From left: Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese; that of Japan, Fumio Kishida; the Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg; New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins; and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol at the NATO summit in Vilnius this Wednesday. DPA via Europa Press (DPA via Europa Press)
The NATO summit in Vilnius was at the center of the war launched by Russia against Ukraine, but this does not prevent the debate on how to deal with the rise of China from being very present at the allies’ table. For the second year in a row, the leaders of four major Asia-Pacific democracies – Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand – have been invited to the Atlantic Allies meeting. Her presence is a symbol of the desire to strengthen ties between nations with democratic values. China responded by opposing “NATO’s eastward push in the Asia-Pacific region” and warned that any action that threatens Beijing’s rights will provoke a violent backlash.
NATO maintains relations with Eastern democracies, but that does not mean that there is a unanimous intention among NATO members on how far this harmony should be extended. The United States is pushing to strengthen a large network of democratic countries to face the challenges of the authoritarian powers and wants the alliance to be one of the vehicles of this project. Specifically, Washington takes a very firm stance on Beijing and shows its distrust of what it sees as worrying Chinese attitudes. The most important European partners share the concern, but advocate avoiding positions that encourage an escalation of tensions.
This discrepancy of a general geopolitical nature is reflected in the Alliance. It emerged when negotiating the new strategic concept adopted at last year’s Madrid summit and has now resurfaced with plans to set up a NATO administrative office in Japan. Tokyo has long desired closer ties with its Atlantic allies, and recently the project appeared to be taking shape with a clear push from Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, but was eventually shelved by explicit opposition from France and implicit opposition from Germany to others. . Paris openly declares that it would be a mistake to expand NATO’s presence in the Asia-Pacific region.
That position was expressed Wednesday by French President Emmanuel Macron, who assured that he agrees that the alliance has partners in other regions, “but this remains the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.” The geography is clear: the Indo-Pacific is not the North Atlantic . The president stressed that he believes the alliance “made the right decision not to expand the conflict areas because it is not the right time and because it is not why we are here.”
For his part, Stoltenberg insisted that the idea of opening an office in Tokyo has been put on hold for the time being, but remains on the table. China heavily criticized the project a few months ago.
What NATO has offered Japan is a cooperation program that includes strengthening ties in the areas of cybersecurity, space and information sharing. “No other partner is closer to NATO than Japan,” said Stoltenberg, emphasizing that “security is global, not regional.”
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Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has been warning for some time that “the crisis in Ukraine this morning could be East Asia,” particularly in light of the risks of a conflict over Taiwan. Tokyo supports Washington’s rhetoric about a democratic front and has backed several of its moves to restrict key technology exports to Beijing.
The final communiqué of the Vilnius summit reaffirms the language critical of China and is in line with the position set out at last year’s Madrid summit and the Alliance’s new strategic concept adopted there. The text indicates that Beijing “seeks to undermine the rules-based international order”, denounces the “opacity” of its military development, intentions and strategy, and warns that NATO stands ready to defend its shared values . China has reacted angrily to this position, and the Xinhua News Agency has used the concept of “tentacle expansion” to refer to the alliance’s relationship with the democracies of the Pacific.
Australia is another key country in the fight against Chinese rise. The Australian government has opted to form an alliance with the US and UK – Aukus – through which it will equip itself with a fleet of nuclear submarines and which also plans to collaborate on the development of hypersonic weapons. Canberra is contributing to Kiev’s war effort, and in Vilnius, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed a new shipment of 30 Bushmaster armored transport vehicles.
South Korea, like Japan, has a representative office outside NATO headquarters in Brussels and is excited about the prospect of a tightening of ties, but has so far been more reticent than Tokyo about public comment or overseeing restrictive measures against China. The South Korean government has so far hesitated to provide Ukraine with military support. The country is under pressure from allies who have an interest in Seoul contributing in some way to Ukraine’s military supply efforts, given its remarkable ammunition and weapons production capacity and the vast material piling up in its arsenals from unresolved tensions has conflict with the North.
Pyongyang fired a long-range missile on Wednesday, the final day of the NATO summit, with the participation of the heads of state and government of South Korea and Japan. According to the Japanese government, the missile flew for about 70 minutes and covered a distance of about 1,000 kilometers.
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