Straight News: What do you think about United States President Joe Biden's first summit of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue leaders at his home in Delaware?
Special Commentator Liu Heping: In fact, there are still a few months left, and President Biden, who has withdrawn from the re-election race, will end his term. Therefore, it is also time to take stock of the diplomatic achievements of the four years of Biden's administration.
I think to be honest, Biden has achieved certain "results" at the diplomatic level in the past four years, including using the deterioration of the situation between Russia and Ukraine to activate NATO, which is in a state of "brain death", and re-tying the once alienated EU to his "belt"; In the Asia-Pacific region, it has consolidated and reshaped the alliances between the United States and Japan, the United States and South Korea, and the United States and Australia, and built the military alliance of the United States, Britain and Australia. and after the outbreak of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, it basically took control of the situation and did not escalate the war, and so on. However, only at the level of the "Indo-Pacific Strategy", especially in the construction of the "Quadrilateral Security Dialogue" mechanism between the United States, Japan, India and Australia, is basically in a state of incompletion.
The main reason behind this is that Trump's replacement of the Asia-Pacific strategy with the "Indo-Pacific strategy" was a wrong choice in itself. Although the "Indo-Pacific strategy" seems to be very beautiful, it can take advantage of the contradiction of Sino-Indian territorial sovereignty disputes to pull India in to contain China, realize the linkage between the India Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, and then encircle China in all directions at sea, but what the United States did not expect is that it is precisely India that drops the chain in the "Indo-Pacific strategy". The reason why India dropped the chain is, first, because India's mind is only optimistic about the India Ocean and has no interest in the Pacific region; Second, in recent years, the conflict between the India government and Sikhism has led to a violent "clash of civilizations" between United States and India. Third, because after the deterioration of the situation between Russia and Ukraine, India not only did not follow the West to sanction Russia, but supported Russia by purchasing a large number of Russia's oil and gas resources. All these have made it difficult to sustain the "face-to-face incompatibility" between the "Indo-Pacific Strategy" and the "Quadrilateral Security Dialogue" mechanism.
It is for this reason that I believe that Biden's meeting of the leaders of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue in his own home, although it seems to be casual and casual, is actually cheering up and smiling.
Straight News: The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue Leaders' Summit will also focus on the sovereignty dispute between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea.
Special Commentator Liu Heping: I think that if Biden's Indo-Pacific Strategy and the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue mechanism are unfinished, then Biden's South China Sea strategy in the past four years can be concluded to be a basic failure.
As you know, the core of Biden's South China Sea strategy is to use the dispute between China and the Philippines over sovereignty in the South China Sea as a starting point to provoke confrontation between China and Southeast Asian countries, especially the relationship between China and ASEAN, and then let ASEAN join the "Indo-Pacific strategy". However, due to the "bounce" of the United States in supporting the Philippines, this not only caused the Philippines' confidence in the United States to be shaken, but also caused the rest of the Southeast Asian countries to see through the United States's tricks. Therefore, we see that in the four years of Biden's administration, first, the remaining countries with sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea with China did not accept the instigation of United States to launch a provocation against China after the Philippines, second, China's relationship with ASEAN remains the same, and no other Southeast Asian countries follow the Philippines and choose sides between China and the United States, and third, no country has publicly stated that it wants to join the "Indo-Pacific Strategy".
In my opinion, in support of the Philippines' intervention in the dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea, the reason why the Biden administration will "skip the ticket" is mainly because the United States itself is stuck in three strategic dilemmas and cannot extricate itself. First, the drunkard of the United States does not mean to drink, and its real purpose in instigating the Philippines to provoke a dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea is to use the unique strategic geographical location of the Philippines to encircle the Taiwan Strait, not to help the Philippines compete for sovereignty in the South China Sea. Second, when it is already inadequate to deal with the situation between Russia and Ukraine and the situation in the Middle East, United States is unable to open up a third battlefield in the South China Sea. Third, United States' strategy toward China is to compete and confront, but not to break Sino-US relations, especially not to trigger a war between China and the United States, and to help the Philippines intervene in the dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea at the military level is obviously not in line with the bottom line of "China and the United States fight without breaking" set by the United States itself.
