foreign policy hand should know how to avoid? And in particular, one who’s made “renewing” and “restoring” these arrangements after four years of a supposedly destructive Trump approach a hallmark of his global strategy?

Nor does the confusion stop there, for the Senkakus aren’t the only disputed islands in Northeast Asia. Don’t forget the Takeshima Islands. Or should they be called by their Korean name – Dokdo? Because they’re claimed by both North and South Korea, as well as Japan. Since South Korea is a U.S. security ally on a par with Japan, do they qualify for American-aided protection, too? If the North Koreans attempt a grab, that would seem like an easy call. (Of course, never forgetting that the North Koreans may well possess nuclear weapons that can hit the continental United States, too – or soon will.)

But what if South Korea attacks them and Japan invokes its U.S. treaty obligations? Wouldn’t Tokyo have every reason to believe that the Senkaku formula applies to the Takeshima/Dokdos, too? And what about the reverse situation – a South Korean attack? Would a Biden administration spokesperson be content to leave those countries in the dark about America’s real policy, too?

These scenarios may seem far-fetched. But only a little while ago, so did a pandemic that would kill hundreds of thousands of Americans and millions around the world, and cripple the U.S. and global economies. I don’t recall the September 11 terrorist attacks being widely predicted, either.

Precisely because, for a globalist alliance worshipper like Biden, there are no easy answers to the Senkakus and Takeshima issues (and please don’t take my use of the Japanese names as an endorsement of Tokyo’s claims), the best maxims to follow are “Do no harm” and the closely related “Keep them out of the news.” Worrisomely, they’re two maxims that the ostensible master strategist who might become America’s next President seems to have completely forgotten.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Big Decisions Coming on Asia

Tags

Asia, Asia-Pacific, Central America, China, containment, currency manipulation, deterrence, East Asia-Pacific, Japan, Mexico, New Journalism, Norman Mailer, nuclear deterrence, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, semiconductors, South Korea, Taiwan, tripwire, U.S. Army, Vietnam, Walker D. Mills, Western Europe

Whenever I think about what to blog about, I ask myself a question that I first heard one of my all-time writing idols raise many years ago when he faced similar decisions. The occasion came during a college writing seminar where the guest lecturer was none other than Norman Mailer.

The seminar probably took place sometime in 1974, and one of my fellow students asked Mailer why he hadn’t turned out anything about the Watergate scandal. I had been wondering this myself, since Mailer’s world renown by then stemmed both from his novels and from his forays into the “new journalism” that was emerging in that era, in which gifted writers tried to employ some key techniques from fiction (especially their keen insights into human nature and their considerable descriptive and narrative skills) ito shed light on the events of the day. On top of turning out numerous important non-fiction works, Mailer had also run (unsuccessfully) for Mayor of New York City in 1969. So he was by no means shy about sounding off on headline subjects, and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one of his fans anxious to hear about the Nixon-centric drama.

But his answer was disarmingly simple. He decided to give Watergate a pass because he couldn’t think of anything distinctive and important to say.

And that’s an (admittedly roundabout) way of explaining why today’s post won’t be about any aspect of President Trump’s contraction of the CCP Virus. At the very least, events are moving so quickly that it’s hard to know the score. Instead, I’m focusing on foreign policy, and in particular two major, under-reported developments in U.S.-Asia relations that are underscoring the return of Cold War-like challenges across the Pacific, but that should be teaching American policymakers very different lessons.

I’ve already dealt to some extent with the first here on RealityChek: The U.S.’ loss of global leadership in the manufacture of cutting-edge semiconductors to companies in South Korea and especially Taiwan. In a journal article scheduled for publication this week, I’ll be laying out the key the technical details and some of the main policy implications. But in brief it amplifies my argument that the location of the world’s most advanced producers of the vital building blocks of modern economies and militaries right at China’s doorstep means that the defense of Taiwan in particular has now become a vital U.S. national security interest that requires the kinds of military forces and strategies (including a threat to use nuclear weapons) employed to protect major treaty allies like Japan and Western Europe both during the Cold War decades and since.

