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Biden is top global arms supplier, China highlights US coercive diplomacy, Nord -Stream and US 3 seas strategy, reticent US allies in Indo-Pacific, Cambodia-Vietnam balancing US influence

May 19, 2023

UPDATE:Despite the White House’s rhetoric about supporting global democracy, the U.S. sold weapons in 2022 to 57 percent of the world’s authoritarian regimes.

This report focuses on the geopolitical side of the equation: whether partners and allies have the willingness to support U.S. operations. Capabilities alone do not equal warfighting outcomes; the partners and allies must be willing to join the United States in the conflict.

After 10 years of the U.S.-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership, Vietnam has a booming economy and the Biden administration has expanded its leverage over the Vietnam’s strategic location between China, ASEAN and the South China Sea.

Biden is Top Arms Salesman

Despite the White House’s rhetoric about supporting global democracy, the U.S. sold weapons in 2022 to 57 percent of the world’s authoritarian regimes. Since President Joe Biden came into office in 2021, he has described a “battle between democracies and autocracies” in which the U.S. and other democracies strive to create a peaceful world. The reality, however, is that the Biden administration has helped increase the military power of a large number of authoritarian countries. According to an Intercept review of recently released government data, the U.S. sold weapons to at least 57 percent of the world’s autocratic countries in 2022.

These findings contradict Biden’s preferred framing of international politics as fundamentally a struggle in which the world’s democracies, led by the United States, are on “the side of peace and security,” as he called it in last year’s State of the Union address. Opposing the United States and its democratic allies are the autocracies that collude to undermine the international system, Biden has stated. In a speech in Warsaw last year, he said the battle between democracy and autocracy is one “between liberty and repression” and “between a rules-based international order and one governed by brute force.” The White House’s 2022 National Security Strategy adds, “The most pressing strategic challenge facing our vision is from powers that layer authoritarian governance with a revisionist foreign policy.”

Despite that rhetoric, a review of the new data suggests instead a business-as-usual approach to weapons sales. Former President Donald Trump based his arms sales policy primarily on economic considerations: corporate interests above all else. In his first foreign trip as president, he traveled to Saudi Arabia and announced a major arms deal with the repressive kingdom. Trump’s business-first approach resulted in a dramatic upturn in weapons sales during his administration.

In Biden’s first full fiscal year as president, weapons sales from the United States to other countries reached $206 billion, according to the State Department’s annual tally, which uses an opaque but seemingly broader accounting of yearly FMS and DCS figures; Biden’s first-year total surpasses the Trump-era high of $192 billion. The multibillion-dollar effort to train and equip Ukraine doesn’t fully explain the dramatic rise in total arms sales last year, let alone to autocracies. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine didn’t occur until five months into fiscal year 2022, and much of the assistance from the United States to Ukraine took the form of grants (not sales) and the transfer of materiel from Pentagon stockpiles through the presidential drawdown authority.

Rather, the new figures reveal the continuity between Republican and Democratic administrations. While Biden signaled early on that his arms sales policy would be based primarily on strategic and human rights considerations, not just economic interests, he broke from that policy not too long after entering office.

Read full report here.

Tim Sweijs - The Use and Utility of Ultimata in Coercive Diplomacy - Palgrave Macmillan

America's Coercive Diplomacy and Its Harm

By Ministry of Foreign Affairs of The People’s Republic of China (PRC)

The United States is used to accusing other countries of using great power status, coercive policies and economic coercion to coerce other countries to obey and engage in coercive diplomacy, but in fact, the United States is the instigator of coercive diplomacy. The invention rights, patent rights and intellectual property rights of coercive diplomacy all belong to the United States. For a long time, the United States will do everything possible to coerce other countries, and the United States has a very disgraceful "dark history" in coercive diplomacy. Today, coercive diplomacy is a standard instrument in the US foreign policy toolbox, and containment and suppression in political, economic, military, cultural and other fields have been used to conduct coercive diplomacy around the world for pure US self-interest. Countries around the world have suffered, with developing countries bearing the brunt of it, and even US' allies and partners have not been spared.

