Good afternoon i hope everybody had a good thanksgiving break. Welcome back to washington, welcome to brookings im bruce jones the director of the policy program at brookings and its my pleasure to welcome you to our event for east Asian Pacific affairs. David stillwell is appointed as assistant secretary of state by President Trump of the 20th of june he served in the air force for 35 years beginning as a Korean League west in 1980 and retiring in 2015 as a Brigadier General he was the asia adviser to the chairman of the joint death of staff from 21 to 2013 you also recently served as the director of the u. S. Focus group. He was also an adjunct fellow thank you to your service to this country. As you can see from his background the david has been at the forefront of managing the policy questions the shape the u. S. And china friendship. Working tirelessly behind the scenes to build policy with china is also then keeping our wider focus on the region as a whole. Where we have a huge number of relationships, partners, allies, and interests that go well beyond simply the question of china. Assistant secretary still well and i and many years together at Work Together at the mount fuji dialog in tokyo tokyo. With thinkers coming together to discuss the state of the alliance. But also the question on the shared or non shared perception of the geopolitical challenges being confronted. And on surprisingly china was at the top of the agenda. David and i were talking in the green room and he was on stage with a number of other actors, people who served in the obama and Trump Administration. A certain amount of friction and and the tactical issues under each administration. What struck me more than that was the 30,000 foot perspective. There is no real to debate about the challenge that china proposes to u. S. Interests in the region. I suspected that debate is not fully settled in the, country it seems to me and the strategic areas of washington. Theres a stronger early consolidated view of the threat that china poses. Its not seen the same in the financial sector, the technology sector. I think that debate continues. The question on how the United States should respond. With any question about the changing role of china its the focus of the project that we are here to continue working on. To continue launching. We read a lot, the press, about the trade war with china. About economic and technology questions. Stricter offense and strategic questions are critically important as well and thats where david has been doing most of his work over recent years. Given his expertise we could have nobody better to help us introduce this phase of the global china project. And the paper of the hole. Which really focuses on the east asia region in some of these critical defense questions in that region. This is one part of a broader project running over 18 months that aims to establish a baseline for understanding and assessing chinas global role which is changing as we speak, and expanding as we speak, and putting christmas around the role of what its playing. We published play pages on strategic investigation. And we will have an additional paper on the emerging frontier technologies in the multilateral system. Today we are going to be focused on east asia, the papers on north korea, the east in South China Sea and Southeast Asia. Following a key not notice dress from secretary still will have a moderator discussion in that a panel at the office with on their research. Before a hand the floor to david to further notice to meet. Bookings disclose as the precipitation of its scholars. Scholars do that work on their own time in off the process there is an important part of our strategy. We disclose that on our website, you can go to scholars bioscience either affiliations. As of now we have scholars advising biden, harris, and buttigieg campaigns and scholars serving the Trump Administration. Part of a tradition at the working scholars has served in every presidency since fdr. I would like to thank the foundation for this. David thank you for spending time with us today. Over to you. Good afternoon its great to be here and see all these friendly faces. I would like to call out ryan house who recruited me for this duty i am grateful for him he is the d. C. And in beijing who taught me more about china than i ever learned so great to see you both, i hope i do not disappoint, topic today is on the idea of pluralism and in this job as i approach this job ive had to think through intellectual trappings for what we are doing here to accomplish and what my advice is to the secretary, trying to distill down into an idea or a single word, it is fraught with risk and i look forward to the debate. As we think about these things, wrestling with these concepts is just as important, i think, as it elucidated in them here. The wrestling for the event was very welcome and i thank you for the opportunity. So, this discussion today is about the peoples republic of china and a mostly its impact on the region and our response to that region and the world. A quick review of policy and in this theme of pluralism that comes to mind as we consider this challenge. First off, policy, i have been fairly public on what that strategy looks like. Just to restate, its obvious that this administration has made longoverdue changes to the policy in the region. China is a major consideration, but so is the relationship with a diverse set of likeminded of partners. Years ago when it began to grow from its ideological isolation and economic weakness, now forming an opening at time, emphasis on opening, requiring the Chinese Communist party to adapt to the larger region and world in order to benefit from the benefits of multilateralism. We understood it would take some time but were encouraged by progress in the 1980s, best demonstrated at a small dumpling restaurant in tinman that in 88 was privately owned. It was one of the first experimental private publicprivate it was a chance to use this human creativity