Why Taiwan Matters

foreign [Applause] s were not for me so good morning everyone uh Victor my name is Victor Chum senior vice president for Asia and career chair at csis Vice Dean and professor at Georgetown and we're very happy this morning to welcome Senator Dan Sullivan who will be speaking on Taiwan and the indo-pacific overall as many of you know Dan Sullivan is a very good friend of csis he is Alaska's eighth U.S senator he currently serves on four Senate committees Commerce science and transportation armed services environment and public works and Veteran Affairs he's also head of the iri the international Republican Institute prior to his election to the U.S Senate Senator Sullivan served as Alaska's attorney general and commissioner of the Alaska Department of Natural national natural resources he also has a distinguished record of military service in the U.S Marine Corps he served in the administration of President George W bush as U.S assistant Secretary of State for economic energy and business under Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice um and also served on the directorate of the National Security Council which was where I first had the chance to meet him here in this ba in economics from that University up in Cambridge Massachusetts I forget the name of it but most importantly he got his Masters of Science in foreign service from Georgetown University a school that I know quite well so with great pleasure I'm happy to welcome my friend and colleague Dan Sullivan to the state all right good morning everybody it's always good to be back at csis and I want to begin by thanking Victor all the staff here you guys do great work I mean truly truly great work that is used by so many people throughout this town including so many Senators but I think throughout the world so thank you keep it up Victor and team we really really appreciate it I am so we have a handout for all of you this is a speech and remarks that I have been giving pretty much all over the place and um this is think tanks Ed boards Senators speeches on the floor and I want to give you a little bit of background on um why I'm doing this and then go through it quickly because most of you who are experts understand this topic and the stakes that are presented by this presentation and then um what I'm really looking forward to is having a little bit of q a with all of you with Victor this is where I come to csis on a pretty regular basis and learn a lot from all of you so with that um what I wanted to do if you have this handout I'll just give you kind of a a little bit of uh background on kind of what has gone into this what um inspired my desire to work on this and then again um get feedback from everybody here because this is a really really important topic um as Victor mentioned I'm uh I'm still serving in the Marines I'm a colonel at the Marine forces Pacific command and I'm the reserve chief of staff at that command that's part of the Indo paycom command it's one of the subordinate service commands out at Indo Paycom in this idea in some ways kind of came from of course my job here in the Senate but also my job as a marine outed into paycom and you know as we're doing the work and I I was just out there uh two weeks ago for about a week of reserve duty a couple issues kind of occurred to me both what I refer to in my day job as a senator but also in my military capacity and one is um this is a huge challenge right and as you can imagine I'm talking about the Taiwan issue Taiwan straight issue um and as you can imagine our forces and I think it's really important for everybody here out in Indo paycom our Focus very intently on this issue but the one thing that occurred to me you're out there with the men and women in the U.S military and our allies saying hey they're working on this um all the time but does the rest of the country know or care or understand you got a whole bunch of military folks who do but the do the rest of the average American public do they so that's an important issue in a related issue comes to this issue of Will and you know in military terms and strategic terms a country's will is very important with regard to strategy with regard to and we don't want it there military conflict and say what you want about the Chinese Communist party and I don't have a lot of nice things to say about them you'll hear that but on this topic they have a lot of will right and I think that it's um important for Americans to understand the stakes and a lot of times a lot of times we don't we're not a country that's great at understanding our own history let alone other uh countries histories and so what I thought would be useful to to go to kind of do a deep dive and and talk about this issue in what I've done in this speech and again we'll go through it rather quickly but it's really three three parts to this one is a little bit of our own history as it relates to Taiwan the Taiwan Strait issue because it's a it's an important history and there's certain things in this history that are quite remarkable like the Taiwan Relations Act and we've had will actually quite a lot of will for decades and that's important for Americans to know and our allies and potential adversaries um the second part uh is um looking at what the world would look like in the aftermath of a successful pla CC CCP