Straight News: The leaders of Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand were once again invited to participate in the NATO summit. What does a gathering of NATO countries have to do with the countries of Asia and even Oceania? Is the "Asia-Pacific version" of NATO already on the verge of being called?
Wu Wei: Since the NATO summit was held in Madrid, Spain in June 2022, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand have been invited to participate for three consecutive years. You may be curious, isn't NATO called the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? How did you bring the Pacific Rim countries with you?
Here it is necessary for me to put another dark line of NATO's eastward expansion on the bright side. In fact, in the more than 30 years since the end of the Cold War, NATO has not only expanded eastward in Europe, but also in the Asia-Pacific region. In 2006, then-U.S. Ambassador to NATO Nuland first proposed the concept of "global partnership" in an attempt to expand NATO's influence in the Asia-Pacific region by establishing a "quasi-NATO membership" contact mechanism with Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Between 2012 and 2014, NATO signed "Individual Partnership and Cooperation Plans" with Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand. In 2023, NATO has further upgraded its relationship with Japan, South Korea, and Australia to a "tailor-made partnership program". In addition to the above-mentioned countries, India is also included in the framework of NATO's Joint Cyber Defense Center of Excellence.
For some time, the phrase "Asia-Pacific version of mini-NATO" has been very popular in the concept market, but I feel that this statement is not rigorous enough. Personally, I believe that the correct definition should mean that NATO is seeking eastward expansion in the so-called "Indo-Pacific" region. Whether it is the "European version of NATO" based on Brussels or the "Indo-Pacific version of small NATO" based on the "island chain", in the final analysis, it is controlled by the same brain, that is, Washington, the United States. This is not a new thing, but a typical "two-legged walk", with one foot in Europe and the other in the vast Pacific Ocean.
What is happening in the so-called "Indo-Pacific" region today gives me a strong sense of "déjà vu", and I believe that the underlying logic of NATO's eastward expansion is based on the game of sea power. Looking back at the past 30 years since the Cold War, the way NATO's eastward expansion has been realized in Europe has tightened the rope around Russia's neck at sea step by step. Today's Russia has to some extent lost access to the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea, and with the accession of some Nordic countries to NATO, the "frozen sea" of the Barents Sea is no longer peaceful. It is by gradually reducing Russia's sea power that NATO transmits pressure from sea to land to the ground. To some extent, I believe that the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine conflict is a sharp backlash triggered by NATO's step-by-step posture. It is presented in the form of a ground war, and that is only because Russia can no longer afford a fleet capable of fighting at sea.
Looking east along this logic, China does not have the same resource endowment as Russia, and its dependence on sea power is higher. NATO's eastward expansion in the so-called "Indo-Pacific" region was also launched from the sea, and the path is the same, that is, an attempt to reduce China's sea power and threaten China's maritime lifeline.
So guys, who said they didn't want to put the rope around China's neck again? How can we keep our enemies out of the country without developing a strong navy?
On the other hand, for NATO to truly realize its eastward expansion in the so-called "Indo-Pacific" region, it needs an imaginary enemy. How did the United States, as the leader of the alliance, unite its allies?
Wu Wei, Special Commentator: The formation of any military alliance requires a very convincing motive, and it may be a powerful external enemy, if not, then fabricate an imaginary enemy. Whether it was the dispute between the Allies and the Allies in World War I, the Axis and the Allies in World War II, or the military confrontation between NATO and the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War, this condition was met.
One of the key words you mentioned: integration. As the head of an alliance, it is extremely costly for the United States to coordinate the relations between so many allies. There is a very subtle key to this, if the power of the imaginary enemy from the outside is stronger, the stronger the centripetal force of the allies based on their own security considerations, and the integration cost paid by the alliance leader is relatively low.
The upcoming NATO summit in Washington will focus on two themes. One is the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and the other is the "Indo-Pacific" situation. To put it bluntly, NATO is trying to create a powerful imaginary enemy in the marketplace of ideas, the so-called "Sino-Russian military alliance". But is that really the case?
Remember how China and Russia define their bilateral relations? In May this year, Russian President Vladimir Putin visited China, and China and Russia jointly issued the Joint Statement on Deepening the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership of Coordination in the New Era on the Occasion of the 75th Anniversary of the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations between the Two Countries. The two sides pointed out that the current Sino-Russian relations go beyond the military-political alliance model of the Cold War period and are non-aligned, non-confrontational, and non-aimed at any third party. In other words, the bilateral relationship between China and Russia is not a military alliance at all, and if there really is such a so-called "Sino-Russian military alliance", then do you think it is still possible for NATO headquarters to point fingers in Brussels, Belgium? I have long since gone back to Washington.
At present, the US-led NATO is fabricating a false image in international public opinion: the so-called "China has provided military assistance to Russia." If just because China has not joined the ranks of some Western countries in sanctioning Russia, it can be recognized as military aid to Russia, then can we say that in addition to these Western countries, most countries in the world are "military aid to Russia"? This is simply a bandit logic.
Of course, there are differences between our perception and that of some Western countries. It is precisely this difference in perception that has led to the breeding ground for the "China threat theory". These countries that were born as "great powers" in history, and after a long time, everyone is a nail, and everyone thinks that the other party also wants to be a hammer. This is their path dependence and cognitive shortcomings confined to the history of colonial aggression, and it is the honey of mine and the arsenic of the other.
We may not be able to reverse this perception in the short term, but we must not forget that the world is not made up of just these "powers". There are many more countries that do not agree with the bandit logic of the "great powers" at all, because they have also been humiliated and colonized in history. And these countries, precisely pinning their hopes on China's rise, hold the same view as us: has it always been so, right? Humanity deserves a more equitable and just future.
China is determined to follow a path that is different from the expansion of the Western powers, based on the common destiny of mankind and the common heat of the world.
Author丨Wu Wei, senior chief writer of Shenzhen Satellite TV Direct News, and special commentator of Shenzhen Satellite TV's "Live Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan".
Editor丨Guo Yongji, chief writer of Shenzhen Satellite TV Direct News