Based on abundant facts and data, this report aims to expose the evil deeds of US coercive diplomacy in the world and make the international community better understand the hegemonic and bullying nature of US diplomacy, and the serious damages caused by US actions to the development of all countries, regional stability and world peace.

The United States is the inventor and master of coercive diplomacy. For a long time, the US, through various rogue means such as economic blockade, unilateral sanctions, military threats, political isolation, and technical blockade, has presented textbook cases of coercive diplomacy to the world. As US scholars have pointed out, the essence of US coercive diplomacy lies in the idea that "you are either with us or against us. The US should lead, and its allies should follow, and the countries that oppose the supremacy of the US will suffer."

Shrugging off the fact that the US itself has engaged in coercive diplomacy everywhere, the US, out of political self-interest, readily tags China and other countries with the label of coercive diplomacy. It needs to be pointed out that an important tradition in China's diplomacy is to uphold the equality of all countries large and small, and never to divide the world into different groups or engage in the practice of coercion and bullying. Moreover, China has always taken a clear-cut stand against hegemony, unilateralism and coercive diplomacy. China never threatens other countries with force. China never forms military coalition or exports ideology. China never makes provocations at others' doorstep or reaches its hands into others' homes. China never wages trade wars or groundlessly hobbles foreign companies. To slander China for engaging in the so-called coercive diplomacy is obviously just making trumped-up charges.

The international community can easily tell who is engaging in coercive diplomacy and who is coercing the whole world. Those who engage in coercion, sanctions, bullying, suppressing other countries and bringing chaos to the world, will eventually hurt themselves. The United States should address its old habit of wanton coercive diplomacy and return a just and rational international order to the world.

Nord Stream Sabotage & 3 Seas Strategy

By Pierre-Emmanuel Thomann

The sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines and the debate about who was responsible for it will remain one of the great episodes of disinformation by the Atlanticist camp in the conflict in Ukraine. There will probably never be any official confirmation of who ordered this act of state terrorism, as everything is being done to cover it up.

The governments concerned, Berlin and Paris in particular, are in a state of complicit amazement. Their silence on this affair, or the scrambling of the tracks, supported by the dominant media and the pseudo-experts who pass in loop on the television sets to relay the Atlanticist narratives, is easily explained. They cannot reveal to their people that their so-called main ally, Washington, has committed an act of war against its own allies, since this would demonstrate that the conflict in Ukraine is a war provoked and maintained by Washington, not only against Russia, but against the whole of Europe. The whole discourse of so-called Western and transatlantic unity would be irreparably cracked

As soon as the gas pipelines exploded in September 2022, while Russia was immediately singled out by experts in the service of the Atlanticist camp, Moscow accused Washington of being behind this terrorist act. The revelations of the American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh about the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, however, reinforced the thesis of Washington's responsibility. Unsurprisingly, this version has been embargoed by the mainstream media, which are the mouthpieces of the governments of the EU and NATO member states. Washington's clumsy attempt at diversion through the New York Times, pointing to the responsibility of a pro-Ukrainian group, did not convince anyone and the Ukrainian Defence was forced to deny this, a rare episode where the Kiev regime was forced to contradict its mentor.

It should also be recalled that Washington had explicitly announced its intention to get rid of the gas pipelines through the voice of President Biden. The states involved in the investigation also stressed that the results of the investigations would remain confidential, as the truth is obviously not good to tell3. The hypothesis that Washington was responsible for sabotaging the Nord Stream gas pipelines is therefore the most likely, and in fact the only credible, lead.

The lack of reaction from the governments of the European states concerned, Germany, France and the Netherlands, which were directly targeted by this terrorist act that can be likened to an ace of war, reveals the unprecedented degree of geopolitical submission of this political class to Washington.

And if we analyse this event from a geopolitical angle, we come to the same conclusion: Washington's responsibility. Replacing this act of war in the context of the geopolitical project "Three Seas Initiative", initiated by Warsaw with the support of Washington, but imagined by an American think tank, reveals the underside of the geopolitical cards.

