Countering China: Japan, America, and Australia Build $95M Pacific Cable – The American

On June 6, Tokyo announced it will join Australia and the United States in building a $95 million undersea cable to counter China, according to ABC News. This development follows a string of American actions extending influence in the Pacific — a region where China has also been expanding its soft power.

When construction is completed in 2025, the island nations of Tarawa, Kosrae, and Nauru will join the existing Micronesian cable system via a connection on Pohnpei. (READ MORE: US Returns to the Philippines to Fend Off China)

Chinese Actions Causing Concerns

Farther to the west, the island of Palau saw a Chinese ship conducting “questionable maneuvers” over a fiber optic cable a week before Tokyo’s announcement, reports Radio Free Asia. When the vessel sailed over the cable, “[i]t slowed to about 1-2 knots” and entered the nation’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) without notifying Palauan authorities. 

Since 2018, Chinese ships have conducted several other incursions into the Palauan EEZ. An American ally, the small nation is one of only four Pacific states to recognize Taipei, not Beijing, as the legitimate ruler of China. That number had been larger until 2019 when, the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) reports, Kiribati and the Solomon Islands granting recognition to the CCP.

The Solomon Islands strengthened its relationship with Beijing in 2022 when it signed a security agreement with China, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. A year later, the State Department announced a Defense Cooperation Agreement with the Solomon Island’s western neighbor Papua New Guinea. The agreement focuses on fighting “a range of maritime threats including illegal … fishing, drug trafficking, migrant smuggling, and illicit transport of weapons of mass destruction” in order to “increase stability and security in the region.”  

New Embassies, New Sovereignty, New Strategy

Defense agreements have been only one part of the geopolitical struggle in the Pacific, as both Beijing and Washington have sent new diplomatic missions to the region. Since February 2022, American embassies have opened in the Solomon Islands, the Maldives, Tonga, and Kiribati, and, in March of this year, the State Department announced its intent to open one in Vanuatu. These American embassies follow the June 2020 opening of a Chinese diplomatic mission in Kiribati after the island chose to recognize the PRC over Taiwan, reports CNN. 

Though not receiving embassies, the nations of Niue and the Cook Islands have also been courted by the two Pacific powers. Last September, Washington extended formal recognitions of sovereignty to both countries. As part of a free association agreement with New Zealand, the two nations had previously been considered fully under Wellington’s jurisdiction, the BBC reports.  According to Radio New Zealand, China courted both countries in 2018 when they were brought into the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). (READ MORE: China Grows Its Influence in the Pacific)

In competition with BRI, the Biden administration’s Indo-Pacific Strategy is pumping over $900 billion into the region.  As part of that strategy, Washington has helped island nations prepare against natural disasters and cyber attacks; the Coast Guard has been sent to build indigenous capacity; and Peace Corps volunteers are now in Tonga, Fiji, Samoa, and Vanuatu.

Concerns From China

According to AP News, Chinese Foreign Affairs spokesperson Wang Wenbin expressed concern over U.S. involvement in the Pacific last May.  “China has no objection to normal exchanges and cooperation between relevant parties and Pacific Island countries, and has always advocated that the international community should pay more attention to and support … the island countries,” Wang said. However, he added, “[w]e also oppose any introduction of any geopolitical games into the Pacific Island country region.”

Whether new embassies and defense pacts constitute geopolitical games or normal exchanges and cooperation is up for debate, but with competing powers entering the region, tiny islands that have not made headlines since World War II are once again holding the attention of geopolitical giants.  

Halfway through earning a master’s in national security at the Institute of World Politics, Mason Stauffer is part of The American Spectator’s 2023 intern class. When he isn’t preparing for his future career in the national security sector, Mason can usually be found hiking through the National Park System or playing his trumpet.