"I envisage a strategy whereby Australia, India, Japan, and the US ... form a diamond to safeguard the maritime commons stretching from the Indian Ocean region to the western Pacific," declared then Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe in an oft-cited essay upon his return to power in the early-2010s. Specifically, the Japanese leader called on the four like-minded powers to ensure China doesn't become the dominant maritime power in adjacent waters. As Abe bluntly put it, his proposed "security diamond" should jointly prevent vital sea-lanes of communications such as the South China Sea from turning into "Lake Beijing". To this…
News Timeline:
Track the development of this news story across the Internet.