and initiative in the chance to get rich through your own work and sell a product. In this case, dumpings. They had one product, one type of dumpling, that was it. The beer was cold, the food was good, the service was outstanding. The restaurant next door was entirely publicly government owned, where when you walked in you had to kind of wake up the staff to serve you and all that resulted from there. The point was that in the 80s, we saw this new idea, the energy of a Kentucky Fried Chicken on the west side of Tiananmen Square and it gave us great hope. It certainly did to me. Given those initial hopeful signs, our policy for many years was largely premised on a version of the golden rule, american officials hope that by demonstrating the benefits of openness we would move beijing to a more liberal path, leading to more economic and political openness. I dont need to rehash how that turned out, but it is clear that many of our a suction wrong. 20 years of antiassurances that they would continue to work towards greater openness has triggered an overdue rethink of our approach to prc its ambitions and our response. The administration is now addressing the prc as it is and not how we wished it would be. What we have seen over the past two decades is that liberal reform has slowed and in some cases reversed. As the prc gained greater wealth and power and became more integrated with the world, did not converge with the free and open global order as we expected. Instead they hope to reshape the International System to become more compatible with its own authoritarian practices. The Trump Administration has been clear that even as our relationships are competitive, we welcome cooperation where interests align. Competition does not have to lead to confrontation or conflict. We have a deep respect for the Chinese People and their is a long history of cooperation is trading partners and even allies in world war ii and that legacy, of course, is what got me interested in this, as i share the name of one of the key players in that. Our aim is to defend sovereignty, advanced regional interests and promote a free open and rulesbased order in asia and worldwide. Now that there is a great shift in policy, it has triggered some questions. If the responsible stakeholder notion has been overtaken by reality, what replaces it . We know that washington is against aggressive and threatening conduct by beijing. But what are we for . Whats our positive statement on all of this . Are we forcing countries to choose . We hear that a lot. Out of this, the word pluralism is not the complete answer to all of these questions, but i think it helps the frame where we are going with this and captures something essential about what we mean when we talk about diversion visions of world order. In dictionary terms, always start with the definition, pluralism is about the coexistence of multiple things. States, groups, principles, opinions for ways of life. In short it means diversity and openness. My point in diplomatic terms is that our foreignpolicy vision rooted in democratic pluralism at home supports a corresponding pluralism abroad, to. Thats in the Indo Pacific Region and across the world. We support systems covered by freedom, rule of law, and respect for the rights of ones neighbors. Just as our vision of pluralism at home is rooted in the sovereign rights of individuals, our vision of pluralism abroad is rooted in the sovereign rights of the states. This has been americas vision for generations. The challenge today is that the appreciation of pluralism is not universal and we must come to its defense. We have all heard about the new type of vision of Global Governance that denigrates pluralism, even though the existing system has served the world and china included very well in the seven decades since world war ii. For details, a pluralistic asia is one in which these diverse countries can continue to thrive as they wish. Secure in their sovereign autonomy, free to be themselves, as singapore put it. No hegemonic power courses them. In a pluralistic china countries pluralistic asia, sorry, they enjoy open and shared use of International Waters where airspace belongs to all and no one country can convert them into sole possession zones of exclusion. Pluralism, as President Trump said two years ago, countries in the region should remain a diverse constellation of stars, each shining brightly, none a satellite to any other. It is important to recognize that the region cherishes the vision for themselves. We know this, for example, from the recent outlook on the asiapacific, emphasizing inclusivity for respect for the regions nations large and small. We know it from the charter the calls from for upholding the principle of unity and diversity. We know it from the japanese free and open indo pacific vision and the south korean policy, the australian indo pacific concept. These focus on broadening ties to other nations based on rule of law and respect for sovereignty, with shared access to the commons and prosperity. The u. S. Supports pluralism around the globe. After world war ii, the United States led the creation of the poorest post International Order that was free to an unprecedented degree. Following this after world war i, the postworld war ii system was designed to benefit victors, giving all an equal voice in the international forum. The arrangements looked to prevent a new world war by ensuring that prosperity could be shared, as with all human endeavors. These things fall short of perfection, but overall this idea for the last seven decades has been a stunning success. As President Trump said in addressing the United Nations, it is an eternal credit to the american character that even after we and our allies emerged victorious from the bloodiest war in history, we did not seek territorial expansion or attempt to impose our way on the lives of others. Instead we helped to build institutions like this one to defend the sovereignty, security, and prosperity of all. The