Michael J. Green's blog

By Michael Green

Surprises?

The biggest (most pleasant) surprise on Asia has been the Obama administration's willingness to use pressure on North Korea. After campaigning on a promise to meet with the leaders of nations like North Korea without conditions, the Obama White House has turned out to be quite hard line vis-à-vis Pyongyang.

Of course, it would be difficult to miss the obvious failure of Ambassador Chris Hill's conciliatory negotiating style at the end of the Bush administration -- let alone the fact that North Korea responded to President Obama's initial promises of engagement by detonating a second nuclear device. Still, in the case of North Korea the administration seems to have embraced the premise that there must be consequences for proliferators.

The administration has moved forward smartly with implementation of sanctions under U.N. Security Council Resolution 1874 (unlike the Bush administration's decision not to implement UNSCR 1718 after the first nuclear test) and thus far the Special Envoy for North Korea has refused to sit down with the North Koreans until they first agree to return to the Six Party Talks. Even the visit of former President Clinton to Pyongyang was done with most of the administration holding its nose and limiting the mission to the humanitarian goal of bringing home two American journalists taken by the North. We will see how long this holds, but for now the administration looks pretty tough.

Praiseworthy?

The Obama administration deserves praise for its selection of an Asia team. There were more than 60 "advisors" on Asia to the Obama campaign (close to the total number of advisors for the entire world working with McCain). Most of these advisors were calling for wholesale changes in Asia policy, echoing the usual canards about the Bush administration's "unilateralism" and "militarism." But in the end, the top jobs in NSC, State and Defense were filled by non-partisan centrists and pragmatists who recognized the successes of the Bush administration's Asia strategy and wanted to tweak rather than redefine the U.S. approach to the region. Better yet, the top officials at State, NSC and DOD are associated with the successes of the Clinton administration's Asia policy, including the revitalization of the U.S.-Japan alliance and the successful negotiations to bring China into the WTO. The team is professional, knowledgeable and very reassuring to the region.

Constructive Criticism?

The administration deserves criticism on two fronts. The complete lack of a trade strategy leaves the United States without any tools to counter the growth of exclusive regional economic arrangements within Asia. This will become obvious when Obama travels to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in two weeks and calls for an open and inclusive architecture like his predecessors -- only his predecessors actually were bringing something to the table in terms of trade liberalizing agreements with Korea and other countries in the region. The second area of criticism would be the administration's willingness to pull punches on human rights and democracy. The president's decision not to meet the Dalai Lama in Washington in August (the first rebuff to the Tibetan Spiritual Leader by a U.S. President in recent memory) was particularly problematic.

Predictions?

The Obama administration will grow tired of China. Obama expanded the Bush administration's Strategic Economic Dialogue into a Strategic and Economic Dialogue and raised expectations of progress with Beijing on everything from climate change to Iran and North Korea. But in the wake of the financial crisis Beijing sees itself as externally stronger and internally more vulnerable. That is not a recipe for more cooperation with Washington. Chinese support for North Korea's economy is increasing in the wake of Pyongyang's nuclear test and China will be relying on coal for 80 percent of its energy no matter how well discussions of climate change cooperation go (and they are not going that well). Then there is the unyielding PLA position on the South China Sea, cyber-security and a host of other security problems that will vex the Obama administration's China policy over the coming years. Usually, new administrations come into power in Washington having talked themselves into a tense relationship with Beijing during the election campaign and then they adjust to a more centrist and stable relationship with China (true of Regan, Carter, Clinton and G.W. Bush). The Obama administration came in without having engaged in a contentious debate over China policy with McCain, but may now find itself under increasing pressure to be tough with Beijing.

Photo by Korean Central Television/Yonhap via Getty Images

By Michael J. Green

In opinion polls, Americans now rate Japan as one of the United States' most reliable allies -- usually behind only Britain, Canada, and Australia. The relationship between President George W. Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Junchiro Koizumi was particularly close, and Koizumi's successor Shinzo Abe often described recent years as the "golden age" of the U.S.-Japan alliance. So it was probably something of a surprise for most readers of The Washington Post and The New York Times to see front page stories on October 22 describing an open spat between Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Japan's new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, over U.S. bases in Japan and the future of the U.S.-Japan alliance.