invasion of Taiwan okay it's not a comp it's not a topic that people want to contemplate but it's an important topic and I go into that that's kind of the meat of this speech and then third is all right if we don't want a conflict and we're not going to launch one the United States isn't Taiwan is going to launch one it will be launched by Xi Jinping in the Chinese Communist party what then should we do in terms of undertaking policies that relate to deterrence deterrence deterrence so that's the three parts of my remarks and if you want to just follow along I'll try and get through this quickly but if you look at page two um I have a slide there of uh Xi Jinping and his uh new members of the elected after the National Congress of the Chinese Communist party in November and um you know let's face it that picture in many ways is kind of ridiculous right I mean these elderly Gentlemens and their fatigues I mean I think they look ridiculous as a U.S marine no offense or maybe I am making an offensive remark but there's a seriousness here they put that picture out almost immediately after uh this last Congress and it is a photo taken to show China and the rest of the world these guys are preparing for war we need to take this very very seriously despite how ridiculous they might be looking in their fatigues and I know our eyes are on Ukraine something that we should stay focused on but defeating authoritarian aggression in Europe is essential to deterring it in Asia but we can't lose sight of the threat to Taiwan and what is at stake so if you turn to the next page on page four what I like to do is analogize this with another moment in U.S history with our allies because a lot of people kind of look and say geez this is a hopeless case right you got China with interior lines or 100 miles away how in the heck can we deter this um well if you look at history in American history which again Americans aren't always so great at doing um we have been here before in the last century we were here before in a proud proud moment of American History um we recognize that a small Enclave of freedom essentially in the middle of a very aggressive totalitarian regime was critical not just to the people of that Community now I'm talking Berlin but to the world Americans understood that in 1948 we were tired we were exhausted the world was exhausted and yet the Soviet Union now was on the March and if you look at that very famous photo of the Berlin airlift in 1948 that is a proud moment of American History at the high point of that blockade of Berlin the United States was Landing an aircraft to supply the people of West Berlin in aircraft one a minute want a minute to save that country we understood that that City West Berlin and its citizens stood on the front line of the struggle between an american-led free world and a powerful expansionist authoritarian regime and we undertook policies that threatened a broader War just to try to save that Outpost of freedom and we were successful we were successful so the same is true in my view of Taiwan today in many ways Taiwan is the 21st Century's West Berlin and I think that's important to recognize so if you look at the next slide Page Six it's important to recognize our own history the Chinese love to talk about will but the United States has had will it's very interesting when you actually look at the history our involvement in Taiwan was really accelerated after one major event in the world that a lot of people don't tie the two together but they're very tied together which was the Korean War in the invasion of South Korea by the authoritarian uh North Korean dictators with the Russian and Chinese Communist Party backing that solidified the United States's view that hope wait a minute we're going to actually look at Taiwan in a different way a lot of people don't understand that connection but it's very much the case and if you look at different administrations starting with the Eisenhower Administration Taiwan plays a central role in our view and Outlook as it relates to our relationship with authoritarian regimes particularly the Chinese Communist Party and in addition to that history with the Eisenhower Administration you look at President Eisenhower's Memoirs the issue of Taiwan covers pages and Pages dozens of pages right so this has been a strong part of American history for decades and it's also historically and from a legislative perspective some real remarkable legislation and what I'm talking about and all of you know what I'm talking about but that's the Taiwan Relations Act when you think about what happened there and I mentioned if you look at page number six some key elements of that act which to this day continues to Define our relationship with Taiwan and the Chinese Communist Party but what happened was quite remarkable yet in administration The Carter Administration who is continuing the efforts to normalize relations with Beijing and when they did it many in the Congress particularly the U.S Senate thought that hey President Carter you've gone too far right we have an ally here who we've been with and they've been with us for decades and we think you're kind of just throwing them under the bus and in the U.S constitutional system the president doesn't have all the power as a matter of fact there is a lot of power that resides with the United