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S. Mahmud Ali Post-Cold War Great Power Security Dynamics 39 to a deepening of their bilateral alliance with America. Japan and India formalized a ‘strategic and global partnership’ during Manmohan Singh’s December 2006 visit to Tokyo. 21 The partnership specified strong ‘political, defence and security cooperation.’ Three months later, Howard and Abe signed their accord. In April, Tokyo hosted talks among US, Japanese and Australian defence officials on BMD collaboration, linking up existing US- Japanese and US-Australian ABM mechanisms. The three allies would jointly develop the SM-3 ship-borne system, to be successfully tested in December with a Japanese ship-borne interceptor shooting down an American target missile. India was not to be left behind. The final string to this bow was tied in July when Brendan Nelson, Australia’s Defence Minister ⎯ fresh from a trip to Beijing where he assured his hosts Australia and its Quad partners only sought peace and friendship ⎯ arrived in Delhi and formalized defence cooperation with his Indian counterpart, A.K. Antony. Japanese Premier Shinzo Abe and Defence Minister Yuriko Koike followed Nelson to Delhi to reinforce ties. Abe described to India’s legislators his vision of an ‘expanded Asia’ combining countries on the shores of the Pacific and Indian Oceans. ‘By Japan and India coming together in this way, this broader Asia will evolve into an immense network spanning the entirety of the Pacific Ocean, incorporating the USA and Australia.’ Now, the Quad’s diplomaticpolitical superstructure was underpinned by a fine-mesh of bilateral and multilateral security and defence agreements. Reinforcing ideological unity were shared security concerns, especially vis-à-vis China, reflected in surprisingly similar terms in reports issued by the four military establishments in 2007, as noted above. 22 What Chinese commentators described as the ‘Asian NATO,’ was born. 23 The Quad’s emergence may have potentially been the decade’s most significant strategic development in the Asia-Pacific area. The pace of pieces falling into place picked up in the summer of 2007. Australia and America launched their Joint Combined Training Capability facility in Queensland, deploying 27,000 personnel from the two forces to try out interoperability in their annual ‘Talisman Sabre’ exercise. Manmohan Singh signed a defence cooperation accord with his Vietnamese counterpart, 21 Abe and Singh, Joint Statement: Towards Japan-India Strategic and Global Partnership, Tokyo, 15 December 2006. 22 See notes 1 1 -14. 23 Zheng Yongnian, “Japan-Australia pact amounts to East Asian NATO aimed at China,” Lianhe zaoboo, 27 March 2007; Pralul Bidwai, “Five-Nation Naval Drill Presages ‘Asian NATO’?” Inter Press Service, 7 September 2007; “China concerned by ‘alliance of democracies’,” ABC Online, 24 June 2007. Vol.1, No.2 2008 pp.27-47
40 Peace and Security Review Vol.1, No.2, Second Quarter, 2008 Ngyuen Tan Dung, during the latter’s visit to Delhi. India began building another network of roads, airstrips and bridges near its disputed Himalayan border to ‘match’ Chinese activities across the ‘Line of Actual Control.’ US Marines started training with Indian troops in sub-Himalayan forests. America offered to sell its futuristic F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to India as the two governments announced the ‘final’ text of their nuclear cooperation agreement ⎯ although Delhi later denied this. While Abe toured India, General Pace told US troops in Japan that he constantly monitored China. ‘If you look at Chinese military power and you look at ours, you get pretty comfortable, pretty quickly,’ he said. ‘Chinese capacity is increasing, our capacity is increasing, and the overall delta between their capacity and ours remains huge in our favour.’ 24 Beijing’s concern became clear in its diplomatic demarches to all four capitals on the Quad’s launch, asking what the group’s objectives were. The responses, conciliatory and emollient, assured Beijing the group aimed at boosting regional peace and security through cooperation and amity; it targeted no country. As with China’s response on its ASAT test, this was not reassuring. On the margins of the G-8 summit in Germany, Hu Jintao asked Manmohan Singh what the Quad’s security parameters were; Singh told him there were none! The military in the four countries made no secret of their anxieties over China’s growing capabilities. Admiral Mike Mullen, testifying as the future CJCS, echoed Quad views. He noted that China had ‘the greatest potential to compete militarily with the US and field disruptive military technologies that could, over time, offset traditional US military advantages.’ His recommendation? ‘We do not want to overreact but at the same time, we must not under-react. Our strategy seeks to encourage China to make the right strategic choices for its people, while we hedge against other possibilities.’ 25 This perspective informed the Quad’s collective approach to China. Meanwhile, US-Russian disputes over America’s Euro-BMD plans and US-Chinese rows over allegedly sub-standard Chinese goods exported to America and elsewhere triggered overt responses to muscular assertions of US interests. Russia and China, smarting under similar unipolar pressures, have pursued a ‘strategic partnership’ whose strength has been apparent in the transfer of military hardware and technology to China and growing diplomatic consultations on key global issues. While Russian unhappiness with the US-led order has been known for sometime, it became evident since 24 Jim Garamore, Pace Discusses Chinese Military During Japan Troop Visit, American Forces Press Service, 19 August 2007. 25 Admiral Michael Mullen, Senate testimony, 31 July 2007. Vol.1, No.2 2008 pp.27-47
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