{"id":27114,"date":"2016-06-14T06:00:26","date_gmt":"2016-06-13T20:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=27114"},"modified":"2016-06-14T10:26:19","modified_gmt":"2016-06-14T00:26:19","slug":"trumps-alliance-doctrine-wont-pay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/trumps-alliance-doctrine-wont-pay\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s alliance doctrine: we won\u2019t pay"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The threats to Asia\u2019s future peace of mind: China versus the US, the South China Sea, North Korea\u2014and then there\u2019s Trump.<\/span><\/p>\n The Donald is a powerful reminder of the fundamental duality in Asia\u2019s responses to the protections and pressures of the US.<\/span><\/p>\n The constant questions about the strategic guarantor go to its strategic strength and the constancy of the guarantee. Trump gives those questions the shrillest edge.<\/span><\/p>\n It can be maddening and galling and scary\u2014even for allies and quasi allies\u2014to be pushed around by the Americans. Maybe only one thing is worse\u2014if the Americans departed from Asia.<\/span><\/p>\n The greatest peacetime threat to the US alliance system in Asia will<\/span> come from the US itself<\/span><\/a>\u2014by <\/span>what it<\/span> demands or fails to deliver<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n Donald Trump encapsulates those conundrums in confronting ways.<\/span><\/p>\n Being pushed or threatened by The Donald would be unpredictable and nerve-wracking. What sort of deals would he demand?<\/span><\/p>\n The nightmare scenario is that Trump mightn\u2019t have an open mind about Asia, but an empty mind.<\/span><\/p>\n Instinct can take you only so far. What if Trump gets a chance to act on his instinct that US alliances in Asia are all give and little get?<\/span><\/p>\n The US presidential election has certainly changed the buzz at the annual strategic talkfests in<\/span> Kuala Lumpur and Singapore<\/span><\/a>. For the first time this decade, it wasn\u2019t all about China.<\/span><\/p>\n Come coffee time, Trump is the top trending topic. Not only is Canberra barracking for<\/span> Hillary<\/span><\/a>, so is most of Asia. Even China can\u2019t decide whether to be delighted or alarmed.<\/span><\/p>\n As an example of the cycle of negatives that have Asia in a spiral consider this: North Korea calls The Donald<\/span> wise and far sighted<\/span><\/a> even though he\u2019s promised to<\/span> take out<\/span><\/a> the North\u2019s nukes and make Kim Jong-un<\/span> disappear<\/span><\/a>. Oh, me. Oh, my. Oh, dear.<\/span><\/p>\n The reassurance from slightly-embarrassed American wonks is that the US alliances in Asia are between states and governments, not an individual leader. True. But US presidents can make the weather.<\/span><\/p>\n A Trump presidency would mean Australia faced a New York doctrine as consequential for our strategic thinking as Richard Nixon\u2019s Guam doctrine.<\/span><\/p>\n As Nixon struggled to extract the US from Vietnam, he used a press conference in Guam to announce the terms of the dialogue he\u2019d been having with Kissinger. Henceforth, Nixon announced, US allies would have<\/span> primary responsibility<\/span><\/a> for their own defence.<\/span><\/p>\n No longer would the US bear any burden or pay any price. Nixon didn\u2019t actually do that rebuttal of Kennedy\u2019s inaugural, but that was the message.<\/span><\/p>\n Even Kissinger was surprised at Nixon doing it there and then. But the Guam Doctrine it became and it had a huge impact on Australian<\/span> thinking and planning.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n Oz defence<\/span> \u2018self reliance\u2019<\/span><\/a> was born and has throbbed ever since, in word if not always in deed or dollars.<\/span><\/p>\n Trump\u2019s New York doctrine would be delivered in dollar-speak\u2014Guam done from Gotham. Something like: \u2018We\u2019re broke. We won\u2019t pay. Now you pay.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n Do the monologue in that NYC accent: Good luck South Korea\u201465 years is enough. Japan, you know you can afford it. What have the Philippines or Thailand done for us lately? And where is Australia exactly?<\/span><\/p>\n Kim Beazley reckons that President Trump would force Australia to<\/span> redo<\/span><\/a> the 2016 Defence White Paper. In that urgent rewrite early next year, \u2018the strategic sections will look very different. We won\u2019t be able to make assumptions about American forward policy.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n