OPINION:
As Americans watch in horror at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s murderous invasion of Ukraine and recall America’s disastrous rout from Afghanistan, an urgent question is being asked: Is the Biden administration’s foreign policy team up to the task of defending America’s national security interests in the Asia Pacific, specifically the defense of Taiwan?
The answer rests upon understanding who is on President Biden’s team and their previous record of actions and results. Former President Barack Obama has noted that 90% of Biden’s team came from his administration. Mr. Obama boasted Mr. Biden is “finishing the job” he started during his two terms in office.
It is worth examining the Obama administration’s foreign policy team and some of the highly destructive decisions they made regarding the Asia-Pacific region.
April 2022 marks the 10th anniversary of what is arguably America’s greatest foreign policy disaster in Asia since the fall of Saigon in 1975. Yet few today understand America’s retreat from the South China Sea at Scarborough Shoal from April to June 2012.
This history matters because the same national security “experts” that oversaw the Scarborough Shoal fiasco are staffing the upper echelons of the Biden administration now, including national security adviser Jake Sullivan, NSC “Asia Czar” Kurt Campbell and others of lesser stature, such as Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby. This group has an established track record of weakness and appeasement in many crises. They appear to be failing regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the People’s Republic of China’s threats to take Taiwan, the Senkaku Islands and parts of India by military force.
In April 2012, PRC commercial ships were caught inside Scarborough Shoal, within the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone, stealing Philippine giant clams and coral. The illegal actions by these PRC ships instigated a standoff that ultimately forced the Philippine Coast Guard and fishermen away from their ancestral fishing grounds. The U.S. State Department, led by then-Assistant Secretary Kurt Campbell, abetted the PRC’s theft by negotiating a flawed mutual withdrawal of PLA Navy and Philippine naval assets from Scarborough in June 2012.
The Philippine vessels withdrew, but the PRC immediately reneged on the agreement. It refused to remove its vessels, giving the PRC sovereign domain over territory that it enjoys to this day — territory belonging to a key U.S. treaty ally. Mr. Campbell, Mr. Sullivan and other seniors within Obama administration ignored pleas by the president of the Philippines for the U.S. to force the PRC to comply. Nothing is more sensitive to a mutual defense treaty than the defense of territory, and everybody in East Asia immediately understood America’s betrayal.
The most obvious failure of these so-called “experts” in defending America’s national interests was the construction of the “New Spratly Islands,” seven artificial islands in the southern portion of the SCS, three being the size and capacity of the Pearl Harbor naval base. Despite repeated warnings about this ongoing NSI construction, the “experts” failed to act to blunt Beijing’s illegal, militarily threatening territorial expansionism.
This ineptitude is even more indefensible because Beijing arrogantly proceeded with its unprecedented, massive construction in the face of an impending decision by the United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration on its claim to most of the SCS. On July 12, 2016, the court ruled China’s claim illegal. Yet the Obama-Biden national security team did little more than acknowledge the building of the islands and conduct routine naval transits through the SCS far from these new islands. PLAN warships now challenge every foreign naval warship entering the SCS and demand they request Beijing’s permission before entering.
The devastating long-term impact of this U.S. policy failure is the PRC’s de facto possession of the SCS, flouting international law and disrupting 80 years of peace and stability.
Combined with the ignoble retreat from Kabul and the failure to deter Russian aggression and adequately help defend Ukraine, this pattern of appeasement and failure has led Beijing to believe the U.S. is unable and/or unwilling to defend Taiwan. Chinese President Xi Jinping repeatedly threatens to invade democratic Taiwan and has built the military capability to do so.
The PLA’s invasion plan is on a timeline that supports Mr. Xi’s “Great Rejuvenation,” which includes the goal of the physical restoration of China. The invasion count-down clock is rapidly ticking: We are now in the “Decade of Concern/Danger” (2020-2030). Those leading Biden’s team assured us that China takes the long view and would take Taiwan through peaceful means and not kinetic combat operations. The fatuousness of this view is now incontrovertible.
What can be done to reverse the CCP’s ambitions?
First and foremost, the Biden administration must designate the PRC as a strategic adversary and an existential threat to U.S. national security and the free world.
Second, the president must replace his current national security team. Mr. Campbell and Mr. Sullivan must be among the first to leave: Mr. Campbell is merely a figurehead as the “Asia czar” and has failed to confront the paramount threat to our nation, and Mr. Sullivan’s record of weakness and abysmal analytical skill is equally unforgivable.
Third, the U.S., in conjunction with our allies and partners, must equip Taiwan with the weapons that will both deter PRC aggression and, if Mr. Xi invades, force Beijing to undertake a protracted, costly counterinsurgency.
Fourth, the U.S. must take a whole-of-government approach to confront and deter the PRC across the region. For example, a massive naval and air buildup must be undertaken immediately.
Fifth, the U.S. must counter the PRC’s vast Political Warfare campaign it is waging to destroy us and other democracies. One step must be to terminate the fatally flawed “strategic ambiguity” policy toward Taiwan.
Sixth, the U.S. military must begin to operate with our allies as real equals. We must open up tactical and operational data sharing, collaborative intelligence, and surveillance and reconnaissance channels to provide adequate indications and warning.
The Biden administration’s national security team had the chance to prove they learned the lessons of the failures of the Obama administration in confronting an expansionist, totalitarian regime in Russia and China. Sadly, they are failing to do so.
Time is not on our side. Accordingly, Mr. Biden must explicitly define the PRC’s existential threat and replace his current national security team with realists who can effectively confront and defeat this threat with real actions today.
• Retired Navy Capt. James Fanell is the former director of intelligence and information operations for the U.S. Pacific Fleet up until his retirement in 2015.
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