[Senate Hearing 118-482]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-482
MODERNIZING U.S. ALLIANCES
AND PARTNERSHIPS IN THE INDO-PACIFIC
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
APRIL 17, 2024
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT
Available via http://www.govinfo.gov
__
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
57-384 WASHINGTON : 2024
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland, Chairman
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire MARCO RUBIO, Florida
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware MITT ROMNEY, Utah
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut PETE RICKETTS, Nebraska
TIM KAINE, Virginia RAND PAUL, Kentucky
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon TODD YOUNG, Indiana
CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii TED CRUZ, Texas
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
Damian Murphy, Staff Director
Christopher M. Socha, Republican Staff Director
John Dutton, Chief Clerk
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Cardin, Hon. Benjamin L., U.S. Senator From Maryland............. 1
Risch, Hon. James E., U.S. Senator From Idaho.................... 2
Harris, Hon. Harry B., Jr., Former U.S. Ambassador to South
Korea, Former Commander, U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, Colorado
Springs, Colorado.............................................. 4
Prepared Statement........................................... 7
Mead, Walter Russell, James Clarke Chace Professor of Foreign
Affairs and Humanities, Bard College, Columnist, Wall Street
Journal, Red Hook, New York.................................... 12
Prepared Statement........................................... 13
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
Responses of Mr. Harry B. Harris, Jr., to Questions Submitted by
Senator James E. Risch......................................... 37
The committee received no response from Mr. Walter Russell Mead
to the following questions submitted by Senator James E. Risch. 38
Letter to Senator Daniel K. Inouye from Douglas MacArthur II,
Assistant Secretary for Congressional Relations, 1965,
submitted by Senator Brian Schatz.............................. 39
(iii)
MODERNIZING U.S. ALLIANCES AND PARTNERSHIPS IN THE INDO-PACIFIC
----------
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2024
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in
room SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Benjamin L.
Cardin, chairman of the committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Cardin [presiding], Menendez, Coons,
Murphy, Kaine, Booker, Schatz, Risch, Romney, Ricketts, and
Young.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN L. CARDIN,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MARYLAND
The Chairman. The hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee will come to order.
Four years ago America's alliances were in tatters,
especially in the Indo-Pacific. We saw a retreat from support
for democracy and human rights, a chaotic patchwork of
diplomatic grudges and self-defeating trade policies, and
demands that our allies pay the cost of hosting U.S. bases.
China was filling the vacuum left by the United States
approach to foreign policy that some called America first but
was in reality America alone. Only 4 years later, our alliances
have never been stronger. The tremendous progress is thanks to
the hard work of the Biden administration.
The historic Camp David summit with Japan and South Korea,
the AUKUS agreement with Australia, the United States, and the
United Kingdom, which goes far beyond nuclear submarines, the
increased practical cooperation with members of the Quad--
Australia, Japan and India, who share many of our strategic
views on China.
And just last week we witnessed the first ever trilateral
summit here in Washington between Japan, the Philippines, and
the United States.
Our alliances in the region do not just reassure nations
who live in Beijing's shadows; they also pay off for the
American people.
Whether it is intelligence sharing on mutual threats or
U.S. basing and rotational agreements, we are enjoying enormous
benefit from maintaining our Indo-Pacific alliances.
Both Democrats and Republicans understand how important
this region is. That is why there is bipartisan agreement
across Congress on the need to preserve and deepen these
alliances, and I am optimistic that the House will do the right
thing and pass the Administration's supplemental security
package.
It not only includes vital funding for Ukraine but almost
$5 billion for the Indo-Pacific. As President Kennedy once
said, ``History has made us friends, economics has made us
partners, and necessity has made us allies. Those who nature
hath so joined together let no man put asunder.''
The truth is that one of the United States' greatest
strategic advantages are alliances. Who are China's closest
friends? Russia, Iran, North Korea, some of the worst human
rights abusers in the world that repress the hope and dreams of
their citizens.
Meanwhile, we have five mutual defense treaties with Japan,
South Korea, Australia, the Philippines, and Thailand, and our
partnerships include New Zealand, Singapore, Vietnam,
Indonesia, India, Mongolia, and Taiwan, and the list goes on.
No one wants to be left off. Why? It is not just because we
have the greatest military in the world. It is because of our
values. It is because while others might use debt trap
diplomacy to buy influence, the United States is working to
bring peace and stability and prosperity.
It is because we are working to uphold the rules based
international order that has benefited people across the
planet. We cannot go back to the days when America was
agonizing and even attacking our friends.
We cannot succeed with a foreign policy that tells
dictators do whatever the hell they want to our allies. From
manufacturing microchips to expanding the operational reach of
our military across the Pacific to combating corruption, to
standing up for human rights, the stakes in the Indo-Pacific
are simply too high for the United States.
We need a robust economic agenda, and we need to show up
with concrete alternatives to what our competitors are offering
in infrastructure and investment. America's leadership in the
world has never been more important.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses. We have two
very, very distinguished expert witnesses with us today, and we
should have an incredibly important discussion.
But first let me recognize the distinguished ranking
member, Senator Risch.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES E. RISCH,
U.S. SENATOR FROM IDAHO
Senator Risch. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, let me say that the United States has had a
strategic interest in Asia being open and free for over two
centuries.
We opened a consulate in India in 1792. In the 1850s
various U.S. Senators made speeches about thwarting efforts by
various colonial powers to dominate the region.
A balance of power favorable to the United States protects
U.S. interests and allies' sovereignty, advances economic
prosperity, and ensures no one has to bow to a bully.
However, this balance is being challenged. The greatest
threat of regional domination, of course, comes from China
supported by a growing China-Russia strategic partnership.
It has been interesting to watch Russia become the junior
partner in this relationship. China has improved its strategic
posture by creating trade and economic dependencies and seizing
territory from the South China Sea to the Indian border.
China knows it can get what it wants if it proves U.S.
alliances and partnerships are not up to the task when things
get tough. Time and again we played into their hands.
In 2012 the United States stood by as China seized the
Scarborough Shoal from the Philippines uncontested, a failure
we must not forget or repeat given China's growing encroachment
on more territory like the Second Thomas Shoal.
Weak responses spread the idea that we are unreliable. Left
unanswered, our allies' confidence is shaken, and we should not
be surprised if they seek to engage with China to protect their
own national interest.
Even in the face of a deteriorating strategic position we
remain unserious about ensuring our alliances can address our
shared objectives and contend with shared threats.
U.S. allies plead for deeper economic engagement with us,
yet the U.S. does not have a substantive economic agenda. The
Administration's Indo-Pacific Economic Framework sounds good
but delivers nothing.
While there are calls for reviews of foreign investments by
allies and the United States, we at the same time allow Chinese
firms to benefit from U.S. tax credits and to profit off
research at U.S. universities. This approach should be
reversed.
Meanwhile, the Administration's approach to allies puts
ideology ahead of reality. The last three budgets proposed by
the Administration prioritized gender and climate over
countering China's advantages in transportation and digital
infrastructure.
The Administration instructs allies to stop buying Russian
energy, and then at the same time bans U.S. LNG exports. This
ham handed move has not gone unnoticed by our allies and for
obvious reasons is roundly criticized.
Numerous political declarations and joint statements
obscure the lack of substance in progress with our allies.
AUKUS is the most egregious example.
I strongly support AUKUS, but the Administration announced
the security alliance in 2021 but did not negotiate what it
meant until after the press release went out.
It is now 2024, and we still do not know when any new
military capabilities will be produced. To make it worse, the
Administration refuses to certify that Australia and U.K., our
closest allies, have the laws to adequately support defense
cooperation.
But this did not stop the Administration from announcing
moves to add a new AUKUS partner last week. Similarly, the
Administration announced with great fanfare a nuclear
consultative group with South Korea to deter North Korean
aggression. A great idea.
A year later, where is the progress? Further, the
Administration fails to prioritize greater burden sharing. The
demands of this security environment are immense. Our partners
need to step up and buy more capability and conduct more
presence operations.
Finally, the Administration's Indo-Pacific alliance
strategy does not account for the growing China-Russia
alignment. Our Asian partners recognize that what happens in
Ukraine will affect Asia's future.
The Administration is politely asking China to restrain
Russia rather than imposing effective strong economic
punishment on China for its active role in Ukraine's suffering.
That is the only kind of thing that China will understand or
respond to.
The Administration's approach to alliances is not serving
our interests. Protectionism over economic engagement, ideology
over pragmatism, and form over substance do not advance U.S.
interests or give our Indo-Pacific partners strategic options.
Initiatives must have concrete actions if they are to help
us win this competition. The Administration's performance is
underwhelming.
I look forward to hearing the witnesses' thoughts on these
matters.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Risch.
I think we all agree that the Indo-Pacific is critically
important to U.S. national security interests. So the topic of
modernizing U.S. alliances and partnerships in the Indo-Pacific
is a timely subject.
We have two outstanding experts on the subject that have
joined us today, and I want to thank both of you for your
service and for your being here today.
First, we have Admiral Harry Harris, a decorated four-star
admiral who served our country for 3 years as the 24th
commander of U.S. Pacific Command, INDOPACOM. Admiral Harris
more recently led U.S. bilateral relations with our friends in
Seoul as the U.S. Ambassador to South Korea from 2018 to 2021.
Admiral Harris, it would be difficult to find anyone with
more experience than you both in the military and diplomatic
capacities in the Indo-Pacific. You are a strong advocate for
U.S. alliances and realistic regarding the seriousness of our
competition with the PRC.
Our second witness is Professor Walter Russell Mead, an
accomplished academic and historian currently serving as the
distinguished fellow in strategies and statesmanship at the
Hudson Institute.
Professor Mead is also the James Clarke Chace professor of
foreign affairs and humanities at Bard College and currently
contributes to the Wall Street Journal and its global view
columnist.
So we have two very, very accomplished experts.
Your entire statements will be made part of the record. You
may proceed as you wish. We hoped that you could summarize in
about 5 minutes or so, so we have time for committee
discussion.
With that, let me start with Admiral Harris.
STATEMENT OF HON. HARRY B. HARRIS, JR., FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR
TO SOUTH KOREA, FORMER COMMANDER, U.S. INDO-PACIFIC COMMAND,
COLORADO SPRINGS, COLORADO
Mr. Harris. Thanks, Chairman Cardin and Ranking Member
Risch and distinguished members. It is an honor for me to
appear again before this committee. It has been almost 6 years
since I last appeared here for my confirmation hearing to be
the Ambassador to South Korea.
I thought then that that would be my last testimony before
you. I thought wrong. Today I am honored and even intimidated
to testify alongside the esteemed, dare I say revered,
Professor Walter Russell Mead as distinguished strategist,
historian, teacher, and prolific writer who understands well
the challenges and threats that confront America in the 21st
century. So please throw the hard balls at him, and toss the
softballs to me.
I know I am time limited here so let me get right to it by
first thanking this committee. That this hearing to examine the
issue of U.S. alliances and partnerships in the Indo-Pacific
comes immediately after Japanese Prime Minister Kishida's and
Philippine President Marcos's visit and 2 weeks after we
celebrated NATO's 75th anniversary sends a powerful signal to
the world in general and to our adversaries in particular.
This committee's introduction last week of a bipartisan
resolution underscoring the strength and the importance of the
U.S.-Japan alliance serves as an authoritative reminder that
2024 marks 64 years of our formal alliance with Japan.
Importantly, this month also celebrates and marks the 45th
anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act. In my opinion, without
Congress's active intervention back in 1979 when your
predecessors in the 96th Congress crafted the act, Taiwan would
have long succumbed to the People's Republic of China, or PRC.
Today, 45 years later, Taiwan is democratic, an idea
factory, and a global force for good despite the PRC's
unrelenting quest to intimidate, isolate, and finally dominate
this beleaguered island.
The Cato Institute's 2023 Freedom Index ranked Taiwan as
the freest country in Asia. As reference points, Taiwan ranked
higher than Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada, and even us.
The PRC ranked a dismal 149 out of 165 countries. Unlike
our policy of strategic ambiguity, it appears Xi's intent is
crystal clear. We must never allow the PRC to dictate America's
Taiwan policy.
As this committee knows far better than me, there are very
few bipartisan issues in Washington these days, but our
national concern about the PRC is one of them.
Now, I visited Taiwan three times last year. In my opinion,
Russia on Ukraine has galvanized them. They get it. But they
need our tangible support, not our best wishes, and I am happy
to discuss how this could happen in the Q&A session.
Throughout my long military career and my short stint in
diplomacy I emphasized my belief that America's single greatest
asymmetric strength is our network of alliances and
partnerships.
Today we face a security environment more complex and
volatile than any I have experienced--ever. Today more than
ever alliances are critical to our national security. Alliances
and allies matter.
Ambassador Emanuel, our envoy to Japan, put it just this
way last Sunday--we are betting on our allies, and they are
betting on us.
President Reagan once said that we cannot play innocents
abroad in a world that is not innocent.
This statement is as true today as it was on December 7,
throughout the cold war, on 9/11, on 2/24 when Russia invaded
Ukraine, and on the 7th of October when Hamas terrorists
invaded Israel.
Over a thousand Israelis including women, children, and the
elderly, were subjected to unspeakable cruelty, murder, and
rape, and hundreds were taken hostage. This is pure evil, and
it baffles and angers me that there are those who seek to
justify Hamas's actions.
Indeed, the world remains a dangerous place. The unipolar
moment following the cold war is long over. So, today more than
ever I believe that America's security and prosperity in the
Indo-Pacific are inextricably linked to this network of
alliances and partnerships as we face a challenging and
precarious crossroad where tangible opportunity meets
significant challenge.
