Events that displease China’s diplomats are usually good for the United States, and this week they were hopping mad. At the height of the NATO summit, China’s ambassador to Nepal, Chen Song, castigated the "‘ass kissers’ everywhere in Europe."
His anger is well founded. Between the bombing raid on Iran’s nuclear program and the summit’s results, the last few days have been good ones for Americans and their friends. Donald Trump entered office intent on rebalancing America’s alliances, and he is making important progress toward his goal. He is creating an opening for an updated Nixon Doctrine.
The summer after his inauguration, Richard Nixon laid it out during a stopover in Guam. "The time has come when the United States," he told some reporters, needs to "be quite emphatic on two points: One, that we will keep our treaty commitments" to defend them. His second point, however, was "as far as the problems of internal security are concerned, as far as the problems of military defense, except for the threat of a major power involving nuclear weapons," he wanted to step back. Instead, "the United States is going to encourage and has a right to expect that this problem will be increasingly handled by, and the responsibility for it taken by, the Asian nations themselves."
Nixon initially applied this doctrine to American allies in East and Southeast Asia, but Israel was the poster child. Since American forces were tied down in Vietnam, the Soviets were energetically striving to reach nuclear parity with the United States, and Europe was the decisive theater for the Cold War, Washington needed to avoid extensive deployments elsewhere. Israel subsequently defeated Egypt and Syria during the Yom Kippur War, which exposed Soviet powerlessness and greatly improved America’s strategic position. The United States resupplied Israeli forces, and the White House raised the nuclear alert level to deter Soviet adventurism, but the U.S. military otherwise stayed out of the fight. For Americans, the payoff was as great as the cost was low.
China’s partners are stronger and more bellicose than the Soviet Union’s subordinates were, and the military situation is not nearly as grim as it was at the height of the Vietnam war, so a carbon copy of the Nixon Doctrine would be unsuitable and is unnecessary anyway. But a Nixon Doctrine 2.0, in which the United States supplies key capabilities to its allies and partners, extends its nuclear umbrella over its allies, and otherwise focuses on the Indo-Pacific—the main theater—is beginning to emerge.
The 12-day conflict in Iran was a classic example of American statecraft. The White House gave Israel the political and diplomatic cover it needed to execute a series of spectacular precision-bombing raids that devastated Iran’s military and nuclear program. For most of this stage of the Oct. 7 war, the U.S. military focused on augmenting Israeli air defenses. Only at the very end did American heavy bombers strike Iranian nuclear facilities, and that came after Israel’s air force cleared out Iran’s air defenses. As Trump remarked, "we worked as a team like perhaps no team has ever worked before."
Much to China’s dismay, Europe is also growing more serious. NATO’s members—other than Spain—agreed at the summit to spend 3.5 percent of their GDP on defense by 2035 and another 1.5 percent on related investments such as infrastructure. German chancellor Friedrich Merz’s praise for "the dirty work Israel is doing for all of us" indicates that an equally important psychological shift has occurred. A well-armed, tough-minded Europe will be far more capable of deterring Russian aggression and relieving pressure on American forces.
China is the gravest and most complex threat, and there is more work to be done in its neighborhood. Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba skipped the NATO summit, and Tokyo is reportedly perplexed by the administration's shifting demands on a range of issues, including defense spending. India is fuming over Trump’s attempted mediation during the Kashmir crisis and the president’s warm embrace of Pakistan’s military chief. Japan is America’s most capable ally in the most strategically important part of the world, and India is the largest country there. Getting on the same page with them is vital.
To be sure, this is nothing compared to this week’s acrimony at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, where India rejected the joint statement. Beijing sees America’s allies as a foundation of American power, but its attempts to develop its own partnerships are faltering.
This week, Trump delivered an important message to the world. When the NATO allies pitch in, "we’re with them all the way." When Israel needs help against common threats, Washington shows up.
Iran just discovered that Xi Jinping doesn’t think that way. Others will notice. And those Chinese diplomats will be seething.