【外交学者APAC 2020】Sun to set on US role in APAC? （美国在亚太事物中的作用正衰退？）

連長

原文链接:http://apac2020.the-diplomat.com/feature/sun-to-set-on-us-role-in-apac/
作者:罗伯特·苏萨特（Robert Sutter ）


Unlikely, says US scholar Robert Sutter, who argues no other power in the region is ready–or willing–to step into America’s shoes.

Despite the enormous challenges it has faced since World War II, US leadership in the Asia-Pacific has proven to be remarkably durable. Indeed, despite serious questions being raised about whether the United States and its often weak allies could hold the line against the expansion of Sino-Soviet communism, the US presence in the region emerged from the Cold War intact.

But the past six decades have not been easy. The low point of Washington’s influence came with the failure of its military support for non-communist governments in Indochina, which coincided with major economic and political crises in the United States. And although US leaders adroitly aligned with Maoist China to deal with the common threat of Soviet expansion after the Soviet-backed Vietnamese Communist troops smashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace in Saigon in 1975, the USSR was widely seen as Asia’s ascendant power. The United States, meanwhile, looked to be in clear decline.

Challenges to the United States’ place in the Asia-Pacific continued in the 1980s–despite the revitalization of American strategic power and its resolute stance against the Soviet ‘evil empire’–as a different kind of power transition was said to be underway. This time Japan, with its extraordinary economic capabilities, was widely seen as set to become the dominant force in the region, marginalizing American leadership at a time when the United States seemed unable to compete with Japanese entrepreneurs at home and abroad. This analysis, with its assumption that the United States would be unable to sustain a leadership position in the Asia-Pacific, lasted more than a decade.

And now, in the 21st century, US leadership is again seen as waning, this time in the shadow of a rising China. Yet these latest predictions of decline tend to follow the same erroneous pattern of earlier predictions: emphasising the strengths of the current rising power, while too often failing to give adequate attention to its weaknesses and limitations. American weaknesses, meanwhile, are typically exaggerated, while its strengths are not always given their due.

A more balanced assessment of strengths and weaknesses suggests that much of the analysis surrounding the latest challenge to the US position as leading power in the Asia-Pacific is misplaced. It may be a controversial view among some observers, but this author believes that the United States is well positioned to maintain its dominance through the next decade, and that any assessment of decline must be measured against four important yardsticks of US strength.

A Constantly Evolving Picture

US policy and leadership in the Asia-Pacific has come in for strong criticism over the past decade from a range of sources–media and specialist commentary as well as popular and elite opinion. Topping the litany of complaints was the hard-line policy adopted by the administration of George W. Bush toward North Korea, its military invasion and occupation of Iraq, and apparently unilateral US approaches on issues ranging from terrorism to climate change, the United Nations to Asia-Pacific regional organizations. The United States appeared alienated and isolated, and increasingly bogged down with the consequences of its invasion of Iraq and perceived overemphasis on the so-called war on terrorism.

By contrast, the Asia-Pacific’s rising powers–particularly China–have often seemed to be advancing rapidly. China has used effective diplomacy and rapidly increasing trade and investment relationships, backed by double-digit economic growth, to broaden its influence throughout the region. Meanwhile, it has achieved steady and significant increases in its military strength.

The focus on Chinese strengths and US weaknesses spawned numerous books and reports by governments and respected international study groups and think tanks, all with a common prediction: the Asia-Pacific was adjusting to an emerging China-centred order and US influence was in decline.

But the reality soon proved to be more complex. Japan clearly was not in China’s orbit, while India’s interest in accommodation with China was mixed and anyway overshadowed by a remarkable upswing in strategic cooperation with the United States. Russian and Chinese aligned interests, meanwhile, waxed and waned and appeared to remain secondary to their respective relationships with the West. And South Korea, arguably the area of greatest advance in Chinese influence against a backdrop of major tension in the US-ROK relationship earlier in the decade, saw dramatic changes beginning in 2004, culminating in often wary South Korean relations with China. This temporary honeymoon effect was also in evidence with Australia.

Beijing, meanwhile, often found the association of Southeast Asian Nations ineffective in pursuing the multilateral initiatives it supported and saw its ascendance in Southeast Asia tempered by the revitalization of now democratic Indonesia, the region’s longstanding leader and the Southeast Asian power least likely to bandwagon with China.

