Security Alliances

The tug-of-war between China and the United States, Australia, Japan, and India will define the geopolitical landscape of Asia and threatens to divide ASEAN.

The U.S. military is prepared for a number of contingencies with regard to North Korea, but the best path forward is diplomacy aimed at denuclearization.

In a new postscript published in Foreign Affairs, I analyze the evidence of countries hedging against the United States after one year of President Trump’s “America First” agenda. At the dawn of the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump, I predicted in Foreign Affairs that Trump’s “America first” agenda would set in motion tectonic forces beyond his control. As the ground shifted beneath their feet, longtime U.S. allies would lose confidence in U.S. leadership and credibility. They would adapt by hedging their bets, moving away from alignment with a United States no longer willing to promote and defend the liberal world order that it had sustained since 1945. The evidence for this hedging would be in adjustments by U.S. allies to their approaches toward geopolitics, economics, and climate change. One year after Trump’s inauguration, the liberal order has not collapsed. But it is in distress as the president turns his back on the world the United States made to embrace a nationalist and isolationist foreign policy. Read the full article here.

The G5 Sahel is made up of the defense forces of Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad. Its goal is to defeat jihadist militants—including affiliates of the Islamic State and al-Qaeda—that take advantage of the porous borders that characterize the region. It launched its first, “symbolic” operation in early November involving troops from Bukina Faso, Mali, and Niger. The coalition may be an example of that elusive goal: an African solution to an African problem. It was created by five different governments that appear committed to meeting the challenges of military cooperation and coordination. However, the godfather of G5 Sahel is President Emmanuel Macron of France and, at least for the time being, the chief financial angels are Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. President Macron is personally committed to G5 Sahel. On December 13, he hosted a summit of the five African heads of state, the prime ministers of Italy and Belgium, and the German chancellor, all of whom were supportive. He successively appealed for funding to the Saudi Arabian crown prince, who has agreed to contribute 100 million euros, and the United Arab Emirates, which has agreed to contribute 30 million euros. The G5 Sahel receives no UN funding because of the Trump administration’s reluctance to channel money through the UN, but the administration has nevertheless pledged $60 million. A donor conference is scheduled for February. France has a counterterrorism force of about four thousand in the region, while the UN has twelve thousand peacekeepers in Mali. Despite these troop numbers, the jihadist threat to the region is growing. The G5 Sahel governments have pledged to add five thousand of their own troops over the next few months to the fight. Is this an African or a French initiative, or a bit of both? It appears to be a genuine initiative of the five African governments but with the strong political encouragement and support of the French presidency and strong financial support from the Gulf. France is deeply involved in the Sahel; all five countries were once part of France’s African empire and later of the French Union. For successive French governments, West Africa and the Sahel has been the “near abroad” of France, a region close to Europe with deep political, cultural, and economic ties. For Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, the G5 provides a means of countering jihadi movements that pose a direct threat to their ruling families.  The United States has military ties with the G5 states, but has declined to take a leadership role with respect to standing up the G5 force. It would be in the U.S. national interest to be supportive of the G5 initiative; if the jihadists pose no security threat to the United States, they do threaten U.S. interests in the region. In the absence of U.S. leadership, we should be grateful to the French.  