States Senate in our Constitution and you had 84 85 U.S senators who said you're not going to go that far President Carter we're going to establish what we think is should be the policy in the Taiwan Relations Act that has stood the test of time to this day quite remarkable and again that goes to our history I won't mention all the elements of the Taiwan Relations Act which I mentioned 85 U.S senators including a young Senator named Joe Biden voted for that legislation but it is all about saying we are not going to let the Taiwan issue be resolved by any other way than peaceful means and we are going to prevent economic and Military coercion in the Taiwan Straits that is U.S bipartisan policy that exists to this day as articulated in the Taiwan Relations Act so you turn to the next page the next slide this is always important I think kind of when you're talking to audiences if you can draw a personal connection because of this history literally tens of thousands of Americans have had a history with regard to Taiwan as part of our responsibilities and duties including myself my first deployment as a U.S marine was on that big ship you see right there that's the USS Bella Wood part of the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit at amphibious ready group we were sent to the Taiwan Strait in 1995 and 96 at what now is referred to as the third Taiwan Strait crisis when the pla mobilized forces to the Taiwan Strait started shooting missiles very aggressively over the island because they were on the verge of their first presidential election and President Clinton to his credit sent two carrier strike groups and a Marine Amphibious ready group and I was part of that as a young infantry officer and lieutenant in the Taiwan Strait that ship you read the history and say at the height of that crisis the president Senate U.S aircraft carrier through the Taiwan Strait it wasn't an aircraft carrier it was that ship looks like a carrier but that's called amphibious assault ship that carries harriers and Marines 1100 Marines uh on that ship that's a that's a serious commitment of U.S credibility and U.S power and um I let later led a delegation with Senator Duckworth and Coons on that airplane that's a picture from our delegation when we delivered almost a million vaccines to Taiwan uh about two years ago now uh when covid started to break out there the Chinese Communist party was trying to strangle the citizens of Taiwan from getting any Western vaccines doing a huge information propaganda operation and we said we're not going to allow that to happen to our Ally we're going to show up here announcing our support which is what we did in a bipartisan way but I'll mention one final thing that really had an impact on me my first trip ever to Taiwan where I wasn't on a ship on land when I landed the state department AIT official got on the bus it was me with Congressional Delegation led by Senator McCain and he said this I've written it down here because it had a real impact to me and I'll I'll quote it to you welcome to Taiwan a vibrant democracy of 24 million people with one of the most Innovative economies in the world a hub of trade and Cutting Edge technology and the only reason this incredible Place exists on the map as such is because of the sacrifice and commitment of America our military our government and our people to taiwan's survival every single American citizen should be proud of that that's what he said I'll never forget that on the bus I was just thinking wow that makes me proud as an American kept this really vibrant democracy free and all Americans should be proud of that it was a powerful greeting so let me get to the meat of this speech and what I did and again I'm going to go through this quickly I've promised that several times and I'm not keeping it to you guys but um so I'll really try here um but what I did was I asked this question of our different Intel agencies several of them which is hey I don't think we understand enough what the stakes are so what I'd like you guys to do is do some analysis on what would happen in terms of U.S interests and those of our allies now we're looking just American interests right if there was a successful military invasion of Taiwan by the CCP don't go into how it happens right there's a lot of different ways that could happen just assume you're starting on day one there's been a military Invasion and now the Chinese Communist Party dominates and has conquered Taiwan and I'm not even talking about the Carnage that would happen because it'll be horrendous but what would happen to U.S interests and believe it or not when I dug into this this is I mentioned this is kind of a it's not studied that well this very question I couldn't find a lot on it at all and I think it's little studied because it's a very depressing topic to contemplate what I just said a successful brutal bloody violent CCP XI xinping LED crushing of Taiwan but that's a huge possibility we all know it so what does that world look like and what are the ramifications for American interests and how would we want to prevent it how should we try to prevent it so those are the key things that I had asked uh different organizations to take a look at and let me just give you a quick summary of that first this would be a devastating blow to the U.S and global economy the