China-US tensions: new American defence chief calls on Japan and South Korea to team up in Indo-Pacific

Soon after being sworn in, US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin calls for Asian allies to strengthen military ties

American maritime manoeuvres in the South China Sea continue despite change of administration in the US

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New US defence secretary Lloyd Austin has pledged to focus strategically on China and Asia. Photo: Getty Images/TNS

Published: 2:22pm, 25 Jan 2021Updated: 11:47pm, 25 Jan 2021

Newly appointed US defence secretary Lloyd Austin has called on key Asian allies to work with the United States in the Indo-Pacific, part of efforts to boost defence ties in the region as its intense rivalry with China looks likely to continue.

Austin, who was sworn in on Friday, did not name China but said the US opposed “any unilateral attempts to change the status quo in the East China Sea” and reaffirmed to his Japanese counterpart Nobuo Kishi that the US military would respond to any attack on the Senkaku Islands under the US-Japan security treaty. The Senkakus are uninhabited islets in the East China Sea controlled by Japan but claimed by China and known as the Diaoyu Islands in Chinese.

It was the first high-level phone call between Japan and America since US President Joe Biden took office and Austin urged Kishi to “strengthen Japan’s contribution to the role the alliance continues to play in providing security in the Indo-Pacific region”, the Pentagon said on Saturday.

In a call on Sunday, Austin told South Korean counterpart Suh Wook that close cooperation between the two allies was important, and the two sides “affirmed the importance of maintaining the rules-based international order, and agreed to enhance cooperation on shared threats”, the Pentagon said.

The two calls followed a phone conversation between new US national security adviser Jake Sullivan and his South Korean counterpart Suh Hoon on Friday, when Sullivan said the South Korea-US alliance was a “linchpin” of peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region.

The exchanges with America’s most important allies in Asia come as the Biden administration, in response to China’s geopolitical posturing, is moving to renew the US alliance network, which was hurt by former US president Donald Trump’s “America first” policy.

While Austin is believed to lack experience in the Indo-Pacific, he has pledged to focus strategically on China and Asia. In his confirmation hearing last week he said mending alliances and focusing strategically on China would be high on his agenda. The retired four-star army general and former commander of the US military effort in Iraq is the first African-American to serve as defence secretary.