NOV,27 2020

‘A Devil’s Advocate Perspective on the Potential for Security Dilemma Contagion in the Forthcoming Biden Administration’s Foreign Policy in the Indo-Pacific’

 

1.      Introduction

The victory of Democratic Joe Biden-Kamala Harris team in the 2020 US Elections comes amidst Sino-US rivalry that reflects the logic of the security dilemma - the challenges faced by security-seeking states amidst anarchy. When policymakers assume that their defensive interests require more armaments, this causes a rival security-seeker to have comparable fears. As this logic underpins both sides’ thinking, they become convinced of the other’s hostility, whilst failing to appreciate that their arming may be feeding their rivals’ fears. Moreover, Ken Booth and Nicholas Wheeler introduce the term ‘security dilemma contagion’, reflecting how a security dilemma between two states may spread and arouse the fears of other defensive states, causing them to adopt stronger military postures of their own, leading to further, overlapping security dilemmas.[2] The implications of such dynamics were reflected in the July Crisis, with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand converging on existing geopolitical faultlines in Europe, culminating in the outbreak of the First World War.

 

2.      Possibilities for Security Dilemma Contagion in the Indo-Pacific

Whilst escalation into conflict is one possible result of the security dilemma, a range of other possible outcomes may result.[3] Former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s characterisation of Sino-US rivalry as ‘Cold War 1.5’ is apt – although Sino-US tensions are broadly comparable to the US-Soviet hostility during the early stages of the Cold War, there are several common interests between Washington and Beijing that underscore the potential for their cooperation.[4] Nonetheless, policymaking prudence requires acknowledgement of worst-case scenarios that may arise from Sino-US geostrategic rivalry. My efforts to adopt a Devil’s Advocate perspective suggest that the following geostrategic factors are notable in assessing the potential for security dilemma contagion in the Indo-Pacific.[5]

 

i)                   Alliance Politics: In his 1984 article, Glenn Snyder noted that amidst the security dilemma between two rival blocs, allies of either rival may fear the prospects of alliance abandonment or entrapment. Alliance abandonment describes the possibility that a state may be abandoned by its ally to face an adversary alone; conversely, alliance entrapment occurs when a state is reluctantly dragged by its ally into a conflict. Snyder argues that these fears are inversely related – when a state fears abandonment, it may attempt to reaffirm its commitment to its ally. However, this may convince that ally of unwavering support, emboldening it into increased aggressiveness, and increasing the likelihood of entrapment. Conversely, a state fearing alliance entrapment may attempt to distance itself from its ally. Such reservations may, however, be seen by the latter as betrayal, thereby hastening the likelihood of alliance abandonment.

 

Within the contemporary Indo-Pacific, the Trump Administration’s disregard for US allies has likely aroused the prospect of alliance abandonment and entrapment occurring concurrently. This is evident in the challenge facing the ROK and Japan. Both stand on the frontline of any US confrontation against China and / or North Korea. During his term, Trump ranged from the jingoistic extreme of ‘fire and fury’ against North Korea and Trump’s trade war against China (posing Seoul and Tokyo with entrapment), to the opposite, neo-isolationist extreme of ‘love letters’ with Kim Jong Un and threats to downsize the US regional military presence in the ROK and Japan (posing Seoul and Tokyo with abandonment). In response, it is notable that conservative sentiment in the ROK and Japan became increasingly vocal in advocating independent nuclear arsenals to achieve military self-reliance during Trump’s ‘War of Words’ with Kim Jong Un in 2017.

 

Whilst Biden’s victory bodes for closer consultation with US regional allies and due regard for their interests, it will take him time to restore US alliance credibility. Moreover, the fact that conservative Americans continued to support Trump in 2020 underscores a longer-term demographic trend – even if Trump has been defeated, the Republican Party may believe that Trumpist policies based on populism, jingoistic unilateralism and neo-isolationism offer a route to regaining control of the White House in 2024 and beyond.[6] Were regional states to develop independent nuclear arsenals in response to an unpredictable White House, it would likely spark off a nuclear arms race.

 

ii)                 Deliberate Ambiguity: In hedging against entrapment and abandonment, a state may adopt a posture of ambiguity over its military obligations. Yet, if mishandled, this could risk of miscalculation. A rival state may mistake ambiguity for weakness and call its bluff, under which circumstance it has little choice but to militarily intervene in order to maintain its credibility.

 

This is evident in the longstanding US policy of strategic ambiguity over the status of Taiwan. By maintaining an implicit threat of US intervention against Chinese invasion, Washington hopes to induce caution in Beijing; concurrently, by ruling explicit alliance obligations to Taiwan, the US hopes to induce Taiwanese caution from declaring formal independence. However, Washington’s posture of ambiguity assumes that an implicit threat of US intervention can deter Beijing invading. Whilst such assumptions were cogent in earlier decades due to US military superiority over China, such assumptions are less tenable today. China’s Anti-Access / Area Denial (A2/AD) doctrine is based on the use of stealthy submarines, naval mines and land-based cruise missiles to turn the western Pacific into a ‘kill zone’, within which any US air-naval deployment would lead to unacceptably heavy US losses. Under such circumstances, Beijing may believe that a war with the US over Taiwan is winnable. Recognising this danger, Richard Haass and David Sacks have called on the US to abandon strategic ambiguity in favor of ‘strategic clarity’ that clearly underlines Washington’s resolve to defend Taiwan.[7]

 

Such a move, if mishandled, can be problematic. Xi Jinping’s ambitions of national rejuvenation are an indication of the extent to which the Chinese Communist Party has resolved to elevate China’s status as a rising superpower. It is conceivable that nationalist sentiment in China could grow to the extent that public pressure is willing to face the risk of war with the US, in order to bring about the unification of the island with the mainland.