high-end chip fabrication that takes place on Taiwan is all we all know enormous the island democracy is home to 92 percent of the world's most advanced semi conductor production I mean think about that in terms of the global economy and what it means um the state department had recently done an assessment of this damage they estimate it would be kind of probably north of about two and a half trillion dollars this is nothing and and this doesn't include the the huge cost to Global shipping which Taiwan plays a huge role in and these very sophisticated uh computer chips not only going into the global economy but going into American a defense production f-35s Radars missile defense so you have an entire huge massive Global impact to the global economy that would be negative particularly providing the CCP with control of these most advanced computer chips which run the whole world's economy second as I mentioned now on page 12 there would be a huge geostrategic loss in a vital area of the world as experts and followers on foreign policy you understand that slide on the first island chain the second island chain that's been a very important strategic Lines within the American Security apparatus since the end of World War II and as you know in the second island chain you have um resonance in Guam Mariana Islands these are all U.S citizens right these are all U.S Senate citizens that would be um put to risk if you turn to uh the next slide on page 14 that is just a indication of the overmatch of what exists across the Taiwan Strait if you look at where the PLA and the Chinese Communist party has built up their military capability just in that theater and what Taiwan has right now look at that I mean that is stunning and here's something else that again nobody really knows for sure but if you look at history when dictators are on the March aggressive dictators are on the March think about the pla successfully invading Taiwan with that amount of military you think they're just going to sit there you don't think they're going to look and say hmm who's our next Target to coerce who's our next Target to use that massive military force which they're growing every single day much more than we are by the way it's a question Victor I hope you asked me about because I don't think we're doing nearly enough so a lot of the assessment that I was briefed on thanks that once there's an invasion and it's successful with that amount of military the pla will very likely use it for the next neighbor for the next democracy in the region to coerce blackmail or bring them under the um control either militarily or just from a coercion perspective so that is another area of our interests that we need to be very cognizant of a third as I mentioned on page 14 is I think our commitment to our allies and credibility to our allies in the region I was just in Japan and Korea over the weekend um would be would be strongly questioned we have treaty alliances with many countries in the region um bilateral alliances and I think those would be questioned significantly which would hurt and undermine all of our national security interests in the region finally if you look on page 16 and slide 15 a successful military invasion of Taiwan by the PLA and CCP would be a huge boost to XI jinping's authoritarian model around the world and I think instinctively we know what a problem that is but we need to face this very soberly and that would be a giant boost for their model as they look to pursue that not just in Asia in the indo-pacific but all around the world so that slide that's an unclassified slide there that's actually from the J2 of Indo paycom if you look at page 16 and I think that's a really good summation of what all the different interests that I'm talking about what the CCP would gain what the U.S would lose in terms of strategic interests very significant sobering but very significant so what do we do about it well let me just end with with this if you look at page 18 I lock I like to talk about the issue of deterrence as composing three levels of deterrence in the Taiwan Strait and that's what we want United States does not want war in the Taiwan Strait Ty the island democracy of Taiwan doesn't want to warn the Taiwan Strait if there's a war in the Taiwan Strait it will be launched by those guys and their silly fatigues on the first page of this presentation that is a fact so what are so what we need to focus on is deterrence we understand the turns but I like to talk about deterrence in the Taiwan Strait in terms of three levels of deterrence the first is the level of helping Taiwan defend itself that is actually in the Taiwan relations act that shouldn't be new to anybody but we need to do much more in terms of that in terms of training in terms of asymmetrical weapon systems that they need and um the ability to use as you know some people call it the porcupine strategy to make Taiwan look like what's happening over in Ukraine I mean the will of the brave people of Ukraine I think is a deterrent to almost any dictator around the world hopefully to Xi Jinping as well wow when peoples homes and family and freedom are really really put to the test people will fight look what the ukrainians are doing so that's the first level and we don't know where we are in that we can do a lot more the whole issue of will for the