Hatoyama came into office a month ago vowing to pull Japanese ships out of the coalition effort in Afghanistan; to oppose the U.S.-Japan agreement realigning U.S. bases on the island of Okinawa; to investigate U.S.-Japan secret agreements on nuclear weapons dating back to the 1950s and 60s; and to increase Japanese independence by establishing a new "East Asia Community" that would exclude the United States. Gates' message in Japan this week was no-nonsense: The Obama administration is not interested in renegotiating previous base agreements and needs the new Japanese government to get behind the alliance. Hatoyama's response was defiant: He would not rush to decisions just to accommodate Obama's visit to Japan on Nov. 11.  But Gates' tough stance sent shudders through Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan.

So much for the "golden age" in U.S.-Japan relations.

Many Japan experts had urged the Obama administration to be patient so that the new Japanese government would have time to figure out its policies. Some of the same experts are now berating Gates on blog sites for provoking an "unnecessary" crisis with Japan. To be sure, there were good reasons to start off with a gentle posture toward the Hatoyama government. The DPJ won its landslide victory because of the economic crisis and the mounting unpopularity of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) -- not because of the unpopularity of the alliance (supported by 76 percent of the public in recent government polls) or because the Japanese people wanted changes in foreign policy (only 3 percent in exit polls said those issues shaped their choices). Moreover, the DPJ's main purpose is to move toward a more redistributive economic policy in order to steal constituencies away from the LDP before a critical first test at the polls in next summer's elections for the Upper House of the Diet. There is little interest in expending political capital on foreign affairs or defense, where the DPJ is badly divided internally to begin with. It therefore seemed likely that the DPJ would move away from some of its more extreme positions on security policy after coming to power -- just as the Obama administration did. A gentle stance would give Hatoyama the "face" to begin that shift.

However, it has become increasingly apparent that the Hatoyama government cannot -- or will not -- move to the center. The Socialist coalition partners are exerting too much control; Hatoyama is afraid of opening a split within his own party by adopting pragmatic governing policies; and the DPJ has interpreted Washington's gentle touch as a green light to continue slapping around the United States for domestic political purposes while loosely associating with Obama's idealistic visions for a nuclear-free world.

On the Okinawa basing issue, Hatoyama has said he will postpone a decision until next year (presumably after the Upper House elections), but his dithering will only increase opposition to U.S. bases on Okinawa, causing the whole deal to unravel -- whether that is ultimately what Hatoyama intends or not. The half-baked East Asia Community idea has the Chinese and South Koreans as perplexed as it has the Obama administration unhappy, but still sends unhelpful signals to the region at a time when the United States needs its closest ally in Asia on its side. The investigation of secret nuclear agreements may end up a big bore, particularly since the United States has not had tactical nuclear weapons in Asia since 1991. But the special committee of outside academics being established to "investigate" the government's past understanding with the United States could also turn into a witch hunt against the traditional managers of the alliance within Japan's Foreign Ministry.

With the U.S. president heading to Tokyo in less than a month, Gates had no choice but to splash cold water on the DPJ on Wednesday. There is some risk that the ever-populist DPJ will now try to use a spat with the United States to increase votes before the election next year.  But Gates is a shrewd judge of his counterparts. He knows that a crisis in the U.S.-Japan alliance would split the DPJ and turn much of the media against Hatoyama, particularly given the strong public support for the alliance and the growing menace from North Korea and China.  Meanwhile, Hatoyama was letting the DPJ leadership play with firecrackers in a room full of dynamite. Letting the alliance drift posed the greater risk.

