1. They are all speculation at this stage. The submarine deal is the main revenue earner for America’s MIC. if the true goal was to contain China, why not arm Taiwan or Japan with nuke subs.
2. What happened to Russia in all this? Russia would be threatened by this US move for sure. They don’t want American nuke subs in Asia. Now Russia is our strategic ally. How are they thinking about QUAD and these US moves?
3. Another of our strategic ally France also has been pissed off by the US. So two of our main strategic equipment suppliers have been pissed off by the US. And you expect these guys to ignore our participation in QUAD - yet another US move? No way, no how.
4. How is that Australia, until recently a very pro China country to the extent that they let Australian universities have confusion institutes everywhere and even supplied Uranium to China (in fact denying us the yellow cake) has suddenly become an anti-China country? Despite all the threatening rhetoric from China, what has Australia got to really lose? Nothing. They have no territorial disputes with the Chinese at all.
5. If this is all about naval basing rights, they can do so in Okinawa right under the Chinese noses or in Singapore, a strong US ally. Why Australia? White power?
6. if the US-India joint defense technology R&D project is anything to go by, we can be assured that the Quad is going to be a spectacular failure. If we cannot achieve much from the 2+2 dialog with the US, why are you under the illusion that the QUAD will achieve that? If we cannot even get the US to issue a CAATSA waiver, why are we in QUAD? Have we told the US, things like CAATSA waivers are a must to build trust?
7. Japan hardly says anything about the QUAD. No press releases, nothing. Japanese have dealt with the Americans long enough to know what works and what doesn’t.
8. If we want to be in every arrangement to show we are flexible, why not RCEP, why not still do the useless NAM? The reality is pandering to everyone would not be seen as a strength. It is just going to make all parties distrust us and not really invite us to the big table. This is already being seen where the US is now looking to Indonesia to setup vaccine exports for COVAX, after their request to us to export did not get a response. Now, this is a central feature of India’s participation in Quad and India is going in with a trust deficit/let down/hand wringing on this core QUAD idea. How exactly will this forum succeed then?
I don’t agree with the premise we get into all sorts of alliances. That type of diplomacy has disadvantages for us as we found out in Iran when we got kicked out of lucrative gas field projects. Now if we get too close to Iran to make up, you can kiss top of the line Israeli defense tech goodbye. so, there are real consequences from cozying up to everyone.
We need to figure out what we want to be, and then pick strategic allies that will help us get there. Or, if we truly want to be a great power capable of manipulating other countries, better become a solid defense exporter and a self sufficient military tech powerhouse. This is why the US is in so many organizations around the world. They don’t even care making a deal with the Taliban or pissing off NATO allies even, as they least bother about consequences from playing alliance games. We are nowhere near the power of the US, and playing alliance games like the US does will bite us in the back.