Taiwanese is important the second level of deterrence has historically been the most decisive which is now we've had at least three major Taiwan crises over the last several decades and it's the deterrence factor of the United States and hopefully our allies coming to the assistance of Taiwan if there's a war launched by the CCP will we do that um you know that's always in question but that's been a decisive level of deterrence historically but the third level which doesn't get talked about nearly as much which I'll end with here is the level of economic Financial energy sanctions that I believe we should tee up now to make it clear to the Chinese Communist party if you invade militarily to crush this island democracy the triggering factor of your military Invasion will result in massive comprehensive economic Financial in energy sanctions against your country against the Chinese Communist party and against your interests now there's a lot of people who do an analysis of what's going on in Taiwan Strait who view that factor maybe is the most important maybe it's the most powerful particularly if we have something like that in conjunction with our allies if you can imagine the United States Europe Japan Korea Canada having that as a policy 65 70 percent of the world's Global GDP that is a major deterrent and I think that's one of the most important things that's why I've introduced the stand with Taiwan act in the Senate on the house side of Congressman Gallagher is the sponsor of this we've been working on this legislation for quite some time I've been pitching foreign governments our allies around the world on similar needs from their perspective to again have a trigger that says here it is if you militarily invade this is what you should be expecting we still have enormous economic financial and in particular energy power and influence these are all huge strategic advantages that I think we should signal with legislation to make sure that we avoid a conflict in the Taiwan Strait so with that I appreciate again the um attention to this important issue and uh thank you for joining us this morning and I'm trying to get this out to as many Americans as possible to understand the stakes understand the history and understand what we should be doing to keep the peace that's what we want and um if it's up to others on this issue of peace and Acro in the Taiwan Strait we need to be ready uh if others choose a different path so with that Victor thanks again and I look forward to your questions thank you everybody [Applause] okay great great thanks well thanks uh thanks so much Senator Sullivan that was terrific and I think your last point is an important point to make I mean this is all about maintaining peace it's about deterrence and peace no no um and we're now at a point where the security environment is very different from what it was a couple of years ago and there's a lot of concerns um so I want to go to I mean I want to go to this because this really is this really is something and by the way that's just one theater right this is just right this is just one theater Eastern theater I think they call it um and so I guess there are two questions here one is in terms of the military balance what should we be doing what should how do you think about what we should be doing what our allies should be doing to try to obviously not to match this but to create enough credibility so that the deterrent signals work on the military side and then your other point about perhaps the biggest deterrent are things like the stand act which show you know the the the the the universe of sanctions that China could come under but as as you know well China also uses economic coercion right against others so how do we build up resilience among our allies to feel like they can withstand Chinese sanctions uh trade dependencies on China these sorts of things so okay that's a good but great questions again Victor was asking me about this chart right the overmatch chart um I think again it goes to to the issues that were that I'm I raise one is our ability to help Taiwanese train and have the will and have the capability to make it very difficult just from the perspective of the Chinese trying to invade and take them over and that's um that's an issue that I think we're behind on I think from the Taiwan military perspective I think there has to be much more of a focus on asymmetrical weapon systems not you know high-end uh platforms like f-35s and Abrams Tanks but uh uh mine capabilities and I ship capabilities and the the ability to train on those you know when people ask about will you see this incredible will in Ukraine it's quite remarkable it's very heroic but one element of will is and military force will have an increased will if they're well trained and well equipped those are very related so that's one I think we have to wake up to the reality that the present moment is not being met by the Biden administration's defense budget every year President Biden comes to the armed services committee on which I sit and proposes a defense department cut inflation adjusted Cuts he doesn't do that to the EPA or Department of Commerce or all the other I mean we're blowing it out in terms of the increases the by demonstration has proposed to almost every Federal agency in the United States government with the exception