On the whole, this could be a rough year for managers of the alliance with Japan. But the future looks brighter. The Upper House election next year will probably flush the Socialists out of the coalition and allow the DPJ to move to the center. The next generation of leaders in the DPJ is made up of realists who want a more effective Japanese role in the world and are not afraid to use the Self Defense Forces or to stand up to China or North Korea on human rights.  Gates did the DPJ a favor by forcing the debate on national strategy that the party was never willing to have while in opposition, and that Hatoyama was eager to avoid for his first year in power.

Song Kyung-Seok-pool/Getty Images

By Michael J. Green

The greatest of the many ironies of President Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize is that it was announced on the day he blew off one of the most deserving winners of the prize in its history: His Holiness the Dalai Lama of Tibet.

The Dalai Lama has met the president of the United States on every one of his visits to Washington since 1991 -- until now. The White House decided it would be smarter to postpone the visit until after President Obama's visit to China, after initially indicating to the Tibetans that there would be a meeting with the president per usual. It appears that the Chinese side implored the administration not to meet the Dalai Lama this time because of the particular sensitivity of the Tibet issue at this juncture for President Hu Jintao.

Of course, the Chinese demarched the Bush and Clinton White Houses and argued that it was a "particularly bad time to see the Dalai Lama" every other time he came to Washington as well. Unfortunately, the Chinese may now concluded that the Tibet issue has fallen permanently on the back burner for the United States. This is the Tibetans' understandable fear. President Obama can correct that impression by pressing Beijing for concrete action on issues of importance to Tibet -- like excessive Han migration into the region -- when he is in Beijing. The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was given in anticipation of great things, and the president's November trip to China will be a good time to start repaying the vote of confidence from Norway.

By Michael J. Green

While conducting research for a book I am currently writing on the history of American strategic thought on Asia, I came across a memorandum prepared by the State Department in the early 1840s to guide the United States' first treaty negotiations with China. The memo stressed that the paramount goal of the U.S. commissioner to China was to secure trade access, and that under no conditions was the U.S. delegation to let on that the United States was a republic, since this might frighten the Qing. Instead, the delegation was instructed to highlight that unlike Britain, the United States would maintain a strict policy of noninterference in the affairs of other states and to express respect for the benign rule of the Celestial Emperor toward his people.

In its day, this was probably considered "smart power" and its advocates have made something of a comeback in recent months.

There has been a great deal of speculation about why the Obama administration has changed the tone and substance of U.S. policy on democracy and human rights. It is partly related to the tension between anti-imperialism and human rights in the liberal foreign-policy playbook. Iraq has also contributed to a backlash against values-based foreign policy strategies in a repeat of what happened to democracy-promotion after the Philippines intervention, World War I, and Vietnam. Politics are at play too, since Democrats now seem to believe that they can seize the political high ground on national security by embracing realism as their own (and perhaps peeling off some moderate Republicans in the process).

However, it would be far too simplistic too argue that the administration has "abandoned" human rights and democracy -- at least in Asia. In fact, the administration has actually made the case for real pressure on regimes like Burma, North Korea, and even China. The problem is that these statements of policy have been overshadowed by conflicting signals sent in speeches by the president or decisions like not inviting the Dalai Lama to the White House during his visit to Washington this week. Ironically, by being both tough and soft at the same time, the administration risks losing both American prestige and progress on the democratic causes America has always championed.

The consequences of this confused message were obvious in a meeting I had earlier this week with a senior delegation from Vietnam. The delegation raised a trip I had taken to Hanoi in early 2005 to hammer out a religious freedom agreement in advance of the Vietnamese prime minister's first visit to the White House (I was then NSC senior director for Asia). In that agreement, Vietnam agreed to open hundreds of house churches in the Central Highlands, paving the way for a successful summit and a strategic advance in U.S. relations with Vietnam. My interlocutors this week raised the trip because they wanted to confirm that U.S. strategy had now changed. They noted that President Obama's U.N. speech identified four pillars, none of which touched on human rights and democracy. Authoritarian states take what leaders say far more seriously than what bureaucrats say. So they asked my advice on how to approach intransigent U.S. bureaucrats now that the president had "moved beyond" the difficult issues of human rights and democracy.