We find ourselves again in peer competition. Not ``near
peer''--but peer competition--with adversaries who are
developing and deploying cutting edge weaponry and information
disorder to undermine democracy and defeat us.
An aggressive North Korea is building and testing nuclear
weapons. A revisionist PRC seeks regional then global
domination, and a revanchist Russia is on the move in Europe.
I agree with Professor Mead's piece in the Wall Street
Journal where he opined that we get it wrong when we believe
that giving in to leaders like Putin will satisfy them.
In my opinion, the same can be said of Kim Jong-Un and
autocrats the world over. Equally concerning to me is the
dangerous and growing alignment between the PRC, Russia, and
North Korea, and all three with Iran.
Maya Angelou once said that when someone shows you who they
are, believe them the first time. These autocrats have shown us
who they are time and time again and what they intend to do,
and shame on us if we ignore them.
Professor Mead asserted over a decade ago that America's
cold war alliances were insufficient then to meet the needs of
the 21st century. I agree.
So today, in addition to the U.S.-Japan-South Korea
trilateral, we have the Quad, we have AUKUS, and the new
trilateral relationship involving the Philippines.
In my written statement I talk about specific alliances and
multilateral relationships, so I will not go into them here
other than to observe that, one, AUKUS is not an alliance to
counter an alien invasion, and two, those relationships reflect
a fundamental change to America's approach.
Moving away from the old hub and spoke model of my day, so
20th century, INDOPACOM is now pursuing lattice like security
arrangements with multiple connections between members.
Mr. Chairman, I will conclude my remarks with this
observation. The U.S. made two flawed geopolitical assumptions
last century.
One, we assumed that the PRC would morph into something
resembling a global force for good, and two, that Russia would
no longer threaten its neighbors or the West.
Today, the Russian bear is afoot, and we find ourselves
shooting well behind the Peking duck. We must step up our game,
or we will find ourselves outgunned, literally and
figuratively.
While challenges to our interests in the Indo-Pacific are
real and daunting, I believe our resolve is powerful and
durable. We are bolstered--and we are sustained and
strengthened--by our allies and partners.
Again, to quote Professor Mead, a distracted America still
leads the world. I thank this committee and the Congress for
your enduring support of our diplomatic corps and our armed
forces, and I look forward to your questions.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Harris follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Harry B. Harris, Jr.
Thank you, Chairman Cardin, Ranking Member Risch, and distinguished
members. It's an honor for me to appear again before this committee.
It's been almost 6 years since I last appeared here for my confirmation
hearing to be the Ambassador to South Korea. I thought then that that
would be my last testimony before you. I thought wrong. Today, I'm
honored and even intimidated to testify alongside the esteemed-dare-I-
say-venerated Professor Walter Russell Mead . . . a distinguished
strategist, historian, teacher, and prolific writer who understands
well the challenges and threats that confront America in the 21st
Century, as well as the importance of alliances to our Nation's
security.
Let me begin by thanking this committee. That this timely hearing
to examine the state of U.S. alliances and partnerships in the Indo-
Pacific comes immediately after Japanese PM Kishida's and Philippine
President Marcos' visit and 2 weeks after we celebrated NATO's 75th
anniversary sends a powerful signal to the world in general and to our
adversaries in particular. This Committee's introduction last week of a
bipartisan resolution underscoring the strength and importance of the
United States-Japan alliance serves as an authoritative reminder that
2024 marks 64 years of our formal alliance with Tokyo.
More broadly, I'm grateful for Congress' bipartisan passing of the
fiscal year 2024 National Defense Authorization Act, which was signed
by the President last December. This NDA (1) included strong support
for Taiwan including increased military aid and security cooperation to
that embattled island; (2) authorized the sale and transfer of defense
articles and services relating to the implementation of the AUKUS
partnership; (3) increased funding for the Pacific Deterrence
Initiative (PDI); and (4) reinforced alliances and partnerships.
Importantly, this month marks the 45th anniversary of the signing
into law of the Taiwan Relations Act. In my opinion, without Congress'
active intervention back in 1979 when your predecessors of the 96th
Congress crafted the Act, Taiwan would have long succumbed to the
People's Republic of China, or PRC. Today, 45 years later, Taiwan is
democratic, an idea factory, and a global force for good, despite the
PRC's unrelenting quest to intimidate, isolate, and finally dominate
this beleaguered island. The CATO Institute's 2023 Freedom Index ranked
Taiwan as the freest country in Asia. A reference points, Taiwan ranked
higher than Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada, and the United
States. The PRC ranked a dismal 149 out of 165 countries. I've called
for ending the almost 44-year U.S. policy of strategic ambiguity in
favor of strategic clarity. I also believe we should ink a bilateral
Free Trade Agreement with Taiwan as soon as possible. The
Administration's Indo-Pacific strategy specifically supports an
environment in which Taiwan's future is determined peacefully by its
people. My successor at Indo-Pacific Command testified before Congress
in 2021 that the PRC could invade Taiwan in 6 years. That's 2027 . . .
3 years from now. We ignore Admiral Davidson's warning at our peril.
Unlike our policy of strategic ambiguity, the PRC's intent is crystal
clear and oft-stated. We must never allow the PRC to dictate America's
Taiwan policy.
I was in Taiwan a year ago for the Council of Foreign Relations . .
. again last May on INDOPACOM business where I met with President Tsai
. . . and again just last December where I delivered remarks to their
National Defense University. In my opinion, Russia-on-Ukraine has
galvanized them. They get it. But they need our tangible support . . .
not our best wishes.
The Congress' continued bipartisan actions to strengthen the
technological backbone of the United States against the relentless
challenge posed by the PRC through passage of the CHIPs and Science Act
in 2022 and your ongoing close examination of Tik-Tok are significant.
I'll take this opportunity to express my hope for speedy passage of
NDAA 2025.
Throughout my long military career and my short stint in the
diplomatic world, I underscored the fact that the United States' single
greatest asymmetric strength is our worldwide network of alliances and
partnerships. Today, we face a global security environment more complex
and volatile than any I have experienced. Today, more than ever,
alliances are critical to our national security. Alliances and allies
matter.
President Reagan once said, `We cannot play innocents abroad in a
world that's not innocent.' This statement is as true today as it was
in on December 7th . . . through the cold war . . . on 9-11 . . . on 2-
24 when Russia invaded Ukraine, and the 7th of October when Hamas
terrorists invaded Israel. Over a thousand Israelis--including women,
children, and the elderly--were subjected to unspeakable cruelty,
murder, and rape . . . and hundreds were taken hostage. This is pure
evil, and it baffles me that there are those who seek to justify Hamas'
actions.
Indeed, the world remains a dangerous place or, as Professor Mead
calls it, a ``terrifying'' place. The unipolar moment following the
cold war is long over.
Today, more than ever, I believe America's security and economic
prosperity are inextricably linked to this network of alliances and
partnerships. We face challenging and precarious global crossroads
where tangible opportunity meets significant challenge. Nowhere is this
truer than in the Indo-Pacific. We find ourselves, again, in peer--not
``near-peer'' but ``peer''--competition with adversaries who are
developing and deploying cutting-edge weaponry and information disorder
to undermine democracy with a goal and intent to defeat us. An
aggressive North Korea is building and testing nuclear weapons; a
revisionist PRC seeks regional, even global, dominion; and a revanchist
Russia is not only on the move in Europe but increasingly conducts
operations and engagements throughout the Indo-Pacific and,
importantly, the High North. I agree with Professor Mead's piece in the
Wall Street Journal where he opined that we get it wrong when we
believe that giving in to leaders like Putin will satisfy them. The
same can be said of Kim Jong Un and autocrats the world over.
Last year, I testified before the House Armed Services Committee on
the threat from the PRC. My testimony occurred in the midst of the spy
balloon fiasco, which is so illustrative of the PRC's bad behavior and
disregard for international norms. That Beijing would claim this
incursion over sovereign American airspace was innocuous and unintended
beggars the imagination.
In 2022, the current Administration released its National Security
Strategy. Though I would use the term ``adversary'' rather than
``competitor'', this strategy recognizes that the PRC is the only
competitor with both the intent and, increasingly, the capability to
reshape the international order. As this committee knows far better
than me, there are very few bipartisan issues in Washington these days,
but our national concern about the PRC is one of them. As Michele
Flournoy has said, ``There is a strong bipartisan consensus in seeing
China as the pacing threat, economically, technologically,
diplomatically and militarily.''
The PRC's aggression in the South China Sea continues unabated--in
fact, it has increased--despite the 2016 Permanent Court of
Arbitration's tribunal ruling that invalidated China's ridiculous 9-
dash line claim and unprecedented land reclamations. The PRC's actions
are coordinated, methodical, and strategic, using its military, ``grey
zone'', and economic power to erode the free and open international
seas.
China's considerable military buildup could soon challenge the U.S.
across almost every domain. While some might say the PRC is already
there, I am not one of them. However, the PRC is making significant
advancements in hypersonic weapons, 5th generation fighters, a blue-
water navy with aircraft carriers, an incredible build up of its
nuclear arsenal, and in the next wave of military technologies
including artificial intelligence and advanced space and cyber
capabilities. Geo-politically, the PRC seeks to supplant the United
States as the security partner of choice for countries not only in the
Indo-Pacific, but globally. As I testified before the Congress when I
was in uniform, and again last year, I believe Beijing seeks hegemony
not only in East Asia, but greater Asia and beyond. The PRC wants to
set the rules for the region, indeed the world.
The United States has made it clear that we reject foreign policy
based on leverage and dominance. The United States won't weaponize
debt. We encourage every country to work in its own interest to protect
its own sovereignty. And we must work in our own enlightened self-
interest to develop our own reliable sources of critical materials,
including rare earths, pharmaceuticals, and chemicals essential for
weaponeering, independent of the PRC. Former Deputy National Security
Advisor for Strategy Nadia Schadlow wrote in 2022 that the PRC is ``the
sole source or a primary supplier for a number of critical energetics
materials.'' By ``energetics,'' I'm referring to those materials that
are used for explosives and propellants--from bullets, to artillery, to
missiles. I was stunned to learn about our reliance on the PRC for this
critical capability.
We find ourselves sailing into rocks and shoals, to use a nautical
analogy, and we must invest and innovate to right the errant course
we're on. If the United States does not keep pace, the Joint Force will
struggle to compete with the People's Liberation Army on future
battlefields.
Now, I note that the current Administration's fundamental
understanding of the PRC is consistent with its predecessor. Consider
that the Secretary of State testified that the previous
Administration's tougher approach is right; that what's happening in
Xinjiang is genocide; and that democracy is being trampled in Hong
Kong. The Secretary of Defense testified that he's focused on the
threat posed by the PRC and he promised strong support for Taiwan.
I'm worried about the trajectory of the PRC's body politic. As
former Australian Prime Minister and now Ambassador to the United
States Kevin Rudd wrote, the 2022 party Congress is likely to be ``an
era-defining event . . . cementing Xi Jinping as China's paramount
leader . . . solidifying the country's turn to the state and away from
the market . . . and officially underscoring the primacy of Marxism-
Leninism.'' In other words, Deng Xiaoping is dead in more ways than
one. If the first era of modern Chinese politics was Mao Zedong's, and
the second Deng Xiaoping's, the third is unquestionable Xi Jinping's.
Equally concerning to me is the dangerous and growing alignment
between the PRC, Russia, and North Korea, and now, Iran. Clearly, we
are in what I call the decisive decade. In 2018, I talked about the
challenges facing the United States, including the perception--which,
by the way, I completely disagree with--that the United States is a
declining power facing unrelenting challenges posed by North Korea, the
PRC, and Russia. Of course, today, I would add Iran to that list. Over
the past 6 years, the situation has worsened in almost every geo-
strategic measure. Consider that Taiwan is under siege, Israel finds
itself fighting once again for its very existence, Ukraine is ablaze,
eastern and northern Europe is under threat, and our Navy is involved
in countering Houthi rebels who have effectively shut down commercial
shipping in the Red Sea.
Regarding alliances in general, I was recently asked during a Q&A
session following a speech I gave in Florida about the U.S. acting as a
global policeman, an idea which has gained some traction in some
quarters. The question was posed along the lines of ``why are we the
world's policeman?'' I reject this notion. We are not the world's
policeman. Police and law enforcement officers do their difficult jobs
out a sense of true noblesse oblige . . . of altruism of a high order.
They risk their lives to protect their communities, often with little
pay, no reward, and scant appreciation from those they protect. Their
actions define ``selfless service.'' But, as a Nation, when we act on
the global stage--whether because of alliance obligations or some other
cause or need--we act out of enlightened self-interest. What we provide
to our allies is matched by what we selfishly gain from our allies--
whether that is access, basing, trade, or even broad international
military support like we saw after 9-11. We are not in this alone.
Ambassador Emanuel, our envoy to Japan, put it this way just this past
Sunday: ``We're betting on our allies and they're betting on us.''
Let me now discuss five examples of how the United States benefits
from alliances--one global case and 4 Indo-Pacific cases.
I'll begin with the global case. 75 years ago this month, the
United States and 11 other countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty
to counter the threat from the Soviet Union. Professor Mead wrote back
in 2001, just a few years after NATO's 50th, that the United States``.
. . built the NATO alliance, the largest and longest-lasting intimate
security partnership among sovereign states in modern history.'' Many
call this the most successful alliance in history and I tend to agree.
Today's NATO--with 32 member countries--is not only the largest NATO
has ever been, but I would submit, it's the strongest that NATO has
ever been. I need not remind this committee that in NATO's 75-year
history, Article 5--the collective defense piece--has only been called
into action once: following 9-11 when we were attacked. In other words,
on that darkest of dark days, NATO came to our assistance, not vice
versa.
