The United States and Asia in 2024: Evolving Contours of Cooperation and Competition

This year saw continued intensification of strategic competition between the US and China, and ongoing efforts across the US government to reorient elements of national power to deal with the China challenge. From the perspective of American policymakers, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) represents an economic, national security, and normative challenge, as it pursues both capabilities and actions to selectively revise global order in ways more favorable to the Chinese Communist Party. Facing some external blowback as well as economic headwinds, however, Beijing appears to have partially recalibrated its foreign policy during the year, seeking to stabilize and improve relations with Europe, Australia, the Global South, and (to a limited extent) the US.

Before he suspended his re-election campaign, President Biden linked America’s China policy to his domestic agenda, including through a set of large-scale spending bills (USD 2 trillion overall) aimed at strengthening American infrastructure and investing in domestic science/technology capacity, and climate change and clean energy. The Treasury Department moved to limit American investments in Chinese technologies in some sectors (measures that will take effect in early 2025), and the administration imposed or raised tariffs on China in a series of steps over the course of the year. Despite some criticism of the administration’s policies from Republicans in Congress, China policy remained largely bipartisan and supportive of the shift toward tougher China policies and enhanced military deterrence. The House Select Committee formed in early 2023 continued to hold hearings, following the departure of chair Rep. Mike Gallagher, on topics including the defense industrial base, PRC technology strategy, fentanyl, China’s alignment with “authoritarian adversaries,” and its global development policies. The House of Representatives also passed a series of 25 China-focused bills during “China Week” in September, on a range of topics including technology-related risks (including communications, biotech, and drones), international trade and export controls, electric vehicles, and protection of American society and institutions from various forms of Chinese Communist Party leverage and influence.

The year also saw continued American efforts to strengthen partnership with and military assistance to Taiwan, where the Democratic Progressive Party’s Lai Ching-te won the presidency in January. While there were efforts to grow economic cooperation—such as the fifth US–Taiwan Economic Prosperity Partnership Dialogue in October—cooperation was most marked in the defense realm, culminating in October’s announcement of a USD 2 billion arms deal. The Biden administration has sought to shift US arms sales toward more asymmetric capabilities, but the level and type of defense capabilities that should be provided to Taiwan are likely to be subject to ongoing debate in the US, as will Taiwan’s level of defense spending and its defense strategy in the face of a Chinese military that is increasingly capable of pressure and control around the island. The Pentagon’s annual report on Chinese military power, released in December, highlighted the growing capability of the People’s Liberation Army, its focus on being ready for cross-Strait contingencies in 2027 (a timeline laid out by Xi Jinping), and the rapid nuclear and missile buildup that has accompanied increases in conventional military capability, even if those advances have been potentially slowed by corruption. The inclusion of Taiwan in a supplemental bill that also included aid for Ukraine and Israel highlights the potential for debates during the next administration about how to prioritize and provide resources to the Indo-Pacific in the face of challenges in multiple regional theaters where the US maintains significant strategic interests and security commitments.

Competition with the PRC has also been an underlying factor in many of the administration’s efforts to solidify and strengthen cooperation with allies and partners in both bilateral and multilateral formats.

One of the Biden administration’s signature policies in Asia has been the effort to strengthen cooperation through bilateral alliance and partnership efforts and in multilateral fora. Among the most prominent initiatives have been AUKUS, the trilateral security partnership between the US, UK, and Australia; the “Quad” with Australia, India, Japan, and the US; trilateral cooperation between the US, South Korea, and Japan; and other trilateral or “minilateral” forms of networked (also referred to as “latticed”) cooperation across the region. Congressional policies and activities have, by and large, reinforced executive-branch efforts.

In September, the heads of state of the Quad countries met in Delaware for their fourth in-person Leaders’ Summit (the sixth leaders’ summit overall) since 2021, and leaders in Congress launched a bipartisan Quad Caucus. The Quad, which the administration has emphasized is not a military alliance but a partnership among “four leading maritime democracies in the Indo-Pacific…anchored by shared values” (White House 2024a), has focused a significant part of its efforts on coordination around public health and public goods provision in the Indo-Pacific. The 2024 summit emphasized public health efforts, announcing the Quad Cancer Moonshot to reduce cancer deaths across the Indo-Pacific, efforts around monkeypox vaccination access, and work on pandemic preparedness, including a second tabletop exercise. Continuing the emphasis that first generated quadrilateral cooperation (the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami in 2004), Quad countries also contributed over USD 5 million in humanitarian assistance after the landslide in Papua New Guinea and over USD 4 million following Typhoon Yagi in Vietnam, as well as broader efforts to strengthen climate resiliency across the region. Other foci of the 2024 summit included semiconductor supply chains, digital infrastructure, ports, telecommunications and other critical/emerging technologies, regional undersea cable networks, and clean energy.

