WASHINGTON, Oct 11: The future of world politics will be decided in the Asia-Pacific region, not Afghanistan or Iraq, and the United States will be right at the centre of the action, says US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in an article she has written for the November issue of the prestigious Foreign Policy magazine.
In the 5,500-word article, Secretary Clinton reviews the challenges that the United States is likely to face in the near future and concludes that real changes are taking place in the Asia-Pacific region, not in the Pak-Afghan region.She also places India in the Asia-Pacific region, pointing out that the US “is making a strategic bet on India's future”.
“As the war in Iraq winds down and America begins to withdraw its forces from Afghanistan, the United States stands at a pivot point,” she writes.
“Over the last 10 years, we have allocated immense resources to those two theatres. In the next 10 years, we need to be smart and systematic about where we invest time and energy.”
One of the most important tasks of American statecraft over the next decade, she argues, will be to “lock in a substantially increased investment — diplomatic, economic, strategic, and otherwise — in the Asia-Pacific region”.
She notes that the Asia-Pacific has become a key driver of global politics, includes many of the key engines of the global economy, and is home to several of key US allies and important emerging powers like China, India, and Indonesia.
“The time has come for the United States to make similar investments” in this region as it did in Europe after the World War II, she argues. “Harnessing Asia's growth and dynamism is central to American economic and strategic interests” as the region provides the United States with “unprecedented opportunities for investment, trade, and access to cutting-edge technology”.
The rapid transformations taking place in the region, she writes, underscores “how much the future of the United States is intimately intertwined with the future of the Asia-Pacific”.
She proposes a six-point strategy for staying engaged with the region, which includes maintaining political consensus and helping protect defence capabilities and communications infrastructure of US allies, particularly from non-state actors.
Describing China as one of the most prominent emerging partners in the region, she notes that the US has stayed engaged with China on all key issues, including the war in Afghanistan and on the situation in Pakistan. “The fact is that a thriving America is good for China and a thriving China is good for America. We both have much more to gain from cooperation than from conflict,” she argues. The US, she says, is also committed to working with China to address critical regional and global security issues.
Stressing the need for both the US and China to remain honest about their differences, Secretary Clinton writes: “At the end of the day, there is no handbook for the evolving US-China relationship. But the stakes are much too high for us to fail.”
India, she argues, is another key emerging power with which the US will work closely as the relationship between India and America will be one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century, rooted in common values and interests.
“There are still obstacles to overcome and questions to answer on both sides, but the United States is making a strategic bet on India's future — that India's greater role on the world stage will enhance peace and security,” she adds. Opening India's markets to the world will pave the way to greater regional and global prosperity.
Indian advances in science and technology, she notes, will improve lives and advance human knowledge everywhere, and India's “vibrant, pluralistic democracy will produce measurable results and improvements” for its citizens and inspire others to follow a similar path of openness and tolerance.
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