After all, those Cold War commitments – which exposed the United States to the risk of Soviet and to a lesser extent Chinese nuclear attack – were reasonably justified by the belief that Japan and Western Europe were centers of industrial and technogical power and potential that could create decisive advantages for the communist powers if they gained control or access to their assets. The importance of advanced semiconductors today means that Taiwan now belongs in the same category.

As I detail in the upcoming article, Washington has rightly been building closer diplomatic and military ties to Taiwan in response (though I also argue that it’s ultimately far more important for the United States to restore its semiconductor leadership ASAP). But this fall, an article in an official journal of the U.S. Army argued for taking a net step that, however logical, would be nothing less than momentous – and comparably sobering. In the words of Marine Corps Captain Walker D. Mills,

“The United States needs to recognize that its conventional deterrence against [Chinese military] action to reunify Taiwan may not continue to hold without a change in force posture. Deterrence should always be prioritized over open conflict between peer or near-peer states because of the exorbitant cost of a war between them. If the United States wants to maintain credible conventional deterrence against a [Chinese military] attack on Taiwan, it needs to consider basing troops in Taiwan.”

To his credit, Mills goes on to make explicit that such troops would in part be performing the kind of “tripwire” function that similar units in South Korea serve – ensuring that aggression against an ally ensures the start of a wider war involving all of America’s formidable military capabilities. The benefit, as always, would be to prevent such aggression in the first place by threatening consequences the attacker would (presumably) find prohibitive.

Where Mills (like U.S. strategists for decades) should have been much more explicit was in explaining that because the threatened major conflict could easily entail nuclear weapons use, and since China now in particular, has ample capability to strike the U.S. homeland, the deployment of tripwire forces can result in the nuclear destruction of any number of American cities.

So this course of action would greatly increase at least theoretical dangers to all Americans. But what’s the alternative? Letting Beijing acquire knowhow that could eventually prove just as dangerous? As my upcoming article demonstrates, the blame for this agonizing dilemma belongs squarely on generations of U.S. policymakers, who watched blithely as this dimension of the nation’s technological predominance slipped away. And hopefully, as I just stated, this predominance can be recreated – and dangerous new U.S. commitments to Taiwan’s security won’t become permanent.

But that superiority won’t come back for years. Therefore, it seems to me that, as nuclear deterrence provided for Western Europe and Japan succeeded in creating the best of both possible worlds for the United States, this strategy could well work for protecting Taiwan for essentially the same reasons.

I’ll just insist on one proviso: At some point before it becomes a fait accompli, this decision should be run by the American people – as has never been the case.

Unfortunately, as I’ve also pointed out, Taiwan has become so important to the United States that even an America First-inclined U.S. President will have to look the other way at its longstanding trade protectionism and predation in order to maintain close ties – just as it winked at German, Japanese mercantilism in particular during the Cold War. But that kind of linkage needn’t apply to other countries in East Asia (and elsewhere in the world), who lack the kinds of assets Taiwan possesses, and in that vein, I hope the Trump administration (and a Biden presidency, if the former Vice President wins in November) won’t let strategic considerations prevent a thoroughgoing probe of Vietnam’s possible exchange rate manipulation and one other trade offense.

The former concern, of course, stems from the effects of countries’ sometime practice of keeping the value of their currencies artificially low. An under-valued currency just as artificially lowers the prices of a manipulator’s goods and services in markets all over the world vis-a-vis their U.S.-origin counterparts, and therefore makes the latter less competitive for reasons having nothing do with free markets.

The argument against the investigation (which I’ve so far seen only on Twitter, but by folks who are thoughtful and well-informed) is that in an economic conflict with China, the United States needs all the friends it can get. In addition, these critics point out, if tariffs are placed on Vietnamese goods, then companies thinking of leaving China because of the Trump levies on hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of Beijing’s exports will face greater difficulties exiting, since Vietnam is such a promising alternative for so many products.