Now, Japan. I've already mentioned last week's state visit by Prime
Minister Kishida. There was also a trilateral summit with Prime
Minister Kishida, President Marcos of the Philippines, and President
Biden. America's alliance with Japan stands as the cornerstone of
prosperity, security, and stability throughout the Indo-Pacific region.
Since the end of World War II, the network of U.S. alliances has been
at the core of a stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific . . . benefiting us
as much as any of our alliance partners. Now, no country can shape in a
positive way the future of the region in isolation, and no vision for
the region is complete without a robust network of sovereign countries
cooperating to secure their collective interests.
This is why trilateral cooperation between the U.S., South Korea,
and Japan is so important. It's crucial for our three nations to work
together to enhance our security cooperation and preserve the
international rules-based order. The reality is that no important
security or economic issue in the region can be addressed without both
South Korea's and Japan's active involvement.
This is also why bilateral cooperation between Tokyo and Seoul is
critical. I'm heartened by Prime Minister Kishida's and President
Yoon's outreaches to each other. Frankly, the stakes are too high to
embark on any other course. Last year, President Yoon travelled to
Japan for bilateral meetings with Prime Minister Kishida--the first
such meeting by a sitting President of South Korea in 12 years. This is
statesmanship in action. The recent trilateral decision to implement
the North Korean missile warning data sharing mechanism has reached
full operational capability . . . this benefits us all. As does the
multi-year trilateral exercise plan established by Washington, Tokyo,
and Seoul which begins this year.
Japan's remarkable commitment to dramatically increase its defense
spending to historic levels is both welcome and critical to our
Alliance and stability in the region. Tokyo's decision to move surface-
to-ship missiles to Okinawa is part and parcel of this buildup and is
both an example and clear recognition of the twin threats from China
and North Korea.
I agree with Professor Mead's assertion which he made over a decade
ago that America's cold war alliances were insufficient to meet the
needs of the 21st Century. To this end, we worked hard on expanding our
international structures when I commanded USPACOM, and my successors
have moved the ball in ways I couldn't even imagine. So today, in
addition to the United States, Japan, South Korea trilateral I already
mentioned, we have the Quad, AUKUS, and a new relationship involving
the Philippines. Let me briefly touch on these.
I'm a big fan and booster of the Quad. That's the informal grouping
of like-minded democracies: the United States, Australia, Japan, and
India. I called for its resurgence when I spoke at the inaugural
Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi in 2016. Jake Sullivan calls it the
``foundation upon which to build a substantial U.S. policy in the
region.'' I've called for the establishment of a Quad Secretariat,
headquartered somewhere in the region, to coordinate what issues to
take on . . . and, perhaps, to also get at the question of how new
members can join. You know, in college football, the Big 10 used to
have 14 teams and the Big 12 had 10 teams. So, there's nothing that
says the Quad has to have only 4 teams. But let me be clear. The Quad
is not NATO nor will it ever be NATO. It's a grouping of like-minded
democracies who share an outlook on the region's opportunities,
challenges, and dangers. It is not a defense pact.
Now, the new Australia, United Kingdom, and U.S., or ``AUKUS''
arrangement is a defense pact . . . and I, for one, am all for AUKUS
and am excited by it. AUKUS is a game changer. I cannot wait to see a
nuclear submarine under Australian colors underway in the Indo-Pacific.
I don't believe this will take decades as some have said. After all, we
put a man on the moon in 8 years and developed a Covid vaccine in less
than 1 year. Last year, President Biden and Prime Ministers Sunak and
Albanese announced a plan . . . an imminently do-able plan in my
opinion . . . to do just this. We are already training Australian
submariners and technicians in nuclear reactor management. I'm
optimistic. One of the outcomes of last week's visit by PM Kishida was
bringing Japan into AUKUS Pillar Two. To be clear, this will not make
Japan an AUKUS Pillar One partner. Nevertheless, this is a significant
development which underscores both Japan's technological prowess and
the importance of AUKUS to the region writ large.
Also encouraging and, frankly, exciting, is the new, formal
trilateral partnership between the United States, Japan, and the
Philippines. This trilateral will change the power dynamic in the South
Chins Sea. It is long overdue in my opinion.
All of these relationships reflect a fundamental change to
America's approach to alliances and partnerships in the Indo-Pacific.
In my day, we worked on improving bilateral relationships using the
hub-and-spoke model. That is so 20th Century! Today, our approach is
analogous to a lattice structure with multiple connections between
members and across structural boundaries.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, since I was the Ambassador to the Republic
of Korea, I would be remiss if I didn't spend a few paragraphs on our
alliance with South Korea. In my opinion, the textbook case for the
power of alliances is the U.S.-South Korea Alliance--which will be 71
years strong this year. Forged during a devastating conflict, it has
stood the test of time. It's mind-boggling to consider how much has
changed in the world in general, Northeast Asia in particular, and the
Korean Peninsula especially, since 1953.
Some changes have been for the better, such as South Korea's
miraculous growth into an economic and cultural powerhouse, a vibrant
democracy, and a high-tech ``innovation nation.'' Other changes have
been for the worse. Why is North Korea, far away in Northeast Asia, a
challenge for the entire world? The answer is simple: Kim Jong-Un's
missiles point in every direction. Today, North Korea stands out as the
only nation this century to test nuclear weapons. North Korea is ruled
with an iron fist, by a brutal dictator, who values power over the
prosperity and welfare of his own people. The North's unrelenting
pursuit of nuclear weapons, the means to deliver them, and its
unmitigated aggression toward South Korea and America should concern us
all.
I believe KJU wants 4 things: sanctions relief, keep his nukes,
split our Alliance, and dominate the peninsula. Last September, KJU
stated unequivocally that he'd never give up his nukes and that North
Korea's status as a nuclear weapons state is irreversible. This past
January, by declaring that the North would no longer seek peaceful
reunification with the South, and depicting the Republic as the North's
``primary foe and invariable principal enemy'', he abandoned a
foundational doctrine of the Communist regime. As the Wall Street
Journal stated, ``Kim Jong Un has a new Enemy No. 1--and it isn't the
U.S.''
This doesn't sound to me like he's going to get rid of his nuclear
ambitions anytime soon. In fact, he's telling us precisely the
opposite. The North continues to test missiles of ever-increasing
complexity. A year ago, we saw multiple drone incursions across the
DMZ. And now, KJU is trading low-cost weapons for Russian technology--
why am I not surprised?
Clearly, this is no path toward peace. While we hope for diplomacy
with North Korea to be successful, we must recognize that hope alone is
not a course of action. The quest for dialogue with the North must
never be made at the expense of the ability to respond to threats from
the North. Dialogue and military readiness must go hand-in-hand.
Idealism must be rooted in realism.
By his declarations and actions, KJU has eliminated any remaining
fantasy about potential peaceful reunification with South Korea. Let's
not sugar-coat his words; let's take them at face value. Maya Angelou
once said, ``When someone shows you who they are, believe them the
first time.'' Time and time again KJU has shown us who he is, and shame
on us if we fail to believe him. Therefore, I believe our heretofore
U.S. policy goal of negotiating away North Korea's nuclear program has
reached its useful end. We must up our combined game. Deterrence by
appeasement is not deterrence at all.
This is why I'm encouraged by South Korean President Yoon's vision
to make the U.S.-South Korea Alliance the centerpiece of his foreign
policy. I'm pleased that he places a primacy on defending South Korea
against the threat from the North, which means a return to joint
military exercises and an emphasis on combined readiness. And I'm
heartened by his outreach to Japan which I've already discussed.
President Yoon's State Visit with President Biden last year
underscored the vitality and, frankly, the global necessity of our
Alliance. The outcomes of this visit are significant, including the
Washington Declaration on extended nuclear deterrence.al force for good
and, two, that Russia would no longer threaten its neighbors or the
West. Today, the Russian
Mr. Chairman, I'll conclude my written testimony with this
observation. The United States made 2 flawed geopolitical assumptions
last century: one, we assumed that the PRC would morph into something
like a globbear is afoot and we find ourselves shooting well behind the
Peking duck. We must step up our game or we'll find ourselves
outgunned, literally and figuratively. While American interests in the
Indo-Pacific are real and enduring, and challenges to our interests are
equally real and daunting, I believe our resolve is powerful and
durable. And we are bolstered, sustained, and strengthened by our
allies and partners. Again, to quote Professor Mead, ``a distracted
America still leads the world.'' As he wrote in 2012, ``the American
world vision isn't powerful because it is American; it is powerful
because it is, for all its limits and faults, the best way forward.'' I
thank this committee and the Congress for your enduring support to our
diplomatic corps and armed forces. I look forward to your questions.
The Chairman. Admiral Harris, first of all, I very much
appreciate your testimony. It is very informative, very
helpful, and very different than when you testified before us
on your nomination.
So we can see the difference between those types of
appearances. But again, thank you for your service.
Professor Mead.
STATEMENT OF WALTER RUSSELL MEAD, JAMES CLARKE CHACE PROFESSOR
OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND HUMANITIES, BARD COLLEGE, COLUMNIST,
WALL STREET JOURNAL, RED HOOK, NEW YORK
Mr. Mead. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Risch, distinguished members
of this committee, it is a great honor to be asked to speak
before you and especially to testify with either Admiral or
Ambassador Harris in both capacities. He is one of America's
great public servants.
I will just make five points this morning, and I hope they
will contribute to our discussion.
First, America's interests are global, but our goal is not
global conquest. History teaches that if any country dominates
either Europe or Asia, our security and our prosperity here
will come under attack.
Maintaining this balance of power and ensuring the freedom
of the world's sea lanes and communications networks is now and
has been for many generations the foundation of American
foreign policy.
These limited goals make American power a force for the
freedom of other countries and provide the basis for strong and
enduring partnerships. Our goal should be to safeguard these
vital long term national interests at the lowest possible risk
and cost.
Second, allies are a vital asset. We do not want to fight
either Russia or China, or for that matter Iran, on our own.
Fortunately, when great powers try to dominate their
neighborhoods the smaller powers come looking for allies.
Today, countries like India, Japan, and, thanks in part to
Ambassador Harris's service, South Korea have awakened to the
danger. Sweden and Finland have joined NATO to help check
Russia's bid for power, and we all saw literally a miracle last
week as Arab air forces joined with the U.K., the U.S., and
Israel to block Iran's missile and drone attacks.
Third, after the cold war Americans fell asleep at the
wheel. We took our military and economic superiority for
granted and thought that the era of great power competition was
over.
We ignored the danger signs from Russia and Iran. We fail
to foresee the consequences of China's abuse of the world
trading system or to match its military build up in its
neighborhood.
Today, we and our allies are overstretched and under
attack. Wars are erupting all over the world. We must get back
to the basics. Military power is not the only dimension of
American power, but without a solid, hard power foundation we
will not be able to make progress on issues like human rights
or climate change.
Fourth, we now face an axis of revisionist powers including
China, Russia, Iran, and smaller hostile countries around the
world.
These countries do not love or trust each other, but their
fear and hatred of American power and their hope that we can
now at long last be defeated is once again haunting the
civilized world and driving them to act in concert.
The danger of a downward spiral into a new era of chaos and
war is real. We can look at Gaza and Sudan to see what an era
like that will mean for the peoples of the world.
Fifth and finally, we still have time to turn things
around. We are not yet in the position of Winston Churchill,
who could promise his fellow citizens nothing but blood, toil,
tears, and sweat in the darkest days of World War II. We can
still deter war while working for peace.
China can be deterred from attacking its neighbors while
those neighbors catch up with its economic growth and military
might. Russia, Iran, and the fanatical terrorists seeking to
revive the ideology of jihadism can be taught that their
fantasies of empire cannot be fulfilled.
While he was still in college the young John Fitzgerald
Kennedy wrote his senior thesis about Britain's failure to
foresee and forestall the terrible tragedy of World War II.
Soon after he published his thesis as the book ``Why
England Slept.'' After that, he went to war.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Risch, honorable members, I
pray to God that no young Americans today will have to write a
book about why America slept or to fight in the war that will
come if we fail.
This distinguished committee does not need for me to tell
it that the world's situation is dark today and getting darker.
But with focus, determination, and the help of our allies
we can still turn this around and this famous committee, scene
of so many of the great debates that shaped American and world
history in past generations, can and I very much hope will play
a leading role in helping to put the world back on the path to
peace.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Mead follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Walter Russell Mead
Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Risch, and members of
the committee:
It is an honor to be invited to testify before this committee and
its distinguished members. It is a great privilege to join you today to
discuss the system of alliances the United States has built and
maintained over the past several decades, and the future of that system
in Asia. International politics are changing rapidly, and not for the
better, and it is altogether appropriate to assess how well the current
configuration of American alliances addresses the needs of the American
people and their friends around the world.
The first step in any strategic assessment is to identify
priorities: only by understanding what is vital, what is important, and
what is desirable can we determine what the United States needs to
accomplish abroad. But it is only the first step. After establishing
priorities, an assessment must also evaluate how to achieve these
objectives. In the next few minutes, I would like to describe the core
goals of American foreign policy and how our different kinds of
alliances help accomplish these goals.
i. america's grand strategy
Although much of the world has changed significantly over the past
century, American objectives have remained remarkably consistent.
Before World War I, Great Britain was the most powerful of the European
states, and it maintained both a global balance of power and an
international economic order that allowed nearly a century of general
peace and prosperity from the end of the Napoleonic Wars until 1914.
There were still many savage conflicts, and some of the national wars
in Europe took on a genocidal character, so the world was far from
tranquil. But it was spared the horrors of a prolonged conflagration
between great powers.
