Understanding the EU's Indo-Pacific Strategy: Insights from Experts

[Music] the fact the european union launched its own indo-pacific strategy

back in september following uh several european countries launching um

their own national strategies particularly germany the netherlands and

and france which themselves followed um

strategies uh being launched by the united states um and and japan

which were first sort of initiator perhaps of this

of this recent uh concept uh it has indeed become a fashionable

concept uh or topic with no less than eight or 10 strategies depending how you how

you count but but of course the reactions by certain countries

like china or russia have been fairly negative to the to these concepts and

and there have been also side effects such as the um

the launch of the uh australia united kingdom united states uh

uh group also in september of last year uh which which is also related to to to

this to this region um

i would like can i ask everybody please to shut down your your microphones except for for the

for the speakers um and to to discuss um this issue today

um for the next hour or so um i'm very happy to to welcome

three very distinguished speakers um

first um christoph panneau um who is um france's ambassador uh for the uh

indo-pacific uh since november 2020 i believe it's a newly created position um is the inaugural

holder of that of that host uh but he also has um strong credentials as a former french

ambassador to australia and to malaysia and has also spent time in japan

um in canada in the uk and in various asia pacific countries such as vietnam where i believe i first met him and and

he has for the past two years traveled around the region

and he also hosted and coordinated

the indo-pacific ministerial meeting that took place

in february of this year in paris during the french presidency of the

european union which is ending um in about 10 days after six months of turmoil i would say

mainly due to the the war in ukraine

and i'd be really interested to know from his point of view and especially uh since we are here at um

essec and and especially at irene how easy or how difficult it was to to

organize um such a meeting um in such a complicated um time secondly i will turn to dr

michito tsuroka who is an associate professor at ko university and who is

uh kind enough to join us from from japan at a very late time

for him and dr churoka is a an expert on

foreign affairs and security issues and he's also a practitioner having spent time

at the ministry of defence and he was seconded to the japanese ministry of defense

as the deputy director of international policy and he was in charge of multilateral

security and defense cooperation in asia he has written extensively on on the

region and also on eu-japan relations which obviously will be of high interest to us because he'll

be able to give us a perception of the european union

indo-pacific strategy from a japanese and asian

point of view he has also written about non-proliferation and and and japan russia relations which

is also um very

relevant and last but not least uh we'll have my my colleague professor uh

frederick charion who is a professor of political science at um

essec also an expert on security issues who's just uh published a book in french

called the gerda influence um and uh who will make some comments on on the the global

picture and and he will follow um presentations by

by both um speakers so without further ado i will invite uh ambassador pino to um

give us his his views on this fascinating topic and um please um the floor is yours ambassador

and thank you very much for being with us well thank you thank you uh for inviting

me philippe and i'm also uh very uh happy to to share this event

with the professor tsuroka uh for whom it is very late in tokyo and

and also with the uh professor shariu thank you so much um let me let me cover because we the

a lot of time is limited let me cover two issues one is the ukraine and the other one is the where

we stand as regards the eu strategy um i shall leave aside for the time

being the the french national strategy but we'll be happy to go back to this later

when uh during the q a um ukraine first because obviously this new

uh international context created by the war of aggression against ukraine has had um obvious repercussions in the

indo-pacific and i will give you uh three examples which in my view

are extremely significant well first of all the the question is whether the ukraine crisis will

distract the european union and france and other eu countries and

reduce their long-term engagement in the region i think the answer is no

and i i will try to come back to this later but the first reason i would give now

is that what happens in ukraine precisely shows the importance of the

principles that we promote in the indo-pacific and which are at the core of our

engagement these principles of course are sovereignty territorial integrity the

rule of law um peaceful settlement of disputes by

negotiation and so on so i think uh ukraine the crisis in ukraine the war in ukraine

makes it even makes them even more relevant and therefore

a good reason for us to increase rather than reduce our engagement

i think the second um thing i would like to stress is that the war has reinforced

polarization and it has increased also indeed confrontation in the indo-pacific i was

at the shangri-la dialogue and when i listened to the american secretary of state of defense sorry and

the chinese minister of defense it is obvious that we are in in a time of confrontation

the french and european approach is multi-polar we don't

support polarization we don't support confrontation and we do not follow the logic of

antagonistic blocks which is at work in the moment at the moment in the indo-pacific and elsewhere