What these arguments overlook, however, is that, as a neighbor of increasingly aggressive China, and a country that’s struggled for centuries to prevent Chinese domination, Vietnam has plenty of powerful reasons of its own to help with any anti-China efforts initiated by the United States So it’s highly likely that Vietnam will keep cooperating with American diplomacy and other policies regardless of what the United States does on the trade front.

Moreover, Vietnam lacks Taiwan-style leverage over and value to the United States because it’s not a world-class producer of anything. So there’s no need for Washington to grin and bear Vietnamese trade abuses that may be harming the U.S. domestic economy.

And finally, although it’s great that Vietnam has been a prime option for companies thinking of moving factories and jobs out of China, it would be even better for Americans if those companies seeking low-cost production sites moved to Mexico or Central America, since greater economic opportunity for those Western Hemisphere countries will be so helpful to the United States on the immigration and drugs fronts.

Mark Twain is reputed (possibly incorrectly) to have said that “History doesn’t repeat itself but it often rhymes.” That is, it holds important lessons, but discovering them can be challenging, and both American security and prosperity are about to depend heavily on U.S. leaders getting them right.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Why America’s Stakes in East Asia’s Security are Looking Vital Again

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allies, America First, China, East Asia, East Asia-Pacific, extended deterrence, free-riding, globalism, Intel, Japan, Joe Biden, manufacturing, Michele Flournoy, nuclear weapons, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, protectionism, Samsung, semiconductors, South Korea, Taiwan, Trump, TSMC

News flash! This past week I read a newspaper column by George F. Will that didn’t prompt me to say “What an ignoramus!’ In fact, not only did I learn something. I learned something so important that, in conjunction with some other recent developments, is causing me to rethink some long and deeply held ideas I’ve had about America’s grand security strategy in the East Asia-Pacific region.

Specifically, although Will’s own focus in the September 8 piece was who Joe Biden would pick as Secretary of Defense, the piece itself described some ominous changes in the U.S.-China military balance in Asia that call into question my main concerns about America’s approach to region, and especially what I’ve depicted as an increasingly dangerous reliance on nuclear weapons to deter Chinese aggression. Meanwhile, as I’ll detail in a forthcoming freelance article, two U.S. Asian allies – Taiwan and South Korea – whose value to the United States I’ve long insisted doesn’t remotely justify running such risks, are looking for now like critical assets.

To review, since the Cold War began, the United States has resolved to defend its East Asian allies in large part by using the threat of nuclear weapons use to persuade potential attackers to lay off. Presidents from both parties agreed that the conventional military forces needed to fight off China and North Korea (and early on, the Soviet Union) were far too expensive for America to field. Moreover, the Korean War convinced the nation that fighting land wars in Asia was folly.

Before China and North Korea developed nuclear weapons able to reach the U.S. homeland, or approached the verge (the case, it seems, with the latter), this globalist policy of extended deterrence made sense whatever the importance to America of Asian allies. For the United States could threaten to respond to any aggression by literally destroying the aggressors, and they couldn’t respond in kind.

As I noted, however, once China and North Korea became capable of striking the continental United States with nuclear warheads, or seemed close to that capability, this U.S. policy not only made no sense. It was utterly perverse. For nothing about the independence of South Korea and Taiwan, in particular, made them worth the incineration of a major American city – or two, or three. The security of much larger and wealthier Japan didn’t seem to warrant paying this fearsome price, either.

Greatly fueling my opposition to U.S. policy and my support for a switch to an America First-type policy of military disengagement from the region was the refusal of any of these countries to spend adequately on their own defense (which, in combination with U.S. conventional forces, could deter and indeed defeat adversaries without forcing Washington to invoke the nuclear threat), and their long records of carrying out protectionist trade policies that harmed the American economy.