This post is co-authored by Sungtae "Jacky" Park, research associate for Korea Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.  Traditional security issues in the Asia-Pacific, such as tensions on the Korean Peninsula or disputes over the South China Sea, consistently attract the attention of policymakers within the region and abroad. But their consequences for ordinary people are often dwarfed by the fallout from nontraditional security (NTS) events, such as climate change, infectious diseases, natural disasters, irregular migration, famine, people smuggling, drug trafficking, and maritime safety. In a new CFR discussion paper, U.S.-ASEAN-ROK Cooperation on Nontraditional Security, Jaehyon Lee, senior fellow in the ASEAN and Oceania studies program at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, gives an overview of how the United States, ASEAN, and South Korea could cooperate to bolster NTS security in Southeast Asia. There have been bilateral and multilateral attempts at cooperation on NTS in the Asia-Pacific, but they have been insufficient. Between the United States, ASEAN, and South Korea, cooperation on NTS issues is currently limited to just a few exceptional circumstances. For instance, the United States and South Korea are partners in the ASEAN Regional Forum Disaster Relief Exercise and they work together on the Lower Mekong Initiative. These efforts, however, are not trilateral among the United States, ASEAN, and South Korea, since each country joins as a member of the ARF or as one of many countries in each project. Trilateral cooperation among the United States, ASEAN, and South Korea would benefit not just the participating parties, but also the region as a whole. Such cooperation would allow South Korea to contribute to the region and is consistent with the Moon Jae-in government’s foreign policy. It would also advance the U.S.-South Korean alliance and give South Korea experience that could be used in future NTS crises in North Korea such as famines, natural disasters, or pandemics. The author recommends the following: Focus on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR). Natural disasters are the most serious concern in the region, resulting in disproportionate casualties and economic losses. Working on HADR issues will also pave the way for cooperation on issues such as climate change, the environment, public health, and pandemics. Fix the reverse hub-and-spoke system. Economically and technically capable ASEAN countries should be donating aid instead of receiving it. Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand are candidates for this shift. Effectively coordinate policy among donor countries. The United States, Australia, China, the European Union, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea should all join in strengthening government-to-government cooperation. These countries are already individually active in NTS cooperation with ASEAN. Expand the U.S.-ROK alliance to cover cooperation on regional NTS threats. The first step in this direction should be to assess the current state of knowledge and capacity on both sides. The United States and South Korea have to share what they have in order to address regional NTS threats. Create an institution to handle U.S.-ASEAN-ROK trilateral NTS cooperation. The ASEAN Political-Security Community Department in the ASEAN Secretariat is a promising institution that could take on this role. In addition, Lee argues that South Korea should review its NTS ties with its neighbors in the region. Particularly for HADR, military participation is unavoidable. The South Korean military has been reluctant to take on responsibilities outside of the Korean Peninsula. Since the Moon Jae-in government is emphasizing South Korea’s regional contributions and responsibilities, this is a good time for the South Korean military to expand the scope of its operations and be more active in managing regional NTS threats. The United States can use its political, military, and economic capabilities to deepen its involvement in the region to deal with NTS threats, filling a space between hard U.S. military power and soft cultural and developmental assistance power. In this area, U.S.-ASEAN-ROK trilateral cooperation could bolster efforts to counter NTS threats and open a new chapter for the U.S.-ROK alliance, which so far has been narrowly defined as an arrangement on Korean Peninsula issues. Nontraditional security issues in the Asia-Pacific are as important as—or more important than—traditional security issues. More people’s lives are threatened and more economic losses are incurred by various NTS threats than by traditional security threats in the Asia-Pacific. Addressing NTS threats can enhance peace, stability, and prosperity in the region. This post is a summary of the discussion paper, U.S.-ASEAN-ROK Cooperation on Nontraditional Security.