of two Homeland Security and the Department of Defense three years in a row now the president puts forward a budget for inflation adjusted Cuts this year the buy demonstration budget shrinks the Navy shrinks the Army and shrinks the Marine Corps go read the budget that's what it does that is not the right signal to be sent into Xi Jinping or Putin what we've done two years in a row on the armed services Committee in a bipartisan way is dramatically increased the Top Line because we know that this budget is inadequate you know I've heard from some Administration officials well they put forward a low-level budget because they want to appease the far left of the Biden administration's Progressive allies who don't like the military or military spending and they'll know that the the armed services Committee in a bipartisan way which we have will dramatically increase it well with this new budget deal that just happened that's not going to happen so um my own view is we need to get much more serious about our own defense budget we have efficiencies as Speaker McCarthy has emphasized which I agree with him that we need at the Department of Defense but at the end of the day we need to help with overmatch in the Taiwan Strait one way we can do that though which is really important is working with our allies if the Japanese the Australians through initiatives like August which is abiding Administration initiative that I actually very much strongly support um if we have our allies even our European allies you may have seen the United States in a Canadian Naval vessel recently done a uh Taiwan straight Transit the ability to bring our allies and their assets into this very important region will help pretty significantly on that overmatch that you currently see in the Taiwan Strait so those are certain areas that I think Victor we can do more on but we have a lot more work to do and then when it comes to coercion this again is an area where we need to be working very closely with our allies and sticking together the United States is big enough that hey if there's economic coercion from China okay bring it we have the ability to retaliate in many ways matter of fact again I think on certain issues the by demonstration has done a good job the technology transfer issues for example under secretary raimondo have been very effective very powerful but the G7 and I was just in Japan spent the full day with Ambassador manuals doing a really good job out in in Japan you may have seen the G7 this year that was based in Japan with the Japanese as the president of the G7 much of that was focused on economic coercion and how we need to stick together with our Democratic allies in particular not just G7 countries but the quad and others to make sure that if the Chinese are trying to pick on say Lithuania because they're courageous and outspoken that we don't allow them to do that I have had discussions with senior EU officials saying hey Lithuania is an EU member don't let the Chinese Communist Party bully them stand up for them they understand Freedom they're under the boot the Jack boot of the Soviet Union for decades so that's what we need to do we have strength in numbers the Chinese Communist party is very good at trying to pick off individual countries they go after the Germans and you know tease them with more access to the market for all their beautiful BMWs and Mercedes-Benz we need our German colleagues to stand strong and say no we're not going to fall for that so that's the key and I think the G7 this past a couple weeks ago was a good important start um really really helpful and um I know time is short I'd love to hear more about your trip um to Korea and Japan the takeaways but before doing that um you mentioned how the war um in Ukraine um really showcased the political will of the Ukrainian people and so I guess the question there for you is there it's twofold what do you think the impact of the war has been to the Taiwanese people yeah and what do you think the effect of Putin's difficulties in the war how has that affected XI jinping's intentions well I think and again csis we we learned so much from all of you but in my discussions with leaders in the region including Taiwanese leaders is I think the war has shown what the defense of Freedom can look like I worry sometimes that the uh people of Taiwan are taking the wrong message from it and they shouldn't they should not take this message just because the United States is not militarily intervened in Taiwan and again I think President Biden on this issue has balanced it correctly meaning we are strongly supporting the ukrainians in defense of their home country without committing U.S troops and I think that's the proper approach but Taiwan and certainly the CCP should not read that that if there was a Taiwan straight contingency that our policy would be the same and I think some as I've heard on Taiwan that they've read it that way and they shouldn't whether or not we come to the aid militarily with U.S forces in the event of a military Invasion by the CCP is not going to be determined by what we did in Ukraine so that's one area in my view what's happened in Hong Kong has rattled the people of Taiwan as much as what's happened in Ukraine and I think that that's a really important um a really important uh example of what could happen what