In addition to its focus on public goods provision and public health, the Quad has taken steps to address challenges to maritime security and cybersecurity, framed as efforts to maintain regional peace and stability and “international order based on the rule of law” (White House 2024a). The Quad has become one conduit of American efforts to improve maritime domain awareness and maritime security across the region in support of the group’s shared goal of a “free and open Indo-Pacific.” To that end, in 2024 the leaders of the Quad countries announced the Maritime Initiative for Training in the Indo-Pacific, which builds on tools provided through the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness and other initiatives, to enable partners across the region to monitor and secure their waters, enforce their laws, and deter unlawful behavior. Quad Coast Guards also announced plans to launch an observer mission in 2025 to improve interoperability, and measures to improve the regional cybersecurity environment.

Another flagship effort to generate new and durable patterns of cooperation among allies in the Indo-Pacific is AUKUS, which focuses on Australia’s acquisition of nuclear attack submarines and a broader range of trilateral cooperation on key security-related technologies.

In 2024, progress continued in building out Australian capabilities and incorporating Australian personnel into US and UK training programs. April’s joint statement, marking the first anniversary of the announcement of Optimal Pathway (the effort to deliver conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines to Australia), noted progress in establishing a rotational presence for US and UK submarines in Australia and an industry forum intended to improve communication about current and future needs among governments, industry, and trade associations (US Department of Defense 2024a). AUKUS leaders subsequently announced a new cooperative agreement involving the transfer of naval nuclear propulsion material and equipment to Australia, and the US revised its export controls to facilitate further defense integration.

The defense ministers meeting in the UK in September highlighted progress in the training of naval personnel and related collaboration (US Department of Defense 2024b). The US, UK, and Australia also began exploring cooperation with Japan under an agreement on principles for Pillar II of the program (on advanced technologies) that also includes consultation with Canada, New Zealand, and South Korea (White House 2024b), and in November signed an agreement to accelerate development and testing of hypersonic vehicles (US Department of Defense 2024c). In December, the US Navy qualified the first Australian naval officer on a nuclear-powered submarine, one of over 100 Royal Australian Navy personnel currently in the training pipeline or aboard US submarines. Undersecretary of State Bonnie Jenkins also travelled to Australia and New Zealand in April to meet with a range of stakeholders, part of continued efforts to reassure parties both domestically and internationally that AUKUS will not undermine the global nonproliferation regime, a critique levied by Beijing in particular.

Many questions remain as the AUKUS partnership develops. Observers have asked whether AUKUS is likely to maintain its current form given domestic changes in government in the UK and the prospect of a second Trump administration that may take a different approach to alliances and partnerships (as well as the prospect of Australian federal elections, expected sometime in summer 2025). In an interview in December 2024, Biden’s outgoing national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, said he thought the Trump administration would view positively the burden-sharing aspects of the AUKUS deal and its contributions to the American defense base, wherein Australia is buying nuclear-powered submarines from the US, and thus investing USD 3 billion in American shipyards.

China’s response to AUKUS both diplomatically and militarily also bears watching in 2025, as UK Defense Minister John Healey specifically referenced China as “increasingly active, increasingly assertive in the region” (quoted in Needham 2024). As AUKUS capabilities develop in parallel with Beijing’s, and China increases its security outreach to the Pacific Islands north of Australia, it remains to be seen how AUKUS will affect regional security dynamics, and on what time frame.

Finally, it is worth watching how AUKUS fits in broader efforts to strengthen and deepen the US–Australia alliance, as observers have cautioned that Australian and American defense strategies are aligned but not identical, and that efforts to improve defense coordination will face specific operational challenges that must be carefully managed (Feigenbaum 2024).