As all this was unfolding, US officials were also pushing back against prevailing assessments of US decline, and were moving to underscore the Bush administration’s carefully considered judgment that China’s rise actually was not having a substantial negative effect on US leadership in Asia. Bush administration officials had differed in private on how to view the implications of China’s rise in the Asia-Pacific, but they increasingly rallied around the public position first articulated in 2005 by now World Bank President Robert Zoellick, who suggested that the United States was best served by seeking to work with China and encourage it to behave as a ‘responsible’ stakeholder in the international system. This approach has continued under President Barack Obama.

But regardless of who is in the White House, there are four yardsticks that should be used to judge US strength and influence in Asia, now and in the future.

Security concerns

In most of the Asia-Pacific, governments are strong, viable and make the decisions that determine their direction in foreign affairs. Popular opinion and the media may influence government officials responsible for formulating policy toward the United States and others, but ultimately they make their own decisions. In general, the officials see their governments’ legitimacy and success resting on nation building and economic development, which require a stable and secure international environment. Unfortunately, the region is not particularly stable and most governments are, in private at least, wary of one another. As a result, they look to the United States to provide the security they need to pursue their goals in an appropriate environment. They also recognize that the US security role is extremely costly and involves great risk, including large-scale casualties if necessary. With this also comes recognition that neither a rising China nor any other Asian power or coalition of powers is able–or willing–to undertake even a fraction of these risks, costs and responsibilities.

Economic priorities

Nation building for most Asia-Pacific governments depends largely on export-oriented growth. Chinese officials recognize this, while officials in other countries recognize the rising importance of China in their trade. However, they all also recognize that foreign invested enterprises account for China’s trade, as does processing trade–both of which make Chinese and Asia-Pacific trade heavily dependent on exports to developed countries, particularly the United States.

In recent years, the United States has run a massive trade deficit with China, and a total trade deficit with Asia of more than $350 billion, all at a time when the US trade deficit stands at over $700 billion. Asia-Pacific government officials recognize that China, which runs a large overall trade surplus, and other regional trading partners are unwilling and unable to bear even a fraction of the cost of such large trade deficits.

Clearly, the 2008-2009 global economic crisis is having an enormous impact on trade and investment, prompting some Asian officials to talk about relying more on domestic consumption. But tangible progress toward this end seems slow, as they appear to be focusing on a revival of world trade that would restore as much as possible previous levels of export-oriented growth, including heavy reliance on the US market.

How cooperative China actually will be in working with the United States to deal with the various implications of the economic crisis also remains an open question, though the evidence appears on balance to show great care on the part of the Chinese administration to avoid pushing controversial policies that would further undermine international confidence in the existing economic system and thwart meaningful efforts at recovery. Indeed, the Chinese leadership appears to be prioritising stability in its continued adherence to international economic patterns, including the leading role of the US dollar, strong direct and indirect US influence on foreign investors in China, and the US market as a top priority for Chinese products.

Government Engagement and Asia-Pacific Contingency Planning

Generally speaking, the Bush administration managed to develop effective interactions with Asia’s leading powers. It’s rare for the United States to enjoy good relations with Japan and China at the same time, but the Bush administration carefully managed relations with both effectively. It’s also unprecedented for the United States to be the leading foreign power in South Asia and to sustain good relations with both India and Pakistan, but that has been the case since relatively early in the Bush administration. And it’s unprecedented for the United States to have healthy ties with Beijing and Taipei at the same time, but this also occurred during the Bush years and was strengthened with the election of Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou in March 2008.

The Obama government has moved to build on these strengths, notably with a series of initiatives designed to remove obstacles to closer US cooperation with ASEAN and other Asian regional organizations. In addition, it has emphasised consultation and the inclusion of international stakeholders before coming to policy decisions on key regional issues, an approach that has been broadly welcomed and is in stark contrast to accusations of unilateralism under the previous US government.

In recent years, meanwhile, the US Pacific Command and other US military commands and organizations have been at the cutting edge of wide ranging and growing US efforts to build and strengthen webs of military relationships throughout the region. In an Asia-Pacific environment where the United States remains on generally good terms with major powers, and in fact most other governments, building military ties through education programs, on-site training and exercises enhances US influence in quiet but effective ways.