As Will’s column indicated, though, the threat, much less the use, of nuclear weapons is becoming less central to American strategy. Excerpts he quotes from recent (separate) writings by a leading Republican and a leading Democratic defense authority both emphasize dealing with the Chinese threat to Taiwan in particular with conventional weapons. The nukes aren’t even mentioned. Especially interesting: The Democrat (Michele Flournoy) is his recommended choice to head a Biden Pentagon – and she’s amassed enough experience and is well regarded enough among military and national security types to be a front-runner. I also checked out the journal article of hers referenced by Will, and nuclear weapons don’t come up there, either.

Moreover, neither Flournoy nor her Republican counterpart (a former aide the late Senator John McCain) shies away from the obvious implication – accomplishing their aim will require a major U.S. buildup of conventional forces in East Asia (including the development of higher tech weapons). In fact, they enthusiastically support it.

Any direct conflict involving two major powers has the potential to escalate beyond the expectations of the belligerents. But certainly bigger and more capable American forces in East Asia would reduce the chances that war with China will go nuclear. So in theory, anyway, the nuclear dimensions of my concerns could be reduced.

Moreover, my willingness to run greater risks to safeguard Taiwan and South Korea in particular, and pay the needed economic price – even if they keep free-riding on defense spending – is growing, too. That’s because of the theme of that forthcoming article I mentioned: Intel, the only major U.S.-owned company left that both designs and manufactures the most advanced kinds of semiconductors, has run into major problems producing the last two generations of microchips. In fact, the problems have been so great that the company has lost the technological lead to South Korea’s Samsung and in particular to Taiwan’s TSMC, and their most advanced facilities are in South Korea and Taiwan, right on China’s rim.

Given the importance of cutting edge semiconductors to developing cutting edge tech products in general, and ultimately cutting-edge weapons (including advanced non-weapons electronic gear and cyber warfare capabilities), acquiring the knowhow to produce these microchips by whatever means – outright conquest, or various forms of pressure – would make China an even more formidable, and even unbeatable challenge for the U.S. military, at least over time.

So until Intel, whose most advanced factories remain in the United States, figures out how to regain its manufacturing chops, or some other U.S.-owned entrant rides to the rescue, there will be a strong argument on behalf of protecting South Korea and Taiwan against Chinese designs at very high risk and cost. And as noted above, Americans may even have to tolerate some more military free-riding along with, in the case of South Korea, fence-sitting in the overall U.S.-China competition for influence in East Asia.

At the same time, because of the military (including nuclear) risks still involved, seizing back control of the semiconductor manufacturing heights ultimately is the best way out of this bind for Americans. So shame on generations of U.S. leaders for helping this vulnerability develop by swallowing the kool-aid about even advanced manufacturing’s obsolescence and replacement by services. But this grave mistake can’t be wished away, or overcome instantly, either – though efforts to regain this lost tech superiority need to be stepped up dramatically. So shame on current leaders, their advisers, and wannabe advisers – whatever their favored foreign policy strategy – if they fail to acknowledge that dangerous new circumstances may be upon the nation, and the sharp imperatives they logically create. And that includes yours truly.

Following Up: It’s Fish-or-Cut-Bait Time for the U.S. Alliance with South Korea

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alliances, allies, America First, burden sharing, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, deterrence, globalism, North Korea, nuclear war, nuclear weapons, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, South Korea, The National Interest, tripwire, Trump, Wuhan virus

Just last week, I posted about how U.S. grand strategy in East Asia is heavily reliant on dangerously unreliable allies. So what a pleasant surprise to yours truly that the very day afterwards, polling data was published making clear just how fitting my description is of South Korea – a longtime bulwark of the American military position in the region. Just as important, the findings also confirm both (1) that the longtime strategy – which has largely continued during the Trump years – could result in American troops finding out during combat that forces and facilities they were relying on for support aren’t available after all; and (2) that coddling this fecklessness risks needlessly entrapping the United States into a nuclear war.

