To Win Asia, Let Her Go
Aaron Friedberg says the U.S. is endanger of losing its predominant status in Asia because of Chinese defense advancements:
After nearly two decades of double digit increases in defense spending, China is beginning to acquire capabilities that could pose a serious challenge to our long-standing position as Asia's preponderant military power. Unless we respond in a prudent and timely fashion, we could find that our commitments to defend our friends and interests in the region are no long regarded as credible. Over time this could eat away at the foundations of our alliances and diminish our ability to deter conflict.
Friedberg's has been the conventional wisdom in Washington when it comes to the disposition of America's defenses. Like all conventional wisdom, it's high time to reexamine it. It's unnatural for the U.S. to be the predominant military power in Asia (see: map) and China's investment in her military capabilities is a natural reflection of this and her growing economy. Insofar as it's a "long-standing" U.S. position to be the dominant military power in Asia, it was one born of the Cold War imperative to deny the Soviet Union access to Asia's industrial capacity and out of a justified fear that a re-militarized Japan would go on another imperial rampage. It was, in other words, a means to an end - not an end of itself.
Both of the threats that propelled America's military dominance in Asia are gone. Yet it remains important that the balance of Asian power favors the kind of open, international system in which both America and Asia, have thrived. The real question is whether China poses a threat to that system akin to the Soviet Union. To date I think we can conclude that they are not a threat to world order, and let's credit the Bush administration and Robert Zoellick for working to make China a "stakeholder" in the system.
Still, there's uncertainty as to how China will behave as she accumulates even more power and so it's necessary to hedge.
But rather than focus on the unsustainable, unnatural, and undesirable goal of being the lone Asian hegemon, the U.S. should, as Michael Lind suggests, ensure that the combined weight of America and her Asian allies stays well ahead of any state that wishes to overturn the balance to our detriment.
As Elbridge Colby has observed, an essential component of this strategy is to incentivize our Asian allies to invest more in their own defenses. That's not done by continuing to divert more American tax dollars to the Pentagon, but by quietly stepping back and forcing our allies to shoulder more responsibility.
