Running through the worldwide acclaim for US president-elect Barack Obama last week have been several threads of Asian skepticism, appeals and even threats.
Chinese leaders sent congratulations that included a subtle reminder that they expected Obama to acknowledge their contentious claim to Taiwan. On the day Americans voted, the Chinese issued a policy paper on Latin America that the US has long considered its backyard.
A senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official, Yang Wanming (楊萬明), said the paper proposed “enhancing military cooperation” between China and Latin American countries. On the same day, China put on display for the first time its indigenous J10 jet fighter at an air show.
A commentator in the government-controlled China Daily urged Obama “to recharter an American foreign policy that will move away from pre-emptive doctrine to one of resolving nation-to-nation disputes on the table and to embrace more consultation on the world arena while avoiding confrontations.”
Across the Taiwan Strait, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) weighed in with an appeal that “the long friendship between the United States and the Republic of China (Taiwan) will continue to strengthen and grow,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
But a spokeswoman for the Democratic Progressive Party, Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲), was dubious of Obama, saying: “The Republicans have leaned more toward Taiwan while the Democrats have leaned more toward China.”
She pointed to former president Bill Clinton’s siding with China on the Taiwan issue.
From Japanese commentators flowed considerable anxiety. The Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan’s largest daily, said: “So far, Obama has talked only in generalities.”
The paper worried that he would be protectionist. The Asahi Shimbun, a leftist paper, said that for Japanese, Obama was an “unknown quantity.”
Yoshihisa Komori, a columnist at the conservative Sankei Shimbun, called Obama “a frighteningly unknown politician” who would rely less on traditional alliances, such as with Japan, and more on international organizations in foreign policy.
In South Korea, the largest newspaper, Chosun Ilbo, applauded Obama’s election, but added: “Yet Obama has shortcomings, such as scant diplomatic experience and no administrative career. He is also inclined to protectionist trade policies on behalf of the US economy.”
Filipinos split on Obama’s stance on the 600 US troops posted in the southern Philippines to help the Philippine Armed Forces fight Moro insurgents. Some urged Obama to keep the troops there, others urged him to withdraw them.
The Thai daily Nation quoted Obama thus: “Americans have sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of red states and blue states.”
The paper then lamented the bitter “red and yellow” divisions in Thailand today, wishing they “could correspond to blue and red in the US.”
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said he had written to Obama: “Many issues will claim your attention. May I make a case for the importance of Southeast Asia to the US, a region which is not unfamiliar to you,” referring to Obama’s childhood in Indonesia. A writer for the Straits Times, however, was skeptical of Obama’s emphasis on hope: “Alas, I’m not sure hope is enough.”
In New Delhi, the Times of India commented: “Obama will be a breath of fresh air in almost every part of the world … Why, then, is India keeping her fingers crossed?” The paper said: “There is little clarity on how the chips will fall on several issues … Pakistan, China, terrorism, nuclear issues, trade, all issues on which India has had a prickly relationship with the Democratic Party.”
In the Australian, columnist Greg Sheridan wrote: “For Australia, Obama is a very mixed bag. Despite a couple of years in Indonesia as a kid, Obama has little knowledge of, or interest, in Asia.” Pointing to US President George W. Bush’s support for Australia, the article concluded: “Don’t expect Obama to be anywhere near as mindful of Australia.”
Indonesian students in an elementary school in the Menteng section of Jakarta, which Obama attended as a child, watched election returns on TV, then erupted into the schoolyard to dance in the rain and shout “Obama, we love you.”
Richard Halloran is a writer based in Hawaii.
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