Tongan Prime Minister Huakavameiliku (2nd L) and visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (R) hold a meeting at the prime minister's office in Nukualofa, Tonga, on May 31, 2022. (Linny Folau/MatangiTonga/AFP via Getty Images)
In late May, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi held a virtual summit with the leaders of several Pacific Island republics to entice them into joining a Beijing-led mutual security and economic agreement. It did not end well.
During the summit, Beijing proposed that the Federated States of Micronesia, the Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea, Niue, and Timor-Leste join it in a new “China-Pacific Island Countries Common Development Vision.”
The proposed pact was sweeping, in particular creating a free trade zone within the member states, as well as providing humanitarian and COVID-19 assistance. It also included Chinese assistance in training Pacific Islander police forces, strengthening cybersecurity, and marine mapping.
More ominously, the plan proposed that these Pacific Islands permit the presence of Chinese security forces and ships in their nations. This could conceivably provide the Chinese military or Coast Guard with expanded access to the Pacific Ocean and make them “better positioned for a conflict” with the United States.
Indeed, the Chinese had reason to be optimistic about such an ambitious pact. Earlier this year, Beijing signed a framework agreement on security cooperation with the Solomon Islands. This deal allows China to send police, military personnel, and other law enforcement forces to the Solomons to assist in “maintaining social order, protecting people’s lives and property, and providing humanitarian assistance.”
The agreement also permits Chinese ships access to Solomon Islands ports to carry out “logistical replenishments,” raising concerns that China may someday acquire a naval base in the country.
Solomon Islands Foreign Minister Jeremiah Manele shakes hands with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi after releasing joint press remarks to mark the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two nations at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China, on Sept. 21, 2019. (Naohiko Hatta/Getty Images)
In addition, Beijing has recently signed bilateral cooperation agreements with Samoa and Kiribati. In particular, the deal with Kiribati focuses on a wide range of areas, including infrastructure (such as rebuilding an airstrip), health and pandemic response, climate change, and maritime affairs.
Nevertheless, China’s meeting with the various Pacific Island states ended with major pushback from the latter. Most Pacific leaders declined or deferred action, arguing that the proposal needed to be amended first.
Some Pacific leaders are particularly wary of China’s long-term intentions. David Panuelo, president of the Federated States of Micronesia, urged “serious caution” going forward and warned that the security aspect of the proposed agreement “is demonstrative of China’s intention to shift Pacific allegiances in their direction.”
Panuelo added that “the Common Development Vision threatens to bring a new Cold War era at best, and a World War at worst.”
The Chinese response has not been comforting. Foreign Minister Wang’s comeback to the rejection of the proposed pact was to tell the Pacific Islanders, “Don’t be too anxious and don’t be too nervous,” adding that China would provide assistance to Pacific Island countries with “no political strings attached.”
Given Beijing’s increasing bellicose behavior in places like the South China Sea, such reassurances are more likely to raise concerns than assuage them. Most Pacific Island nations will likely deal with China in a more ad hoc and transactional manner, giving as little as they can while trying to extract maximum benefits.
These nations, too, are more likely to hedge against too much Chinese influence in their neighborhoods by engaging closely at the same time with the West. In particular, many of these countries could join the new U.S.-led “Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity” (IPEF).
IPEF can be seen as a successor to the abortive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a proposed trade pact that would have included most of the major Pacific rim countries, including Latin American states. Donald Trump killed the TPP upon becoming president.
Critically, IPEF is not a free trade agreement like the TPP. Instead, it is intended as a framework for fostering better trade and economic relations between its member states. IPEF’s efforts will revolve around four pillars: fair and resilient trade; supply chain resilience; infrastructure, clean energy, and decarbonization; and tax and anti-corruption measures.
At least one Pacific Island nation—Fiji—has already joined IPEF, which also includes Australia, Brunei, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, and Vietnam, as well as the United States.
Above all, it is intended to counter the growing Chinese economic clout, both regionally and worldwide. In fact, Beijing has already denounced IPEF as an attempt to force Asian-Pacific nations to “choose sides” in the Sino-American strategic competition.
This is probably true, and one might see IPEF as the economic side of an emerging U.S.-led security network in the Indo-Pacific, as exemplified by the AUKUS agreement and the Australian-Indian-Japanese-U.S. Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, also known as the “Quad.”
Most nations in the region would probably prefer to balance between the two great powers, drawing benefits from each. That said, one should not expect the shelving of the Common Development Vision to be the end of China’s efforts to peel off Pacific Island nations into its sphere of influence. Beijing will continue to pursue bilateral efforts to reach out to these nations, and China has said that it will soon release a position paper on pressing closer cooperation with the Pacific countries.
The Sino-American competition in the Indo-Pacific is only heating up more, and expanding further out into the Pacific Ocean.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Richard A. Bitzinger is an independent international security analyst. He was previously a senior fellow with the Military Transformations Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore, and he has held jobs in the U.S. government and at various think tanks. His research focuses on security and defense issues relating to the Asia-Pacific region, including the rise of China as a military power, and military modernization and arms proliferation in the region.