In addition to the Quad and AUKUS, the US focused in 2024 on expanding and institutionalizing trilateral security cooperation between the US, the Republic of Korea (South Korea, ROK) and Japan. This effort is viewed as key to the success of the administration’s Indo-Pacific Strategy (Lee and Hwang 2024), and cooperation continued to deepen throughout the year.

In June, defense ministers from Japan, South Korea, and the US met to review progress since the meeting at Camp David in August 2023, and announced a new, multi-domain trilateral exercise (Freedom Edge) to be held later that summer. This was followed by a meeting in late July, at which the parties signed a Trilateral Security Cooperation Framework, which outlined plans for institutionalized policy consultation, information-sharing, exercises, and other cooperation (US Department of Defense 2024d). A Trilateral Secretariat to coordinate and implement these activities and commitments was announced in November. In addition to a range of ministerial-level meetings among the three countries’ national security leaders, trilateral cooperation also occurred in the economic sphere, as Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen and Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo attended meetings with their counterparts in April and June, respectively, for conversations on supply chain resiliency and sanctions enforcement, among other topics. Additional efforts such as a technology leaders training program, a conference on women’s economic empowerment, and an inaugural Trilateral Global Leadership Youth Summit fleshed out the diplomatic and civil-society elements of the growing trilateral partnership.

These efforts took place alongside efforts to solidify and strengthen the US’s bilateral relationships with both South Korea and Japan. With respect to the US–ROK alliance, highlights included the completion in July of guidelines around nuclear deterrence and nuclear operations on the Korean Peninsula, intended to strengthen extended deterrence; the 56th Security Consultative Meeting in October; and, also in October, a new Special Measures Agreement on cost-sharing for 2026–2030, which was approved by the ROK National Assembly in late November. In July, following a meeting of the US–Japan Security Consultative Committee, the Pentagon announced that it would upgrade its current three-star command in Japan to a Joint Force Headquarters reporting to INDOPACOM, enhancing command-and-control and alliance interoperability.

The future of trilateral cooperation, however, faces several questions. First is the impact of domestic politics: how the US presidential transition, combined with the impeachment of ROK president Yoon Suk-yeol following his short-lived attempt to declare martial law in December, will affect the sustainability and robustness of trilateral cooperation (which President Yoon had expended political capital to advance). On the operational side, the US–Japan alliance must work out to what extent and how the evolving and upgraded US Forces Japan command will integrate its Japanese counterparts, especially in light of Japan’s creation of a new Japanese Joint Operations Center to coordinate between the Self-Defense Forces’ ground, air, and maritime components, which is expected to become operational in spring 2025.

A third question bears on the relationship between Indo-Pacific and European security, as Japan and Korea have been at the forefront of growing connections and overlapping security concerns that span the two geographic areas. The expansion of cross-regional dialogue and ties between America’s allies in Europe and allies in the Indo-Pacific was a key trend in 2024. In July, the “Indo-Pacific 4” (Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea) participated in their third NATO summit in Washington, D.C., where the White House (2024c) noted and welcomed what it described as “growing contributions to global security of NATO’s Indo-Pacific Partners.” In October, they participated for the first time in NATO’s Defense Ministerial Meeting. For its part, NATO has also increasingly voiced concern about China’s “ambitions and coercive policies,” calling out its support for Russia in sharp language in July’s Washington Summit Declaration (NATO 2024). The growing involvement of North Korea in Russia’s war against Ukraine, including the deployment into combat of a reported 11,000 North Korean troops around Kursk in December, raises additional questions about cross-regional linkages, not just for trilateral coordination, but for American security policy and partnerships that span the two regions and combatant commands.

