TIME TO RESET TRILATERAL RELATIONS

United States President Joe Biden has made it a top priority of his Administration to repair and re-energize global alliances during its first year in power. This is a necessary strategic and political calculus made in light of growing global security, public health, and environmental challenges that will require cooperation and multilateral contributions. President Trump’s ‘America first’ policy did much to undermine confidence in such relationships over his time in office.

- Andy Wong

Given that a key challenge is the continuing escalation of geopolitical tensions with China in the Indo-Pacific theatre, U.S. foreign policy is turning towards repairing and strengthening bilateral alliance ties between the U.S. and two of its most important North Asian allies: Japan and South Korea. This effort is not just consigned, however, to the bilateral U.S. - Japan/South Korean relations, but also in trying to broker renewed political and military cooperation and understanding between these two Asian powers within a trilateral framework with the U.S as a bonding agent.

The new U.S. Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken has picked up from his role as Deputy Secretary of State days in 2015 under the Obama Administration by holding regular meetings with top diplomats from Japan and South Korea, alongside U.S. Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin. Their first trip together to Tokyo and Seoul was calculated to be overt public reaffirmations of trilateral cooperation between the three powers.