At the recent Quad Summit hosted by outgoing US President Joe Biden in Delaware, the grouping showed clear signs of consolidation. For Biden, it was a fitting tribute, because it was under his presidency that the Quad has been held as a summit. It has now met for the sixth time, twice virtually. Quad foreign ministers have met eight times over the past five years, and Quad commerce and industry ministers and development finance institutions are scheduled to start regular meetings, too.
The most prominent message from the Quad Summit is that the Quad is here to stay, to undertake collaborative ventures for public good. Through such functional cooperation, the Quad hopes to maintain a free and open Indo-Pacific region and challenge all efforts to achieve hegemony in the region.
While China is not mentioned in the Wilmington Declaration, the intention is clear: Beijing will not be allowed to get away with its strategic and economic dominance. The Quad will engage in forms of functional, technological and related cooperation and engage countries and regional institutions, particularly ASEAN, the Pacific Islands Forum and the Indian Ocean Rim Association.
There are major thrust areas in which Quad consolidation is seen, which will challenge China’s efforts in the region. The first of these is in the maritime domain. Given China’s pressure on the Philippines in the South China Sea, all Quad partners have strengthened, individually, their relationship with the Philippines and have a common approach, which is not yet a formal Quad approach, but which helps in building common understanding.
In all, 25 countries have benefited from the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness related to dark vessel movements in the region The Quad helped them to monitor activity in their exclusive economic zone, which particularly focuses on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU). Most IUU in the region is conducted by Chinese fishing boats guarded by the China Coast Guard and this is a definite challenge to them.
This partnership is to encompass maritime security, to cover new technologies and data inflows. Three initiatives on this are under way. For the first time, the Quad coast guards are set to launch a ship observer mission next year to improve interoperability and coordination in the Indo-Pacific region. A Quad Indo-Pacific logistics network pilot project is under way. This will seek to foster a combined airlift capacity among Quad partners and leverage logistic strengths to provide Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) in the region more effectively. The HADR has been one of the cardinal principles since the 2004 tsunami in the region which brought the Quad together. The Quad already has a partnership on HADR and guidelines for this partnership would now be enhanced.
This partnership came into play in May, when landslides occurred in Papua New Guinea and when Typhoon Yagi hit Vietnam, Myanmar and other ASEAN countries. For Myanmar, it is mainly an Indian effort, since the other Quad members do not have formal ties with the Myanmar junta.
Another important and clear challenge to the way China operates is a health partnership. By last year, this had grown into the Quad Health Security Partnership, which covers pandemic preparation. The current mpox outbreak has resulted in Quad efforts for equitable access to effective quality vaccines which will include expanding vaccine manufacturing in developing countries. This is a clear challenge to China.
The Quad Cancer Moonshot is another important initiative focusing on collaboration, including with private and civil society sectors, to reduce the number of people suffering from cancer. Initially focusing on cervical cancer, it is intended to work on other forms as well. The Quad countries would collaborate on further research and development to enhance the participation of the private and civil society sectors to reduce the incidence of cancer.
China’s main strength in the region is its support and development of infrastructure through its Belt and Road Initiative. The Quad wants to challenge this by improving regional connectivity through quality infrastructure. New partnerships are being enunciated such as a partnership on ports in the future. The Quad infrastructure fellowships now comprise 2,200 experts working on disaster resilient infrastructure.
The Quad Partnership for Cable Connectivity and Resilience is providing quality undersea cable networks that are free from Chinese domination. Australia has a center focusing on this announced in July which is building human capacity. Japan will provide technical cooperation, particularly in the South Pacific. The US is expected to contribute training programs to support cable connectivity, which presently is focusing on the Pacific Island countries and their requirements. India is working on the maintenance of such cables by harnessing Quad repair capabilities.
Through such efforts the Quad, which is working slowly in real terms, is expected to challenge the might of China, whose technology is considered to be robus, but lacking in openness.
Finally, the challenge of critical and emerging technologies is what the Quad is pursuing. The next real battle between the Quad and China for the hearts and minds of all the countries in the Indo-Pacific region is over the access to transparent and dependable technologies. Earlier, the open radio access network in the Pacific was announced. Now, this is being expanded to the ASEAN region, beginning with the Philippines. Japan and the US are supporting the global expansion of the Open Radio Access Network (RAN) field trials and the Asia Open RAN Academy.
Quad members consult frequently, exchange ideas to advance shared priorities, and deliver benefits for partners across the Indo-Pacific region. The Quad is here to stay. It is engaging regional institutions on their priorities. This is the real challenge as the Quad initiatives provide viable alternatives for countries in the region so they do not need to have a total dependence on China. The Quad is not sending warships to counter China in the Indo-Pacific region, but into launching moonshots to build the region’s future.
Gurjit Singh is a former Indian ambassador to Germany, Indonesia, ASEAN, Ethiopia and the African Union.
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