so this is the european strategy this is the french strategy we want to promote and propose an

alternative to this polarization it is not easy but this is our way and this is our values as well

and our dna uh our i would say in a in international policy and the third

aspect i would like to cover regarding ukraine is of course the economic dimension

because the new strategic context created by the war in ukraine has intensified the

debate on economic security

about resilience of value chains about you know the future of the global economy which is so crucial for the

region about dependencies as well economic dependencies

and i believe that these issues because of ukraine will be even more important

in the indo-pacific context so let me cover now the eu strategy on recent developments

first of all the eu dimension is extremely important for france and the publication last september the eu

strategy for cooperation in indo-pacific was for us a major milestone we have worked very hard to deliver this

outcome and it shows also very importantly that there is now

a collective recognition by the eu its member states and the eu

institutions as well that we have strong interests in the region and that the indo-pacific is

strategically significant as i said i do not believe that the war in ukraine will

change that we're going to keep the course and increase our engagement in the indo-pacific

and i also have very good hope based on my close contacts with them that the next presidencies

who come after france the czech republic and next year sweden and spain

will keep the momentum going the momentum that was created by the forum

that we hold in paris on the 22nd of february it brought together 52 ministers or

representatives from both the eu and the indo-pacific including also importantly regional organizations

from the indo-pacific it was the first meeting of its kind between eu

representatives and indo-pacific countries at miniseries level and it came only six months after the

launch of the strategy and i think we we managed to fulfill our objectives

which were number one to reaffirm the eu's long-term commitment in the to the this region of strategic

interest and number two to discuss and identify

together concrete actions which would give more flesh to the eu strategy

and this we did during the three round tables that were organized on the morning of the 22nd of february

on security and defense on connectivity and digital issues and on global issues in particular climate change

biodiversity and health issues we started things in paris or things started before

that were confirmed in paris there is of course the global gateway initiative which is

much talked about [Music] adopted by the eu

last december and it offers a new framework to help reduce strategy dependencies and

promote sustainable connectivity between we'll come back during the discussion to

the global gateway it is being launched it is very ambitious it does not cover

it is important to re remind you that it does not cover the

indo-pacific only it covers the whole world and there is a

good reason to believe that africa and ukraine and and the neighborhood of the eu will receive a

lot of resources from this initiative but there are more than two billion

euros committed for the next three years under this initiative for the indo-pacific

and we are launching now between the eu and asean team europe initiatives that will be

funded by global gateway as well as member states money on the green partnership another team

europe initiative on sustainable connectivity with the pacific we have the green blue

alliance with the pacific and timor-leste we have the kiwa initiative on biodiversity

and more generally we have a lot of initiatives regarding connectivity and digital

issues including network security data protection problems supply chains semiconductors

responsible artificial intelligence cyber threats etc and last on defense and security

the eu will act as a security provider in cyber in counterterrorism in space also in

maritime security and we have we are continuing uh two important initiatives in capacity building which

are and primarily i think i've spoken for almost nine

minutes so i should stop there but we will go back to these issues later in the discussion thank you

thank you very much uh ambassador that was extremely uh uh useful and uh and and white's uh and and wide ranging um

as a as an introduction um so um i i suggest we we we move on to uh uh professor um

university and um and please you have the floor thank you very much uh thank you very

much for the invitation and kind of introduction uh

yes i'll let me also start by saying a few words on on on ukraine first and then the

our japan's views on the france and europe's in the pacific engagement and also the a little bit

about uh geopolitical uh impact of the war in ukraine on on on on asia uh and the

first on on japan's response to the war in ukraine and uh government and government uh uh led by

prime minister hume the the response has been quite tough on russia so in terms of imposing sanctions

and compared to what japan did in the wake of the annexation of crimea back in 2014

so that so this time the transaction is very much in line fully in line with other g7 partners including the european

union so the um and what we have seen so far is a is an unprecedented level of

coordination and contact between japanese officials and european officials including of course the

european union and brussels people so the and also the the g7 process has been quite uh

quite active so so the g7 i think the role of g7 uh has been very much reinvigorated

and and first the the the under the uk presidency last year so the uk had a

lot of good reasons to to to revitalize the g7 process yeah because the uk was about to leave the european union last

year or aft just after the leaving the european union so sorry it was very important for for for the british

