Far Eastern Economic Review, Jul/Aug, 2005

China’s Asian Ambitions
By Axel Berkofsky

Is China trying to push the U.S. out of East Asia and overtake it as the region’s dominant economic and military power? If one is to believe the rhetoric recently coming out of Washington, that is precisely what Beijing is aiming to achieve through the 2005 East Asian Summit, scheduled to take place in Kuala Lumpur in December.

Already in February, during talks with Singapore’s Foreign Minister George Yeo, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice voiced her concerns about the possibly “exclusive” and “inward looking” East Asian Summit. China expert Drew Thompson from the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies shares these concerns, maintaining that the inaugural summit bringing together the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, China, Japan, South Korea and India to discuss the establishment of the so-called East Asian Community is, in fact, a Chinese-led attempt to demonstrate that Asia no longer wants the U.S. to call the shots in a region. “This behavior fuels the feeling in Washington that Beijing is attempting to marginalize the U.S. and ultimately push it out of Asia,” Mr. Thompson wrote recently.

The summit’s agenda has yet to be formulated, and so far the parties involved have limited themselves to hoping that EAS will create the basis for an East Asian Community based on “common values” and a “common identity.” However, they have yet to define exactly what values and identity they have in mind. Such an approach does not give much reason to believe that East Asia is on the brink of some radical new master plan.

In fact, it is highly likely that concrete details of the shape of the proposed EAC and how it might look could take years to emerge, and very little of substance is expected to emerge from the summit. The discussion of possible EAC institutions that would be authorized to implement EAC policies, or even legally-binding decisions, have so far not made it onto the agenda.

So who is “in” and who is “out” in this soon-to-be formed club? In are the 10 Asean member states, as well as the Asean Plus Three dialogue partners: China, Japan and South Korea. Although not part of East Asia, India is also in, and Australia and New Zealand may be included one day. Geography, it seems, is relative. Out, at least for now, is the U.S., which has not been invited to Kuala Lumpur.

The original idea of an EAC can be traced back to the beginning of the 1990s, to an idea by Malaysia’s former prime minister, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, of an East Asian Economic Caucus, in which he foresaw Asians counterbalancing U.S. economic dominance in Asia. Dr. Mahathir’s vision, however, never made it beyond the planning stage, mainly because Japan and other Asian nations friendly to Washington were opposed to the chauvinistic if not hostile rhetoric toward the U.S. accompanying his concept of an “Asia for Asians only.”

The seed of the current concept of an EAC reappeared on Asia’s agenda after the Asian financial crisis of 1997. No concrete proposals on how to avoid a repeat of the financial crisis through meaningful economic and financial integration were discussed until November 2001 at the Asean Plus Three summit in Brunei. The East Asian Vision Group, initiated by former South Korean President Kim Dae Jung, submitted a report to the Asean Plus Three summit outlining details of the envisioned EAC. The report, titled “Towards an East Asian Community,” pictured an East Asia that will be transformed from “a region of nations to a bona fide regional community with shared challenges, common aspirations and a parallel destiny.”

However, it took Asean Plus Three another three years to come up with a date for the EAS, thanks to the “Asean way of diplomacy” of reaching a consensus after all parties involved decide to postpone or ignore all potentially controversial issues. It is unclear if the envisioned EAC will ever go beyond the stage of rhetoric and wishful thinking. Some analysts ask: Why should the vast EAC achieve more than the much smaller Asean has done in the 38 years since its inception? They point to the enormous obstacles facing the community, not least the enormous challenges posed by having China, Japan and India all at the same negotiating table—each with their own, often conflicting, agendas.

For its part, Beijing insists it will not use the EAC as a tool to promote its economic and political dominance in the region. Some Chinese scholars—aware of China’s growing power and influence—are less diplomatic, hoping that the P.R.C. will lead an economic and political bloc able to match the U.S. and Europe. There is, however, little doubt that China, the region’s assertive economic superpower, will pursue its own interests in the EAC, and not necessarily the region’s, and it would be naïve to think that Beijing is willing to subordinate its national interests to that of the EAC.