genuine winwin approach fueled the greatest explosion of prosperity the world has ever seen. It spread naturally around the globe to countries that opted to join the world economy. The opportunity was seized. Great powers did not dole it out as some sort of imperial largess. Its a view deeply ingrained in american thinking, fair play is about genuine arrangements. Everyone can benefit. Life is not necessarily zerosum. My being strong and prosperous doesnt require others to be weak or poor. This is also how we conduct national relations. Been up and we are weak or for something because some one else in the world makes money or has power. On the contrary, we think that these insights can benefit us and the power of others can make the world better place in the they will make things we want to buy and buy the things we make. Positive synergistic thinking is inherently synergistic area this is why the u. S. Never sought exclusive power in asia or the world. With the collapse of soviet communism, the United States became at least for a time the worlds only socalled superpower. But we didnt use that position to keep other countries down. On the contrary, we invested substantially in the growth of other countries, including china, japan, india, and others, to bring about greater wealth and prosperity elsewhere, not just your home. That is pluralism or multipolarity. We dont fear or oppose such multipolarity. On the contrary, we have cultivated it, sharing the burdens of keeping the world safe and secure. The u. S. Does not oppose growth in power and prosperity of other countries. We dont view it as a zerosum matter or at threat. As one historian records, but they were flying to the u. S. After normalization in 1979, the one minister asked why he picked to the u. S. For his first trip as leader. He said because, their allies are all rich and strong and of china wants to be rich and strong, we need america. There is a lesson here about chinas own experience with pluralism. China was on a better trajectory in the era of reform and opening when it moved towards greater pluralism in politics and policy. This is what i witnessed first in that scratchy dumpling shop. At that time many were fond of quoting the practical idea that it doesnt matter if the the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice. Realistic and open to several options, right . Maybe more fraught, the concept of let 100 flowers bloom. More pluralism and less authoritarianism would be better for the Chinese People in the world. A less authoritarian china would be likely less aggressive overseas. The increasing authoritarianism reflected in his new type of governance was in this region and beyond. So, from another perspective, beijings new type of governance, chinese officials have spoken for themselves. Then the foreign minister summed it up well in 2010 at the Regional Forum when he declared that china is a big country and you are all small countries and that is just a fact. For beijing, International Relations is about hierarchy and big makes right. Its not respectful pluralism were sovereign autonomy. Inside china, the communist party increasingly enforces digital and ideological homogeneity. As is increasingly apparent in hong kong and beyond, the chinese idea of governance is enforcement of uniformity. At the global level, what is chinas view of pluralism . Consider how it responded when a single nba executive tweeted an unwelcome opinion about hong kong. Clearly beijings campaign to compel ideological conformity does not stop at their borders. So, to wrap up, there is a choice before us. Addressing this idea of not forcing us to choose. I want to address this relationship between pluralism and choice. If a pluralistic world is one where countries have the freedom to be themselves, thats a freedom to make choices. Pluralism and choice go handinhand. Lets consider the commonly heard concern that countries will forced to choose between the u. S. And china. They will be forced by us to make a choice. When we say that the American Vision is pluralistic and inclusive, we mean it and the record shows it. We have no objection if other countries strive to deal with beijing and cooperative and cordial ways. In our foreign relations, though, all countries constantly make choices about policy issues, economics, trade, sovereignty, security, etc. These choices affect interests and wellbeing. We encourage our allies and partners to choose prudently in ways that protect their Sovereign National interests. It means the ability to live free of domination and to make ones own decisions. We are not looking to dictate to others and we want our allies and friends not to be subject to others dictates. Sovereignty is important, without it the freedom to choose at all can be lost. Choices that preserve sovereignty preserve the future and freedom of choice that we all cherish. A region in which countries maintain their freedom of choice is a pluralistic region and will be more prosperous and secure. I will close by returning to our policy. It has long been the view of america that the postwar International System is sufficiently resilient and adaptable to accommodate and gladly incorporate a strong and prosperous china that plays by the rules and has served the world so well. The system is capable of change and has adapted to many ideas and pressures not imagined decades ago. It is our hope that beijing will return to the path of reform and convergence with more respect at home and abroad for pluralism being a welcome sign. With that, i look forward to your questions and to the upcoming interaction. Thank you for your attention. Mr. Secretary, thank you, we are still on. Thank you for the fascinating talks. You gave us a lot to ponder. I want to get right to it before we bring the many other voices into the conversation and switch out with the panel. There was a specific word that you used in your excellent speech that i really noticed and wanted to follow up with. When you talked about the u. S. Endorsing