During His Asia Trip, Can Trump Assuage Doubts About America’s Leading Role in the Region?

It is an ambitious trip. He will stop in Japan and South Korea, two US allies, and China, by far the most important Asian country for Washington. In Da Nang, Vietnam, he will attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, and in Manila, he will attend a gala dinner to mark Asean’s 50th anniversary. Taken together, these destinations and occasions are a cartographic representation of key US interests in Asia. The question is how Trump will use his visit to underline American commitment to the region.

Asians will ask for different things from him. For South Korea, the agenda is assured. North Korea’s nuclear and missile provocation has risen so high on the radar of American patience that the danger is not that Trump will do too little on that front but perhaps too much. There is a danger that Pyongyang will overshadow his entire Asia trip.

Indeed, his stance on North Korea will be welcomed in Japan as well, since it lies in the immediate path of Pyongyang’s missile tests. It would not be going too far to say that Tokyo would benefit from a public declaration of Washington’s strategic bottom line as much as Seoul would.