Japan and Singapore apart, Asian nations clearly are not keen to include the U.S. Asian leaders grumble that Washington does not seem to understand that economic development—not the fight against international terrorism—is at top of the agenda for Southeast Asian governments. China, on the other hand, does understand, and its initiative to implement a free trade agreement with Asean by 2010 gives hope to Asian leaders that China’s rise will indeed be peaceful and beneficial to those who elect to support Chinese-led integration in Asia. Rather than supporting the U.S. War on Terror, Southeast Asian nations seem willing to accept China’s leadership and dominance in order to promote economic integration and development.

Instead of suspecting a conspiracy against Washington and its allies in Asia, as other commentators suggest, the U.S. should instead become more active in the Asean Regional Forum and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, engaging multilaterally in Asian regional economics and security. The U.S., like the European Union, has a full seat in the ARF, but has in the past shown only very limited enthusiasm to contribute to regional security through the multilateral security forum. It now seems very likely that Secretary of State Rice will skip participation in the ARF’s annual meeting in Vientiane, Laos at the end of July, and send her deputy Robert Zoellick in her place. This decision seems to have confirmed suspicions that the U.S. doesn’t take ARF seriously, and other ARF members have expressed their annoyance. In contrast, China has undertaken several initiatives to strengthen the ARF, such as proposing that defense ministers attend meetings in order to improve transparency in Asia’s military affairs.

With the U.S. left out in the cold, and China becoming increasingly proactive in the region, who will be in the driving seat? At a meeting in April, Asean foreign ministers agreed that Asean would take the lead in the summit process, a plan that China seems to accept—at least on paper. Yet Wang Gungwu, director of the National University of Singapore, believes that China is not planning to turn into Asia’s Good Samaritan: “The message is clear. China’s choice is not made to please anybody. It is an integral part of China’s own future.”

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has already presented eight proposals to kick off the implementation process of the EAC, and offered to initiate a China-led feasibility study on the envisioned East Asia Free Trade Area, which according to Mr. Wen, “will be at the heart of EAC.” On defense matters, he suggested hosting a convention of research institutes and think tanks asked to come up with a “blueprint” for security integration. If that is not a leading role in the EAC, then what is?

China is unlikely, however, to have a completely free hand to massage and manipulate the EAC as it sees fit. Officially, Japan is in support of further regional integration in Asia—unless it takes place at the expense of the U.S. Not surprisingly, Tokyo is supporting Washington’s bid for observer status at the EAS. The government of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has recently made several statements reassuring the U.S. that Japan’s bilateral military alliance with it will not lose significance should anything concrete come out of the EAS in December. To make sure that others in Asia, especially China, get the message as well, the U.S. and Japan recently announced they are upgrading the Guidelines for U.S.-Japan Defense Cooperation, implemented in 1997. Japan’s newly gained military self-confidence, in light of this development, will equip Tokyo to be Washington’s “deputy sheriff” in Northeast Asia, much to the chagrin of many Asian countries, among them China and South Korea.

Japan is also seeking to put more “real” friends in the EAC by strongly supporting Australia’s participation in the summit, despite the fact that Canberra has shown limited enthusiasm for both the summit and the EAC. Australia’s Prime Minister John Howard is not hugely popular amongst Southeast Asian leaders, since he has thus far refused to join Asean’s Southeast Asian nonaggression pact and accept the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, which he described as a “product of the Cold War” and “not relevant” to Australia. Asian commentators, however, suspect that Howard refusal to sign the treaty has more to do with fighting terrorism. He declared in 2002, following the Bali bombing, that Australia reserves the right to launch pre-emptive strikes against other nations.

If trade liberalization and financial cooperation are what the EAC is really all about, why not just implement these through separate agreements and scrap the vague concept of an East Asian Community? In other words: What value does an EAC add to already existing Asian structures?

Suspecting that the EAC will not turn into an Asian version of the European Union encompassing a political integration process any time soon, India stresses the economic integration through an envisioned East Asian Community. In fact, Indian government officials are reportedly looking forward to joining an East Asian Economic Community.

No matter what shape or form the EAC takes, it will be interesting to see how the Asian nations will jockey for influence when they are free from the watchful gaze of the U.S. It certainly could shake things up in the region, which may not necessarily be a bad thing. After all, what’s wrong with a little healthy competition from China in the battle for political and economic hegemony in Asia?

Mr. Berkofsky is senior policy analyst at the Brussels-based European Policy Centre.

Source: http://taiwansecurity.org/News/2005/FEER-0705.htm; accessed on Jul. 27, 2005