government to to reinvigorate uh the the g7 process but this year as well the german presidency of the g7 i

think it's a it's quite active so they we have produced a lot of very a documents on on ukraine and also there

we have imposed uh sanctions on russian uh and the coordination uh between among g7 partners has been quite extraordinary

so and actually japan is going to chair uh the g7 next year so there i

i believe that there will be a smooth transition from from german presidency to the japanese presidency of the g7 so

so this is a the role of g7 i think is a very important in this regard and uh

and one of the the biggest reasons why uh the the tokyo this time

uh the position is quite tough on russia is that uh the the the prime minister shira uh said in his speech at

shangri-la dialogue just last weekend um the

or the the two weeks ago actually so so he said that the ukraine today may be east asia tomorrow

so there and an extruder has been emphasizing that the change of status score

uh by force should never been uh be

be repeated in anywhere in the world of course including these days here so the and the hidden message actually

behind that is that uh the the given the fact that japan is fully aligned with the european

powers uh on on this crisis on this war in ukraine so the our expectation is that we expect

europeans to be fully aligned with japan and u.s or other partners and allies in asia

if something really serious happens in asia involving china perhaps said the crisis in the tyrant straight to a

crisis in this house chinese or east china sea so there so so the other sort of

expectations are there and uh and and in that context the level of interest in japan in europe's

engagement in the university is really high so the that was very much a stimulated

by the by the series of european naval deployments to the region last year so that was uh the development started

by by by france by the john dark mission the the amphibious assault ship and came to japan and there we did there for the

first time the ground exercise between not only between the french and japanese forces but also together as americans as

well so so that's sort of that that actually paved a sort of way for a more

a practical cooperation including the more serious joint exercises during training and exercises between japanese

forces and various european powers and and also the last year saw a deployment of a british carrier strike

group and that attracted a lot of attention in japan as well uh and and also the the tokyo very much

welcomed the release of various indo-pacific strategies by individual european powers and also by the european

union so the of course the the the different strategies have different characters and

the different forecasts but uh but i think the one one thing uh those strategies have in common

is the fact that europeans are now going beyond china and going beyond economic field

so the going beyond china meaning that more cooperation is like mining partners and so japan australia and others

and so so chancellor schultz down a visit to japan just uh very much in the middle of the war in ukraine uh last

month or two months ago uh it was a clear demonstration that the the new german government is interested in

working more closely with the like-minded partners in asia so that that is very much a part of a going

beyond china aspect and also going beyond economy of course means that the raising political and security uh

profile uh of europe in asia so that that that is very much a a welcomed in japan

uh and and finally the let me say a few words on the geopolitical and changes and whether the geopolitical

risks have increased and that because that that's uh that's part of the the questions that i i got from our from our

convener so the and the first uh the thing i wanted to emphasize is the is the

implications and consequences of uh the increase of food price and the oil and other fuel prices

on asia because they're for of course the the hike in oil price uh and other things uh have

impacted have influenced the japan or the european countries as well but so we are sort of still lucky

to to be able to afford a higher price oil and other things but uh in some more uh less fortunate countries uh the the

the food price and oil price hikes are having more serious uh impact

so they i think it's very much in in our responsibility i mean the european japan and united states uh in

the context of g7 and other things that we have responsibility to address this problem

because they of course they everything started with the the russia's invasion

of ukraine that's that that's for sure it's 100 responsibility on russia that's for sure but still

the the we have been imposing sanctions on russia and uh that have had some impacts

the unintended uh consequences as well so so i think it's very much in our interest not not only our responsibility

but also it's in our interest as well to to address such a the repercussions of of the

the things that has been that that have been taking place in the context of the war in ukraine

and uh so just uh very finally quickly on the

the impact on china because the the the people have been wondering what sort of impact would the war in ukraine

have on china's behavior particularly vis-a-vis taiwan

so but i see there are two uh sets of inconvenient realities for for the chinese and one is that

one is the fact that the russian forces are struggling in ukraine the chinese actually expected

a quick win for the russian forces but the reality is far from that so the

so so the russians say experience in in ukraine has demonstrated how difficult it is to conquer your neighbor

particularly the neighbor where the the people are hostile to you to

hostile to to the invader so sorry now the beijing uh has to has to revise its contingency planning military

contingency planning visa with taiwan so there perhaps it takes some time but the problem is that uh in in five years