A final theme in the development of American foreign policy in Asia has been the growth of other “minilateral” fora intended to enhance regional cooperation. Alongside the US–Japan–ROK trilateral discussed above, the US also held its first trilateral summit with the leaders of Japan and the Philippines in April, announcing plans for a joint exercise focused on humanitarian assistance / disaster relief and economic cooperation measures (White House 2024d); in December Japan hosted the first trilateral maritime dialogue in Tokyo. Japan and the Philippines also enhanced bilateral defense and security relations significantly in 2024, concluding a bilateral Reciprocal Access Agreement that will enable expansion of joint military activities; it was ratified by the Philippine Senate in December. The development follows Japan’s signing of a similar agreement with Australia, which entered into force in 2023, and which was noted in a trilateral US–Japan–Australia defense ministers’ meeting in Hawaii in May as a development that would enable Japan’s participation alongside the US in force posture activities in Australia (US Department of Defense 2024e). In April, US, Japanese, Australian, and Philippine naval forces conducted the first four-country patrol in the South China Sea, and in October, the US, Japan, Canada, and the Philippines held additional maritime security exercises. Asian security architecture, in other words, is increasingly characterized by trilateral or networked cooperation, some via trilateral or multilateral arrangements involving the US, and others through direct ties among Asian countries.

These developments appear to be a response to multiple converging trends: the speed of China’s rise and growing strategic competition between the US and China on the one hand, and on the other, dissatisfaction with—but desire not to jettison—existing regional institutions and multilateral mechanisms that have proved slow and inadequate to deal with emerging regional challenges. This latticed cooperation has expanded alongside active Chinese security outreach, via efforts like the Global Security Initiative and Global Public Security Cooperation Forum, as well as efforts to invigorate or create new bilateral and multilateral frameworks for security cooperation, such as GSI-supported activities in the Lancang–Mekong region and a now-annual ministerial-level law enforcement and policing dialogue with Pacific Island countries. How these newer and more flexible multilateral/minilateral frameworks—whether sponsored by the US or China—will coexist with current regional architecture remains an open question.

A related trend to watch is China’s emergence as a regional security provider, with offerings of assistance concentrated largely in the internal and nontraditional security spheres, as opposed to traditional types of military cooperation emphasized by the US (Greitens 2024; Greitens and Kardon 2024). PRC security outreach, diplomacy, and cooperation include locations where Washington does not have strong security ties (such as Cambodia), but also countries in which the US has invested significantly in stronger defense partnerships in recent years (such as Vietnam). How this hybridization of security assistance from the US and China will mesh with continued strategic competition between the two great powers, and how countries in Asia respond to the changing incentive structure provided by these developments, bears close observation in 2025.

In 2024, the US also continued its efforts in Asia to strengthen existing bilateral partnerships and expand cooperation in new and emerging ones. Among these were steps to deepen the US alliance with the Philippines, continue improving ties with India, Vietnam, and Indonesia, and improve relations with Mongolia.

The US’s continued efforts to broaden and deepen its alliance with the Philippines were highlighted by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s visits. Prior to Austin’s July visit for the 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue, the US announced an additional USD 500 million in military aid for the Philippines, amid intensified confrontations with China in the South China Sea. In November, the two countries signed a General Security of Military Information Agreement and broke ground on a new Combined Coordination Center (US Department of Defense 2024f). Austin also visited sites established under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which were expanded from five sites to nine during his tenure. In April the US Army had deployed a midrange missile system to Luzon for Exercise Salaknib 24; by fall it had agreed to keep the system in the northern Philippines indefinitely, over vocal Chinese opposition.

The acceleration of defense relations with the US was part of a broader push by Manila to build security relationships, including new partnerships with Vietnam, India, and Singapore. The Philippines has historically struggled to balance military modernization, especially in the air and maritime realms, with high internal security demands, and it remains to be seen whether the country’s midterm elections in 2025—also the first elections for the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, an important step in the peace process for an area often troubled by instability and violence—will enhance or distract from the alliance’s efforts to upgrade Manila’s capabilities and strengthen its role in regional deterrence. The Trump administration’s approach also bears watching, though incoming officials, such as Secretary of State nominee Marco Rubio (2023), have previously signaled strong support for Philippine efforts to resist Chinese aggrandizement.

Broader US foreign policy toward Southeast Asia, however, has been identified as a weak spot in the administration’s approach. Under Biden, the US has taken steps to upgrade bilateral relations with countries like Vietnam and Indonesia, elevating each to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in fall 2023. In November 2024, President Biden welcomed Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto to the White House to mark the one-year anniversary of this upgrade and of a defense cooperation agreement also reached in November 2023. A new ASEAN-US Center in Washington, D.C., launched after the US announced a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership with ASEAN itself in 2022, The Center hosted the Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn for his first working visit to the US in June 2024; Secretary of State Blinken attended the US-ASEAN summit held in Laos in November. Also in November, the US launched the Maritime Security Consortium, a public–private initiative intended to more quickly identify low-cost, commercially available solutions to maritime security challenges in the region (US Department of Defense 2024g). Beyond these steps, however, it is not clear what concrete progress has been made in relations with Southeast Asia. There has been little forward movement in the US alliance with Thailand, and little activity of substance on relations with Cambodia, Laos, Brunei, or Malaysia, while the civil war in Myanmar continues with the US largely absent from the conflict calculus.