As Americans determined that Britain was no longer capable of
shouldering this burden, and as they saw that this failure cost
hundreds of thousands of American lives in two world wars, they moved
in fits and starts toward creating a new international order that was
based on American rather than British power. To do this, they
endeavored to make their hemisphere peaceful and secure, maintain a
favorable balance of power on both ends of the Eurasian landmass, and
to create a reasonably well-integrated global economy in which
Americans, their friends, and neutral countries alike could access
economically important goods, such as oil and other forms of energy,
and communicate freely across the global commons. The challenge of
Soviet Communism underscored the importance of this national strategy,
as that strategy provided the tools to contain the USSR and to ensure
that the postcolonial nations emerging from the collapsing European
empires aligned with the Free World rather than the Communist bloc.
Those efforts led the United States to incorporate, with mixed success,
goals like economic development into its national strategy.
America's alliance network, the largest and most effective system
of alliances among free nations in the history of the world, is both
the product of this strategy and a means by which we have achieved our
goals at less risk and cost than we would have faced acting alone.
Before I describe each of these goals and how our alliances factor
into them, I would like to make a further observation about American
foreign policy that informs much of this testimony. In some countries,
foreign policy is largely restricted to the actions of the state. This
has never been true in American history, and I see no reason for this
to change in the years to come. Ever since the United States gained its
independence, American traders, missionaries, military experts and
development workers have affected how other countries view the United
States and have in turn shaped American foreign policy. In many cases,
the actions of American citizens acting on their own initiative have
done more to change the world than the official representatives of our
government. While I will restrict my remarks today to government
actions, none of us should forget that the American people will
continue to change the world through their religious and civic
activism, their universities, and their business activities.
The first pillar of American security is the maintenance of a
favorable balance of power on both ends of the Eurasian supercontinent.
Americans have believed that any nation that dominated the immense
resources of East Asia or Europe would have the ability to threaten
American security and to cripple our trade.
During his tenure in the White House, Teddy Roosevelt used the
power that the United States developed during the Industrial Revolution
to restrain revisionist states in Europe and Asia. His diplomacy to end
the war between Russia and Japan won him a Nobel Peace Prize, but his
main goal was to prevent any one country from dominating East Asia.
Similarly, he warned Germany against attempting to overturn the
British-led order in Europe. George Kennan, the most eloquent
articulator of the containment strategy that won the cold war, argued
for a ``strongpoint defense'' against Communism that focused on the
same regions. As he saw it, control over the industrial heartlands of
Europe and Japan would decide the contest between communism and
democracy. To that end, he recommended that the United States do
everything in its power to reconstruct Europe's and Japan's economies
and to develop strong alliances in both places. A bipartisan consensus
formed around that strategy, which served the country well throughout
the cold war.
Maintaining the balance of power has benefited the United States
and its allies. Keeping the Red Army at bay was an expensive
proposition, and at times a fraught one, but it cost much less in lives
and treasure than a third major conflict in Europe and East Asia would
have. The current confrontation with China is similarly tragic, but it
is far better than ceding some of the most economically and
strategically important parts of the world to a rival.
Allies have always been important in these efforts. In recent
years, our allies have stepped up in meaningful ways to preserve and
maintain this system. Japan has long been an important economic and
diplomatic counterbalance to China, and as Prime Minister Kishida's
visit last week demonstrated, his country is increasingly important in
the security realm as well. It is even contributing to the defense of
Ukraine. South Korea is assisting Europe's security through arms sales
and transfers, along with its work to defend its own country, which has
become an important part of the global economy. The Philippines is
contesting Chinese claims in the South China Sea, one of the most
important arteries of the global economy. And Australia, which has
fought alongside the United States in every major conflict for more
than a century, is playing a major role through the Quad, AUKUS, and
other critical initiatives.
From the American Revolution, fought as we can read in the
Declaration of Independence in part to free the American economy from
unfair British trade restrictions, to the present day advancing
Americans' economic interests by preserving our rights to trade (and
protecting American producers from predatory practices by overseas,
state-aided rivals) has been the second pillar of our national
strategy. After World War II Americans organized the global economy
around a dollar-based system of international finance and trade that
helped propel both this country and our allies to unprecedented levels
of prosperity. Today, thanks to the abuse of the system by China,
changes in patterns of investment and trade and to errors in the post-
cold war construction of the World Trade Organization, the old system
is badly in need of reform. Nevertheless, building and upholding a
trade system that favors the interests of Americans and binds our
allies into a common system remains a key task for American
policymakers.
America's economic and security needs are often connected. Economic
activity requires energy, and securing plentiful and stable sources of
energy is important for the global economy to function. The free flow
of information and goods between countries is similarly important. The
interstitial spaces through which that information and those goods
move, such as international waters and outer space, must be kept secure
for American prosperity to continue.
Stability in global energy markets is even more important for many
of our Asian allies than it is for the United States. The International
Energy Agency estimates that net imports account for 90 percent of
Japan's total energy supply and 85 percent of South Korea's. India is
not an ally, but one-third of its total energy supply comes from
abroad. The United States is a net exporter of energy, by comparison,
and we nevertheless feel keenly the effects of high oil prices. This
hearing is not about the Middle East, but I would be remiss if I did
not note that the security and stability of the oil-exporting regions
of the world is a matter of economic survival for our key allies and
partners in Asia, and that they pay careful attention to our Middle
East policy.
Preventing any single country from dominating the Middle East or
acquiring the ability to block the flow of Middle East energy to world
markets remains an essential component of American global strategy. The
interests of the state of Israel and the United States are not
identical, but the aspirations of Iran today, and perhaps of other
countries in the future, to dominate the Middle East threaten Israel's
survival and vital American interests. For this reason, Israel (and
Gulf Arab states with similar concerns) are important strategic
partners for the United States. Building a solid framework of regional
security in which local actors like Israel and its Arab neighbors take
the lead, with American support in reserve, is the best way to protect
basic American interests at the lowest risk and cost.
Keeping the interstitial spaces free and clear is also important
for the American and the global economy. In recent years, we have seen
resurgences of piracy in various parts of the world, including off the
coast of Somalia, and Iran's Houthi proxies are significantly
disrupting global trade by attacking international shipping near the
Red Sea. There are two other potential flashpoints that I would like to
discuss today.
The first is in the South China Sea. In 2016, the United Nations
found that over one-fifth of global trade passed through this disputed
waterway. China has built and militarized a set of islands in the South
China Sea as part of its campaign to claim the waterway as part of
China's territory. An arbitration court at The Hague has found these
Chinese claims to be meritless, but China has ignored the ruling.
Recently, it has escalated its harassment of Philippine ships as our
treaty ally maintains its own territorial claims there. Among others,
ships from our Australian and Japanese allies have joined our efforts
to defend Philippine sovereignty. There are many possible causes of a
broader conflict there, and the consequences for the global economy
would be dramatic.
The other is around Taiwan. My recent travels in Northeast Asia
have reinforced how devastating a war around Taiwan will be for the
global economy. High-tech industries around the world will grind to a
halt if Taiwan's semiconductor industry can no longer export. Fighting
in the waters around Taiwan will immediately restrict Japan's and South
Korea's abilities to import food and fuel for their populations, to say
nothing of the other inputs their economies need to function and trade
with other countries. Bloomberg estimates that a conflict started by a
Chinese invasion of Taiwan would slash global GDP 10 percent in the
first year of fighting. Japan and the Philippines are each taking
measures to deter such a conflict, and the Biden administration has
reached many agreements that should make Beijing hesitate about using
force in the Taiwan Strait.
The core objectives of American grand strategy are remarkably
constant, but as circumstances change, our enduring interests require
changes in policy. We should understand that the nature of American
leadership is to promote and accelerate technological, economic and
social change as our dynamic capitalist economy innovates and expands.
The Information Revolution today is introducing changes as profound,
and sometimes as destabilizing, as the Industrial Revolution did in its
day. A changing America must manage its affairs in a changing world.
From the development of nuclear weapons to the impact of information
technology and artificial intelligence, scientific developments are
continually changing and, usually, making more complex the tasks of our
diplomats and military leaders. This is a feature not a bug of
America's activity in the world, and we must continually update both
our tactics and our strategies as the situation at home and abroad
rapidly evolves in an era of accelerating and often disruptive
technological progress.
Europe was once the center of American foreign policy concerns.
Today the center of gravity in world politics has shifted decisively
away from the European Union and its neighbors. And while Russia's
revisionist foreign policy goals and deep hatred (under its current
leadership) of the United States and our values make it a rival,
Vladimir Putin's Russia poses a less immediate threat to the European
balance of power than did the Soviet Union under Stalin and his
successors. As the United States seeks to prevent Russia from becoming
a more formidable enemy, we seek to cooperate with NATO allies and
others to limit Russian power. America's goal for NATO should be to
promote the ability and the will of our European allies to stand up for
their own security even as our priorities move elsewhere.
China today, both as a powerful actor in the Indo-Pacific and as a
source of strength and support to other American rivals like Russia and
Iran, is the chief threat to both the geopolitical and economic
interests of the United States. China is a more formidable rival than
the Soviet Union was. The possibility of a never-ending struggle
against such an adversary is a grim one, and although our geopolitical
track record has been a good one, it is not clear who would prevail in
such a contest. But there is another way to achieve our objectives in
the region and ensure another century of American peace and prosperity.
ii. the problem of uneven economic development
When we look at the history of Asia and of American engagement in
the Indo-Pacific, the geopolitical consequences of uneven economic
development have led to the most serious challenges to the balance of
power that America seeks. In the late 18th and throughout the 19th
century the British and the Europeans established colonial empires
because they were able to achieve a level of modernization and
industrial development much faster than Japan, China, and India.
Japan's early industrial success made it the greatest power in Asia by
the early 1900s, and aspirations for regional supremacy went to the
heads of Japan's rulers, driving them on a destructive and ultimately
ruinous quest for hegemony.
Today, China's success has made it the greatest regional power and
tempted many in Beijing to follow the path of Imperial Japan. Take its
outsized share of the region's GDP: in 1980 mainland China accounted
for approximately 11 percent of the combined GDP of East Asia and the
Pacific. In 2022, it accounted for nearly 57 percent of the region's
total GDP. To specifically see the kind of power inequities this causes
it is helpful to examine the evolution of the Indian and Chinese
economies since 1980.
According to World Bank figures in chained dollars, in 1980 India's
GDP was 64 percent of China's. By 2001 when China joined the World
Trade Organization, India's economy was only 28 percent as large as
China's. And, despite several years of rapid growth in the 21st
century, by 2021 India's economy had fallen even further behind and
equaled only 17 percent of the Chinese economy. Even as India has
caught up with China in population and built a world-class technology
sector, it has not emerged as the kind of manufacturing powerhouse that
could rival China's economic weight in Asia and beyond.
If India's economy had kept pace with China over the past 40 years,
India would currently have a GDP of $10 trillion instead of $2.73
trillion. Between the military spending an economy of that size can
support and the economic and political clout it would give Indian
businessmen and diplomats, there would be no ``China threat'' in the
Indo-Pacific. When and if the gap between India and China begins to
close, the balance of power in Asia will also start to shift, and China
will need to rethink its approach to regional and world politics begins
to close, the balance of power in Asia will also start to shift, and
China will need to rethink its approach to regional and world politics.
China today, like Japan in the 1930s, is a country whose rapid
development seems to put Asian supremacy within reach, but Beijing has
lucked into a fortuitous moment in history, not an era. As India,
Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Thailand, Bangladesh, and Burma
all continue to modernize and reach their potential, a rising Asia will
become too big for any country to dominate. In this sense, the
objective of American strategy toward the region should not necessarily
be either to crush China or to change its form of government but to
promote development and modernization across the rest of the region.
Our goal should not be a defeated, embittered, impoverished or divided
China. It should be an Indo-Pacific so big, so rich, and so powerful
that no single country now or in the future can successfully pursue a
hegemonic strategy. As the rest of Asia rises, Beijing's chance at
supremacy begins to shrink--and our allies in the Indo-Pacific will be
able to bear more of the costs that keeping the peace requires.
iii. the missing piece: economic development
In order to help push the region toward a more natural balance of
power, it is helpful to take a step back and look at American strategy
in the decades following the end of World War II. The progress toward
free trade and the development of an international legal and political
system that supported successive waves of expansion and integration
across the entire world economy was one of the great triumphs in
American foreign policy, even as an Iron Curtain had descended on much
of Europe. American leaders realized that unless important countries
could recover from the calamitous destruction of World War II and
regain their prosperity, the United States would have no foreign
customers for its products, no strong military allies in the struggle
with the Soviet Union, and the poverty and misery felt by many would
enhance the appeal of communism around the globe. To avoid this
outcome, the United States opened its markets to foreign goods from
Europe and Japan--often on a non-reciprocal basis--while also promoting
American aid and investment abroad, maintaining a stable system of
exchange rates, and bearing a disproportionate share of the burden of
the common defense. The role of the dollar as a global reserve
currency, along with the expansionary bias of American fiscal and
monetary authorities, facilitated America's assumption of the role that
became known as ``the locomotive of the global economy'' and ``the
consumer of last resort.'' American trade deficits stimulated
production and consumption in the rest of the world, significantly
increasing both the prosperity of other countries and their willingness
to participate in the American system.
While the decision to grant foreigners access to our domestic
markets was one of the most debated aspects of American foreign policy,
it was imperative that countries from France and Germany to Japan and
South Korea recognized that the advantages of partnering with the
United States were greater than those of aligning with the Soviet
Union. This policy helped consolidate support around the world for the
American system and was very much a critical element of our strategy to
contain and ultimately roll back the Soviet empire.