time or ten years time i'm quite sure that beijing will come up with a better uh better

military strategy um the i mean better invasion

planning for for taiwan so so we have to be very much worried about that and another a set of inconvenient

realities for for for the chinese is the is the very high level of

unity among europeans americans and japanese in imposing sanctions on russia

so the it's always a nightmare for chinese to see americans and europeans cooperating together

so the so the current level of unity particularly transatlantic unity is a

it's something that the china didn't want to see so the but

again that china we i'm quite sure that beijing will come up with a better plan

to to make its economy more resilient uh against the international sanctions and the other actions by the west

so for the moment it's good news for us but uh the in five years time or 10 years time i think the the china will

come up with a better plan so the so there are still the the so many uh uh

the the issues we have and so i very much look forward to our discussions thank

you thank you very much professor there was a tour de force uh in covering so many

topics in uh in in just two minutes and i have uh of course many many questions which i will

keep to myself for the next uh few minutes uh as uh somebody uh who has a lot to say will will now uh um

take the floor uh my colleague uh professor uh frederick sharon um um thank you thank you very much felipe and

and thank you very much uh mr ambassador and dear colleague uh professor for those two um

two very challenging and interesting um interventions of yours um i will just react to some of your of your points

heading adding a few comments and maybe um just trying to launch a debate with a few a bunch of questions like maybe

three questions not more um first of all uh ambassador opinion is stressed rightfully of course on the

link between the situation in asia pacific and what is happening right now in

ukraine of course it is seen as a test

for asia also because of what uh professor rocha said about the lessons that can be drawn

from the from the ukrainian situation especially by china everybody can guess that china and beijing uh observes very

closely uh what is happening now in in in ukraine uh beat uh the the success or the the absence of

success of the russian strategy and also of course the reactions of

the west um namely especially the us but also the

the couple between the us and iraq and nato in general so of course

there is there is a deep link between those two situations uh that which might be a danger too

because precisely because it is a test the protagonist might be ready to go pretty far it's not just

a local conflict uh it is a local conflict but what is at stake is probably more global and it turns to be

uh at least in the in the eyes of many observers also tests for the balance of power between

democracies and authoritarianism it is seen and perceived as such by many

observers and powers and governments uh probably in the world what is also striking to me is is that it's not just

only a competition between democracies and authoritarianism it's also a kind of competition between the methods of the

20th century and the method of the 21st centuries it seems that

russia vladimir putin believes or believed

that it was possible today in 2022

to do more or less same things as at the times when the soviet union crashed this prague spring

in 1968 in former czechoslovakia so a country a big country can invade a small one and

change the situation and take it all [Music] clearly

from on the democratic side especially in washington

uh the bet is totally different it is what i would call 21st century uh methods um

the bet is that you cannot do that anymore today if a power even a big power even a nuclear power tries to do

something like that invasion for instance um the costs will be very high political

but also military of course would be very high we must say that the united states

has a firsthand experience about that after what happened in iraq

and afghanistan especially iraq against it's different but so we we have this this test uh too uh

ambassador pino also uh uh recalled us that france does not support confrontation

and doesn't want to uh to support the logic of blocks which is

a very old french uh stance a kind of goalie stance refusing the logic of of the blocks in

international relations i would have a question here don't you think ambassador that we

we should clarify or position it it's pretty clear in a way that we don't want a return to the logic of blocks but how

to avoid being considered a religion ally again uh in this uh in this affair we

understand that the french will not to fuel the rhetoric of war the rhetoric of blacks

especially in asia pacific but things have changed in a way

france has probably clarified most of its misunderstanding with the united states

on the matter especially in the recent euros by coming back to the integrated comment of nato

and so on and so on so isn't there a risk don't you think there is risk to come back to this image of reluctant lie

and how to how to avoid it also you rightly

uh very interestingly pointed the the need to enhance the eu dimension in asia pacific

um how do you measure the cohesion of the eu group towards that how do you do you think that all the um the eu members

or a majority of them or are ready to to play a role in asia pacific and until and what kind of ro

until until where um professor zuroka insisted on uh uh

first of all under the role that the position of japan especially regarding ukrainians it was very striking to me

how japan showed solidarity with the democracies in the ukrainian affair which is of course a very noticeable uh

point in the crisis um the eu and north america two pillars of the west once again with much caution about this

