“Where I fault the Biden Administration is on their weak policy concerning trade,” the head of the Washington-based think tank told the CSIS/Nikkei Symposium in Tokyo via video.
Hamre said the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework that Washington launched in place of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for the Trans-Pacific Partnership lacks content.
“The core is missing,” he said, pointing out that Asian partners want increased market access and more trade opportunities, which the IPEF has not addressed in detail. “Foreign policy in Asia is trade policy. And with no trade policy, America can’t be a full partner in building the new Asia.”
Hamre, a deputy defence secretary in the Bill Clinton administration, talked of two fundamental policy decisions by former US presidents – one by Barack Obama and one by Donald Trump – that have led to “remarkable consistency” in American security policy and have set the foundation for President Joe Biden’s approach to Asia.
On Obama’s pivot to Asia, Hamre said, “For the first time in American history, we said that Asia, not Europe, was our highest priority.”
He went on: “Because of our historic ties to Europe, we always put our Europe policies first. But President Obama recognised that Asia is now the centre of gravity, both for global economics and global geopolitics.”
“Japanese leaders are questioning whether America’s commitment of extended deterrence against nuclear attack is credible,” CSIS President John Hamre says.
Under Trump, he said, “then secretary of defence James Mattis shifted American defence planning away from terrorism and back to major power competition. General Mattis said our highest priority is to prepare to deter China.”
Biden has adopted and advanced these policies, including strengthening the Quad, a strategic coalition of four leading Indo-Pacific democracies, the US, Japan, India and Australia.
The CEO added that the US-Japan alliance has a new pressing challenge of rebuilding confidence in America’s extended nuclear deterrence to Japan.
He criticised Trump’s dismissal of the threat North Korea’s short-range missiles pose. “He said he only cared about long-range missiles and he demanded that North Korea not launch inter-continental ballistic missiles that could hit the US,” Hamre said.
“What was wrong about that position was it ignored our commitment of extended deterrence to Japan,” he continued. “We promised Japan that we would consider a nuclear attack on Japan as though it was identical to an attack on the US. That means we have to take a short-range missile launch as seriously as an ICBM launch.”
Hamre said that through many conversations with Japanese counterparts he has felt a “deep questioning” about America’s credibility concerning extended deterrence.
“A Japanese member of the Diet earlier this summer confronted me,” Hamre explained. “He said, ‘We see you in Ukraine. You help Ukraine, but you are trying to not get involved so that you don’t face a nuclear strike by Russia. That makes us uncertain about your commitment to defend us from nuclear intimidation.’
“Japanese leaders are questioning whether America’s commitment of extended deterrence against nuclear attack is credible. This is a significant and serious issue that the Biden Administration needs to address.
“We are going to have to take more specific concrete steps to rebuild confidence.”