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1 1 (November 02, 2020)

handle is hein.crs/govdcls0001 and id is 1 raw text is: %Fnw C~l rES .rh$e November 2, 2020 The Quad: Security Cooperation Among the United States, Japan, India, and Australia 0v e*v iw In October 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his three counterparts from Australia, India, and Japan convened an in-person meeting in Tokyo. The focus was on boosting the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, aka the Quad, a four- country coalition with a common platform of protecting freedom of navigation and promoting democratic values in the region. The gathering released no joint statement, but Pompeo stated that the purpose of the group was to protect our people and partners from the Chinese Communist Party's exploitation, corruption, and coercion. Although the three other ministers framed the meeting differently in their opening statements, fears of China's growing influence and assertiveness in the region loom large. Tensions with China have worsened for all four countries in 2020, driving increased defense cooperation among them. Despite this confluence, the Quad faces major challenges in defining itself and its goals. Does expanding defense cooperation provide meaningful strategic advantages? Will the Quad broaden its activities on democracy promotion? Is it durable as a framework even in the face of leadership changes in member countries? These questions may be of critical importance to Congress given its oversight responsibilities, interest in security alliances, and growing concern about China's power and influence in the region. Earlier iterations of the Quad faltered. The grouping originally arose from the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami: in the disaster relief effort, the four navies coordinated, providing inspiration for more maritime cooperation. In 2007, a series of Quad meetings was denounced by China as an attempt to encircle it. The effort dissipated amidst member leadership transitions, concern about economic repercussions from China, and attention to other national interests. The renewed effort, begun in 2017, is bringing similar accusations from Beijing, crystallizing the geopolitical and economic risks for the Quad partners. All four members are heavily reliant on Chinese supply chains, and each of the four are significantly more economically integrated with China than with one another, especially India and Japan. China is the first or second largest trading partner for all four countries, underscoring the risk of angering Beijing. For Japan, Australia, and India, alarm about China's intentions may be coupled with a perception that U.S. influence in the region is waning. For years, Asian states have expressed fear that the United States' power is diminishing in the region. These fears may have been heightened by Trump's 2016 America First policy, particularly after the U.S. withdrawal from the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement. Skeptics of the Quad earlier pointed to the group's lack of operationalization. Shortly after the October 2020 meeting in Tokyo, India announced that Australia would be invited to join the United States, Japan, and India for the annual Malabar naval exercises slated for November. The exercises, originally bilateral between the United States and India, later added Japan as a permanent member in 2015. Defense officials say that the exercise could be a potent war-fighting exercise that deepens trust and interoperability among the four militaries in the air and sea domains. All four militaries operate compatible anti-submarine warfare systems, making that a promising area of cooperation. In addition to Malabar, Quad countries are increasing bilateral, trilateral, and multilateral exercises with one another that may accelerate the ability of the four countries to build integrated capabilities. Examples of these exercises include but are not limited to the India-Australia biennial AUSINDEX naval exercise, the Japan-India JIMEX exercise in the North Arabian Sea, and all four countries in the large multilateral biennial Rim of the Pacific maritime warfare exercise. As U.S. treaty allies, Australia and Japan regularly hold large-scale exercises with the U.S. military. Critics have pointed to questions about the group's inability to speak with one voice on regional issues, absence of democracy promotion efforts, dearth of joint military operations, and lack of institutional structure as limits on its effectiveness. In the past, India and Australia have expressed wariness of provoking China and cornering it into a defensive posture. Japan, arguably the country with the most acute concern about China's rise given the history of conflict and ongoing territorial disputes in the East China Sea, has in recent years looked to stabilize relations with Beijing. Under new leadership since September 2020, Japan will face choices about how far to push a new framework that is likely to come under withering criticism from China. Another critique involves the exclusion of other regional countries and the potential for marginalization of traditional bilateral alliances. U.S. treaty ally South Korea is not in the Quad despite fitting the description of being a democracy with maritime interests and growing naval capabilities. South Korea is likely reluctant to be included in a group that antagonizes China, but it may also chafe at exclusion. While the United States professes to support Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) centrality in regional multilateral efforts, member countries' varied capabilities \ \\ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\ \\ \\\ goo \\\\ \ L \N \ I \N,\ \\ \ \ Q\\ \\\ \\\

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