expression um were could find the clear support of japan in

the ukrainian affair uh japan stands with the european and north american democracies we didn't have any

doubts about that but the message is very important especially for china especially for russia and probably for

many other countries um in the world it raises to me the question of the engagement of japan in the new

geopolitical situation it is a debate uh always in japan i'm not a species of japan that i was very

lucky to have a very interesting trip uh invited by your ministry of foreign affairs in japan in uh in december 1919

to 2019 just before everything closed with the coveted crisis and

we all know that there is a very pretty harsh uh debate in japan on the engagement of japan in those affairs

how would you assess the support of the public opinion in japan regarding those this clear and very uh very precious

engagement of japan in the ukrainian affairs it seems to me that we have a common

point the eu and japan we we have difficulties for many years to to have um the statute of strategic

power in relation to our economic weight it's not something new and we still have

this this problem this difficulty um income also

it was very interesting to you to to listen to you talking about the lessons uh

drawn by china about what's happening in ukraine um china you say was probably expecting a

more uh quicker and faster uh russian success uh in ukraine which we which would be a lesson for russia

for china of course um but do you think that well in europe at least many observers in the

public debate strays that maybe china will think twice now before trying to invade taiwan

or launch a kind of military aggression in in asia pacific do you think it will be

it will be the same do you think it will look like uh the same as what is happening right

now in ukraine um can we imagine that china would be ready to launch this kind of

pretty old-style invasion like russia did in ukraine uh don't you think it could take a very different form uh

maybe a kind of cyber uh destabilization or or something more progressive something more subtle

than what russia tried to do um in ukraine um and maybe

very quickly and to to finish uh just a few questions um

we've noticed and it was pretty striking to us in europe uh the very

strong reluctance to criticize russia in the south

among the the countries in the south it was the silence

or sometimes smaller than that in africa in the middle east

um or well the religions to criticize russia

uh was pretty clear how is it in in in asia i'm not talking about japan

but rather the southern countries like in asean or all the countries how how is the situation

uh regarding uh russia and ukraine uh right now um and um

also maybe a question for uh for ambassador penelo um what if

or american ally establishes a link between

the security situation in asia and the security situation in europe namely what if the united states

asked asks the european allies to be much more present

with them with the with the us uh in asia pacific for instance

by maritime patrols in uh south china sea trying to enforce uh the liberty of uh

of navigation and so on well what if the u.s asks us europeans uh a

deeper and more uh assertive presence with them in asia pacific

clearly linking this european support to the american support in europe because it's maybe a fear that we can

have well what what do we do if the americans tell us okay we we are here for you in europe given the situation

with russia and so on now we ask you

to be with us in asia to to contain uh china what what would be the european response to that i i will stop here

because we must keep some time for for the debate but thank you for very much for your very interesting fascinating

interventions for your two interventions thank you thank you frederick um you know

i think on this on this last question you asked if i may say my impression has been

until now that the americans wanted the europeans to have a sort of um

show of support but uh you know not much more than that and and and

would have preferred certainly under the previous administration but even somewhat the biden administration as

well to um maintain uh you know a stronger military

in europe so that the u.s can can can withdraw um and and focus on the indo-pacific

but that's why we have the uh french ambassador to the indo-pacific so he can he can

give us um uh he he sought um christoph would you like to to

respond to uh very many questions i'll take the last question first

i agree with you i think the u.s policy is clearly to ask

and this has been going on since donald trump to ask the europeans to share a bigger part of the burden in europe

they are committing enormous amount of resources to asia they are still

very much prominent vis-a-vis china [Music]

maybe not for long but at the moment they are on you know in many areas on technology

on advanced system etc so i think for the americans any um eu contribution to

the security of the new pacific is welcome but i don't think they have in mind to ask us to share

a very big part of the burden because they want us to do that precisely in europe not not in asia

i'll take the second question then i go in reverse order

what about all eu members it is very true that all eu member states do not have the same

degree of interest or the same level of presence or engagement in the indo-pacific but what is important

what happened through the adoption of the strategy is that there is a collective

recognition that the eu as a group has strong interests in the region

and that countries who are not interested or who are less interested now because of the crime

will not prevent you know others to engage and more importantly would not prevent the eu collectively to engage in

the region so i think the the fact that we have different uh interests

not different interests but different level of presence i would say or level of commitment to the region is not an