Although almost completely uncovered in the American media, the U.S.-South Korea alliance has been nearing a crossroads for months, as President Trump has insisted that the Seoul government pay more of the costs of stationing American forces on South Korean soil, and the South Koreans have responding with a mixture of grudging concessions at negotiations over the subject, and outright indignation. And in a July 23 National Interest post, a team of scholars from Western Kentucky University showed that a majority of the South Korean public feels exactly the same way.

There’s no question that, as a fully sovereign, independent country, South Koreans and their government have every right to hold whatever opinion they wishes about its security relations with the United States. But of course, Americans and their government are entitled to the same views, and it would be entirely reasonable to regard South Korea’s opinions and policies as complete – and dangerous – outrages.

As the Western Kentucky researchers show compellingly, numerous polls, as well as a recent survey of their own, show that strong majorities of South Koreans want the U.S. military to remain in their country because they believe that these forces are crucial to their own country’s security. But they’re also decidedly reluctant to accommodate the U.S. requests to shoulder more of the defense burden.

From an American standpoint, these attitudes would be understandable if any combination of the following conditions still described South Korea – it’s a poor country that can’t afford to defend itself adequately, or it’s already spending on its down defense to the max, or it doesn’t face very serious security threats to begin with. These conditions might also warrant cutting the South Koreans some slack when it comes to their resentment of President Trump’s allegedly heavy-handed approach to the issue – which the polls show tend to increase their unwillingness to pay more of the costs of hosting U.S. forces. After all, no one likes being bullied.

Here’s the problem, though, from an American standpoint: None of these conditions hold. And none are close to holding. For as of last year, South Korea was the world’s twelfth biggest economy, with total output of about $1.63 trillion. The gross domestic product of highly secretive North Korea’s is estimated at about $20 billion. That’s 0.01 percent of the South’s total. (Here‘s a handy source for the data.)

South Korea’s military spending isn’t real impressive, either. Both in absolute terms and as a share of its economy, it’s gone up. But as of last year, it was still only 2.7 percent of its gross domestic product. By comparison, the United States spends 3.4 percent of its economy on the military. (For both figures, click on this link.)

It can still be argued –as the Western Kentucky researchers maintain – that the South Koreans are already being more than generous in funding the U.S. military presence, and that a change in Trump attitude would likely induce more cooperation. But their defense burden-sharing views – as has been the case with so many others – weirdly ignore how the most valid standard by far is not whether the South Koreans (or any other U.S. ally) are paying as much as the United States for their defense or slightly more or slightly less or whatever. The most valid standard is whether they’re paying as much as is needed (adjusted for their capabilities of course) to defend themselves on their own. And the reason could not be more obvious: For all the talk of “common defense,” it’s their security that’s most at risk, not the United States’. (See my contribution to this anthology – from 1990 – analyzing this largely off-base burden-sharing debate.) 

And nowhere is this difference starker than on the Korean peninsula – on which South Korea is right next door to a North Korean regime that is widely described as dangerously aggressive or utterly deranged. Yet whatever you think of North Korea, nothing could be clearer than that it poses a much greater danger to South Korea than to the United States.

This observation, of course, brings us to the most completely unacceptable feature of this situation for Americans: It’s precisely because South Korea is flagrantly free-riding in defense matters that tens of thousands of U.S. troops need to be stationed right at the Demilitarized Zone dividing the peninsula, and why nowadays (as opposed to the period during which North Korea had no nuclear capabilities) their presence could well result in the U.S. homeland being hit by a North Korean nuclear warhead.

That’s because, as I’ve repeatedly explained, the mission of these U.S. forces isn’t to contribute a successful conventional military defense of South Korea.  They’re too weak – even with the help of the South Koreans.  Instead, their mission is to serve as a nuclear war tripwire – to prevent (or in the parlance of strategists “deter”) a North Korean attack in the first place by creating the danger that a U.S. President will respond to their imminent destruction by turning the conflict nuclear.  But however important South Korea is, is it really worth the complete destruction of a major American city, or two, that would result from a successful North Korean retaliation?