the Taiwanese are looking at could be their future there was an article just today in the Wall Street Journal about the people of Hong Kong how they are their freedom has been crushed a woman who put out a Facebook post two years ago has now been arrested by the Chinese Communist Party in the Hong Kong dictatorial authorities so um I think there's a lot of lessons learned but to me the most important one that I hope the dictators of the world are taking is that when you come in and think that you can walk over a neighbor of yours not because that neighbor threatens you from a national security perspective Ukraine did not threaten Russia from a national security perspective Taiwan does not threaten China from a national security perspective the reason they're they feel threatened is because of what these countries represent they represent neighbors who have chosen the path however difficult it might be of a Democratic future and that scares the heck out of Putin and Xi Jinping what I always like to say is one of the greatest weaknesses those two dictators have is they fear their own people they fear their own people and we need to exploit that in the years and decades to come thanks um you know I understand as you framed in your opening remarks that this is about getting the American people to understand the importance of this issue this is just a factoid for you but you know we we do a polling here at csis of the region and as you can imagine the region you know there's a split between those who think about you know the United States role in the region versus those who look at China's rise I mean you'll get different answers from Japan versus Malaysia for example but on the question of Taiwan it was uniform every country pulled the same way which was if if the if the United States were to lose Taiwan by military force the view of U.S confidence in the United States as a global power and in the region would just be gone right and so um uh so this is very important not just for the people of Taiwan but also for U.S power and preeminence in the world um let me ask you if I could about your trip to Japan and Korea I know that um it was a quick trip and quick you look well aware even without even with the jet lag I mean that's that's pretty amazing well I go home most weekends to Alaska so you're used to it's pretty yeah it's pretty I like to remind people Anchorage is closer to Tokyo than it is the Washington DC so um that's my hometown so we're I kind of go to Asia every weekend right you're logging on you're logging a lot of miles um um uh but love to hear your takeaways from uh from what's going on in Seoul in Tokyo yeah on this issue but broadly well look I I mean it was a very positive trip and the trends are and I had the opportunity to meet with uh you know the leadership in terms of National Security supervisor foreign minister all the top officials when I was in Korea at the end of last year I was honored to meet with President Yoon who I think is doing a remarkable job um in his speech to the Joint session of Congress just a couple weeks ago was just incredible hopefully you all saw that gave it in English which is not an easy thing to do um did fantastic a couple takeaways that I think um you know that my sense the alliance between the United States bilateral and Korea and Japan is very strong as you know this year we're celebrating the 7th 70th anniversary of the U.S Korean Alliance and the polling that you see of the populations in those two countries is really strong almost hitting historic levels of their support for the U.S alliance between the United States and Korea and the United States in Japan in Korea the numbers are I think the embassy told me in the high 70s or low 80s and at the same time the view of the Chinese Communist party has plummeted plummeted low 20s High Teens the politician when you're talking 80 to 20. it's pretty remarkable and especially among the young people so that's a really good Trend in both countries so that Dynamic is going well two other takeaways that I think are really important uh the leadership in Korea particularly under President Yoon in my view has undertaken something that is very courageous and at the same time very difficult and that is their desire to want to really improve on the trilateral relationship Korea Japan the United States that is absolutely critical when you look at the issues in the region and the importance and the strength that our three countries can bring to the challenges whether it's Taiwan Strait whether it's Chinese economic coercion but having the United States Korea and Japan working more closely together on all these issues is fundamental one of our great strategic advantages as you all know is America is an ally Rich Nation China Russia North Korea their Ally poor not many people wanting to go join the Chinese Communist Party team but the more aggressive they are in the region the more people want to come back to their trust we're not a perfect country by any means but there's a trust level built over decades between the United States and so many countries in that region and if we can um cement in a stronger way the relationship between Korea and Japan which of course has very difficult and um you know still uh uh difficult history between those two countries um that is only going to strengthen the region