obstacle because we have a common policy which is the eu strategy

that was adopted by all member states and then the first question about the logic of blocks

how to avoid being considered as a reluctant ally um

when i speak of the reluctance of the eu and france to

to follow the logic of blocks it is not only because it is in our dna it is also because countries in the

region do not follow this logic and do not want to be drawn into a polarization and have to choose between america and

the u.s if you look at asean if you look at india and to a certain extent if you look

japan and korea as well to a certain extent this is what we hear so it's not only a

french vision or european vision it is also what

partners in the region feel like you know and it is i think very important

we have a china policy we still have this policy which was adopted in 2019 of engaging china

well when we can as a partner and that involves you know on climate change on biodiversity

on non-proliferation north korea iran and other issues such as the

burden of debt for african countries but we also consider that china is a very serious competitor economic and

technological and a systemic rival so there is a balance between the three and more

well we we have we consider that in the past two years the balance has gone very much

in the direction of systemic rivalry but we still want to engage with china we still have a dialogue with china

including on human rights issues and it doesn't mean that we are um or that

we seek equidistance between china and the us france is an ally of the united states

we work very closely with the u.s in many parts of the indo-pacific for

instance in the pacific part of the indo-pacific but also on other issues

there are many issues on which we are converging with the u.s so it's not an equidistance it's simply the fact that

we are allied but we are not aligned thank you thank you ambassador and i want to pick up on what frederick uh

actually asked when he mentioned uh the idea of um reluctant ally

um professor uh tsuroka how do you feel the the role of the eu perhaps the role of france as a kind of

third power trying to play a role in a region which is far away which is not necessarily our back garden so to speak

when you have president biden visiting japan recently and and the

republic of korea and when you have the shangri-la dialogue

which many of us took part in recently um

and and things seems very much focused on on the pacific region uh while of course france considers

itself rightly as a um indo-pacific nation uh and and i'm sure ambassador pino will will we can add on that

but i'd like to to hear you you you your view on on on this how you see from your standpoint this this move and also

as a footnote you mentioned russia very interesting points earlier

could you tell us in a few sentences how you feel about russia japan relations especially since you

have territorial uh issues thank you very much okay thank you very much for all the

fascinating important questions uh the and first on the yes the role of uh europe

uh in relation to that of the united states in the region

the i don't think uh europe can substitute

role played by the united states and i don't think the

europeans uh want to substitute america's role in the region so the united states and europe

individually as individual countries or the eu or nato they have different

roles and uh but from japan's perspective and uh from my personal perspective the

what i think is the increasingly important is the sort of a network of various us

alliances and partnerships in the region so there it's quite interesting that the us in the pacific strategy talks about

the bringing together and making a bridge between european allies and partners and

asian allies and partners so that how we could bring those uh different alliances and different partnerships together and

closer and that that is quite important because the in in the japanese context for example what

we have been trying to do in recent years is to connect the us japan alliance with

japan australia strategic partnership in japan france and japan uk defense relationships and how we could uh

how we could ensure synergies between those different and kinds of alliances and partnerships

so that that is becoming more important because of the relative decline of american power in the region so it used

to be that american presence was dominant so the the power balance between the us

and china was very much in favor of the united states but that is no longer the case today

so the we need to we need to bring other partners and allies together first

and foremost to to support the the current rules-based order in the region

and also the it is about uh maintaining the the u.s presence in the region as

well so the i i i'm that is why and because of the relative decline of

american power and that is what uh the president biden and others in the united states are fully aware of

so that that is why the u.s is asking more help from from its allies and partners and so that is why it's in the

americas interest as well to see more european uh for example the naval deployments in

the region so sort of bringing together or perhaps a plugging in

uh the the france or the uk and other european partners into what

japan us or australia are already doing in the region so so that that that i think is becoming more more important

and the uh and if you add on the on i think the

the the beijing's approach to to to taiwan in the wake of the war in ukraine yes

the the the frederick is is really correct that uh the it is now

it now makes more sense for for beijing to try to be more subtle

rather than doing an overt classical type of military invasion against taiwan so because now

the the beijing is fully aware how difficult it is to to invade uh invade an unfriendly a country or neighbor

so so the more subtle subtler approach utilizing the the disinformation hybrid tactics

including cyber attacks uh i think that's what the beijing is now uh thinking of rather