That this question has been evaded continuously by the U.S. government ever since North Korea’s nuclear forces began nearing intercontinental capabilities is appalling enough. That it’s still being evaded by a President supposedly devoted to America First principles – and now that Americans have had months of experience with the upheaval caused by a virus that for all its dangers can’t directly destroy any of the country’s infrastructure and the rest of its physical plant – is nothing less than masochistic. Indeed, compared with these nuclear issues, America’s legitimate gripes about finances are wildly misplaced, unless they’re seeking to pressure Seoul to become militarily self-sufficient – which they aren’t.

There’s one consideration that could overrule all these objections: If President Trump concluded that South Korea’s security was a vital American interest, and therefore by definition worth putting America’s very survival on the line for. But revealingly, no such utterances of the kind have issued from the administration. And if they had, of course, then the United States would automatically lose all its leverage in the defense costs talks with South Korea, as Seoul could be confident that America would (as so memorably pledged in former President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 Inaugural Address) “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship” to keep it free – and, incidentally, prosperous.

And here’s the icing on this cake: The public opinion findings presented by the Western Kentucky authors suggest that South Koreans on the whole aren’t so completely terrified by the threat from the North as Americans suppose them to be. For example, the authors’ own survey found that only 70 percent agreed that they were “concerned about North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.” And the authors report that “South Koreans were only mildly concerned about North Korea using military force against them ….”

Does this sound like an ally that’s certain to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Americans if military tensions in its own neighborhood approached the boiling point? That would promptly increase the preparations needed for imminent conflict? Or one that would keep hemming and hawing until the shooting actually started – and even afterwards attaching more importance to showing good faith to the North in hopes of halting the conflict than in mounting the most effective defense possible, much less helping the United State seize the initiative when the opportunity came? Anyone who believes that staunch South Korean backing can simply be assumed in any of these circumstances simply hasn’t been paying attention, and would be backing a policy sure either to produce calamitous defeat, or to push Washington to use nuclear weapons as a Hail Mary – and risk North Korean retaliation in kind.  

Finally, to return to a point made earlier: South Korea is a sovereign, fully independent country that’s completely entitled to pursue its own policy course. And if it’s not worked up about a North Korea threat to respond enough to give a joint defense of its territory a reasonable chance of success, it’s not for Americans to complain. Instead, it’s for them to either put their collective shoulder to the wheel and commit fully to defend the South come what may – or take the hint, get out of Dodge ASAP, and make sure they don’t have to pay the consequences if South Korea is wrong.

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Trusting Asian Allies to Help Contain China is Risky Business

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alliances, allies, Asia-Pacific, Aspen Institute, Cato Institute, China, East Asia-Pacific, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Jim Risch, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, Republicans, South Korea, Taiwan, Ted Galen Carpenter, Trade, Trump

Some leading Republican Senators are slated to introduce legislation today intending to fill what they see as a big and dangerous gap in U.S. globalization and national security policy: the alleged lack of a comprehensive strategy to push China to conform with international norms on trade and related business policies and practices, and to make sure that the People’s Republic doesn’t replace the United States as the kingpin of the East Asia-Pacific region.

I haven’t seen the bill yet, but this Financial Times report gives what looks like a pretty complete summary – which comes from the horse’s mouth (Idaho Republican Senator Jim Risch, the lead sponsor and the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee). Some of the economic proposals seem promising – although their focus seems to be China’s appalling human rights violations (about which the United States sadly can do little) as opposed to China’s economic predation (which Washington has considerable power to fight effectively).

As for the national security stuff – I really wish that Risch and his colleagues had consulted with Ted Galen Carpenter of the Cato Institute, one of America’s most trenchant foreign policy critics (and, full disclosure, a valued friend).

For in a new survey just posted by the Aspen Institute, Carpenter has made depressingly clear that one of the conditions most vitally needed nowadays for containing China’s growing military power and political influence in its back yard – reliable allies – simply doesn’t exist and isn’t likely to anytime soon.

