Bidens security adviser tells Australia the US will be a power in Asia for decades
Joe Bidenâs national security adviser Jake Sullivan has declared his nation is a resident power in the Indo-Pacific region, telling Australians he rejects claims the United States doesnât have the staying power to remain in Asia in the face of a rising China.
Mr Sullivanâs declaration that America is ânot going anywhereâ is in stark contrast to former Australian prime minister Paul Keating, who on Wednesday said while the US should remain in East Asia as a âbalancing and conciliatingâ military power it would be significantly eclipsed by China over the coming years.
US national security adviser Jake Sullivan says the US has the staying power to remain in the region.Credit:AP
After delivering a wide-ranging address to the Lowy Institute on Thursday, Mr Sullivan also conceded there had been âsome challengesâ in the rollout of the AUKUS defence pact with Australia and Britain but he stopped short of criticising the Morrison government.
It came on the same day Chinese President Xi Jinping warned the region must not ârelapseâ into Cold War-style confrontation, which was widely seen as a criticism of groups such as AUKUS and the Quad partnership of Australia, the US, Japan and India.
Mr Sullivan also rejected comparisons to the Cold War, saying the US was instead moving forward with what President Biden calls âstiff competitionâ.
He said the US was going to âcompete vigorously across multiple dimensionsâ and âstand up for our valuesâ, but it also recognised that China was âgoing to be a factor in the international system for the foreseeable future â" itâs not going anywhereâ.
âAnd the United States is not going anywhere, and weâre not going anywhere in the Indo-Pacific either. And so weâre going to have to learn how to deal with that reality,â he said.
âWe are a resident power in the Indo-Pacific. You know, weâre resident as far west as Guam, in terms of actual American territory... Weâre resident with substantial long-term troop presence in Japan, in Korea, in Australia.
âAnd at any given moment, American surface and undersea assets are at work, enforcing freedom of navigation, engaging in exercises, engaging in work on humanitarian assistance and disaster response. And so we have been a resident power in the Indo-Pacific for decades. It is core to our being as a geopolitical actor. It is fundamental to our identity.â
Mr Sullivan said the Biden administrationâs strategy was to build âsituations of strengthâ with other countries âto deal both with the hard challenge of the rise of China and the enduring threat that Russia posesâ as well as other challenges.
He said the US wants to âset the terms for an effective and healthy competition with Chinaâ, while leaving open the door to cooperating with Beijing on areas such as climate change.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been forced to deal with the continued fallout of the AUKUS agreement to build nuclear submarines with the help of the US and Britain after it sunk a $90 billion deal with France to build conventionally powered boats.
French President Emmanuel Macron last week accused Mr Morrison of lying to him, while President Biden said that the handling of the decision was âclumsyâ and he had been under the impression the French were informed well in advance of the announcement in September.
Asked whether the US president was referring to Australiaâs handling of the announcement, Mr Sullivan said âwe have had to go through some challenges in dealing with the rollout and in how weâve tried to engage intensively diplomatically with the Frenchâ.
âI mean, this sincerely, I know it comes off as a sincere dodge â" but a dodge nonetheless â" is that I just think thereâs no profit in revisiting how we got to where we are,â he said.
âGoing back through all the ins and outs of this will be interesting for the historians to do at some point. But as National Security Adviser, Iâve got to keep sort of my eyes firmly fixed on the present and future.â
He said sharing nuclear technology with Australia was a âbig betâ and Mr Biden âwanted to say not just to Australia, but to the world, that if you are a strong friend and ally and partner, and you bet with us, we will bet with youâ.
In an appearance at the National Press Club on Wednesday, Mr Keating said Australia had tied itself to the USâs âwishful thinkingâ that it could be the security guarantor in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
The former Labor prime minister said China was âsimply too big and too central to be ostracisedâ and declared Australia was âat odds with our geography and we have lost our wayâ.
He also said Taiwan was ânot a vital Australian interestâ and labelled it a âcivil matterâ for China.
A spokesperson for Taiwanâs ministry of foreign affairs hit back on Thursday, saying the Taiwan Strait was âby no means a domestic matter between Chinese, and the security of the Taiwan Strait involves the stability and prosperity of the Indo-Pacific regionâ.
Japanâs embassy in Canberra also took issue with Mr Keatingâs attack on its ruling Liberal Democratic Party, which he claimed were the âthe Bourbons of the Indo-Pacificâ and should have reached âaccommodation with China years agoâ.
âThis is not the era of the Bourbons. This is an era in which the security situation in the Indo-Pacific is becoming more severe year after year,â Japanâs embassy said.
âThat is why the Embassy of Japan has no intention to comment on any outdated description of the challenges facing Australia and Japan.â.
Anthony Galloway is foreign affairs and national security correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via Twitter or email.
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