than firing missiles again against taiwan or rather than landing uh the ground troops to on on taiwan

so the and uh and related to that uh the the

i'm i i'm personally actually getting a bit concerned about the the way in which

nato helps ukraine and nato helps uh eastern funk uh countries like uh like

the baltic states because what we are seeing now is a weapons support without troops and without participation

without direct involvement yes they they they have good reasons uh not not to not

directly involved in any conflict in in ukraine or of course you don't want to fight against russians

uh in in ukraine that's uh that's 100 understandable but uh

a bit of a the sort of a worrisome uh uh discussions uh starting to to take

place in the united states and in asia and particularly in the united states now the more and more people talking

about uh sending weapons to taiwan if something rests

if something really serious happens there rather than thinking about talking about

descending troops so the yes the sending weapons is good but sending weapons

in some cases cannot substitute direct involvement direct military involvement

so the yes the there are now more and more things and we have been discovering how

how how new things we can do just by sending weapons or sharing intelligence with ukrainians but

if the the effectiveness of a armed support weapons support

becomes too high then that could end up the decreasing incentive or for or need

for for direct participation direct military involvement so the if the the success of a weapons

support end up increasing and if we end of the

heightening threshold for direct military involvement that i think

could cause uh some

concerns not only in taiwan but also in other u.s allies in the region

and the another uh debate that i'm uh following closely and getting a bit more concerned about is the

german way of reinforcing its uh its native uh presence in lithuania so so chancellor schultz

uh seemed to have agreed about expanding

the the presence of german forces in lithuania from a battalion level to a to a a brigade level

so but uh in the end it's now becoming clear that uh what the germans are suggesting is not a sending

brigade combat brigade to to lithuania but only only establishing a headquarters in the training and the

troops remain in germany and and they will be sent to utrania only when necessary so this is a sort of a ford

deployment without troops so this sort of model gets established in nato

so the the meaning of ford deployment could change and that is not a quite good news for

countries in the form on the front line like the baltic states of course but at the same time the taiwan japan or other

on the u.s allison partners in the asia-pacific region so the weapons support without troops so

they're for deployment without troops if this sort of a new innovative survey a concept gets established then that's uh

not that may not be a a great news for for those uh sitting on the front line so

that is my my sort of a personal uh thank you thank you very very interesting i think you have to take

into account you know which which member which member state of nato uh obviously you know the german approach i'm sure

frederick can comment on that he's quite different from the french approach or from the british approach

um there's you know many books will be written about this subject but uh let's move back to the indo-pacific if i may

and there's one question from actually one of my students which i'm glad to to see um

udita um it's about investments um and perhaps uh ambassador pino could could answer that one

investments can be seen as a modern way of spreading a country sphere of influence

so with initiatives such as global gateway or the buildback better word in the us

how do you rationalize the principles of sovereignty independence non-interference and confrontations that

are deeply rooted and publicized as the value of the eu and western powers as a whole very very

ambitious question but um um christophe would you like to take that

one and maybe comment on anything else that professor tura said

well uh i i don't really share this view that

investment is uh is wrong in a way because investment is obviously a way to spread

one's influence but there's nothing wrong with that as long as the recipient country

accepts it and that it is being the investment is being carried out by respecting the rules and this is

precisely why we want to provide an alternative offer to belton road initiative

belton road initiative sometimes means investment that do not respect sustainability

uh debt uh social regulations environmental impact and so on as long as investment

is based on these rules i see personally i see nothing wrong with it

and i think the eu is already the first investor in the indo-pacific number one investor

and will remain so for the foreseeable future but my second comment is that investment

is not enough we have invested a lot in china we were hoping that

developing our economic ties with china would bring about in the future a different china

a more converging china converging with our values and it hasn't worked it's obvious

so investment is one aspect of the policy but you need to also act and engage in other issues including

security including promoting principles of multilateralism and the rule of law including

you know digital economy connectivity including climate change so investment is not in itself the the

answer to what is going on in the indo-pacific but it is something that we should pursue

and i don't see anything um wrong with it personally and professor sturoka

said something very interesting regarding the complementarity

i think that exists between different contributions to the

indo-pacific i think the american uh america is the u.s are a key actor in this region it's obvious for everybody

uh europe has not the same level of presence or engagement but european action can be