During his first visit to Northeast Asia as president, Donald Trump has stayed on script, deepened relationships with his counterparts, and succeeded in communicating the right combination of assurance regarding the United States’ commitment to its allies and resolve in the face of the global threat posed by North Korea. Indicative of the message and tone of the first part of Trump’s five-country Asian tour was the presentation of hats by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Emblazoned with the message “Make the Alliance Even Greater,” the hats were a not-so-subtle jab at the limits of Trump’s “America first” rhetoric when talking to friends and allies. Most notable from Trump’s visits to Japan and South Korea was what did not happen: no counterproductive personal attacks on North Korea’s Kim Jong-un and the fogged-out denial by Mother Nature of a visit with South Korean President Moon Jae-in to the demilitarized zone. Read more on NBR.org

Donald Trump’s visit to Asia will put in the spotlight one of the biggest problems that has beset his administration’s policy toward North Korea. On the one hand, Trump is expected to provide assurances to Japanese and South Korean allies that the United States will fulfill its defense commitments in the face of North Korea’s expanding nuclear and missile capabilities. On the other hand, Trump must simultaneously convey the urgency and resolve necessary to squeeze North Korea and to face down Pyongyang’s direct nuclear threats toward the United States. Read more on The Hill

The prevailing narrative in the American media regarding newly-elected South Korean president Moon Jae-in’s first meeting with Donald Trump (aside from how to approach the presidential handshake) revolves around expectations that the chemistry between the left-leaning Moon and the conservative Trump will be bad. These expectations are amplified by the apparent gap in both leaders’ approaches to the rising North Korean threat and China’s attempts to make missile defense a wedge issue for the U.S.-ROK alliance. But the main challenge that each leader faces--and the one that will ultimately keep them together--is whether either alliance partner can truly afford to go it alone in the face of a rising North Korean threat. Moon’s choice: alliance or autonomy For Moon, the challenges stem from the perennial tension in South Korea’s foreign policy between the desire for autonomy and the need for alliance with the United States to ensure its security (something I detail in my forthcoming book "South Korea at the Crossroads"). The rising peninsular threat from North Korea and growing regional tensions among great power neighbors China, the U.S. and Japan are simply too serious for South Korea to risk its security by pursuing autonomy and abandoning the alliance with the United States. South Korean progressives are advocating for autonomy within the alliance and have urged Moon to convince Trump to let South Korea “take the lead” on North Korea while also encouraging Seoul to gain greater leverage with China by appeasing Beijing’s objections to the installation of a U.S. mid-tier missile defense system in South Korea. But Moon must also worry that an overly-assertive approach might bring Trump to devalue consultation with South Korean allies just at a time when South Korea is struggling to overcome signs of “Korea passing” in regional relations following South Korea’s political leadership vacuum and impeachment of the former president. Thus, South Korea faces contradictory and simultaneous fears that Trump will abandon South Korea and that the U.S. will entrap South Korea amidst rising tensions between Washington and Beijing. Because of the devastating consequences that would arise from a conflict with North Korea, it is in South Korea’s interest to maximize its influence and solidarity within the alliance with its security guarantor, the U.S. Trump’s choice: unilateralism or joint action against North Korea The Trump administration’s number one international security challenge stems from North Korean efforts to develop the capability to launch a missile that could be used to launch a direct nuclear strike on the United States. The administration has conducted a policy review and is urgently addressing the North Korean threat primarily by stepping up pressure on China and the international community to enforce sanctions. Any review of available instruments designed to induce a change in direction in North Korea quickly reveals that South Korean cooperation is essential and that the consequences to South Korea of North Korean retaliation to military coercion would be devastating. The costs to the United States of unilateral actions that ultimately risk rather than preserve the security of its allies would be prohibitive unless they are demonstrably essential to homeland defense against an imminent attack. The massive pressure and engagement strategy adopted by the Trump administration involves an international campaign to make the costs of North Korea’s nuclear program prohibitive and, as Pacific Commander Admiral Harry Harris has testified before Congress last April, “to bring Kim Jong Un to his senses, not to his knees.” Likewise, efforts to secure greater cooperation from Beijing will only work to the extent that China recognizes that the U.S.-ROK alliance is regarded as essential in thwarting North Korean aims. Common threats and common purpose Given the shared U.S.-ROK objective of ending this common threat, there is ample ground for the U.S. and South Korea to build common purpose through a stronger alliance that should deflect North Korean challenges while outweighing the South Korean impulse for autonomy or any American impulse for unilateralism. Both Trump and Moon may dream of alternatives to the alliance, but in choosing to hold an early summit, both men are also admitting that as a practical matter when it comes to North Korea, there is no viable alternative to cooperation through the U.S.-ROK alliance. This post originally appeared on Forbes.

