IndoPacific

President Donald Trump holds a press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., this past February. On Friday, ministers from the United States, Japan and South Korea met to discuss keeping the Indo-Pacific region safe and stable. File photo by Anna Rose Layden/UPI | License Photo

July 18 (UPI) — U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau discussed security and commerce when he met with Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Funakoshi Takehiro and South Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Park Yoonjoo in Osaka, Japan, on Friday.

The goal of the meeting was to advance the countries’ trilateral partnership, which is “critical for the safety, security, and prosperity of our three countries,” State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a press release.

The three “emphasized their commitment to maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific and discussed efforts to ensure peace and stability in the region,” Bruce said.

The security of the region is always tense, thanks to North Korea and its alliances with China and Russia.

On Thursday, a United Nations report showed evidence that North Korea many times shipped arms and material to Russia, which trained North Korean troops for combat against Ukrainian forces, Seth Bailey, the U.S. State Department’s director for Korean and Mongolian Affairs, told U.N. members.

At the Osaka meeting, the three reaffirmed their resolute commitment to the complete denuclearization of North Korea and expressed serious concerns about its increasing military cooperation with Russia. They discussed the importance of strengthening deterrence and resilience against regional security threats, Bruce said.

One of those threats came last weekend, when Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov visited North Korea and expressed support for the hermit country.

“No one is considering using force against North Korea despite the military buildup around the country by the United States, South Korea and Japan,” Lavrov said of the joint military exercise that took place in South Korea the day before.

“We respect North Korea’s aspirations and understand the reasons why it is pursuing a nuclear development,” he said.

Landau, Funakoshi and Park reiterated their commitment to strengthening supply chains and collaborating on emerging technologies to boost their economic cooperation, Bruce added.

They agreed Japanese and Korean participation in the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference in June sent a strong signal about the importance of energy security underpinned by unleashing American liquified natural gas.

The U.S.-Japan bond was shaken last week, though, when President Donald Trump said he planned to impose a 25% tariff on Japan starting in August. Though hurt by the statement, Japan said it will continue to negotiate with the president.

“The real climax and critical moment are the three weeks until Aug. 1,” Japan’s Minister of Economic Revitalization Ryosei Akazawa said. “We would like to support the government’s negotiations more firmly than ever before.”

The United States has a $57 billion trade deficit with Japan with $84.95 billion exports from the United States and $141.52 billion imports in 2024, according to the United Nations COMTRADE database.

June 1 (UPI) — China criticized the United States on Sunday for having a “Cold War mentality” after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth described Beijing as a threat the Indo-Pacific region in a speech Saturday.

“Hegseth deliberately ignored the call for peace and development by countries in the region, and instead touted the Cold War mentality for bloc confrontation, vilified China with defamatory allegations, and falsely called China a ‘threat,'” a spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

“The remarks were filled with provocations and intended to sow discord. China deplores and firmly opposes them and has protested strongly to the U.S.”

Hegseth had delivered his remarks during the International Institute for Strategic Studies Shangri-La Dialogue event in Singapore. He said the Indo-Pacific region is the United States’ “priority theater” and won’t allow China to push it and its allies out of the region.

China retorted Sunday that “no country in the world deserves to be called a hegemonic power other than the U.S. itself.”

“To perpetuate its hegemony and advance the so-called ‘Indo-Pacific strategy,’ the U.S. has deployed offensive weaponry in the South China Sea and kept stoking flames and creating tensions in the Asia-Pacific, which are turning the region into a powder keg and making countries in the region deeply concerned,” the Foreign Ministry spokesperson said.

Hegseth had also said that China was “preparing to use military force” to alter the balance of power in the region and said that the United States and its allies must be prepared for armed conflict, citing “great progress” in the region toward “achieving peace through strength.”

“If deterrence fails — and if called upon by [the] commander in chief — we are prepared to do what the Department of Defense does best: to fight and win, decisively,” Hegseth said.

Mainland China and the island of Taiwan, among other islands, were ruled by the Republic of China before the ROC lost the Chinese Civil War in the early 20th century to the Chinese Communist Party, which established the new government of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949.

The ROC in turn established a temporary capital in Taipei on the island of Taiwan, a former Japanese territory, in December 1949 that served as the seat for China at the United Nations until it was replaced by the People’s Republic of China in 1971 when foreign countries switched their diplomatic relations.

China views self-governed Taiwan and its 23 million residents as a wayward province and has vowed to retake it by force, if necessary. Many supporters of Taiwan have since argued that it is already an independent sovereign state separate from mainland China, which has never controlled Taiwan.

Tensions between the United States and China started to grow during the administration of President Joe Biden in 2022 when then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan, sparking a military response from the Chinese government and increased drills in the Taiwan Strait. In 2022, a four-star general predicted that the U.S. and China could be at war by the end of this year.

After returning for his second term, President Donald Trump‘s administration has escalated tensions with China, particularly related to trade tariffs that appear now to be expanding into broader military and diplomatic arenas.

For example, the Pentagon has increased naval patrols in contested areas of the South China Sea and bolstered military partnerships with allies including Japan, Australia, and the Philippines.

“The Taiwan question is entirely China’s internal affair. No country is in a position to interfere. The U.S. should never imagine it could use the Taiwan question as leverage against China,” the Foreign Ministry spokesperson said. “The U.S. must never play with fire on this question.”

May 31 (UPI) — The United States and its allies won’t allow China to dominate the Indo-Pacific region, but do not seek war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Saturday morning in Singapore.

He addressed regional concerns while speaking during the International Institute for Strategic Studies Shangri-La Dialogue event in Singapore.

Hegseth said the Indo-Pacific region is the United States’ “priority theater” and won’t allow China to push the United States and its allies out of the region, the Department of Defense announced Friday in a news release.

Instead, deterrence will be the primary tool by which the United States and its allies will counter any aggressive moves made by China, particularly in the South China Sea and against Taiwan.

“As our allies share the burden, we can increase our focus on the Indo-Pacific,” Hegseth said, adding that the region is the nation’s “priority theater.”

He said the futures of the United States and its allies in the Indo-Pacific depend on each other.

“We share a vision of peace and stability, of prosperity and security,” Hegseth said, “and we are here to stay.”

Common sense and national interests with guide policy making in the region, while respecting mutual self-interests.

President Donald Trump is working to get European nations to do more to increase their respective national security interests instead of largely relying on the United States.

As European nations do more to protect themselves, Hegseth said the United States will be better able to focus on matters in the Indo-Pacific region and do more to thwart Chinese aggression.

“This enables all of us to benefit from the peace and stability that comes with a lasting and strong American presence here in the Indo-Pacific,” Hegseth said.

That presence won’t come at a cost for the nation’s allies, though.

“We are not here to pressure other countries to embrace and adopt our politics or ideology,” Hegseth told the audience. “We are all sovereign nations.”

He said the United States does not “seek conflict with communist China.”

But the United States “will not be pushed out of this critical region,” Hegseth added. “And we will not let our allies and partners be subordinated and intimidated.”

He said China’s leaders are “preparing to use military force to alter the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific,” including occupying Taiwan.

Any move by China to take over Taiwan, which China has claimed as part of its sovereign state, would trigger “devastating consequences” for the region and the world, Hegseth told the audience.

“The threat China poses is real, and it could be imminent,” he said, adding that the United States and its allies must be prepared with “urgency and vigilance.”

If deterrence doesn’t work and a fighting war is inevitable, “we are prepared to do what the Department of Defense does best: to fight and win decisively,” Hegseth said.

The best way to ensure peace is to prepare for war, “but we have to do this quickly,” he said. “We have no time to waste.”