which is converging but sometimes slightly different from

what the us want to do is complementary to the u.s approach and

i think what professor turoka was describing is actually a multipolar indo-pacific and this is precisely the

vision that we have and of course we have to promote this vision

because a bipolar in the pacific would be a nightmare for all countries of the region

right and this is also a view from china actually china is very much in in in in favor of a multipolar

word um i'd like to hear briefly frederic to to to comment on on on uh professor

soroka's uh points on on nato which which is of course a little bit outside in the pacific but if you could give us

a quick answer that would be great well that on on on sorry there is a noise outside on uh on the difference

between french and germany more precisely or yeah yeah well you know how he he's wary uh from from from japan

and this is actually you know uh a japan europe dialogue that we're having right now you know and how how

you would respond to this concern that you know and you're an expert on defense issues so how you know this new world of

of of supplying uh weapons and equipments rather than than than troops or or that rather than

political supports i i think it's what we can witness now in ukraine which is to supply to to send

weapons rather than troops uh is a very specific situation uh

ukraine is not in nato this is precisely the point and it's not part of the priority alliance

of nato that's why the united states explained several times so um we will the

american approach i mean this american approach we can let's not try to imagine what would have been the american

response to the ukrainian crisis with donald trump that would have been this is another

another problem concerning uh concerning nato's uh reliability uh today but um let's let's stick to the other binding

administration uh the american administration says precisely

ukraine is not part of nato ukraine is not part of it's not a priority a lie so the case is different of course if one

of our allies was attacked uh beat a nato member or in which case article 5

would be triggered or even a country with defense agreements which is a case of of japan

it has even been extended a little bit by joe biden to taiwan when he repeated twice that the us would defend taiwan

the first time we didn't know exactly if it was a gaff or a kind of improvised answer the second time clearly that's

exactly what it was meaning um it's different and so i think there is there is there are fears among the

allies of nato and the u.s today and there are fears because several times in the past uh the united states

seemed not to be a reliable partner but each time with with countries or groups who had not no

difference agreements with the us the kurds syria in a way

now ukraine and these triggered fears uh among the allies of the us what what is the ust reliable is there still a a

secure guarantee of security what if we were attacked what would they do and so on and each time the united

states answer that that's different for you because we have

agreements and and we have defense agreements so i would not worry too much um about a general trend for nato

trying to replace uh the sending of troops by uh sending weapons i think ukraine is a specific case that does not

illustrate um a global trend uh

[Music] as far as the the real ions the real alliance with treaties and texts

are concerned i'm not i'm not worried too much about that um but uh

another problem is uh when you mention also the difference between the allies it's not a matter of wheel i think it's

it's a matter of capacity i think that germany for instance but even even

most of the nato countries are just today not able i think to to fight

and to to show some uh determination uh

in a situation of tension i i think this is a problem we all depend on the united states in nato right now i don't think

that the doctrine has changed uh i i think that the the loneliness of the united states

as a strategic actual able to act concretely to send troops or with the kind of

military side lafayette or know how due to support allies especially with projection of troops at the other side

of the world and so on uh the us is probably alone in this in this situation france and britain a

little bit but with very limited means today uh for budgetary constraints and and many reasons i think that's that's a

big problem then of course there is another problem just what if donald trump or a kind of uh

someone likes him uh comes back to power and i say this is the real problem and today the question

is um should countries like european like in the eu or countries like japan develop

a capacity to defend themselves alone of course there is there is a question there but i don't think the doctrine has

changed i think the the the solitude of the united states in its capacity to act is the problem today

and then maybe tomorrow with a new administration maybe the will of the united states due to act

all right thanks very much that was very helpful um we have only about uh

12 minutes left um i'd like to go to the to the to the chat we have a few questions and uh i'll i'll

i'll go to turoka in in one second but the first question is about the south china sea we were

talking about crisis in in indo-pacific and do you see that as a as a potential uh crisis be beyond the

taiwan strait which is the one we've been discussing mainly and the second question is from that

that was from uh erta mananti and the second question is from our colleague professor uh joseph

mila uh he is asking uh since the launching of quad by prime minister abbey

this is the idea of the free and open indo-pacific strategy um

what about the asean outlook on the indo-pacific is there a robust consensus on this vision by all partners and

stakeholders um [Music]

will um will uh well uh airtight is saying that's that's not her question uh but