Tensions between the US and China are heating up as a top Chinese general has again accused the US of trying to form an “Asia-Pacific NATO.”
At the Shangri-La Dialogue talk shop held last weekend in Singapore, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin defended the US strategy, emphasizing cooperation with Indo-Pacific allies like Japan and Australia to boost regional security.
This friction underscores the growing divide, with China criticizing the US for promoting division while the US argues it’s responding to China’s aggressive actions, including harassment of the Philippines in the South China Sea and ramped-up military maneuvers around Taiwan.
This development is part of a broader US strategy to bolster regional security through “minilateral” partnerships, such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, AUKUS and several budding trilateral agreements. Australia, Japan, the Philippines and US defense chiefs met in May, giving rise to talk of a new “Squad” partnership.
While these initiatives have sparked discussions about the possibility of forming an Indo-Pacific NATO, the complexities and historical challenges suggest that pursuing an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization won’t likely happen anytime soon.
Failed collective efforts
During the early Cold War, several efforts to create a collective security agreement in the Pacific similar to NATO failed. Since the end of World War II, there have been three serious attempts to form an Indo-Pacific NATO, namely the Pacific Pact, Pacific Ocean Pact and Southeast Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO).
The first attempt was made by South Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines in 1949. Abandonment fears were rife in Seoul, Taipei and Manila as aid to Taiwan slowed and US troops left the Korean Peninsula. Washington rejected the pact primarily due to its concerns about being entrapped by Taiwan and South Korea.
The next try came soon after the Korean War broke out, though it was an American proposal at that time. President Harry Truman brought in John Foster Dulles to build a Pacific Ocean Pact. However, Canberra, Wellington, Tokyo and Manila all expressed hostility to the new effort. Washington quickly pivoted and negotiated a series of bilateral defense treaties, creating the hub and spokes system.
The closest the Pacific has come to a NATO-esque organization was SEATO, another creation of John Foster Dulles, the Secretary of State from 1953 to 1959. SEATO only included two Southeast Asian nations, Thailand and the Philippines, and the organization faced impediments from the beginning.
In particular, it lacked a credible NATO-like Article 5 collective security guarantee and a standing military command structure. Ultimately, SEATO was the wrong tool for the communist threat they faced at the time.
Each new iteration of a Pacific NATO failed for unique reasons but the underlying causes remained consistent. The Pacific partners were dispersed over hundreds of miles with varied histories, cultures, political institutions and threats.
While Pacific nations feared Chinese, Soviet and North Korean aggression, American military might was then dominant, negating the need for collective defense. Despite wanting some form of collective defense, policymakers failed to resolve the underlying issues, resulting in successive failures.
Now, commentators are once again speculating about the formation of an Indo-Pacific NATO, or an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization. It makes sense that some would want to pool together resources and establish a collective defense organization.
Although China’s aggression and North Korean instigations have brought American partners closer together, the creation of an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization is still hindered by considerable barriers.
Those include conflicting foreign policy approaches. Since the Cold War, India has proudly pioneered a non-alignment strategy. Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar has specifically said that India will not officially align with the US in a formal Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization bloc.
South Korea also has an unsuitable strategy approach for a collective security organization. Seoul’s national security apparatus is almost entirely geared toward deterring and winning a war against North Korea.
President Yoon Suk Yeol has prioritized strengthening US relations. However, South Korea continues to prioritize committing resources against the North Korean threat and would likely be hesitant to divert them to support a regional collective defense organization.
Australia is also looking to expand cooperation with the US but would be hesitant to over-commit resources to a collective Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization. While Australian strategy notes that it has an interest in deterring North Korean aggression, it is unclear if Canberra would be willing to commit to defending South Korea from a North Korean invasion.
Australia’s embrace of AUKUS and participation in other regional security initiatives indicates that Canberra is willing to be more active in deterring threats but significantly AUKUS is not a warfighting agreement.
India, South Korea and Australia are undoubtedly moving closer to the US, mainly due to Chinese provocations. However, that shift does not mean that they will be willing to commit to a NATO-like structure.