Unfortunately, today, it is not clear that many in the region are
convinced that the benefits of working with the Americans outweighs the
benefits of working more closely with our communist adversaries in
Beijing. A recent annual survey of business, political and civil-
society actors by the Singapore-based ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute found
for the first time this year that a slim majority of Southeast Asian
leaders would, if forced to choose, opt for China over the U.S. as
their ``preferred alignment choice in the region.'' Thailand, Indonesia
and Malaysia were among the countries where majorities would choose
China. What I have heard from senior officials and business leaders
across the region is that vague--even if well intentioned--initiatives
like IPEF do not provide many nations with what they really want, which
is access to American markets. For many of these countries, trade and
investment with the United States is seen as an engine for development
and a pathway toward the kind of wealth and prosperity that we have
enjoyed in the West for generations.
Many things have changed since the 1940s and the United States
cannot return to the non-reciprocal trade relationships of the past.
But the development of a truly integrated, efficient and dynamic
economic system that attracts partners around the world remains
necessary to America's security and economic interests.
iv. the eroding military balance
It is important to note that the Biden administration has had
several notable accomplishments that have strengthened our hand in the
Indo-Pacific over the last few years. Last summer, the US and India
signed several important agreements that deepened cooperation between
the world's two largest democracies. Many countries, alarmed by Chinese
saber-rattling and heavy-handed diplomacy, have looked toward the
United States in order to strengthen security ties, leading to
significant initiatives such as the launch of AUKUS. The
administration's diplomatic efforts have helped facilitate a temporary
easing of the often-strained relationship between Japan and South
Korea. Additionally, strategically located Pacific Island nations such
as Papua New Guinea have granted the United States permission to
station U.S. troops and supplies on the island nation which is close in
proximity to vital shipping lanes. The American-led campaign to limit
Chinese access to sensitive computer technology has chalked up
important wins. Passage of the flawed but consequential Inflation
Reduction Act, and Chips Act demonstrated America's economic resilience
and refuted claims that Washington is hopelessly gridlocked. However,
the alliances and partnerships that give the U.S. the strength to
manage its relationship with Beijing ultimately depend on military
power and our will, and perceived will to use it when necessary. The
erosion of American deterrence is the biggest single problem facing
American foreign policy, and our inability to get this issue right has
led to catastrophe in both Ukraine and the Middle East and could
potentially lead to war in Asia.
Over the last 20 years, China has launched one of the greatest
military buildups in the history of the world and America's failure to
match this epochal military buildup--not a lack of diplomatic
activism--is the root cause of the region's geopolitical insecurity.
China recently announced a 7.2 percent increase in defense spending. In
contrast, when adjusted for inflation, the President's $850 billion
request for the defense budget in 2025 is actually a reduction. China
possesses the world's largest navy, and recent estimates suggest that
their shipbuilding capacity is over 230 times greater than that of our
own. TheCenter for Strategic and International Studies has noted that
as we have allowed our defense industrial base to shrivel up, Beijing
has invested in and is in the process of acquiring high-end weapons
systems and equipment five to six times faster than the United States.
As many war games have shown, it is not even clear if we have enough
long range precision guided munitions to last a week if all-out war
breaks out over Taiwan or in the South China Sea. Earlier this month,
the Navy released a fact sheet showing that several of its key
shipbuilding programs are facing years of delays. These are just a few
examples that I know you are all aware of, but it is becoming
increasingly clear that the military balance in the Far East has
shifted from a clear American advantage into a gray zone and Beijing is
now closer than ever to having the capability to forcibly unify with
Taiwan. Better security cooperation with our allies, like we have seen
with Japan and the Philippines last week, can help at the margins, but
a serious policy for the Indo-Pacific requires larger investments from
the United States than both parties seem currently unready to provide.
This reality is well understood in capitals across Asia and many
nations are beginning to take steps to hedge their position.
v. moralism, morality, and global issues
This discussion has focused primarily on American interests, and a
listener could object that American values have made some fleeting
appearances, but I have not placed much emphasis on them. Dean Acheson,
one of the architects of the American-led post-World War II order, once
made an insightful comment about the difference between morality and
moralism in American foreign policy. Years after he served as Harry
Truman's Secretary of State, he argued that ``the righteous who seek to
deduce foreign policy from ethical or moral principles are as
misleading and misled as the modern Machiavellis who would conduct our
foreign relations without regard to them.'' As he saw it, moral
progress could only come through the responsible exercise of power, and
throughout his life he sought to make sure that the United States did
that.
America's cold war policy aimed at stopping the spread of Soviet
tyranny was, Acheson rightly believed, deeply moral. Today, the Chinese
Communist Party has become an expansionist, tyrannical power whose
inordinate ambition endangers freedom worldwide. America's interests
and values both lead us to oppose that ambition, even as we seek to
avoid the catastrophe of another great-power war.
Moral foreign policy often requires pragmatism. Defeating Nazi
Germany required an alliance with the equally evil Soviet Union. And
President Nixon's rapprochement with Mao's China, then at the
horrifying acme of the Cultural Revolution, similarly was driven by the
need to counter the greater threat posed at that time by the Soviet
Union. Today, America and its democratic allies, even at their best,
are not strong and united enough to handle the world's geopolitical
challenges without enlisting the help of nondemocratic and even
antidemocratic partners. In pursuit of objectives that are
fundamentally moral and legitimate, the United States will need to draw
on our pragmatic tradition of foreign policy that recognizes realities
while aiming at the promotion of human freedom and flourishing.
Since the end of the cold war, many American analysts and
policymakers assumed that geopolitical competition was largely
irrelevant, and that the United States needed to redefine its interests
around a set of what some would call ``posthistorical goals'' and
global issues. Eliminating global poverty, addressing social injustices
ranging from the marginalization of women and sexual minorities to
economic inequality within and between countries, fighting climate
change, strengthening the role of law and of rule-driven institutions
in international life, and promoting human rights replaced the more
limited goals of traditional statecraft.
It is not wrong to care about such things and many of these goals
reflect objectives that the American people intend to pursue either
through government policies or through the activities of NGOs and
religious organizations. But for American strategists at a time of
limited resources and mounting international challenges it will be
necessary to distinguish between the achievable and the aspirational,
and the ``must haves'' and the ``nice to haves'' among these goals.
Furthermore, we must rigorously reject the seductive illusion that soft
power and the power of example can be the principal tools of American
foreign policy in times like these. The failure of America and our
allies to maintain our military margin of superiority in the South
China Sea and the Taiwan Strait has done more to endanger peace than
anything we have done or could have done in the realm of soft power to
preserve it.
In the absence of a military coalition that has the will and the
means to uphold the peace, none of the global goals dear to the hearts
of many Americans can be achieved. Building that coalition and doing
America's share to provide the resources and power such a coalition
requires, must in today's world hold the central place in American
statecraft. A network of strong alliance partners in the key theaters
of world politics backed by American economic, technological and
military power remains the best and the cheapest way to secure our
essential interests and to provide a foundation for the pursuit of
higher and more complex goals.
The Chairman. Well, thank you for your insight. I think we
all need to take your advice and be prepared to act on it.
I was interested in both of your comments about our
alliances, which is the subject here for the Indo-Pacific.
I would agree with you, Professor Mead, that our
adversaries do not trust each other but they have an alliance.
Their alliance is not a transparent alliance that we do
when we deal with the Quad, or we deal with the AUKUS
agreements, but there is a clear alliance between China,
between Russia, between Iran, between North Korea.
They are covering for each other and supporting each other.
They may not trust each other, and they are forming a very
strong block against the national security interests of the
United States that promote a value based rule based global
systems with democratic institutions.
So I guess my first question is, we have a lot of
alliances. America is known in the Indo-Pacific for being
military forward, but are we doing enough in trade and
investment in diplomacy, which is really where I think the
battleground needs to be.
Our military is there--absolutely important--but we need to
avoid, as you said, sending our men and women over in harm's
way.
So is there a better way to coordinate our alliances in
order to meet the challenges that we have today? Let me start,
if I might, first with Professor Mead and then we will go to
Admiral--Ambassador Harris.
Mr. Mead. Well, absolutely, Senator. In 1980 India's GDP
was 65 percent of China's. Today it is about 17 percent of
China's, and that gap that opened up is in some ways the heart
of our problem in the Far East.
That is to say that China, which at one point was one of a
number of powers in Asia, has, thanks to its vast economic
growth and its military build up, become a threat to the
system.
The best way to assure the long term stability of the Indo-
Pacific--of a free and open Indo-Pacific without Americans
going to war--is to encourage and support the economic growth
of countries like India, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the
Philippines in the hope that at some point as these countries
are more dynamic, powerful, and wealthy, even in Beijing they
will understand that their dream of dominating the Indo-Pacific
is simply not realistic.
It is too big for any one country, even China, to control,
and so this must always be a core element of our strategy in
the region.
The Chairman. Admiral Harris, you were our military leader
in the Indo-Pacific, and then you became our Ambassador to one
of the most important countries in the region.
So are we putting too much attention into the military and
not into diplomacy and economics and trade?
Mr. Harris. Mr. Chairman, I do not think so. I think that
we are putting adequate emphasis on diplomacy, the military
component, and the economic component.
However, I am not convinced that we are advocating all the
time for the right things in those three buckets. Let me get at
this just a little bit.
I will add to what Professor Mead said by highlighting that
in 1970 the GDP of South Korea was actually less than that of
North Korea, and by some measure South Korea is the ninth
largest economy in the world today.
And that is not because of the great communist system that
North Korea has. It is because the United States provided South
Korea an umbrella under which it could develop economically.
So I think that is an important point.
The Chairman. Let me fine tune this a little bit.
We withdrew from TPP. This framework that is being
discussed is important, but it is not trade agreements. It does
not have remedies.
We are not a member of the United Nations Convention on the
Law of the Sea. Are we missing opportunities because we are not
as aggressive as we need to be on those fronts?
Mr. Harris. Clearly, in my opinion we are missing huge
opportunities. So I advocated in uniform for the United States
to become a signatory to TPP, which is kind of an unusual
position for a military officer to take.
But I did it because of the security relationships between
the TPP countries that I felt would have been strengthened had
we become a signatory to it. We lost that opportunity, and now
there is this thing called CPTPP which is being driven by
Japan. And we are not a signatory to that, either.
It would be super ironic if China becomes a signatory--a
member of CPTPP, which is a free trade agreement.
I agree with the ranking member that IPEF lacks the teeth
that a free trade agreement or free trade relationship has.
So I am an advocate for free trade agreements. I believe we
need to have a free trade agreement with Taiwan. I hope that we
become a signatory to CPTPP--not for the benefit of the other
11 countries that are in CPTPP, but because of the benefit to
us. For our own enlightened self-interest we should become a
signatory to these things.
And the same with UNCLOS. That is the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea. We have long been a holdout
in signing on to UNCLOS even though it was President Reagan and
his team who put together the final package for UNCLOS.
He had a lot of disagreements with the UNCLOS as it was
initially crafted and for all the right reasons. So, he and his
team crafted a version of UNCLOS that would have benefited the
United States economically.
But here we are today as one of the few countries in the
world that are not signatories to UNCLOS, and in fact if you
look at the map of nations that are not signatories to UNCLOS
it starts to resemble an axis of stupidity. Because we are not
a signatory to this convention that China, Russia, and others
are signatories to, and they are taking economic advantage of
all the things that UNCLOS provides. We are not.
So that is, in my opinion, shooting ourselves in the foot.
The Chairman. Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I am tempted to take up there, but I got a couple of things
I want to talk about first.
We are almost a fourth of the way through the 21st century
already and as we have watched this first quarter of a century
unfold it has become apparent, I think, that more and more we
have seen two poles develop and that one pole is the
association of the autocracies in the world, and the other is
the democracies of the world, and as every year goes by it
seems it gets more and more so, and our affiliation for the
people on our side is our values, our freedoms, the things that
we value.
On the other side I think that they are pulled together, as
you guys have pointed out, a hatred for America amongst other
things, but also their values of how they think a government
should treat their people.
I think the challenge for the rest of the 21st century is
how the two poles keep from killing each other and exist on the
same planet, because they are not going to change. The
autocracies are not going to change.
I mean, there is hope, I think, for Iran because of the
demographics in the country. But China is not going to change.
Russia is not going to change. North Korea is not going to
change.
So we have got to figure out how we do that. Your thoughts
on how we coexist with these countries? We are, certainly, not
changing. They are not, certainly, changing.
Mr. Mead, why do we not start with you?
Mr. Mead. Well, I think here we come back, to some degree,
to the thought of George Kennan and thinking about how are we
going to deal with the Soviet Union after World War II, a
hostile power with expansionist ambitions, morbid suspicion of
the United States, a nontransparent political system, and yet,
in a world of nuclear weapons the idea of a U.S.-Soviet war was
unthinkable.
And his analysis, I think, remains useful today that you
can reach agreements--pragmatic agreements--with powers like
this under some circumstances but you first have to establish a
firm line of deterrence.
They have to realize that sort of pushing and poking with a
bayonet will not get them any benefits, that your power and
your resolve and your alliance network are resilient and strong
enough so that there is--they cannot succeed in this other way,
and then you can start to talk about areas where you do have
real interests.
We got through 40 years of the cold war in this way, not
always elegantly, but I think we are going to find that, yes,
learning to live with countries with whom we have fundamental
differences is going to be at least in the kind of year to year
process necessary to our policy.
We can hope for better things. We can--as you mentioned
with Iran. My own experiences of traveling in China before Xi
Jinping took things in a different direction. There are many,
many people in China who see the world much more the way we do
than the way the current leadership of the Chinese Communist
Party does.
I am not given to despair. But I think pragmatically we
cannot assume that our enemies will suddenly convert to the
cause of democracy and human rights, and all of our problems
will melt away. We need another more substantive strategy for
dealing with it.
Senator Risch. Ambassador.
Mr. Harris. So, thanks for the question, Senator.