The success of these efforts is down in part to active contingency planning by many Asia-Pacific governments. As regional power relations evolve, notably in response to China’s rise, other governments are generally seeking to work positively and pragmatically with China on the one hand, while also looking for the reassurance of close security, intelligence and other ties with the United States in case China shifts from its current generally benign approach to one of greater assertiveness or even dominance.

Non-Government Engagement and Immigration

For much of its history, the United States exerted influence in the Asia-Pacific more through business, religious, educational and other interchange than via channels dependent on government leadership and support. Active US non-government interaction with the region continues today, leaving non-government US interests with a strong and usually positive impact on US regional influence. Meanwhile, over 40 years of generally colour-blind US immigration policy since the ending of discriminatory restrictions on Asian immigration in 1965 has resulted in the influx of millions of Asian migrants who call America home and who interact with their countries of origin in ways that reflect well on the United States. No other country, with the exception of Canada, has such an active and powerfully positive channel of influence in the Asia-Pacific.

US Irreplaceable

These four yardsticks demonstrate that the United States is deeply integrated in the Asia-Pacific at both the government and non-government level, while US security commitments and trade practices meet the fundamental security and economic needs of regional leaders. They know this, and they also know that neither a rising China nor any other power or coalition of powers is able or willing to meet even a small fraction of those needs.

Meanwhile, while China has no clear way of overcoming pervasive regional suspicion over its role, its leadership has continued to emphasize a narrow scope of national interests and tries to assure other nations that its policies and practices serve those interests. As a result, it tends to avoid the types of risks, costs and commitments in security and economic areas that underpin the US leadership role in the Asia-Pacific. This is occurring while China continues to run a substantial trade surplus and to accumulate large foreign exchange reserves that are supported by currency policies widely seen to disadvantage trading competitors in the region and elsewhere.

A further gripe with China is that despite its economic progress, it annually receives billions of dollars in foreign assistance loans and lesser grants from international organizations like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank and from foreign government and non-government donors that presumably would otherwise be available for other deserving clients in the Asia-Pacific (and the world). It also carefully adheres to UN budget formulas that keep Chinese dues remarkably low for a country with such international prominence and development.

As a consequence, the ‘win-win’ principle that underscores recent Chinese foreign policy means, in effect, that Chinese officials make sure that their policies provide a ‘win’ for generally narrowly defined national interests of China, while eschewing the kinds of risky and costly commitments for the broader regional and global common good that Asia-Pacific leaders instead look to US leadership to provide.

All this said, the current US path is not set in stone–it could still decide to emphasize a narrower range of national interests and curb military and economic commitments that underpin its leadership position in the Asia-Pacific. Such a move toward ‘strategic withdrawal’ and economic protectionism has occurred before–following the US loss in Vietnam and the end of the Cold War. Still, so far at least, these tendencies have been notably absent (or at least muted) as US officials and broader public opinion recognize the continued importance of active engagement with a region of growing importance to US interests.

作者简介:

罗伯特·苏萨特
电话:202-687-8487
传真:202-687-7397
电邮:sutterr@georgetown.edu
简介:Robert Sutter has been Visiting Professor of Asian Studies at the School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, since 2001. In addition to this full-time position, Sutter teaches regularly as Adjunct Professor of Asian Studies in the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University.
A Ph.D. graduate in History and East Asian Languages from Harvard University, Sutter taught part-time for over thirty years at Georgetown, George Washington, Johns Hopkins Universities, or the University of Virginia. He has published 18 books, over 100 articles and several hundred government reports dealing with contemporary East Asian and Pacific countries and their relations with the United States. His most recent book is U.S.-Chinese Relations: Perilous Past, Pragmatic Present (Rowman and Littlefield 2010).
Sutter’s government career (1968-2001) involved work on Asian and Pacific affairs and US foreign policy for the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress, the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of State, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was for many years the Senior Specialist and Director of the Foreign Affairs and National Defense Division of the Congressional Research Service. He also was the National Intelligence Officer for East Asia and the Pacific at the US Government’s National Intelligence Council, and the China Division Director at the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research.
学历:Ph.D. () Harvard University, History and East Asian Languages
详细介绍：http://explore.georgetown.edu/people/sutterr/?action=viewgeneral

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