Views from Down Underer

Episode 5: US-Korea-Japan leaders’ meeting, BRICS South Africa summit, Middle Power in Global Politics

US President Joe Biden hosted ROK President Yoon and Japan PM Kishida in Camp David for a trilateral summit meeting that seeks to deepen its security partnership to strengthen trilateral deterrence and contribute to long-term balance of power in East Asia and in the Indo-Pacific.  BRICS summit in South Africa added six new members to this economic forum of the non-G7 countries.  Are these evidence of greater agency of middle powers in the context of the US-China strategic competition? Why are the middle powers taking the initiative?  Can the middle powers be considered as another pole between the two poles of US and China?

Episode 4: China-Philippine tension in the South China Sea and Trump’s third indictment

The Philippines accused China's coast guard of firing water cannon at a Philippine ship supplying one of its 'outpost' in the South China Sea.  What is the background of this tension?  Is this a tit-for-tat action by China against the current Marcos' administration move away from the China-friendly foreign policy of the Duterte administration?  Former US President Trump was indicted on his role in the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.  What are the implications of the 'mess' in domestic US politics to the Indo-Pacific region?  How will Indo-Pacific countries react according to what they see happening in the US?

Episode 3: Qin Gang canned; Blinken, Albanese, Macron and the summer South Pacific tour: What’s the buzz...tell me what’s a-happening?

Up north, Qin Gang has gone from a missing Foreign Affairs Minister of the PRC to a missing ex-Foreign Affairs Minister.  Down south, leaders and top diplomats of the West are here on a charm offensive all singing that famous Backstreet Boys line: "Don't care who you are, where you're from...as long as you love me."

Episode 2: New Zealand’s ’independent foreign policy:’ Walking cool but can it walk the line and face the ties that bind?

New Zealand PM Chris Hipkins delivered three foreign policy speeches in a short span of 10 days -- from July 7 to July 17.  Like any small state, NZ is caught in between the intensification of the US-China strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific region.  As a Five Eyes member and IP4 partner of NATO, NZ is trying to balance its relations between the two great powers of US and the PRC.  Did the PM's speech work? Is NZ's independent foreign policy a case of a foreign policy that has not been tested in the post Cold War era? 

Episode 1: NATO and Ukraine, NATO in Asia-Pacific, Betting on India

This episode is on NATO's recent summit discussing Ukraine membership and its likely role in the Asia-Pacific.  How do we make sense of what happened in Vilnius and the implications to the Asia-Pacific region?  With talk of diversification of supply chain and de-risking, India has become the 'favourite' to take the title of factory of the world from China.  Yet, Foxconn pulling out of a $19 billion semiconductor manufacturing in India may signal that the bet is at best a long-shot?