Now that the reverie aboard the USS Intrepid has receded into memory, it is time to ask just what, precisely, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull achieved on his recent visit to New York and meeting with U.S. President Donald J. Trump. First of all, there is no doubting the importance that the meeting took place. Ignore the criticism of President Trump for keeping Prime Minister Turnbull waiting and for cutting their exchange short. It would not have mattered which world leader was standing by in New York—nothing could have prevented the U.S. president from celebrating the passage of the healthcare bill through the House. But if that criticism was unwarranted, so too was the feverish anticipation, among Australian commentators, for this first face-to-face encounter between the two leaders. Much of that anticipation is attributable to the panic among a number of senior Australian opinion leaders following a rocky January call between Trump and Turnbull. In the wake of that conversation, the White House only reluctantly committed to honoring a controversial refugee settlement deal—signed by President Obama—whereby asylum seekers held by Australians in offshore detention camps will be resettled in the United States. That the call provoked the hysteria it did among Australian opinion leaders reflects something of a paradox in how debate over the alliance is conducted in Australia. Critics of the relationship were quick to argue that Trump’s brusque tone was reason enough for Australia to distance itself from this administration. Equally, the alliance’s strongest and loudest advocates in the Australian media also cried foul, believing that Washington was not treating Canberra with the respect they feel it deserves. Australian journalist Peter Hartcher, for example, a powerful advocate of the alliance, labeled the call “a case of alliance shock for Australia.” Turnbull’s visit to New York did not feature prominently in U.S. reporting. Then again, Australia rarely does. Its contribution to wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan are not often mentioned in the United States, and U.S. presidents in memoirs of their time in office rarely allocate much, if any, space to dealings with Australian counterparts or to the alliance itself. The pageantry aboard the USS Intrepid centered around perhaps the most powerful historical theme in the bilateral relationship: the United States’s pivotal role in saving Australia from a Japanese attack in the Second World War. The two leaders were there to mark the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Battle of the Coral Sea. In recent years, this heroic narrative of fighting together shoulder-to-shoulder has been broadened to include the two countries’ record in fighting alongside each other in every major conflict since World War I.  Judging from the euphoric reporting in Australia in recent days, however, you could be forgiven for thinking that, prior to the New York visit, the alliance was on the brink of collapse. According to The Australian’s Foreign Editor, Greg Sheridan, and that newspaper’s editor-at-large, Paul Kelly, the commemoration of the Coral Sea battle offered the idyllic setting in which President Trump could be inducted into the historic rites and rituals of the bilateral relationship. But the alliance was never in crisis, despite one difficult phone call. It is deep and broad enough to prosper even if the leaders in the respective capitals do not have a strong personal relationship. In any case, the “testy” phone call in January between Turnbull and Trump was nowhere near as contentious as U.S.-Australian discord over the Suez crisis in 1956—when Australia supported the British and French military action against Cairo, ignoring President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s call for restraint. It is nothing like the divergence of approaches between President John F. Kennedy and Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies over how to handle Indonesian President Sukarno’s claims on West New Guinea in the early 1960s, and Sukarno’s policy of confrontation with Malaysia. Canberra supported the Dutch retaining control of West New Guinea, and wanted U.S. guarantees of military assistance in the event of Australian forces coming into conflict with the Indonesian military during Sukarno’s confrontation policy. On both counts, Canberra was disappointed by the response from the White House.  In the case of West New Guinea, Kennedy argued that it was better to assuage Sukarno’s nationalism rather than push him into the arms of the Indonesian communist party. In addition, in the event of trouble over Malaysia, Kennedy only promised logistical assistance to Canberra. Any tension today is also nothing remotely like the frustration felt by Australian Prime Minister John Howard in 1999. Then, U.S. President Bill Clinton refused to commit U.S. ground troops under the banner of the United Nations to stop the bloodshed in East Timor, triggered by the fall of the Suharto regime and Timor’s process of separating from Indonesia. In New York, Prime Minister Turnbull sounded rather more confident than most allies in the region about the future of the U.S. administration’s Asia policy, which remains in flux. Far from watching how that policy begins to settle, the Australian leader argued that the “commitment to the peace, stability [and] the rule of law” in Asia had been ”renewed by President Trump, for which we thank you.”   But as history shows, Turnbull should not assume that the pomp and pageantry on display aboard the USS Intrepid means that the president will treat Australia differently from other US allies in the region. The cold, hard facts for Canberra—proven time and again since the signing of the ANZUS treaty in 1951—is that the United States will—quite properly—act in a way that maximizes its own interests. No U.S. president in the past has allowed the bilateral history to cloud their assessment of U.S. priorities in the Asia-Pacific, especially those related to China, Indonesia or the structure of regional strategic and economic architecture.  