Risch and Carpenter certainly agree on the importance of reliable allies, and apparently on their absence – although the former evidently and bizarrely believes that President Trump deserves at least part of the blame for the current unsatisfactory state of America’s regional security relationships. That take on the U.S. approach is bizarre because America (a) keeps running a growing risk of nuclear attack on the American homeland by stationing “tripwire” forces in South Korea largely because that wealthy country continues to skimp on its own defense; and (b) last I checked, America’s immense (and expensive) naval, air, and land deployments in the region were still fully intact.

And don’t just take my word for it: Carpenter lays out in painstaking detail how under President Trump the United States has actually clarified its rhetorical opposition to China’s territorial ambitions, stepped up its military operations in the Asia-Pacific region, and boosted military aid to Taiwan – which of course China views as nothing but a renegade province that it has every right to take back by force.

Regardless of what the United States is or isn’t doing, though, if U.S. alliances are going to be strengthened and oriented more explicitly against China, the allies themselves need to be at least as concerned about Beijing’s aims as Americans. That’s mainly, as Risch and his Senate colleagues note (along with yours truly over the years, as in the above linked 2014 RealityChek post), because China’s military buildup and modernization drive have eroded U.S. military superiority, and because if there’s anything worse than going to war without needed allies, it’s going to war with allies unlikely to help out once the shooting starts. And Carpenter revealed exactly how real that latter danger is by detailing just the latest instance of allied timidity:

“Washington is seeking backing from both its European and East Asian allies for a more hardline policy regarding China. The Trump administration exerted pressure for a strong, united response to Beijing’s imposition of a new national security law on Hong Kong. US officials wanted a joint statement condemning that measure and an agreement from the allies to impose some economic sanctions. However, the European Union collectively, and its leading members individually, flatly refused Washington’s request. With the exception of Australia, the reaction of the East Asian allies was no better. Japan declined to join the United States, Britain, Australia, and Canada in issuing a statement condemning the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China’s] actions in Hong Kong. South Korea seemed even more determined than Japan to avoid taking sides on the Hong Kong issue.”

And as the author rightly emphasizes, “Given the dearth of even diplomatic support from the allies for Washington’s Hong Kong proposal, there is even less chance that those countries will back a military containment policy against the PRC.”

A principal reason is money. Since the 1990s, America’s Asian allies (in particular, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan) have profited hugely from setting up electronics assembly operations in China and selling the final products (made largely of their own parts, components, and materials, and put together with their production equipment) to the United States. Why on earth would they want to break up this highly lucrative marriage of their technology on the one hand, and China’s low labor costs and lavish subsidies on the other?

To be sure, as noted repeatedly on RealityChek, China has been moving up the technology ladder, and replacing Made-Elsewhere-in-Asia inputs with its own manufactures. But it’s a long way from totally supplanting its neighbors’ products.

It’s true that American multinational companies also are guilty of feeding and profiting handsomely from the Chinese beast. And it’s equally true that pre-Trump U.S. Presidents have helped create the problem by coddling allied fence-sitting. But at least the Trump administration’s trade policies are striving to disrupt these U.S. corporate supply chains, and its tariffs are threatening the profitability of foreign-owned multinationals’ export-focused China operations.  Japan has followed suit on decoupling to a limited extent, and India – which has moved closer to the United States lately for fear of China – is increasingly wary of its own, much less profitable, entanglement with the People’s Republic. But even Taiwan keeps eagerly investing in China and thereby increasing both its wealth and its military power.

Neither Carpenter nor I support the goal of beefing up U.S. military China containment efforts in the Asia-Pacific region (though not for the exactly the same reasons). In fact, we both favor major pullbacks. But we both agree that if containment is to be pursued, Washington needs to do a much better job of lining up its local ducks. Otherwise, it could find itself either losing another war in Asia, or winning a victory that’s pyrrhic at best.

