Mattis Moves to Reassure Asia (Again)

James Mattis is off to the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore this weekend for his second Asia trip as Defense Secretary. This time, he may face an even more skeptical region than he did during his reassurance tour in February.

Financial Times has a preview:

While Mr Mattis will repeat the usual ​US ​mantra about ​American leadership in the Asia-Pacific region, his words ​may ring hollow to some. His speech will come four months after Donald Trump walked away from the TPP and two days after he announced he would quit the Paris climate accord, ​placing the US in a three-member club with Syria and Nicaragua. […]

Mira Rapp-Hooper, an Asia expert at the Center for a New American Security, said Mr Trump was ​also ​taking a very narrow approach to Asia that marked a big difference from Mr Obama, and added that it was worrying how little he had said about ​assertive ​Chinese ​moves​ in the South China Sea.

“One of the most striking things is the transactional approach . . . that has left China feeling like it could not be better positioned and left allies feeling that they are intensively vulnerable,” she said. “[That’s] made the region feel that US leadership is completely up for grabs.”

To be fair, Mattis can point to a series of recent actions that counter the narrative of American disengagement. This past week, the Trump Administration launched its first freedom-of-navigation operation in the South China Sea; this week, two U.S. carriers are conducting drills with Japan in a show of force aimed at Pyongyang; and yesterday, the United States introduced new sanctions against North Korea at the Security Council. All of these moves seem to have been strategically timed ahead of Shangri-La to reassure skittish allies that the U.S. government was not surrendering its traditional leadership role.

But the FT is right that those positive actions have been undermined by other signals, including Trump’s griping about trade deficits and defense costs with South Korea, his initial quiescence on the South China Sea, and his many laudatory statements about China’s great efforts to restrain Pyongyang. Combined with Trump’s withdrawal from Paris and TPP, those moves have left some in Asia to conclude that the United States can no longer be relied upon, as they hasten to cut deals with Beijing or cast a fresh eye on China’s trade agenda.

None of this is irreparably damaging to America’s standing: As Australia’s Malcolm Turnbull noted during his keynote speech, Asia’s disappointment over TPP and Paris does not preclude cooperation with Washington on a host of other vital issues. But it remains to be seen which issues Trump will actually choose to address. Trump’s prioritization of the North Korean crisis is clear enough; so, too, is his notion that the United States should try to peel Beijing away from Pyongyang. Otherwise, though, the region is still waiting for clarity.

Mattis’s challenge at Shangri-La is to articulate a vision that has so far been lacking, and to demonstrate that Trump’s early record of mixed messages can be shaped into a coherent strategy. Let’s hope he can deliver.