The Three Seas Initiative

The Three Seas Initiative (TSI) project brings together twelve Central and Eastern European countries located between the Baltic, Black and Adriatic Seas: Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Croatia, Slovenia and Austria. Fifteen other participants have chosen to join certain projects, including Ukraine. The aim of the initiative is to strengthen connectivity within this geographical area through the development of road, rail and waterway transport infrastructure, energy infrastructure such as gas pipelines and electricity grids, and digital infrastructure. The stated objectives are to strengthen economic development, cohesion within the European Union and transatlantic links.

Indo-Pacific Combat: Partners & Allies

By Michael J. Mazarr, Derek Grossman, Jeffrey W. Hornung, Jennifer D. P. Moroney, Shawn Cochran, Ashley L. Rhoades, Andrew Stravers.

The study described in this report assessed the potential for the United States to receive support in air component capabilities from partners and allies in the event of a major combat contingency in the Indo-Pacific. A companion report focuses on technical and operational considerations associated with partner and allied support: whether they have the capability and capacity to support U.S. air operations in a major conflict. This report focuses on the geopolitical side of the equation: whether partners and allies have the willingness to support U.S. operations. Capabilities alone do not equal warfighting outcomes; the partners and allies must be willing to join the United States in the conflict.

The authors identified 12 countries for the focus of the analysis, representing a mix of U.S. treaty allies, significant regional players, and countries with specific air component assets potentially important to a contingency. These countries are Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam. The authors then defined four potential scenarios for high-end conflict against which they assessed as these countries' possible contribution: a conflict over Taiwan, a second Korean war, a maritime conflict in the South China Sea, and a major stability operation on the Korean Peninsula following a collapse of North Korea.

Key Findings

Australia and Japan have significant security interests at stake in major Asian contingencies. But both will face political (and, in the case of Japan, legal and constitutional) hurdles to participating in wars that do not directly engage them at first.
South Korea values the U.S. alliance but has little interest in being a cobelligerent off the Korean Peninsula.
The authors found little evidence that, unless directly attacked itself, Thailand is willing to endanger its security by offering military aid to the United States.
Several other regional countries—notably India, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam—have very strong traditions of nonalignment and display no evidence of being willing to volunteer to join a war that does not directly involve them.
New Zealand and the Philippines have few air assets to devote to a major fight and strong incentives to remain aloof from distant wars.
Various factors will affect final choices of these partners, such as the degree of Chinese belligerence between now and the crisis, degree of U.S. commitment, and political changes in other countries in the region.

Recommendation

The Air Force would likely make the most progress by focusing on efforts designed to enhance (1) deeper interoperability across the board with Australia and Japan, (2) local self-defense capabilities (as opposed to distant power projection capacity) of partners and allies, and (3) partner capability and ability to operate with the United States more broadly—but only in very narrow air systems (typically not combat aircraft) and with the goal of joint activities only in such scenarios as stability operations or humanitarian assistance and disaster response.

Cambodia-Vietnam Dynamics

By UCH Leang

Cambodia and China have expanded strategic cooperation and upgraded relations to a “diamond cooperation framework” in six priority areas: political cooperation, production capacity and quality, agriculture, energy, security, and people-to people exchanges. Meanwhile, In Washington, closer ties with Southeast Asian countries are seen as crucial in counterbalancing Beijing’s growing footprint in the region. After 10 years of the U.S.-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership, Vietnam has a booming economy and the Biden administration has expanded its leverage over the Vietnam’s strategic location between China, ASEAN and the South China Sea.

China’s rising geopolitical influence has spurred the United States to relaunch great power competition for control over international order. Currently, China is the second largest economy in the world and will surpass the US by 2030. China’s economic, technological, and military power has also unsettled US allies. China’s assertive posture in the South and East China Seas and its integration of Eurasia via the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) have confirmed US fears. Significantly, by PPP measure China’s economy surpassed the US in 2014 and will become the largest world’s economy in GDP by 2030.

China’s growth in technology, innovation, and high-tech manufacturing over the last two decades has been spectacular. Xi Jinping’s assertion that “time and situation” favor China is a clear indication of its shift from Deng’s strategy of “lie low and bide your time” to a more assertive strategy of China claiming its rightful place. His clear articulation of timelines for the realization of the ‘Chinese Dream’ is significant. By 2049, China aims to achieve the number one world power status with a world-class military.