 

iii)               Geostrategic Real Estate: I use this term to refer to geostrategically-located positions of critical interest to rival powers in a security dilemma. These locations include land and sea chokepoints, and important military infrastructure such as ports and airfields. When such locations are located in allied or third-party states, it underscores the potentially cascading effects of security dilemma contagion resulting from tensions between the rival great powers.

 

The US-China security dilemma has spillover effects for multiple secondary states in the Indo-Pacific region. These include US allies the Republic of Korea (ROK), Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand, along with Washington’s quasi-alliances with Singapore and Taiwan. Given that a Sino-US standoff would occur in the littoral regions of the western Pacific, the fact that the majority of the aforementioned entities are islands make them geostrategic real estate in the form of ‘unsinkable aircraft carriers’ – islands capable of hosting multiple airbases - that can be used to support US power projection against China.

 

From China’s perspective, several of the aforementioned entities are located within reach of the Sea Lines of Communication (SLOCs) that stretch from the Arabian Sea to the South China Sea. China is dependent on these SLOCs for its energy security, posing Beijing with the ‘Malacca Dilemma’ – China’s efforts to consolidate these SLOCs have involved land reclamation in the South China Sea to construct its own ‘unsinkable aircraft carriers’, thereby arousing further concerns for secondary states in Southeast Asia. Concurrently, the concentration of its population along its coast has underscored to Beijing the importance of maintaining the First and Second Island Chains as a strategic buffer zone against sea-based attacks in the event of a clash with the US.

 

The implications of Sino-US rivalry for regional states is underscored by the air-naval doctrines of the US and China – respectively, the AirSea Battle and A2/AD doctrines. Both doctrines make it difficult for regional states to remain aloof from Sino-US rivalry. Consider how a hypothetical armed conflict between the US and China might play out. A pre-emptive Chinese application of A2/AD may involve barrages of cruise missiles against air and naval facilities in US-allied states to interdict the infrastructure needed to support a US deployment. Such a Chinese gambit would entail civilian casualties. Conversely, given that the US Navy’s air assets are dwarfed by the PRC’s land-based air assets, a US campaign against China would necessitate the deployment of US Air Force units from airbases located in US regional allies, even though the latter may be concerned about civilian casualties in the event of a Sino-US clash.

 

iv)                Geostrategic Encirclement: Either rival in a security dilemma may attempt to expand its alliance network to encircle its rival and thus impose on its adversary the threat of a two-front war. Yet, such a strategy may arouse its rival’s fears even further, and cause it to lash out in desperation. Moreover, the expansion of tensions to encompass a broader geostrategic area risks additional countries becoming entangled in security dilemma contagion.

 

This is evident given the growing scope of security cooperation between Australia, India, Japan and the US under the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. In bringing together the four most powerful democracies in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the subtext of the Quad in hedging against China is apparent. Particularly notable is India, which, apart from the most populous member of the Quad, is the only member to have a contiguous land border with China. In the aftermath of the May 2020 cross-border skirmishes with China, India stepped up military logistics-sharing arrangements with its Quad partners. India’s increasing security cooperation within the Quad portends the capacity of the US and its partners to impose a two-front war against China. With the cooperation of the ROK, Japan and Taiwan, the US would be able to concentrate air and naval forces to threaten China’s coastal regions; against China’s western land frontier, India is able to mobilise the world’s second-largest army and an increasingly modernised air force. Furthermore, increased Quad access to the Indian Ocean underscores the grouping’s ability to interdict the SLOCs that China is economically dependent on, even as the PRC’s power projection capabilities beyond the South China Sea remain limited. Under such circumstances, it is conceivable that China may see the growing cooperation between the Quad members as a sign of geostrategic encirclement, which may cause it to lash out in desperation in a crisis, particularly if Beijing believes that conflict is inevitable.

 

3.      Conclusion

Whilst the geostrategic factors discussed here point to the potential for security dilemma contagion in the Asia Pacific region, it does not necessarily presuppose that the region is predestined for a 21^st century version of the developments that culminated in the outbreak of the First World War. Escalation into conflict is one possible outcome of the security dilemma, and in this regard, this paper’s discussion of these factors behind security dilemma contagion mark a Devil’s Advocate effort to identify areas where policymakers and diplomats need to take into account to avoid the slippery slope to a clash of arms that none wish for. Whilst emphasising the need to avoid unnecessary extrapolation between the July Crisis of 1914 and the contemporary Indo-Pacific, there are several characteristics in the latter that offer grounds for cautious optimism, inasmuch as secondary states have no desire to be on the receiving end of the fallout from the Sino-US security dilemma.

 

My follow-up column will accordingly consider in more detail the characteristics of international relations in the Indo-Pacific region that have, to some extent, dampened the impact of security dilemma contagion. Moreover, this follow-up analysis will conclude by underscoring prescriptions for diplomatic and security policy as the Indo-Pacific region awaits the inauguration of the Biden-Harris White House.