It's on the record. President Barack Obama's administration wants to pivot U.S. foreign policy away from the Middle East and toward East Asia. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's recent Foreign Policy article exemplified this thinking. "The future of the United States is intimately intertwined with the future of the Asia-Pacific," Clinton wrote, touting Washington's "irreplaceable role in the Pacific."
The desire to focus on the Asia-Pacific is sound, but the administration's policies there are not. The impulse to reassure America's Asian allies that the U.S. commitment to their security is rock solid perversely makes it likely that they will continue to free-ride on America's exertions -- in an era when Washington has less and less money to spend.
Read Full Article »