China’s assertiveness in the South China Sea could lead to conflicts with smaller powers and seek to dilute the power and influence of the US through asymmetric strategies. On the other hand, the US has revived its alliance strategies to combine with India, Japan, and Australia to create the Quad strategy to blunt China’s increasing influence in the Indo-Pacific.

The US has continued to warn of potential economic risks posed by BRI, focusing on “debt-trap” narratives to increase anxiety in small states. While, the Biden Administration, G-7 and EU have announced their intention to compete with the BRI infrastructure strategy, the Build Back better and Global gateway initiatives have failed to materialise. As their domestic infrastructure dilapidates, neither the US or EU possess sufficient surplus capital to fund international infrastructure development. US and EU announcements have served only to confirm the disconnect between strategy and capacity to counter China.

With the increase in its economic and military power, China has taken an increasingly assertive position for reforms in multilateral institutions to augment the representation and voice of developing countries. China has also played a leading role in creating alternative development finance institutions such as the AIIB and BRICS New Development Bank (NDB). These are seen as efforts to reduce the influence of US-dominated IMF and World Bank. China is also emphatic that multi-polar world order is an absolute necessity and is focused on reducing American power and influence in global governance. Xi Jinping declared that China needs to lead “the reform of the global governance system with fairness and justice”.

The US has followed a strategy of forward-deployment to maintain the global architecture it has helped create post-1945. With nearly 800 overseas bases across the world, it dominates the Asia-Pacific and Western Eurasia. With a string of significant bases in the Middle East and the Gulf countries and Diego Garcia in the Indian ocean, the US dominates the Indian Ocean to project influence into Eastern Africa, the southern side of Asia, and the southern side of Eurasia. What is less publicised is that the US has nearly 400 bases surrounding China in a dangerously aggressive containment strategy. The 2019 revival of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) among the US, India, Japan, and Australia is clearly focused on containing China.

However, the successful conclusion of the ASEAN-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) in November 2020, which includes US allies Japan and Australia, is testimony to the trade dynamism between ASEAN and China, which are each others largest trade partners. The essence of this strategic competition is focused on the US’s attempts to decouple from China to deny it easy access to critical technologies and markets. On the other hand, through the BRI, China is working to extend influence across Eurasia and the Asia-Pacific and foster a new global economic order.

Cambodia-China’s enhanced co-operation and friendship culminated in the establishment of “Cambodia-China Comprehensive Strategic Partnership of Cooperation” on December 13, 2010. Until today, Cambodia and China relations reach to “Diamond” friendship and have taken root in the two countries, and from the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) cooperation, free trade agreement (FTA), Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) has yielded fruitful results, bringing huge benefits to the people. The two countries have joined hands to fight the pandemic, and the Chinese vaccines have effectively helped Cambodia to protect the people's lives and health, accelerate economic recovery and restore normalcy to social life. Cambodia hopes that the two sides will further advance the building of a Cambodia-China community with a shared future, foster greater synergy between development strategies, and strengthen cooperation in such fields as economy, trade, infrastructure, minerals, energy, agriculture and defense.

Cambodia is firmly committed to the “one-China principle and holds that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China's territory”. Cambodia resolutely opposes any words and deeds that infringe on China's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and will continue to firmly support China in safeguarding its core interests, and stand firm together with the over 1.4 billion Chinese people.

Cambodia-U.S. Relations

Unlike Cambodia-China relations, Cambodia’s domestic political issues are leveraged by the U.S. to gain greater influence over Cambodia. The U.S. has interfered in Cambodia’s internal affairs by providing support to the opposition and encouraging local and international civil society groups, as well as some media outlets, to frame a “negative” perception of Cambodia, which tarnishes the Kingdom’s image on the international stage.

US officials have voiced alarm for more than three years now over the China- backed refurbishment of Ream Naval Base, located outside Cambodia’s main port city of Sihanoukville. The United States also imposed the sanctions on senior officials of Cambodia, Chinese investors and companies in Cambodia over alleged systemic corruption, transnational organised crime and human rights abuses.

