America’s foreign policy crossroads
On December 3, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin presented a speech at the Reagan National Defense Forum. The forum seeks to bring key members of the defense community together to produce leadership, innovation, and policy goals in the hopes of enriching American foreign policy and projecting our strengths into the world and into the future.
With Defense Secretary Austin being the premier defense figure in the US, his speech was very much anticipated.
Austin made some strong statements in his address, particularly that the United States should be the one to define the world order of the 21st century, and not China. When speaking about China’s ability to catch the US in our capabilities — and therefore the reshape the world order — Austin stated that “We will not let that happen.”
This rhetoric comes at a very interesting time given the current events. Russia and their war in Ukraine is fresh in our minds, but what seems to be less frequent on the news cycle are the protests China has been witnessing. Additionally, Austin had recently (November 22) met with his Chinese counterpart in Cambodia, in which the CCP official affirmed China’s desire to build a partnership with the US without forgoing their ambitions to seize Taiwan.
Anyways, back to the protests.
What started as protests against China’s backwards COVID policies erupted into outright anti-Xi, anti-CCP protests throughout China — the most severe that have been seen since Tiananmen Square. You can read more about it below.
With the US’s two greatest adversaries — Russia and China — in precarious positions, Austin’s remarks seem to indicate a resurgence of American strength and policy-clarity at a time when we need to be decisive. Austin said it best: “These next few years will set the terms of our competition with the People’s Republic of China… And they will determine whether our children and grandchildren… face emboldened autocrats who seek to dominate by force and fear.”
Austin also highlighted that the future of US policy towards China, with a revamped budget, is focused on deterrence. The forum also coincided with the reveal of the B-21 Raider, a new nuclear stealth bomber.
Austin’s remarks come as somewhat of a reassurance, in my opinion, at a time when policy towards our adversaries has seemed perpetually uncertain. The Biden administration has been inconsistent with their remarks on “what ifs” regarding Taiwan, but Austin’s speech seems to at least confirm we are no longer sitting idly by; that at this crossroads, we are choosing to step up rather than play lapdog.
What do you think? Let me know in the comments below.
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EDIT: December 6, 2022
A reader commented on this piece and stated that US foreign policy is discouraging because the US always seems to be at a foreign policy crossroads; that the US — while it certainly has a standard ideology — is often at a loss for its goals in a given region or state.
I offered a reply that I think speaks to an interesting distinction between foreign policy decisions of the past versus the present:
