Oorja Tapan
Amid rising tensions in the South China Sea and the potential for conflict over Taiwan, the U.S. Department of Defense has been ramping up its diplomatic efforts in the Indo-Pacific region to counter China’s escalating regional threats and ambitions. Recently, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin convened a meeting with his counterparts from Japan, Australia, and the Philippines, dubbed the new “Squad” defense partnership.
This quadrilateral alliance is just one of several regional partnerships the United States has forged to counter China’s assertiveness in the wider Indo-Pacific region. Other notable partnerships include the Quad – consisting of the U.S., Australia, India, and Japan – as well as AUKUS, a defense pact between Australia, the U.K., and the U.S. Together these illustrate the larger “minilateral” foreign policy of the Biden administration in the Indo-Pacific region, all geared to keep the pressure high on Chinese belligerence.
China views the newly formed “Squad” as another attempt by the U.S. to contain China as part of its Indo-Pacific Strategy. Beijing warns of a “Ukrainization” of the Philippines – essentially casting the country as a pawn under U.S. influence in the “Great Power Game.”
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