P.S. One of Risch’s co-sponsors, Utah Republican Mitt Romney, has just revealed that he’s especially clueless on the potential of rallying the allies. 

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: Closer U.S. Taiwan Ties Must Become a Two-Way Street

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alliances, allies, CCP Virus, China, coronavirus, COVID 19, decoupling, East Asia-Pacific, foreign investment, Hong Kong, Huawei, national security, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, South Korea, Taiwan, tech, Trade, Trump, TSMC, Wuhan virus

As if its CCP Virus coverup and planned crackdown on what’s left of Hong Kong’s freedoms weren’t bad enough, China has been escalating its aggressive words and deeds throughout its East Asia/Pacific neighborhood, and one major sign has been new pressure exerted on Taiwan – which Beijing views as a breakaway province that needs to end its rebellion immediately and join the Communist People’s Republic.

This more worrisome Chinese posture understandably has sparked calls for the United States to retaliate by demonstrating stronger support for Taiwan in various ways. This impulse also seems reasonable to me. But if the Trump administration speeds up its march down this road, it handles a closer relationship with Taiwan a lot better than its predecessors for decades had handled security alliance relationships with Japan and South Korea. Specifically, it’s crucial that Taiwan share much more of the burden of resisting China’s ambitions than has long been the case.

The latest alarm bells about China’s Taiwan policies have been set off by China’s words – or, more accurately, a missing word. Although the PRC (People’s Republic of China) has never renounced using force to achieve its longstanding aim “reunifying” China (as it defines the issue), its rhetorical positions toward the island have long fluctuated between the conciliatory and the blustery. But for 40 years, when Beijing mentioned of reunification, the word “peaceful” has always preceded it.

Last Friday, though, China’s second most important leader dropped the “peaceful” – and did it at a major forum: the annual meeting of the country’s rubberstamp parliament.

So it seems clear that the China cloud over Taiwan has darkened. But U.S. steps to bolster Taiwan’s security will greatly underperform – and may actually increase the dangers posed to America by China itself – unless Washington starts demanding in return that Taiwan stop its longstanding practice of investing massively in manufacturing in China, including in high tech sectors.

Indeed, as of 2018, according to this report, the total value of Taiwanese investment in China hit $180 billion – ten times the value of Taiwan’s investment in the United States. The annual amounts have been going down, but mainly because of the Trump administration’s tariffs on China, which have made it much more difficult for any factories in China – Chinese or foreign-owned – to earn fat profits by exporting major shares of their output to the United States. Even so, such investment had reached massive proportions. Indeed, in 2017. China still attracted nearly 45 percent of all Taiwan’s outbound foreign direct investment. Moreover, so much of this investment has come in technology sectors that fears have emerged of the island hollowing out its own innovation sector – which has been so vital to Taiwan’s spectacular economic development. And of course, Taiwanese companies like contract semiconductor manufacturing giant TSMC have been major suppliers of microchips and other high tech products to Chinese tech companies like Huawei, the global leader in advanced telecommunications.

It’s important to recognize that Taiwan is hardly the only U.S. ally that’s promoted China’s economic – and therefore technological and military – development. It’s not even the biggest. (That dubious honor goes to Hong Kong, but most of this Chinese “Special Administrative Region’s” direct investment flows to China seem to be concentrated in lower-tech, labor-intensive sectors without significant national security implications.) Moreover, the United States remains complicit itself.

But even though his administration doesn’t use the word, decoupling from China does appear to be a major goal of President Trump’s. There’s certainly been a lot of it. I’m not big at all on the United States embarking on a full-fledged campaign to mobilize East Asia/Pacific countries to out-compete China for influence in the  region. Indeed, I’ve argued that disentangling the United States from China economically is vital to ensure American security and prosperity on its own merits. But if President Trump does want to go the full-court anti-China press route, what’s the point if supposed American allies aren’t all-in on decoupling asd  as well?