Is there any reason to believe that this would change with Trump? The proposition is highly doubtful. The event in New York thus perpetuates a grand Australian delusion. It assumes that the United States will elevate this kind of sentiment above its own self-interest when it comes to the conduct of its foreign affairs. It allows hope to dictate to judgment about where Australia might sit in U.S. priorities.  Australia may well be more important to the US now than at any time during the Cold War: a point of reassurance for Canberra.  But that doesn’t mean that Australian and U.S. interests will always align. The mooring of the relationship to memory means that the harder conversations that Washington and Canberra need to have may become more difficult to initiate. But these conversations must be had—about China’s rise, Beijing’s progressive militarization of the South China Sea and, above all, renewing the public arguments for the importance of the U.S.-Australia alliance. The conversations are all too easily lost amidst a sea of complacency and nostalgia. James Curran is professor of History at Sydney University and a non-resident fellow at the Lowy Institute for International Policy.

After a historic election in South Korea, progressive Moon Jae-in is the country’s new president. Exit polls estimate Moon won 41% of the vote and conservative Hong Joon-pyo, his closest competitor, has conceded defeat, along with Moon’s other political rivals. President-elect Moon Jae-in will take office in a South Korea that has been consumed by domestic politics resulting from Park Geun-hye’s impeachment and a compressed national election campaign. But now as president, he will quickly be forced by rising Northeast Asian tensions to reassert South Korean political leadership that has been absent. Despite aspirations to enhance South Korea’s impact and voice, Moon will face a steep learning curve. A return to liberal foreign policy The Moon campaign template for foreign policy outlines a return to the liberal foreign policies that his political mentor Roh Moo-hyun followed a decade ago before conservatives re-took control of the Blue House. The Roh Moo-hyun administration, in which Moon Jae-in served as chief of staff, pursued greater autonomy while maintaining the U.S.-ROK alliance, sought greater balance in South Korea’s position between China and the United States, and emphasized inter-Korean and regional security cooperation by fostering regional economic and political integration. But a return to these priorities by the Moon administration face many obstacles that did not exist a decade ago. New obstacles First, the immediacy of Moon’s transition to power means that he and his team must switch gears from campaigning to governing within 24 hours. Moon will take office as president with a transitional government that will remain in place until a new prime minister and cabinet can win approval from a National Assembly that his Democratic Party does not control. The need for consensus within the National Assembly will influence the selection of Moon’s cabinet and will constrain his capacity to pass laws supporting his policy agenda. South Korean attitudes will form a second constraint on Moon’s approach to foreign policy. While there is agreement on the need for a clean start domestically, public approval for the security alliance with Washington and anxieties about China are high, while expectations for cooperation with North Korea are low. The South Korean public has moved in a conservative direction on major foreign policy issues over the past decade, and it will take time to build a successful record for the progressive Moon administration to reverse this trend. A different international landscape Third, the international landscape has changed drastically during the last decade, making it more difficult for Moon to implement many elements of his platform that had once been priorities under Roh Moo-hyun. North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weapons has advanced and Kim Jong Un has tied his survival to the nuclear project. UN Security Council resolutions restrict many economic activities that were permissible when Moon was last in power. South Korean companies, burned by the closure of the Kaesong Industrial Complex in North Korea, have moved on. Moon and his advisors will have to convince North Korea to reverse its nuclear trajectory before dreams of a common Korean market will be feasible. Fourth, U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has moved forward in setting its policy toward North Korea while South Korea has been caught up in its own political leadership vacuum. Moon Jae-in comes into office as the concrete has begun to set on Trump administration preferences, albeit still self-contradictory and uncertain. Little room for error To be an effective advocate for South Korean interests, the liberal Moon must figure out both how to talk to Trump and how not to push buttons that might jeopardize the relationship.  The fact that Moon inherits deeper mechanisms for coordination between Washington and Seoul than existed a decade ago under Roh Moo-hyun will help keep the alliance moving in the right direction, but bad chemistry between the two leaders would do much to undermine deeply shared U.S.-ROK interests in a non-nuclear peninsula and a prosperous Northeast Asia. To achieve success, Moon Jae-in must restore South Korea’s confidence in the institutions of leadership at home while navigating a narrowing strategic space in Northeast Asia. It is a daunting task. Time will tell if Moon is up for the job. This post originally appeared on Forbes. Mr. Snyder’s upcoming book is South Korea at the Crossroads: Autonomy and Alliance in an Era of Rising Regional Rivalry.