I think we have an exemplar to look at, and that is the
United States' long cold war against the Soviet Union, both
hugely capable nuclear states that managed to work through our
daily differences without treading on the foundational
differences between our countries until the Soviet Union
collapsed of its own weight.
I think it is important that we understand that the United
States is at fundamentally, ideologically polar opposite
positions than that taken today by modern China, Russia, North
Korea, and even Iran. We ought not to begin discussions with
these countries, in my opinion, by trying to negotiate away
those foundational beliefs that they hold--just as they should
not try to negotiate away our foundational beliefs.
An example of that is the Taiwan issue. China is not going
to change their mind that Taiwan is a renegade province of
China, and we should not try to change that view of theirs
because it is a waste of breath, energy, and resources.
And they should not try to change our idea that we think
that the Taiwan issue should be resolved peacefully by the
Taiwanese.
Now, if we yield to that point in any way, then the PRC is
winning, and we are losing. I think that we ought to keep this
in mind as we make policies at the political level and laws at
the congressional level when we deal with these countries, and
a good example of this is the Science and CHIPS Act.
Another example is the Congress's--the Senate's--ongoing
examination of TikTok, and these sorts of things. This falls
into the realm of policy and laws.
Senator Risch. Thank you. My time is up. I wish we had more
time. Your comments have been fascinating and certainly open a
lot more areas of discussion. But it is what it is.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The Chairman. Senator Coons.
Senator Coons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member.
Thank you to our two distinguished witnesses. I am grateful
that you are offering us your insight and your advice in this
important time.
In your opening testimony, Mr. Mead, you sounded a dark but
important, and I think, timely note by referencing back to John
F. Kennedy's book, ``Why America Slept'' and then the
consequences that he himself was in combat in the South Pacific
a few short years later.
Given what both of you have seen, studied, spoken about, I
do think it is long past time for us to be more engaged,
effective, and purposeful in meeting this moment. And this is
timely because right now, today, on the other side of the
Congress the Speaker is making a decision--his caucus is making
a decision--about whether we will move ahead with robust
funding for security in the Indo-Pacific, for the defense of
Israel, for the defense of Ukraine, for humanitarian aid, that
in combination will reassure a divided and worried world that
the United States intends to still be the indispensable global
partner with this network of alliances, this lattice of
security arrangements we have.
I thought it was a striking development in the last year
that both Germany and Japan decided to double their defense
spending. In both cases it has a double edged sword.
It is partly because they lack confidence that we will be
the trusted and reliable security partner they have counted on
us to be for decades. It is also because, as Prime Minister
Kishida said to us in an address to a joint session of
Congress, that they recognize that Americans have wearied of
bearing so much of the burden of being that guarantor of the
free and open global system.
We have critical work to do, and I think in the last 3
years there has been real progress. AUKUS was a striking
innovation in terms of security and deterrence. The Quad has
been elevated from a talk shop to a real movement forward, and
as you both said in your testimony our alliances are absolutely
a key strategic benefit.
Tragically, our past president, unmoored from a sense of
history, did not appreciate or invest in those alliances.
Many have invested and worked hard, both of you, and you in
particular as Ambassador helped bring together Japan and Korea
in a way that critically contributes to the regional security
architecture.
You have referenced some critical failings--the failure to
ratify the Convention of the Law of the Sea, which those of us
who serve on this committee, we were here for those debates--I
only wish we could go back and rerun them and ratify them
again--the failure to join CPTPP and to have a real and robust
trade and economic agenda.
What are the key actions now, looking forward, that each of
you would urge us to take both to strengthen our security
architecture in the region to deter the dark possibilities, Mr.
Mead, that you laid out, and to better balance what I think is
our real strength, which is our economy?
We are the world's most innovative country. We have the
strongest economic underpinnings of any advanced society right
now. Our biggest weakness is our political division, is our
inability to show that confidence, that bipartisan strength,
that this committee was long known for.
What are the key actions you think we must take in this
moment to secure our future?
Mr. Mead, and then, if I might, Admiral.
Mr. Mead. Thank you, Senator Coons. Those are very useful
questions. I hope my answers will be as useful as the question.
To give you just two quick things, I would say that we do
need to increase our defense spending in ways that are not
simply spreading pork around the American economy but actually
focused on the capabilities that we need and that our allies
are looking for.
If Germany and Japan can do a better job, so can we.
Domestically, though--and I think this is important--I agree
with you. With all we have been hearing this morning about the
need for U.S. receptivity to more trade, fair and free trade
agreements with key partners, to do that we need to be
reassuring the American people that our economy is moving
forward in a way that benefits them.
I am actually publishing today or tomorrow, depending on--
an essay in Tablet magazine that looks at how we can use some
technological innovations to help Gen Z, the Zoomers, enjoy the
same kind of access to single family housing and get on the
property ladder in the way that past generations have done.
I think when the American people see that the door is open
to more prosperity for them, we as a country will be able to
approach some of these international issues in a more open
minded, and I think, ultimately helpful way.
Senator Coons. Mr. Chairman, if we might, could we hear
from the Ambassador?
Mr. Harris. Thanks, Senator.
I think there are half a dozen ways I can respond to your
question. I will start by saying that we should be very
aggressive, in my opinion, on laws that affect our relationship
with China, aggressive in terms of holding China accountable,
and aggressive in protecting our country.
Again, I go back to the CHIPS and Science Act. I look at
what could come down the pike with TikTok and the like. I think
that we should sign on to CPTPP before China does. We will be
at a significant economic disadvantage if China gets in the
CPTPP, and we do not.
We should sign UNCLOS for all the reasons that I talked
about. I think we should reimagine foreign military sales--
FMS--and an example here: We should get the munitions to Taiwan
that Taiwan has already paid for and that Congress has already
authorized, but the United States still has not gotten those
munitions--those weapon systems--to Taiwan.
It has taken us 8 years to get Harpoon to Taiwan, even
though Taiwan already has Harpoon, and that sale has already
been approved. So, it should not take 8 years. It should not
take a decade to do that.
I think we should increase our defense spending. If you
look at it in terms of inflation, our defense spending has
actually gone down at a time when we need it more than ever.
I think we should look for ways to use foreign weapons
manufacturers--shipbuilding, for example--as a bridge to
overcome our own industrial deficiencies in this regard in the
2020 to 2030 timeframe, not as a permanent solution but as a
bridge solution.
Those are just some ideas. I will stop here.
Senator Coons. Thank you both.
Mr. Chairman, I could not agree more with the testimony
that the hour is late, the need is urgent, and we need to act
in a way that shows the bipartisan determination to address
things like defense modernization using trade and engaging more
closely with our allies.
Thank you for this hearing.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Coons.
Senator Romney.
Senator Romney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
China apparently believes that America is in decline, that
our social networks are frayed, that our industrial base is not
as strong as it once was, that actually there are attitudes of
isolationism in the U.S., an unwillingness to work with allies
and to support allies.
Given the fact that Xi is reported to be a pretty smart
guy, would he not be wise to say if that is the case why do we
not just wait out Taiwan, wait out America's weakness, and no
reason to invade?
I know there are many who feel like an invasion could be
imminent. But if you really believe that America was in
decline, a position I disagree with, but if you were to believe
that and also recognize that an invasion of Taiwan would have
an enormous economic impact on China given their reliance on
Taiwanese semiconductors, is it your view that invasion is a
real and imminent threat, or is it that no, actually, Xi
Jinping is going to wait it out and see how things develop?
Each of you get a chance to speak. Could you begin, and
then I will turn to the admiral?
Mr. Mead. Yes, Senator. Thank you for the question.
Well, I am not good at reading anyone's mind, and Xi
Jinping is not transparent to me. But I do think that what we
need to do--the best way to restore predictability and
stability, and in fact, to get the topic of a Chinese invasion
of Taiwan off the sort of international conversation agenda is
for there to be a margin of military superiority sufficient so
that it is evident to people in Beijing as well as elsewhere
that it is simply not possible for China to successfully
attack.
And those are not preparations for invasion of the mainland
by us. These are defensive preparations. And in that case China
itself will stop talking about Taiwan, stop harassing Taiwan as
much because why do you open a conversation the result of which
will simply advertise your weakness?
So this would be the way I think we should proceed.
Senator Romney. Thank you.
Admiral.
Mr. Harris. Senator, I think on the one hand, if you are
looking at it demographically the PRC is upside down in terms
of youth and age and the like. So that could argue that sooner
rather than later regarding an invasion.
But on the other hand, I think that Xi Jinping is no fool.
He seeks stability in the international order so that he has
time to shape that international order even more to his favor.
So that would argue against the likelihood of an immediate
attack on Taiwan. I am reminded of the Davidson window.
Phil Davidson was the four-star that relieved me at
INDOPACOM when I retired, and he famously said, or the
``Davidson window'' famously ascribes to him, that 2027 is the
timeframe by which China could and will invade Taiwan.
I have never put a time certain on that. General Minihan,
who is the Air Force four-star in command of the Air Mobility
Command, he said 2025. Well, that is next year, and the
Davidson window is in 3 years.
I always said that the 2030s was the decade of danger. So I
think we are moving in that direction, and we could move to the
point that Xi Jinping will balance all the pluses and minuses,
and could decide because of the reasons you articulated and
because of the demographic upside down status of his people
that that might be the time to attack Taiwan.
But we have time, I believe, Senator, to right that issue
by supporting Taiwan and doing the other things I talked about
in response to Senator Coons' questions.
Senator Romney. Thank you.
Let me ask, should or are Japan and South Korea thinking
about becoming nuclear nations?
Mr. Harris. There are----
Senator Romney. They are next door to people--North Korea
and China--that have nuclear weapons. They look at us as being
their source of nuclear protection. But are they thinking about
becoming nuclear, or should they be?
Mr. Mead and Admiral.
Mr. Harris. So, I will start with that, Senator.
There are, clearly, elements inside South Korea and Japan
that are advocating for their own independent nuclear
deterrent. Those voices so far have not been the predominant
voices in either country, which is a good thing.
There are some in Korea that are advocating for the return
of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, which we removed in the
1990s.
I believe that both are bad ideas, that we must convince
them that our extended nuclear deterrence is actually reliable.
I think South Korea's President Yoon's visit to the U.S. last
year, the outcome of which was the Washington Declaration on
extended nuclear deterrence, has gone a long way to quieting
those voices that would have South Korea nuclearized, if you
will.
Senator Romney. Mr. Mead, do you have comments on that?
May I continue? Thank you.
Mr. Mead. I believe that--I would hope that we will not see
that day because that day would be an indication that both of
those countries no longer trusted the United States' ability to
take the lead there.
But I think also we would then see this as the beginning of
a further proliferation cascade. What begins in East Asia would
not stop in East Asia, and personally I believe the world has
too many nuclear weapons already.
Senator Romney. Thank you.
The Chairman. Senator Schatz.
Senator Schatz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member,
and thank you to our two distinguished testifiers.
Admiral Harris, it is very good to see you again. It has
been too long.
It is well known that Hawaii is not covered by Article Six
of the NATO Treaty.
In fact, I have--and with the permission of the Chairman I
would like to submit for the record a letter from Senator
Inouye to Assistant Secretary MacArthur in 1965 on this very
topic.
The Chairman. Without objection.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this document.]
Senator Schatz. Admiral Harris, do you think there is
deterrent value in making it explicit that Hawaii is covered?
Mr. Harris. Senator, good to see you again, and for sure.
So the issue for those who might not be aware of it is Article
Six defines the geographic area of NATO. Hawaii is not in the
geographic area as defined by Article Six.
As Article Six was amended to include Alaska, Alaska is.
And also Hawaii became a State after the Atlantic Charter was
signed.
[Editor's note.--We endeavor to publish accurately the
spoken and written words of Senators and witnesses in each
hearing published. The paragraph above reflects what Mr. Harris
said. Mr. Harris corrected this statement to ``As Article Six
was clarified in 1965 to include Alaska, Alaska is now covered
in the geographic area of NATO. Also, Hawaii became a State
after the NATO Treaty was signed.'']
Mr. Harris. I believe that Hawaii in 2024 is far different
than Hawaii in 1965, and Hawaii is on the front line of any
attack if we were to suffer an attack from China or North
Korea. It is on the front line. It will be attacked again, and
I do not want to be a part of another December 7 if we can
prevent it.
Hawaii covered by NATO, in my opinion, will go a long way
to preventing that. It would, in fact, be a deterrent. Now,
Hawaii is--in 2024--is a State of the United States. Hawaii is
far different than other countries who have territories
globally, those territories of which may not be covered by
NATO.
Again, Hawaii is a State. Its congressional leaders vote on
things like the United Nations, on things like Ukraine, on
issues like impeachment and all that, unlike, perhaps, some
other territories of the United States.
So I think that Hawaii's status is different than that of
simply territories, and therefore, I believe that Hawaii should
be covered by NATO.
Now, the argument against it is, well, all of these other
countries have territories, too. Again, Hawaii is not like----
Senator Schatz. Territory.
Mr. Harris [continuing]. These other territories.
Senator Schatz. Well, we are not a territory and thank you,
Admiral Harris, for that.
And the other argument that I have heard is that we would
be covered by Article Four, but Article Four just provides for
consultation, and so the argument from NATO and for those that
do not want to go through the difficulty of amending this
agreement or even establishing a sidecar explicit multilateral
agreement is that, well, if Hawaii were attacked--and I think
this is true, by the way--that certainly we would convene NATO,
and then we would under Article Four consult.
That is cold comfort, is it not? And I think that for our
national security, and also as a matter of principle to treat
every one of our 50 States equally, that we have to remedy
this.
And the argument is also made that various NATO countries
have territories all across the globe--territories, not States.
That is a different question, and I think it is one that we
have to address.