The administration's confused signals have also hurt on Burma. After weeks of speculation that U.S. sanctions would be lifted -- speculation fueled by self-proclaimed advisors to candidate Obama now seeking to ingratiate themselves with the SPDC and by the administration's own proengagement rhetoric -- the administration's policy review on Burma turned out to be fairly modest in terms of course correction. In fact -- and this was largely missed by the press -- Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell testified that if there was not progress on securing the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and integrating the NLD and the ethnic minorities into the new constitution, the U.S. would actually seek to increase sanctions on the regime. But by then the regime had already internalized the wrong message and thought that reducing Aung San Suu Kyi's sentence from three years to 18 months would be enough to get sanctions lifted (even as the regime launched violent new military offensives against ethnic minorities along the Chinese and Thai border). Just as bad, states in ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, are moving away from their own very healthy debate about how to implement the human rights standards in the association's new charter and focusing on getting the United States to change its policy instead (Singaporeans could not be more gleeful at the opportunity to escape an internal ASEAN debate on values by shifting the burden back on Washington to change its approach). Now the prospects for progress in this new engagement of the regime are diminished because U.S. signals have softened everyone else's resolve.

Ditto for North Korea. Secretary of State Clinton's July 23 statement on North Korea, emphasized that the United States will "continue to work closely with other governments, international organizations, and NGOs to address human rights violations and abuses perpetuated by the regime, and would soon announce an envoy for North Korean human rights." But the senior envoy dispatched to the region has made barely a mention of the situation in the North.

On China, Secretary Clinton fumbled early with statements that she would not let issues like human rights and Tibet interfere with more important strategic issues. But senior administration officials have steadily adjusted since. President Obama raised human rights in welcoming remarks for the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue and in a Sept. 24 speech to the Center for a New American Security, Deputy Secretary of State Jim Steinberg said that he "could not disagree more" with Chinese officials who say that there is no place for human rights in the U.S.-China dialogue.

The problem is that nobody seems to believe any of this anymore. Than Shwe and the thugs running Burma guessed wrong on the administration's expectations. The Vietnamese clearly think the heat is off on religious freedom in their country. Japan's new foreign minister, Katsuya Okada, gloated in a joint press conference with the Cambodian foreign minister this week that the U.S. was "moving closer to Japan and Cambodia's position" -- even though Campbell had clearly testified on the content of the policy the week before.

Now with the administration's decision not to invite the Dalai Lama to the Oval Office during his visit to Washington this week (the first noninvite by a president during the visit of the Dalai Lama since 1991), the White House is compounding the mistakes in its messaging on human rights and democracy in the region.

The elements of a strong policy on human rights and democracy are a matter of record in the statements of senior Obama administration officials (for which they deserve full credit), but those points have been muddled or drowned out by conflicting narratives about engagement, access, "smart power" and the president's own apparent ambivalence about championing universal values. I suspect this will change as feigned neorealism comes up short in terms of results. Indeed, one can already see some evolution in the administration's approach to these issues. However, until the president clearly reaffirms America's commitment to human rights, democracy, and governance, there will be five consequences in Asia that even hard-core realists will lament (not to mention the idealists who would normally be comfortably at the core of a Democratic foreign policy):

1. Change agents within repressive states who matter most will be demoralized, disempowered and possibly endangered;
2. Repressive regimes will continue to think that they can get away with much lower standards than the administration could sell to the Congress or the American people if they want to lift sanctions or advance engagement (as happened in Burma with respect to Aung San Suu Kyi's sentence);
3. Repressive regimes will continue citing evidence of a higher U.S. tolerance for human rights abuses (something that now worries the Tibetans in the wake of the postponement of the Dalai Lama's visit to Washington);
4. The emerging debate in ASEAN, Japan, and Korea on the importance of addressing human rights and democracy will subside;
5. America's greatest source of soft power -- our values -- will suffer.