After a tumultuous 2016, the world holds its breath for what the coming year may bring. Angry populism is on the march. Great power relations are tense. The Middle East has imploded. Meanwhile, President-Elect Donald J. Trump proposes to upend U.S. foreign policy in areas from trade to climate, alliances to nonproliferation, terrorism to human rights. In a world in disarray, can multilateralism deliver? Ten major summits during 2017 will help provide an answer. Here’s what to look for at each. European Union Summit (March 25, 2017, Rome). Last June, British voters caused a geopolitical earthquake by voting to leave the European Union (EU). UK Prime Minister Theresa May promises to invoke Article 50 by the end of March, starting the clock on the arduous, two-year negotiations over “Brexit.” That same month, leaders of the remaining twenty-seven EU member states gather in the Eternal City to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the Treaty of Rome (1957), which established the European Economic Community among the original six (Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and West Germany). They are billing the somber summit as the culmination of a six-month “political reflection on the future of the European Union,” intended to convince EU citizens that the bloc remains capable of controlling migration, providing security, and delivering economic growth. They have their work cut for them, given rising nativism, growing terrorist fears, high unemployment, and looming elections in several EU states, notably France and Germany. Host Italy, meanwhile, faces an uncertain future following the resignation of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi after a failed referendum. G7 Summit (May 26–27, Toarmina, Italy). Italy plays host again in late May, when leaders of the seven most important advanced market democracies (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States) plus the EU gather in this historic city on Sicily’s stunning Ionian coast. Appropriately—given the setting at the crossroads of the Mediterranean—the agenda will focus on the global migration crisis, which has hit Italy hard, as well as efforts to stabilize North Africa and the Middle East, from which many migrants and refugees have fled. But the real drama at Donald Trump’s first G7 summit will be whether Western powers remain united toward Russia, which they suspended from the G8 in 2014, after its annexation of Crimea. The EU has already extended sanctions on Russia for another six months. But Trump has vowed to reset ties with Moscow and may go against his own party’s push for renewed sanctions. NATO Leaders Summit (Date TBD, Brussels). U.S.-European differences could also be on display when Trump and the leaders of the other NATO members gather at the alliance’s gleaming new headquarters in Brussels. The alliance, unlike the building, is in need of repair. Baltic and East European states have been unnerved by Trump’s depiction of NATO as “obsolete” and his suggestion that U.S. defense guarantees be contingent on greater burden-sharing. The alliance may also be divided over how to confront and deter Russia, particularly if Trump continues to insist (with a certainty that has “horrified” close U.S. allies who know better) that Moscow did not hack the 2016 U.S. election. Conference on the Ocean (June 5–9, New York). Thanks to the personal interest of Secretary of State John Kerry, the world has devoted unprecedented attention over the past four years to protecting marine environments from pollution, overfishing, and acidification. The critical question now is whether this momentum will continue. In early June the United Nations will host “Our Oceans, Our Future.” This high-level meeting will support implementation of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14, designed to encourage conservation and sustainable use of the oceans, seas, and marine resources therein. The world will be looking to the Trump administration for signals about where it stands when it comes to protecting a vast ecosystem critical to supporting life on Earth. G20 Summit (July 7–8, Hamburg, Germany). The new geopolitics and geoeconomics of the Trump era will come into sharper focus in July, when the biggest developed and developing countries meet in Hamburg. Chancellor Angela Merkel, this year’s host, has emerged as the world’s most important defender of globalization. She has chosen “shaping an interconnected world” as the theme of this year’s summit. Her priorities include fostering economic