The second barrier to creating an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization is the deep economic integration Indo-Pacific partners have with China. By the 1980s, European nations only conducted 4% of their trade with the Soviet Union. The economic cost of balancing against the Soviet Union was thus low.
China, on the other hand, is now the largest trading partner for most of the potential treaty organization members, including South Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. And Beijing has consistently shown a willingness to use economic coercion to affect its neighbors’ policies.
In 2017, China drastically limited Korean goods and services when South Korea agreed to host a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) antimissile battery from the US. In 2020, after Australian officials called for an investigation into China’s role in the original spread of Covid-19, Beijing retaliated with stiff tariffs on certain Australian exports.
Beijing is clearly anxious about neighboring countries coalescing against it in a collective defense arrangement and any official movement toward an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization will likely result in Chinese economic retaliation.
Domestic attitudes are also an impediment to forming an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization. If an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization were to form, one of the most urgent scenarios to prepare for would be a conflict over Taiwan. Even if Taiwan were not an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization member, partner states would likely get dragged in to a China fight.
But polling consistently shows that Indo-Pacific populations are against going to war with China over Taiwan. If China invaded Taiwan, 34% of South Koreans would support military assistance, 11% of Japanese would support its Self Defense Forces using force with the US and 56% of Australians say their country should remain neutral.
To be sure, domestic attitudes can shift with events. A Chinese missile attack on Taipei might shift national opinions about their nation’s involvement in an armed conflict with China.
However, prevailing domestic attitudes across most of the region are not conducive to forming an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization. Concerns about getting entangled in a war over Taiwan will prevent political leadership from pursuing a NATO-like structure.
Collective action, not collective defense
While an Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization may not coalesce anytime soon, Washington and its partners should still focus on expanding, maturing and institutionalizing new minilateral security networks. Rather than pursuing collective defense, policymakers should embrace collective action.
Leader summits are essential because they signal to bureaucracies that the defense arrangements are a priority for the respective administrations and give leaders an opportunity to explain why these alignments are important to national interests.
It has been a year since Quad leaders met for a summit and one is still not scheduled. Moreover, a large majority of South Koreans support building their own nuclear arsenal, largely due to a lack of trust in Washington’s extended deterrence.
Biden, Kishida, and Yoon must meet again in August to demonstrate solidarity but also to find ways to reassure the South Korean public of American commitments.
To support the mission, the White House should prioritize hiring now Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell’s replacement to fill the role of Indo-Pacific Coordinator at the National Security Council.
A senior inter-agency official coordinating US policy directly with allies and partners is critical to energizing trilateral progress. Leaders must maintain the momentum they have fought for these past years despite it being an election year in multiple partner countries.
Additionally, policymakers should focus on legislating the infrastructure needed to support collective action in the Indo-Pacific. Shipbuilding is the perfect model. AUKUS is an ambitious plan but it fails if the US does not have sufficient shipbuilding infrastructure.
Congress passing the presidential supplemental, which allocated $3.3 billion to US shipbuilding, helps ensure that AUKUS collective action survives.
Washington should take the same approach with Tomahawk missiles. The long-range cruise missiles are a critical tool in the American arsenal and increasingly crucial for partners like Japan, Australia and the United Kingdom.
Procurement of the guided munition has stagnated significantly over the years, leaving a dilapidated manufacturing process and only around 4,000 missiles. War games show that the United States would run out of long-range missiles in less than a week if war broke out with China.
Washington should thus invest funds specific to addressing munition infrastructure to boost manufacturing of arms critical for a potential Indo-Pacific conflict.
While the formation of an Indo-Pacific NATO is still unlikely due to various strategic, geopolitical and economic barriers, the focus should remain on strengthening and institutionalizing existing minilateral alliances.
By fostering collective action through sustained high-level engagement and strategic investments, the Indo-Pacific region can achieve enhanced security and stability without the need for a formal treaty organization.
Connor Fiddler is the Associate Deputy Director for the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He is the author of the Hub-and-Spokes on Substack, analyzing US military cooperation with Asian allies. Connor is also a Rising Expert with the Young Professionals in Foreign Policy and a Young Leader with the Pacific Forum. Follow him on X at @Connor_Fiddler.