The U.S. President is in Asia to shore up alliances against Russia—and China

(Originally published May 20 in “What in the World“) The U.S. Senate finally passed a bill giving $40 billion in military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

U.S. President Joe Biden, meeting with the leaders of Finland and Sweden in Washington, pledged American support to them even as Turkey continues to block their bids to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Biden’s pledge raises the prospect of a face-saving way to avoid further provoking Russian President Vladimir Putin’s original complaint, that NATO’s inexorable expansion eastward since the fall of the Soviet Union posed a direct threat to Russian security.

Biden then hopped on a plane to Seoul to begin an Asian diplomatic push that will take him from South Korea to Japan, where he’ll meet with leaders from the other three members of the so-called “Quad”—Australia, India, and Japan. Biden is reportedly seeking to reassure Asian allies that the U.S. remains committed in the region despite the distraction of Ukraine and that, on the contrary, the U.S. is leading a two-front battle against authoritarianism in Europe and the Pacific.

Biden has yet to pull India fully into the alliance, however. New Delhi, reliant on Russia for fertilizer, fuel and military equipment, has declined to condemn Russia’s war in Ukraine. Otherwise, however, Biden may find himself preaching to the choir. America’s allies remain most concerned with China’s growing military assertiveness in the region, with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida likening the need to stand up to Russia in Ukraine with the need to stand up to China over Taiwan. Australia will undoubtedly raise concerns about the loss of the Solomon Islands to Chinese influence after the two nations signed a surprise defense agreement.

But in Asia money talks, and critics are already poo-poohing Biden’s pledge of $150 million in investment in Southeast Asia after meeting with leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. That money is peanuts in almost any context, but particularly against the scale of Chinese investment in the region, both public and private. That has been accompanied by a massive new wave of Chinese immigration into the region in recent years, which wouldn’t be a source of concern except for the fact that Beijing has adopted a policy of continuing to treat those emigrants as Chinese citizens whether or not they maintain it and using the presence of its citizens to justify security arrangements like the one it just struck with the Solomons.