My final question for you, Admiral Harris, is just over the
last several years my own judgment is that we have done--we,
the United States--have done through the State Department and
the Department of Defense a much better job of engaging with
our Asia Pacific allies in terms of island nations, that when
we think about the Indo-Pacific we usually skip all the way
over the Pacific part, and then just go to South Asia or East
Asia and the sort of trouble areas.
And one of the things that I think Secretary Blinken and
President Biden and Senators Cardin and Risch through ratifying
COFA, through spending time with Pacific Island leaders, have
done is to show the respect to other sovereigns.
They may be a sovereign with 65,000 residents. They may be
a sovereign with 2 million people. But they are still a
sovereign country and deserve to be interacted with as if they
are not just a place to park our military equipment and to,
perhaps, have a trade agreement.
I am wondering if you can speak to the evolution of that,
those relationships, and how that impacts our security.
Mr. Harris. Yes. We did ignore these countries in the South
Pacific and the Central Pacific, and it is shameful that we
did.
China, on the other hand, has not ignored them, and they
work hard at filling the diplomatic and economic void left by
the United States.
An example is we have an ambassador in Fiji who is the
ambassador to five different countries. He is spread thin
throughout that region, and we are starting to correct it
thanks to this committee and the leadership here by putting in
a standalone and separate embassy in many of these countries.
We pulled out our embassy in the Solomons in the 1990s, and
now we are going to reestablish a new mission in the Solomons.
Meanwhile, China successfully filled that void from their
perspective. So, I agree with you, and I am glad to see that we
are starting to fix the situation now.
Senator Schatz. Thank you very much.
The Chairman. Senator Ricketts.
Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Admiral Harris, in October at AEI you assessed that the
U.S. is ill prepared to face off against the PRC in a Taiwan
Strait conflict in this decade.
You said that our lack of resourcing for the Indo-Pacific,
the PRC's upside down demographics, their own economic
challenges, are all factors that could lead the PRC to move
sooner rather than later with regard to Taiwan.
This makes our alliances and partnerships in the region
even more important as they represent a clear and asymmetric
advantage that we have over the PRC. The good news is that many
of these alliances from Japan to Australia have been upgraded
in recent years.
However, it is still unclear what the role of these allies
and partners would play in a Taiwan contingency. For example,
Japan is widely seen as--by analysts as our most likely U.S.
ally to contribute troops to defend Taiwan. But of course, that
is no sure thing.
Admiral Harris, if this is indeed the case where, in fact,
the next decade there is a danger for a Taiwan contingency what
are your expectations in terms of response we could expect from
our allies and partners in the region if there were a
contingency like this?
Mr. Harris. Very important question, Senator.
I believe that our allies, as we will in other scenarios,
will make those decisions that best meet their enlightened
self-interest.
I do believe that Japan understands the full danger
presented to them geopolitically by the People's Republic of
China, and I think they will be with us in Taiwan.
I think Australia will. Peter Dutton, the former minister
of defense in Australia, he famously said several years ago
that of course Australia would be with the United States if the
U.S. defended Taiwan.
But our own policy on Taiwan is not clear. We have this
policy of strategic ambiguity so we cannot even tell the
Taiwanese or the Chinese what we would do if China invaded
Taiwan.
Meanwhile, China has spent the last century--well, for all
of its existence really but heavily this century--by telling us
clearly what they intend to do with regard to Taiwan if Taiwan
does not yield to them and return to the fold, if you will.
Senator Ricketts. So actually it is an interesting point
you bring up there, Admiral, because I think that is part of
our strategy is this strategic ambiguity, to not really say for
sure what would happen so that that would give the PRC more
difficulty in planning against what we might do.
It sounds like from your remarks you almost disagree with
that strategic ambiguity. Are you suggesting that we be more
clear about certain things? Help me with----
Mr. Harris. So I have advocated that we should end our
policy of strategic ambiguity in favor of strategic clarity.
Now, look, in my opinion we owe clarity to three constituents
on the issue of what we will do if China attacks Taiwan.
We owe it to the Taiwanese so they can make those decisions
as a country to either arm up or capitulate. We owe it to the
Chinese because they are going to lose a lot of troops in any
battle with the United States, a lot of them, so they ought to
know what they are getting into. We were very clear with the
Soviet Union, and that was an important thing.
But the most important constituent in my opinion, Senator,
is the American people. They need to know what their sons and
daughters are signing up for when they sign on to the U.S.
military with regard to the question of Taiwan and whether we
are going to fight the Chinese over that.
And the American people, parents primarily--but those who
signed up as well--were very clear in our understanding during
the cold war of what could possibly happen if the Soviets moved
on the plains in Western Europe and across the Fulda Gap and
down the Greenland, Iceland, and U.K. gap.
They signed on to that. They knew that. But today, they are
not clear about China, and we owe it to our own people, I
believe, to be clear in that regard.
Senator Ricketts. Very good.
Just getting back to our allies, do you think that their
response would be different for--depending on what the
contingency was, for example, if this was a blockade versus an
outright military invasion? Do you think our allies would
behave differently with regard to their level of support for
what we were trying to do?
Mr. Harris. Potentially, but again, our allies are
wondering what we would do--in any of those scenarios, whether
it was an outright invasion or a blockade. We got to see a
precursor of how a blockade might look after former Speaker
Pelosi's visit to Taiwan, which was very helpful to us to
understand how China might conduct a blockade.
Senator Ricketts. And so I am guessing you are saying we
should come up with our own direction for those different
contingencies, whether it is blockade or outright invasion, and
this strategic ambiguity and just say, hey, this is what we are
going to do?
Mr. Harris. Well, I will modify that slightly. I mean, I
know that INDOPACOM has those contingencies in planning, but I
do not think we should necessarily share what those
contingencies are.
Senator Ricketts. OK. But just the general direction of
what our level of support is going to be for Taiwan should the
PRC do something like that.
Mr. Harris. I think we should defend Taiwan.
Senator Ricketts. OK. Very good.
Mr. Harris. I think we should follow the law which is the
Taiwan Relations Act, which does not oblige us to defend
Taiwan, but it does oblige us to provide for Taiwan's defense,
which they pay for, and that we advocate for a peaceful
resolution of the issue, not a martial resolution of the issue.
Senator Ricketts. OK. Thank you, Admiral.
The Chairman. Senator Menendez.
Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The PRC's expansion of its military capabilities outside
its borders often relies on its foreign aid loans through their
Belt and Road Initiative, preying on developing nations that
are strategically located in the region.
This results in the construction of many dual use
facilities that provide China's air force and navy with
potential outstations for future operations while these
recipients are left in the infamous PRC debt trap.
Admiral Harris, from your perspective how impactful are
economic conditions and relations to the Administration's
partnership and alliance goals, particularly with regard to
nations in the region that may not be as resilient to economic
and military influence from China?
Mr. Harris. Senator, I believe that our policies are
positive in that regard, but there is a lot more that we could
do, and some of the examples I already provided in response to
Senator Coons's questioning.
I think economically we could do a lot more in terms of
free trade frameworks and free trade bilateral and multilateral
free trade agreements, and China for sure is moving to fill all
the opportunity voids that are left by us.
Senator Menendez. Well, in the Senate Finance Committee,
which I served as--the chairman serves, we have Ambassador Tai
before us today, and I want to get to my question.
This one of the things I am going to ask. We do not have
any free trade agreements being promoted in the region. We have
a behemoth of an economic challenge with China in this region.
You mentioned earlier in your testimony that people will
react to their own self-interest--countries will react into
their own self-interest. That is not a novel idea, but it is a
very clarion idea.
So, therefore, would it not behoove us, beyond an economic
question, as a security concern to be engaged in free trade
agreements in this region--to strengthen the economic
opportunity to loosen the noose that China has with these
countries?
Mr. Harris. For sure, Senator. That is why I advocated for
TPP when I was the PACOM commander because of those security
connections represented by the countries that signed on to TPP.
Senator Menendez. Yes. It was a lost opportunity.
Mr. Mead, do you believe a free and open Indo-Pacific is
available with--achievable, I should say, with a foreign policy
approach that is based on uncertainty?
Mr. Mead. I am sorry, based in----
Senator Menendez. Uncertainty.
Mr. Mead. Well, uncertainty is irreducible in life. But I
would say that the United States needs to be absolutely clear
about our commitment to the region on a multi-dimensional
basis--military, economic, cultural--in every possible way
deepening our links.
Every time I have gone to the region since the 1980s I have
heard people ask me, is America here to stay? Are you really
committed to this region?
My answer is the first American permanent force in that
area was in 1819 when we had sent the U.S. Navy to protect
American whalers. I think we are here to stay, but we need to
keep getting that message out. So we need to restore a sense of
confidence.
Senator Menendez. And in that respect the United States is
the best deterrent our partners have in the region when it
comes to Chinese aggression and expansion. Do you believe that
if a future Administration threatened to retreat from alliances
like the trilateral alliance that we have with Japan and South
Korea or AUKUS, China would continue to be deterred from
applying economic and military pressures against allies in the
region?
Mr. Mead. I would hope that any president of the United
States of any party would understand the value of these
alliances and relationships, Senator.
Senator Menendez. I agree with you, and this is why I get
concerned when I see what former President Trump said while he
was in office, raising questions about our security alliance
with Japan, refusing to say what he would do with Taiwan even
though we have a law that pretty much I think outlines what we
should do with Taiwan.
And so while I believe the Biden administration has room to
improve, it is undeniable that it has reestablished the United
States' position as a reliable global partner, particularly in
the region that we are discussing today, and if we have
uncertainty, uncertainty invites a response, and that response
is not going to be the one that we want.
So I hope we make it very clear and indisputable what our
positions are, what our presence will be, and what our actions
will be in the future.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Kaine.
Senator Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks to the
witnesses.
Ambassador Harris, good to see you again. I so enjoyed the
opportunity to visit with you when you were in Korea with a
CODEL in 2019, and I am very happy that you are here today.
On the alliances question, I think sometimes those of us on
this side of the dais understand some realities, but we do not
explain them that well, and I would like to get into the
rapprochement that the U.S. has been able to help forge between
the political leadership in South Korea and Japan.
When President Biden had the summit at Camp David, the
headline here at home was President Biden has these leaders at
Camp David, and it was kind of a ho-hum moment at home because
we view Japan and South Korea as allies.
So it was not that surprising. But I think it was a much
bigger deal in Japan and South Korea. Talk a little bit about
what this closer political relationship between Japan and Korea
mean to stability in the region.
Mr. Harris. It means, in my opinion, Senator--and good to
see you again--it means everything in the region, especially
Northeast Asia. There is no economic or security issue that can
be resolved in Northeast Asia without the active participation
and cooperation between Seoul and Tokyo. Otherwise, without
that cooperation there will be no positive movement on security
in the region, and China will move to fill that void.
I believe that President Yoon of South Korea and Prime
Minister Kishida of Japan's outreach to each other--despite
considerable domestic opposition--by doing the right thing
demonstrates statesmanship in action. The significantly
improved bilateral and trilateral relationships that are
playing out now are the benefit of that outreach. The big
beneficiary is stability and prosperity in Northeast Asia.
Senator Kaine. Let me ask you a question about how to
calibrate the work we are doing in the region to be a deterrent
to Chinese aggression without it being a provocation to China.
You talked about the Davidson window, and I would sort of
like to hear each of you respond to this. I think the Davidson
window concept is a concept about when China could invade, not
necessarily when they will invade.
So it is when they believe they have the capacity to
undertake military action, and I think the U.S. strategy has
been to just push that back a day at a time, a year at a time,
and we do that by providing defense support to Taiwan. We do it
by creating this latticework of alliances to promote stability
in the region, whether it is AUKUS or the Quad, or we are
working with Korea and Japan.
At some point one of Xi Jinping's calculations could be, I
am not yet ready, but if I see too many pieces being put on the
chessboard around me that might block my ultimate ambitions, I
may act before I am ready. And this has to be probably one of
the most careful analyses done every day in the Pentagon and
elsewhere in our security establishment to try to decide what
is a deterrent, and then what goes beyond deterrent to
provocation.
Could you share a little--each of your share your own
thought on how we try to get that calibration--how we should
contemplate calibrating this correctly?
Mr. Mead. It is a very good set of questions, Senator. I
would argue that part of what we need to do is to make the
picture bigger that the consequences of a Chinese attack on
Taiwan or a full blown blockade of Taiwan would not just take
place in the South China Sea. I think it would be very hard to
get commercial shipping in and out of Chinese ports should
there be an event of that kind.
I do not know that it would be easy for South Korea to
trade with the rest of the world if there was a military
confrontation in the South China Sea, Japan, Taiwan, and so on.
We could be doing a good deal to deter China by showing
that we and other countries around the world are prepared to
impose a global blockade on China that would exert severe
costs.
But we should also--I see that Bloomberg's, I believe,
organization has estimated that a war in the South China Sea or
over Taiwan could take 10 percent off global GDP in a first
year. A blockade could be almost as eventful.
When we think about deterring and staving off and otherwise
responding to this kind of threat, we really do need to put
together a multi-dimensional approach.
I think as China saw that this was a more serious element
of our planning, the temptation to move in a Davidson window or
in the scenario you describe might be less.
Senator Kaine. Thank you.
Mr. Chair, could I have Admiral Harris respond as well?
The Chairman. Yes.
Mr. Harris. Thanks, Senator.
I will simply say that from a military perspective
calibration is easy because the military has to be ready all
the time. So they must assume that China is going to attack
today. And so they must have plans and procedures in place to
deal with that.
But from a diplomatic or policy level issue it is far more
difficult, and that is the heart of the question because, like
you say, you want to be supportive of our friends, allies, and
partners and us, and not be provocative at the same time.
