The Indo-Pacific strategy’s fatal blind spot

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Carl Bildt is a former prime minister and foreign minister of Sweden. Is the dominance of “Indo-Pacific” thinking leading Western strategists astray? Originating in Australian foreign policy circles, the United States adopted this label in 2018, when the Hawaii-based U.S. Pacific Command was officially renamed the Indo-Pacific Command. The status of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (“Quad”), comprising Australia, India, Japan and the U.S., was duly elevated, and Europe, too, got on board, with a minor avalanche of policy documents bearing the same label. In pushing the Indo-Pacific line, Western strategists usually emphasize the importance of bringing India into the fold....