by Lucio Blanco Pitlo III/ November 15, 2019/ Originally Posted at the Diplomat

Growing aid, trade, and diplomatic outreach and rumored interest in securing bases heighten worries about China’s expanding footprint in the Pacific. But while Pacific island states are not naïve to growing great power competition, they do not necessarily share the same level of concerns as those held by Oceania’s longstanding powers. Some even welcome China’s arrival as a way to compel traditional Pacific powers to recommit to the region. Besides, while Beijing certainly wants to increase its influence in the Blue Continent, the attitudes of longstanding powers, especially in relation to climate change, provide greater push for island countries to accommodate new suitors.

China’s Pacific outreach is on a roll. From 2011 to 2019, China provided $1.47 billion in concessional loans to Pacific island states. If it pays up to its pledges, it may overtake Australia to become the region’s top donor. Last month, the Third China-Pacific Island Countries Economic Development and Cooperation Forum was held in Apia, Samoa attended by Vice Premier Hu Chunhua. In the same month, President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang met Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare in Beijing. Xi also met former New Zealand Prime Minister John Key in Beijing. In September, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi met Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, a timely meeting given increasingly frayed bilateral ties.

Also in September, the Solomon Islands and Kiribati both switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. Of the 15 remaining diplomatic allies of Taiwan, four are in the Pacific, highlighting the region’s priority for Beijing’s foreign policy.

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) also elicited incipient high-level Pacific participation. Fijian Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama attended the first Belt and Road Forum in 2017, while Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister Peter O’Neill attended the second one last April. The Joint Communique of the second Belt and Road Forum mentioned an interest to work with the Pacific Islands Forum, where China has been a dialogue partner since 1990.

Though minuscule in land area, the strategic location, vastness, and marine resources of Pacific island countries made them the object of interest of bigger powers. From the 16th to the 20th centuries, Spain, Germany, Great Britain, France, Japan, and the United States took part in the scramble for the Pacific and to this day some islands remain as overseas territories of these great powers. Crucial battles of World War II took place in the Pacific theater, including the Battles of the Coral Sea, Midway and Iwo Jima. Britain, France, and the United States conducted nuclear tests on the islands. Read more…