In addition to these three strategic dilemmas, United States' involvement in the dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea also faces an insurmountable tactical dilemma. Because the dispute between China and the Philippines over sovereignty in the South China Sea does not occur in the Philippines itself, but in the disputed waters between China and the Philippines, United States to intervene is a legal master, and more importantly, China uses asymmetric tactics against the United States, that is, when we deal with the dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea between China and the Philippines, we have never dispatched the navy, but only dispatched administrative law enforcement forces, that is, the coast guard, which has led to the seemingly powerful United States navy, which cannot help at all when dealing with the sovereignty dispute between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea. Can't find a focal point.
I believe that it is precisely because it is unable to deal with the sovereignty dispute between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea alone that the Biden administration is ready to throw this burden on the "Quadrilateral Security Dialogue" mechanism of the United States, Japan, India and Australia, and is ready to let them help save the day.
(From left) United States President Joe Biden, Australia Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and India Prime Minister Narendra Modi (data photo)
Straight News: One of the important agendas of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue between the United States, Japan, India and Australia, led by the Biden administration, is to prepare to use the coast guards of the four countries to conduct joint patrols. What do you think about this?
Special Commentator Liu Heping: To be honest, when I first saw the news, I really couldn't believe my eyes. As we all know, the original intention of the four countries of the United States, Japan, India and Australia to implement the "Indo-Pacific Strategy" and establish the "Quadrilateral Security Dialogue" mechanism is to comprehensively contain and contain China from the sea under the guise of "maintaining a free and open India Pacific". In other words, this was originally a so-called grand strategy that seemed to belong to the ideological and security level, and this grand strategy was to be implemented by the military forces of the United States, Japan, India, and Australia. However, this four-party summit discussed the use of the coast guards of the four countries to conduct joint patrols in the "Indo-Pacific region", and aimed at Chinese fishermen who legally fish on the high seas, which not only deviates from the original intention of the so-called "maintaining a free and open India Pacific", but also the "Indo-Pacific strategy" is downgraded from the strategic level to the tactical level, from the level of maintaining ideology and security, to the level of administrative law enforcement.
So the question is, why did the United States, Japan, India, and Australia, especially the Biden administration, do this, and what is the intention of this move? In my opinion, this action of theirs is actually a false shot, and it is fake to deal with Chinese fishermen, but it is real to deal with Chinese coast guard. Or rather, they are just a high-sounding excuse to jointly dispatch the coast guards of the four countries against the Chinese coast guard under the guise of dealing with Chinese fishermen. The reason behind this is not only because the Chinese coast guard is the real guardian saint of Chinese fishermen, and they jointly dispatch the coast guard to deal with Chinese fishermen, they will inevitably face up to China's coast guard, and more importantly, China's use of the coast guard to deal with the sovereignty dispute in the South China Sea between China and the Philippines over the years has achieved very obvious results, making great contributions to safeguarding China's sovereignty in the South China Sea, the East China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, and at the same time making the powerful maritime military force of United States in a situation where "the tiger eats the sky and does not know where to start". The state of being in a hurry and having no way to find a legal, effective and legitimate focus. It was in this context that they decided to unite with the coast guards of the four countries to deal with the Chinese coast guard in the name of "protecting fisheries" in order to solve the embarrassment of not being able to dispatch a navy to deal with the Chinese coast guard.
If the United States, Japan, India, and Australia really reach a consensus on this, it means that the curtain will officially open on the head-to-head game between China and the maritime administrative law enforcement forces of the United States, Japan, India, and Australia, and in the future, when China deals with the sovereignty disputes in the East China Sea, the South China Sea, and the Taiwan Strait, especially the dispute over sovereignty in the South China Sea, it may encounter the coast guard jointly established by the United States, Japan, India, and Australia.
Author丨Liu Heping