and we've seen that I saw that both with Korea's leadership certainly led by President Yoon but also Japan's leadership the countries their leaders have met recently um in in Tokyo in Seoul there's going to be trilateral National Security advisor level meetings here in the next week or so where Jake Sullivan's going out to the region and President Biden has invited both leaders to come to Washington here I hope in a few months that is all really positive one final area that I pitched and I think it's an enormous strategic Advantage for us that we don't talk about enough is trilateral engagement not just on Mill to Mill issues not just on trade issues but on energy issues on energy issues the United States is an energy superpower all of the above energy Renewables oil gas and a lot of our allies in the region need that and need our assistance particularly the Japanese who are very focused and Koreans but more the Japanese on getting off Russian oil and gas Alaska has a huge LNG project that we've been working on for many years that could Supply our allies in the region in addition to alaskans clean burning natural gas for decades that is a strategic Advantage for us and our allies that Xi Jinping fears that Putin fears and we need to do much more on bringing that level of energy cooperation across the board through a trilateral through the quad and to me that is a message I was pitching in the region on my last trip not just Alaska but other elements of American Energy and it was I would say very much a welcome message so I'm hopeful that on these next rounds of trilateral discussions the administration the Japanese the Koreans will strongly move forward on the Strategic advantage that we have with regard to energy and bring the Taiwanese and that in the Philippines and asean countries into that mix as well that's actually very interesting because I'm as you say for both Korea and Japan holy energy dependent totally external sources and they're usually not from places you want them to be dependent exactly they're over relying on the Middle East by far you know and you know from an Alaska perspective now I'm being a little parochial but historically the uh Alaska was the first place to export LNG anywhere in the world we started exporting LNG to Japan in the late 1960s 50 years of uninterrupted American exports to Japan the most trusted supplier of energy never missed the cargo shipment as I mentioned to the Japanese you know 10 percent of their LNG is still from Russia and they're looking possibly at doubling down on what's called Arctic lng2 they're investors in that that's a Russian project my view to the Japanese senior leaders was hey don't fund the Russian war machine for 20 more years buying LNG buy it from your most reliable partner you know the other problem with getting it from Russia Putin wakes up one morning and he's mad at you boom he'll cut off that energy like that Alaska was a supplier of LNG to Japan for a half century and we never miss one cargo shipment most reliable supplier of LNG of any place in the world come back to us come back to your roots we got 50 years of uninterrupted supplies like a pipeline it's seven day cargo shipment from Alaska to Tokyo no strategic choke points it's literally like a pipeline if you need energy reliable which your country needs so does Korea get it from your allies not from the Russians certainly and not from very unstable regions like the Middle East and Qatar so um I think it's a message that made strategic sense it's a win-win for our countries and it was a message I was a strongly proposing and to be honest with the strong support of our ambassador in Korea Ambassador Goldberg and our ambassador in Tokyo Ambassador Emanuel both of whom are doing a really good job a very important point in terms of building resiliencies in our alliance relationships it's not just about it's not just about the military not just about military not just about trade energy is a great and Renewables and um you know critical minerals the United States has so much of this and what we've done over the last decades is we outsourced it certainly to China on critical minerals and we enabled our allies to Outsource all of their energy needs to Russia huge mistake huge mistake we can fix it we have the resources in this country to help our allies for decades to get off the Reliance and we're not going to be the ones who cut off energy supplies or critical minerals look at what the Chinese did to the Japanese on rare earth when they got mad come back to your ally the United States for these really important needs yeah especially you know in the last decade we're in this new era of like countries weaponizing trade and energy yes it's really it's really something yeah we don't do that yeah we don't do that um really thank you so much for taking the time to be with us this morning especially after just getting off the airplane from the region uh ladies and Gentlemen please thank you thanks again everybody thank you [Music]

Channel: Center for Strategic & International Studies

Views: 80,508

Keywords: Center for Strategic and International Studies, CSIS, bipartisan, policy, foreign relations, national security, think tank, politics, #KoreaChair, #Event, #2C

Id: EiW1fn_GRX0

Length: 55min 30sec (3330 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 08 2023