Vietnam-U.S. Relations

From mortal enemy to “strategic partnership.” The U.S.-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership of the past decade has helped create booming economic growth. Vietnam’s strategic location between China, ASEAN and the South China Sea are fundamental to Washington’s efforts to leverage Southeast Asia in its counterbalancing strategy to arrest Beijing’s growing regional gravity.

U.S.-Vietnam relations have grown rapidly since diplomatic normalisation was achieved in 1995 - an expansion seen in the establishment of a “comprehensive partnership” in 2013, the transfer of two U.S. Coast Guard cutters to Hanoi in 2017, and port visits by U.S. aircraft carriers in 2018 and 2020.

Bilateral trade has grown two-hundredfold since normalisation, and annual U.S. investment in Vietnam has reached US$2.8 billion. “Vietnam enjoys a very high trade surplus with the U.S., totalling more than US$116 billion last year, and receives U.S. assistance in a wide range of domains, including defense and security, while managing to keep the rapprochement at a pace it is comfortable with”.

Vietnam-China Relations

Despite Vietnam’s complex ties with China, the "four No's" policy is both understood and appreciated: Vietnam advocates not joining a military alliance; non-alignment against another country; foreign countries are not allowed to set up military bases in Vietnam or use Vietnam's territory to fight against other countries; it rejects the use of force or the threat with force in international relations. These reflect Vietnam's political wisdom to a certain extent, the "four No's" have laid the foundation for the development of China-Vietnam relations toward the "four goods." In recent years, China and Vietnam have adhered to the policy of long-term stability, forward-thinking, good-neighborliness and comprehensive cooperation, and the spirit of being good neighbors, friends, comrades and partners. The bilateral friendship has reached a new stage of comprehensive strategic partnership manifested in the recent meeting between the countries two leaders, which further consolidated China-Vietnam amity.

China and Vietnam are neighbors and share similar cultures. Both are have fast developing societies and economies. After the CPCs 20th National Congress, Chinese modernisation and construction initiatives will create more development opportunities and dividends for neighbouring countries including Vietnam.

Cambodia-Vietnam Relations

Cambodia and Vietnam share both a joint border of more than 1,270 kms and the all important Mekong River. Relations between the two countries are bound by historical, geographical, and political ties. The two nations established official diplomatic relations on June 24, 1967.

The bilateral relationship between Cambodia and Vietnam can be described as a love-hate relationship. The two nations have a long history of interaction, cooperation, and hostility as close neighbours and have been both friends and adversaries.

Based on historical, geographical, and political factors, strengthening relations and cooperation between the two countries is indispensable. Thus, the two countries continue to live together in peace, with mutual respect for sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity, non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, resolve issues peacefully and cooperate in all areas of mutual benefit that befits their adopted motto of “good neighbourliness, traditional friendship, and comprehensive, sustainable and long-term cooperation”. The motto signifies the sincere wishes of both countries to continue to broaden and deepen all levels of cooperation and amity.

Conclusion

China-U.S. rivalry has meant that small and middle states like Cambodia and Vietnam were incapable to resist the impact of great power competition. To expand their regional influence, the great powers pressured the small states, either directly or indirectly, through their allies, organisations and institutions.

Both China and the U.S. have played important roles in promoting Cambodia and Vietnam development. Therefore, both countries seek beneficial paths to balance relations between the two superpowers while maximising their political, economic and diplomatic initiatives by not give prominence to one power over another. Moreover, both Cambodia and Vietnam do not seek to overshadow other countries in the region or the world, but seek to maintain the balance of friendship, peace, security, stability, national sovereignty and development.

Despite very small and medium sized populations, Cambodia and Vietnam’s geographical location and regional role, particularly its membership in ASEAN, are strategically important to China and the U.S.. Thus, the foreign policy enshrined in Article 53 of the 1993 Constitution of Cambodia, is a policy of permanent neutrality and non-alignment and peaceful co-existence with its neighbours and all other countries around the world. The "four No's" policy of Vietnam and ASEAN Centrality not only bind Cambodia and Vietnam good relations, but ensure, within the context of geostrategic rivalry, that both countries can continue their growth and development with harmony and prosperity.

UCH Leang, is a leading Vietnam specialist and researcher of International Relations of Royal Academy of Cambodia.

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