World reacts to Obama's new military focus on Asia
(Read article summary)Chinese newspapers call on China to assert itself, while India and African nations ponder the implications of becoming 'strategic partners' with the US.
Was that a collective sigh, or a gasp?
President Obama and his Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced yesterday that the US military would essentially go on a diet, after one of the largest ramp-ups in military spending since World War II.
Reaction across the world thus far has been muted, and in the case of China – the country Mr. Panetta identified as an emerging threat in November – there has been no official reaction at all, as the Monitor's Peter Ford points out today.
In addition to ending its military presence in Iraq, and drawing down forces over the next few years in Afghanistan, the US military will also reduce its massive presence in Europe – a legacy of the cold war – and shift more of its assets to the Asia-Pacific region to counterbalance the growing economic and military strength of China.
In Africa, Latin America, and elsewhere on the globe, the US will “use innovative methods to sustain US presence, maintaining key military-to-military relations and pursuing new security partnerships as needed,” Mr. Panetta told reporters in Washington.
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