It has been eight decades since the Battle for Guadalcanal was fought between Allied Forces and the Japanese Imperial Army. Today, the Solomon Islands are again at the center of a Pacific power game — one that pits the US and its strategic partners against their latest adversary, China.
News that the People’s Republic of China and the Solomon Islands had signed a framework agreement on security cooperation was met with significant unease on Tuesday in the US, Australia and New Zealand, where officials fear it could pave the way for a Chinese naval base in the Pacific. (The World War II fight over Guadalcanal, the Solomons’ main island, was sparked by Tokyo in 1942 moving in troops and laborers to construct an airfield, which would have given Japan an advantage in the Pacific theater.)
That Beijing has come out on top of this latest tussle for maritime influence indicates Australia’s 2016 policy of re-engagement with its Pacific neighbors — and a US$1.5 billion infrastructure fund established two years later — has been found wanting.
Australian Minister for International Development and the Pacific Zed Seselja’s visit to the Solomon Islands last week seems to have done little to persuade the government that Canberra was serious about its support. The Solomon Islands’ opposition leader told the Australian Broadcasting Corp that he had warned Canberra about the pending military deal as early as August last year and got nowhere.
Canberra has long been guilty of treating its island neighbors poorly — using them as expensive prisons for refugees and asylum seekers as part of its deeply criticized offshore detention regime, or neglecting the urgent and impending climate crisis that is lapping at the islanders’ doors.
In 2015, then-immigration minister and now Australian Minister for Defence Peter Dutton was caught on a hot mic joking about the impact of rising sea levels on island nations. (At the time, he was with Scott Morrison, who is now prime minister.)
A White House delegation that arrived yesterday in Honiara — led by US National Security Council Indo-Pacific Affairs Coordinator Kurt Campbell, in a tour that also includes, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Hawaii — also looks like it has come too late. A draft proposal leaked last month indicated China could “make ship visits to, carry out logistical replenishment in, and have stopover and transition in Solomon Islands,” with Chinese forces to be used “to protect the safety of Chinese personnel and major projects in Solomon Islands.”
The US warned the deal would leave the door open for the deployment of Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops to the Solomons, which are about 2,000km off Australia’s east coast and sit on a key shipping route linking Australia, New Zealand, Asia and the US.
It sets “a concerning precedent for the wider Pacific Island region,” US Department of State spokesman Ned Price said on Tuesday.
Australia and the US have been scrambling since the news of the security agreement was leaked, said Natasha Kassam, a former Australian diplomat in China and the Solomon Islands who is the director of the Lowy Institute’s public opinion and foreign policy program.
They have their work cut out. Many Pacific island nations have expressed concerns that Western countries only pay attention to them when China is a factor, serving as a reminder that last minute interventions are no substitute for long-term and sustained dialogue, Kassam said.
Solomon Islands officially broke ties with Taiwan in 2019. The decision split its political leadership, with the opposition, arguing that relations with Beijing could compromise land rights, rule of law and cultural heritage.
Tensions came to a head in November last year with an outbreak of anti-China violence in the capital, Honiara. Beijing sent police advisers to the archipelago; Australian peacekeepers were also deployed, and they would remain on the ground until December next year.
For its part, China said Pacific countries should diversify their foreign relations, and criticized the US response to the deal.
“Deliberately hyping up tensions and provoking confrontational blocs wins no support and attempts to obstruct cooperation with China is doomed to fail,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Wang Wenbin (汪文斌) said on Tuesday.
Beijing has long been increasing its influence in the Pacific through formal and informal channels, said Hayley Channer, a Canberra-based senior policy fellow at the Perth USAsia Center.
Last year’s riots in the Solomons “opened the door for China to propose a security pact like this — but this agreement goes much further than just protecting Chinese citizens. It would be a way for the PLA to project power closer to Australian shores, which is why Australia and the US are concerned,” Channer said.
Coming just weeks out from Australia’s May 21 federal election, the China deal is a blow to Morrison, whose conservative government is under pressure from the Labor Party. It caps a tumultuous few years for relations between China, on one hand, and Australia and the US, on the other.
A trade war that started during the administration of former US president Donald Trump hit Australia — the most China-dependent economy in the developed world — hard. Canberra’s decision to ban Huawei Technologies from participating in its 5G network and the passage of anti-foreign-interference laws worsened relations.
Canberra should not get mad, Channer said. It should get even, by convincing Pacific Island countries that what Australia and its allies have to offer — whether that is defense cooperation, economic aid or critical infrastructure — is more compelling.
First, the allies have to get their act together. Otherwise, Chinese influence will just move from one island in the Pacific to another.
Ruth Pollard is a columnist and editor with Bloomberg Opinion. She was previously South and Southeast Asia government team leader at Bloomberg News.
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