CAMP DAVID, Maryland — President Joe Biden hosted Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio and South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol at Camp David for a trilateral summit in the face of the growing threat China and North Korea pose to Indo-Pacific nations.
Biden has made courting Indo-Pacific allies a core focus of his presidency. However, long-standing tension between Japan and South Korea, stemming from the Japanese occupation of the Korean Peninsula during the first half of the 20th century, has, in some eyes, stalled U.S. diplomatic efforts to counter China and North Korea.
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"China’s entire strategy is based on the premise that America’s No. 1 and No. 2 ally in the region can’t get together and get on the same page," U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel noted Wednesday ahead of the summit.
"America's commitment to both countries is ironclad, and my personal commitment to bringing these three countries was real from the very beginning," Biden opened Friday's press conference after thanking both leaders for their country's assistance with the wildfire cleanup effort in Hawaii.
The president lauded both men for their "political courage" in standing up to the long-held tensions between their respective countries.
Biden briefly addressed the security agreement, specifically efforts to share information on North Korean missile launches, and stated that the three leaders and their deputies would hold routine conversations to advance their cooperative capacity.
"That means we'll have a hotline to share information," the president said of any potential threats to the three countries or in the Indo-Pacific writ large.
On economic issues, Biden announced the launch of a supply chain monitoring pilot "so we can get ahead of the issues as they appear based on the experience we had in the pandemic."
The president also announced a trilateral healthcare collaboration, building off the U.S. Cancer Moonshot initiative, that Biden said he hoped would end cancer "in our lifetimes."
"This is the first summit I've hosted at Camp David as president," Biden closed. "I can think of no better fitting location to begin the next era of our cooperation."
Friday's event, nestled in the northeastern Appalachians, marked the first time international leaders, and the press, had visited Camp David in nearly a decade.
White House officials specifically told press not to take photos or video outside the designated press conference area, as Camp David remains an active military site.
Former President Donald Trump had originally planned to host the 46th G-7 at Camp David during the summer of 2020, but those plans were scuttled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Former President Barack Obama also hosted both Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and the 38th G-8 Summit at Camp David in 2012.
The president and his Asian counterparts were previously scheduled to hold trilateral breakouts following the G-7 summit in Hiroshima, Japan, this summer. However, Biden was forced to cut his trip short and return to Washington, D.C., to engage in debt ceiling negotiations with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Republican lawmakers.
Friday's summit included both bilateral and trilateral meetings with his counterparts and their deputies, a press conference, and the publication of a "duty to consult" document outlining mandated contact between the three governments in times of crisis.
U.S. officials have stressed that though the United States, Japan, and South Korea will seek to deepen both economic and security ties Friday, the summit will not formalize any type of mandated security agreement akin to Article 5 of NATO.
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"First, it's explicitly not a new NATO for the Pacific. We've said that. We will continue to underscore that, and so will both Japan and South Korea," national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters Friday morning ahead of the summit. "We've had a combined 150 years of alliance cooperation with Japan and Korea, so in that sense, the work that we are doing with these two countries is not new."
"What is new is that we are now stitching all of that work together to try to enhance regional stability and security, and I would just point out that in all of those decades of cooperation we've had with Japan and [South Korea], we have helped safeguard stability and security in the Indo-Pacific, and that has created the conditions for all of the countries of the region to do well, economically, by the way, including China." he continued. "We see it as a contributor, a net contributor to security in the region, to stability in the region, and to enhance prosperity in the region. And we think it will be broadly welcomed by countries throughout the Indo-Pacific from the Pacific Islands to ASEAN to South Asia."