Part of the lacuna is the lack of a viable American economic strategy, in a region where China’s role as an economic center of gravity is strong and growing. The US has not rejoined the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the multilateral trade agreement it withdrew from in 2017, and remains outside the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, an ASEAN-led initiative that is now the world’s largest multilateral trade pact and that includes many US allies and partners in Asia. Under Biden, Washington has remained engaged in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and has also sought to present the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) as an alternative. Three agreements under IPEF entered into force in 2024: the Agreement relating to Supply Chain Resilience (February), the Clean Economy Agreement (October), and the Fair Economy Agreement (October). IPEF, however, is simply an agreement to work toward certain principles and future agreements, making it a relatively weak tool compared to the other regional economic initiatives that do not include the US; and it includes only seven ASEAN countries, not all. Most importantly, IPEF has focused on economic security and supply chains, but does not provide market access to the US, which is the highest priority for countries across Southeast Asia. As a result, critics have characterized American policy toward Southeast Asia as “benign neglect,” and prone to seeing the region solely through the lens of US–China competition (Grossman 2024; Lee 2024).

In South Asia, the US has also sought to deepen its relationship with India, viewing New Delhi as a contributor to regional deterrence vis-à-vis China and to other regional security challenges in South/Central Asia and the Indian Ocean. Under the Biden administration, the partnership has included a strong focus on tech cooperation; the two countries began a trilateral technology partnership with South Korea, and in July, following Prime Minister Modi’s re-election, national security advisor Jake Sullivan visited Delhi to discuss the bilateral Initiative on Critical Emerging Technologies. The US–India Major Defense Partnership continued to grow, with an expanded bilateral Tiger TRIUMPH exercise in March and an inaugural bilateral space-focused tabletop exercise in May (White House 2024e). Other high points included the signing of a Security of Supply Agreement in August to improve defense-industrial support, the launch of a new Indian Ocean Dialogue in November, and discussion of expanded partnership on critical minerals and trade. In October, India also signed an agreement to procure 31 MQ-9B drones, which are expected to improve India’s intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities in the Indian Ocean and shift New Delhi somewhat further away from its previous dependence on arms imports from Russia. While there is no question that China’s growing challenge to both Washington’s and New Delhi’s interests has catalyzed unprecedented levels of cooperation, significant divergences in perspectives, values, and interests nonetheless remain, and will likely shape the pace, scope, and specific foci of cooperation into 2025.

Mongolia was another area of American diplomatic focus in 2024. In July, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Mongolian Foreign Minister Battsetseg Batmunkh convened in Washington for an inaugural Comprehensive Strategic Dialogue, and in August, Secretary Blinken made the first visit by a secretary of state to Ulaanbaatar since 2016.

American foreign policy in Asia in 2024, the final year of the Biden administration, was characterized by two key trends: intensifying strategic competition between the US and China (efforts to mitigate the potential for conflict notwithstanding), and efforts to improve cooperation with regional partners and allies through both bilateral and multilateral initiatives. Some of these efforts met with visible success: inaugurating new partnerships, expanding existing ones, or institutionalizing key forms of cooperation, particularly through trilateral security partnerships. In several important cases, however, the success of these efforts rested or rests on the initiative of particular leaders in partner countries, from President Marcos in the Philippines to President Yoon in South Korea. This highlights the importance of understanding the role that domestic politics and leadership changes can play in shaping patterns of competition and cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, and highlights both the importance and the uncertainty of future American foreign policy in Asia. How will a second Trump administration approach the complex geopolitical, security, and economic issues that shape the US role in the region? While President Trump’s expected approach is often described as transactional, which transactions he and his team prioritize, and how he weights the costs and benefits of choices even within a broadly transactional framework, remain to be seen in 2025.