But this said, I think we should be less concerned about
provoking China. I mean, look what China has done to provoke
us. The balloon thing last year is a case in point. If you
believe China, it was innocuous and unintended. This beggars
the imagination when you think about it.
So we should be less concerned about provoking China than
we should be concerned about bolstering our friends, allies,
and partners in the region.
Senator Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks to the witnesses.
The Chairman. Senator Coons asked about the importance of
the support we have for the Indo-Pacific that is in the
supplemental appropriation bill that is, hopefully, going to be
considered in the House by the end of this week.
Part of that, of course--the main part of that supplemental
is the support for Ukraine, and it was, I think, informative
that Japanese Prime Minister Kishida in his speech before us
said Ukraine today may be East Asia tomorrow.
So I guess my question to you is how important is the
outcome of Ukraine in regards to the calculations being made in
security in the Indo-Pacific as it relates to either Taiwan,
the China Seas, or other security interests? Are our allies
looking at what is happening, or are our enemies looking at
what is happening in Ukraine affecting the calculations in the
Indo-Pacific?
I will go with my military person first.
Mr. Harris. A great question, Senator, and I believe that
we must support Ukraine, and to quote Admiral Stavridis
recently, it would be strategic and moral malpractice not to do
so.
Where Ukraine goes Poland follows, Moldova follows, the
Baltics follow. So, it is important to the stability of
Ukraine, and more important to the stability of Europe and our
NATO allies, that we support Ukraine.
In fact, if you look at the cost to Russia today, they have
borne enormous costs in terms of materiel, resources, and
people, and we have not lost a single U.S. soldier in the
fight. So this is Ukraine's fight, but they cannot fight it
without our support and the EU support and NATO support, the
individual countries' support.
So that is why I believe the supplemental is so important.
Xi Jinping, as I said before, is no fool. He is watching
Ukraine closely, and he is learning that control of the
internet is vital.
He has got to be wondering if his army, which is trained in
the Soviet model, is as bad as Russia's army appears to be; if
the PLA navy--the People's Liberation Army navy--is as bad as
the Black Sea fleet appears to be. He is learning about all of
these things.
But to the question of how other countries in the Indo-
Pacific view that they are watching Ukraine and our actions
very closely, and they will take their cues on what we do with
regard to Ukraine.
If we walk away from Ukraine, I think they will start to
consider those things that we talked about earlier in the
hearing, because their faith and confidence in the United
States to come to their aid could be questioned.
Even though we are not an ally of Ukraine, we are allies of
many countries in the Indo-Pacific, and they will be wondering.
The Chairman. I think we all agree with your response on
that. But we are also frustrated that it is difficult for us to
connect the importance of our support for Ukraine through the
support of the American people for our engagement in Ukraine.
So let me ask both of you a final question. Alliances, you
have all pointed out, are extremely important for us to have in
the Indo-Pacific. How do we explain that to Americans so that
we have more support for these types of alliances among the
American political system?
If you could give us a simple answer to that we would
appreciate it because we find that we usually lose our
constituents after one sentence. So can you give us an answer
in one sentence?
[Laughter.]
Mr. Mead. Senator, I think--Mr. Chairman, I think experts
and people who are deeply engaged in foreign policy often think
in terms of hope and the beautiful things that we can build.
It was Dean Acheson who said the average American has less
than 10 minutes a week to devote to the study of foreign
affairs.
At a similar moment at the start of the cold war, President
Truman realized that the way to get the attention of the
American people was to tell them the truth in a way that I
think frightened--let us say, frightened the pants off them.
That is not quite what he said but close enough.
And we need--the world situation is grave; things could go
disastrously wrong in a relatively short period of time. We
need to get that message out. It needs to be done by leaders in
both parties.
This committee played a large role in doing that in the
1940s. We need to level with the American people about just how
much trouble we are in, and I think at that point we will begin
to see a much more positive and engaged response.
The Chairman. Admiral.
Mr. Harris. We join alliances for us as much as for them.
One sentence.
Senator Risch. That was good. I like it.
The Chairman. Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Thank you, both, for spending--we sit here a
lot, spend a lot of time here. A lot of times we get a lot of
talk and not much substance, and I think today all of us feel
we got our money's worth today. Thank you.
The Chairman. Absolutely.
Senator Kaine.
I have been told the Senator Van Hollen is on his way. I do
not know if that is accurate or not. I do not want to hold my
colleagues up. He is my colleague in Maryland so we will give
him a moment or two and see if he----
I just really want to agree with Senator Risch. We were
talking a little bit. The two of you are extraordinary in your
wisdom, and we thank you for that. We recognize the seriousness
of the situation.
It is frustrating to us that we have not been able to be
more effective in communicating to our constituents the urgency
of these issues, and I think the point that you raised about
the PRC looking at the Ukraine campaign and looking at the need
to deal with the internet is a good point.
We are looking at having a hearing of this committee
dealing with how social media is affecting America's foreign
policy and national security interests because it is clear that
our adversaries are using social media, our open system,
against us, and it is affecting the type of policies that we
need to deal with the urgency of the situation.
I hope we are able to get the supplemental done this week,
but it is already months later than it should have been, and
Ukraine has paid a heavy price for our inability to act in a
more timely way.
So the circumstances are pretty dire, and I really do not
think the majority of Americans recognize the urgency of the
situation. So any advice you have on dealing with the social
media I will take your advice on that as well.
Mr. Harris. I am not on social media.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Harris. So I was on Twitter for a little while, but
when I left Korea I got off of that, and I just do not do
social media.
Mr. Mead. I think you are right. Not that long ago
Americans were bragging that our open system was going to
destabilize these autocracies, and today we are concerned that
these autocracies will actually use our open system or will
weaponize our open system against us.
That is, I think, a sign of how far the world that we are
in is different from the world that we thought we were going to
be in 5, 10, 15 years ago.
And I look at things like the lack of education in world
history in our high schools and colleges. I look at in general
a sort of lack of understanding of the history, how we got to
where we are, so that young people looking at social media have
no context within which to see this.
We really do need to think about how do we prepare our
society so that rather than being overwhelmed and divided by
these new technologies and new forms of communication we are
actually--they actually make us stronger.
The Chairman. Agreed.
I have gotten information from my colleague that will allow
us to close. I do not need his permission, but he would allow
us to close the hearing.
The record will stay open until the end of business
tomorrow. If members have questions we would ask that you would
answer them for the record.
And again, with our sincere thanks to both of you for your
help in this important subject, the committee will be
adjourned. Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 11:31 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
----------
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
Responses of Mr. Harry B. Harris, Jr. to Questions
Submitted by Senator James E. Risch
Question. Given China's support for Russia in Ukraine, do you think
Russia would support China in a Taiwan conflict? What would this look
like, and how should we prepare for this?
Answer. Yes, I do. A lot depends on the timing of a China v. Taiwan
conflict and the outcome of Russia's illegal and immoral invasion of
sovereign, independent Ukraine. I've seen reporting that Russia has
suffered as many as 350,000 casualties (killed and wounded) so far and
significant loss of key military hardware. Russia will continue to lose
irreplaceable personnel and replaceable hardware as its conflict with
Ukraine lurches on, which will affect its ability to support China with
personnel and materiel in the near term. As long as we (and NATO, plus
partners like Japan and South Korea) continue to support Ukraine,
Russia's ability to ultimately help China is less than it could be
otherwise. Our best preparation is four-fold:
1. Continue to resource our Joint Force at a rate higher than
inflation so that we have the best equipment for our forces and for
Taiwan.
2. Continue to support Ukraine which depletes Russia's personnel
and equipment without us firing a shot, which ultimately will weaken
Russia's ability to support China.
3. Diplomacy and diplomats matter. In this instance, we should
relentlessly ensure that our allies and partners are with us if we
choose to defend Taiwan. Additionally, we must get Ambassadors to posts
quickly. This requires quick nominations of qualified people to be
Ambassadors and fast action by the Senate to confirm them.
4. As I testified, I believe we should end our American policy of
strategic ambiguity in favor of strategic clarity when it comes to the
question of whether we will defend Taiwan if China invades. The
President has said on at least 4 public occasions that yes, we would.
This is helpful. However, his declarations have been ``walked back'' by
government officials who have not been elected or confirmed by the
Senate, or both. This is not helpful and makes us appear feckless.
Question. How concerned are you that China will take action at
Second Thomas Shoal to test the U.S.-Philippine alliance and U.S.
resolve? What should the United States be doing now to prepare for that
scenario?
Answer. Yes, I am concerned. Unlike our policy of strategic
ambiguity regarding Taiwan, we have been clear that, while we don't
take sides in territorial disputes in the South China Sea (SCS), our
treaty obligations to the Philippines extend to Philippine troops
wherever they are, including aboard the beached and rusting Sierra
Madre hulk on Second Thomas Shoal. I believe this has prevented the PRC
from being even more aggressive than they currently are (limited, so
far, to water cannons and bumping). The U.S. has finally taken a clear
position supporting the 2016 International Tribunal on the Law of the
Sea (ITLOS) ruling which invalidated China's 9-dash line claim and
validated the Philippine position. The Philippines, with our urging,
took this case to the Tribunal. We lost an opportunity when the
Tribunal ruling was announced in 2016 because we did not immediately
and publicly support it or the Philippine position. However, then-
Philippine Duterte didn't support the ruling at all (the case was
initiated by his predecessor's administration).
What we should be doing now is:
1. Ensure the Philippines are ready to fight but are not
instigating a fight which could cause the treaty to be invoked
prematurely. This means equipment, training, and rapid buildup of the
Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) sites.
2. Diplomats and diplomacy matter. We should be clear with the PRC
that we will fully meet our obligations to the Philippines under our
treaty. In this instance, we should relentlessly ensure that our allies
and partners are with us if we choose to defend the Philippines.
Additionally, we must get Ambassadors to posts quickly. This requires
quick nominations of qualified people to be Ambassadors and fast action
by the Senate to confirm them. Finally, continue to expand INDOPACOM's
emphasis on ``lattice-like'' security structures to replace the old
``hub-and-spoke'' model of my day. The new U.S.-Philippines-Japan
trilateral is a case in point.
3. Ensure our own forces are ready. Continue to resource our Joint
Force at a rate higher than inflation so that we have the best
equipment for our forces and for the Philippines.
4. Creating dilemmas for China. I began advocating for the U.S. to
pull out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 2017.
As a refresher, the INF Treaty was a bilateral treaty with the Soviet
Union (and its successor states, primarily Russia, after the USSR fell
in 1991) which, per Wikipedia,``. . . banned all of the two nations'
nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic missiles, cruise
missiles, and missile launchers with ranges of 500-1,000 kilometers
(310-620 mi) (short medium-range) and 1,000-5,500 km (620-3,420 mi)
(intermediate-range)''. China was never a signatory to INF nor would it
have been for good reason: the overwhelming majority of China's
ballistic missile inventory would have been excluded by INF had it been
a signatory. Russia routinely violated INF. Therefore, INF was
unilaterally self-limiting for the U.S., which is why I was for
scrapping it or significantly renegotiating it. The U.S. did withdraw
from the Treaty in 2019 despite, laughably, China's opposition to our
withdrawal. However, though we've tested land-based Tomahawk (precluded
by the Treaty when it was in force) since then, to my knowledge we've
not yet developed a new intermediate range mobile land-based missile.
We should do so without delay, including hypersonic missiles, and
deploy them immediately somewhere in the Philippines archipelago
(perhaps at an EDCA site) and elsewhere to create dilemmas for China.
Question. Last week, President Biden and Prime Minister Kishida
announced an effort to modernize U.S.-Japan military command and
control. What concrete steps are needed to actually make this a
reality? Do you think we are providing adequate resources to make this
happen?
Answer. Once the leaders ``buy off'' on this, which they did, DoD
and INDOPACOM are cleared to work with the Japanese Ministry of
National Defense (MND) and the Japan Joint Staff (JJS) to develop
courses of action (COAs) on ways to implement a better command and
control arrangement. This part should take no more that 6 months in my
opinion. Once DoD and MND agree on the best COA, they can proceed to
execution unless, for the U.S. side, if the selected COA involves
significant additional resources/manpower or moving an existing
headquarters somewhere else. These should be executed only after
consultation with the Congress and, depending on their scopes, might
actually require congressional authorization. The Japanese side might
face similar issues. Regarding the second part of this question, I
cannot answer that until I know what COA is ultimately developed and
selected. Right now, it is only a think-piece.
Question. How can we make sure our new access agreements in the
Philippines and Papua New Guinea advance our strategic interests,
support our partners, and are politically sustainable?
Answer. I believe these agreements advance our strategic interests
already, or we would not have pursued them in the first place. We
support our partners (and, in the case of the Philippines, our treaty
ally) by actually following through and committing resources--
authorizing and appropriating--to those access sites to get them built/
built up quickly. To ensure they are politically sustainable:
1. We must demonstrate to the American people, through Congress,
that these sites remain strategically important and worth the
investment. China's bad behavior is helping make our own case for us.
2. Increase the defense budget ahead of inflation.
______
The Committee Received No Response From Mr. Walter Russell Mead
to the Following Questions Submitted by Senator James E. Risch
Question. Given China's support for Russia in Ukraine, do you think
Russia would support China in a Taiwan conflict? What would this look
like and how should we prepare for this?
[No response received.]
Question. How concerned are you that China will take action at
Second Thomas Shoal to test the U.S.-Philippine alliance and U.S.
resolve? What should the United States be doing now to prepare for that
scenario?
[No response received.]
Question. We have to work with the Indo-Pacific partners we have to
advance U.S. interests, even if they are not on the same page about
democracy and human rights.
In practical terms, what should our approach be to partners that
share our strategic interests, but not our values? What helps, and what
hurts?
[No response received.]
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