resilience, advancing sustainable development, empowering women, implementing the Paris climate agreement, and advancing peace and development in Africa. Beyond the final communiqué of commitments, observers will be focusing on interactions between President Trump and his major non-Western counterparts, particularly Vladimir Putin of Russia, Xi Jinping of China, and Narendra Modi of India. BRICS Summit (September, Xiamen, China). At the end of the summer, five of the world’s biggest emerging economies—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—will gather in China for the ninth BRICS summit. The choice of location is noteworthy. The coastal city of Xiamen was one of the nation’s first special economic zones, serving as a window to the global economy and a destination for foreign investment. Xiamen also sits right across the Taiwan Strait from Taiwan itself, which thanks to President-Elect Trump has reemerged as a flashpoint in Sino-American relations. Look to President Xi to use the summit to advance solidarity within the heterogeneous BRICS bloc, as well as elevate its diplomatic profile as a potential geopolitical and economic counterweight to the West. Opening of UN General Assembly (September 12–25, New York). In September, President Trump will deliver his maiden speech to the United Nations. Back in 2012, he complained about the “cheap 12 inch sq. marble tiles behind the speaker at UN,” tweeting that he would be happy to replace them with “beautiful marble slabs” if asked. More recently the president-elect has suggested he has more thorough UN remodeling in mind. “The United Nations has such great potential,” he tweeted after the Security Council’s December 23 vote against Israel’s settlement policy. “But right now it is just a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time. Sad!” World leaders will be paying close attention to both the tone and substance of his remarks. These may include a declaration that henceforth U.S. contributions to the UN’s regular and peacekeeping budgets (currently assessed annually) will be treated as purely “voluntary.” For incoming Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, keeping U.S.-UN relations on an even keel will be a constant test. ASEAN and East Asia Summits (April and November, Philippines). The coming year will be a big one for President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, which holds the rotating chair of the ten-nation Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). The Filipino strongman will host two ASEAN summits, in April (in Manila) and November (at Clark Air Base in Luzon). The latter event will coincide with the East Asia Summit, where President Xi will surely tout his newly cozy relationship with Duterte. Less certain is whether President Trump will bother to show up and (if he does) what message he will send Duterte, Xi, and other attendees about maritime disputes in the South China Sea, as well as U.S. staying power in the region. The new Chinese-Filipino partnership suggests that rather than hedging against China’s rise, neighbors may be drawn into its orbit. This trend could accelerate if Trump offers no alternative to the Trans-Pacific Partnership that he has scorned, leaving the Chinese-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership as the only viable alternative. UNFCCC COP 23 (November 6–17, Bonn). The sleepy former capital of West Germany will host 2017’s last major multilateral summit, the annual conference of parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Despite the location, the conference will in fact be organized by Fiji—marking the first time that a small island state has been given the honor. The conference should provide a bellwether for gauging the U.S. commitment to the global climate change agenda, including whether the new president follows through on his pledge to cancel the Paris Accord. Fiji’s prime minister has already invited the president-elect to visit his nation to see the effects of climate change. Abdicating leadership in climate negotiations would be costly for the United States, as China—which has already donated $224k to support Fiji’s presidency—is poised to fill the void. There will be no shortage of international events to watch closely in 2017 as the world seeks clues for how the incoming Trump administration will navigate often thorny diplomatic questions and handle surprises that could upend the goals of a number of these meetings. Officials are advised to ring in the New Year in style before the hard work begins.