Correspondents’ response to the AUKUS pact:
America correspondent Lucas Waagmeester: “Strategic military partnerships between countries are not unique. But this is another step in that trend that we have been seeing in Asia for a number of years. China was not mentioned in the press conference, but President Biden already said rather that America wants to strengthen alliances in Asia to create a barrier against China’s influence, both militarily and in maritime trade.
This partnership also brings the UK back into the Pacific. There wasn’t really a big British presence there anymore. And Australia is also placed much more emphatically in this power play. The country is put on the game board with that fleet of submarines,” says Waagmeester. Australia is economically very dependent on China, but is now taking a military-strategic side against China.”
Correspondent China Sjoerd den Daas: “China has said in response that this bloc of three countries needs to shake off the Cold War mentality and the ideological prejudices. That is kind of the Pavlov reaction you can expect, but I think not that it will stop there. They also know that this is not a pact for a few months but for generations to come.”
“People really see this as a gamechanger. The balance in the region is severely disrupted. China will do everything it can to secure the South China Sea. Relations with Australia are definitely deteriorating. Apart from the import duties that are already there, there will be a strong response from China. There will be no armed conflict in the region yet, but this does increase the risk of miscalculations and of course things can always go wrong.”
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