Strategic Competition Between China and the United States in the Indo-Pacific

Abstract

With the rapid modernisation of its naval forces and the launch of the BRI, China has accelerated disputes with countries in its near seas and unveiled its ambition to control the Indo-Pacific region. The Donald Trump administration in the US has asserted that China is a strategic competitor, challenging America’s power, undermining US security and prosperity and seeking to replace it in Asia. Washington has objected to China’s military strategy in the South China Sea (East Sea of Vietnam), asserted its freedom of navigation in the region, and promoted an Indo-Pacific strategy with greater vigour to bring regional states together into a new security network such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, comprising the US, Japan, India, and Australia, for example. In addition to security tensions, the US and China have now begun a trade war where the two sides have targeted each other’s goods with punitive duties. This chapter will analyse the recent increase in strategic competition between the US and China in the Indo-Pacific region, especially under President Trump. It also discusses the factors leading to recent tensions in US-China relations and the impact of their strategic competition on cooperation and development in the wider region.