Over the course of 2023, the United States will attempt to
renegotiate several key agreements with three small Pacific countries.
While the issue has received relatively little attention, the outcome of these talks will not
only be vital to securing U.S. national security interests for decades to come,
but could also play a significant role in preserving International peace and stability.
However, these crucial discussions are proving to be far more difficult than many expected.
So, just what are these agreements? Why are they so important? And why
have the negotiations been quite so troublesome.
Hello and welcome. If you're new to the channel, my name is James Ker-Lindsay and
here I take an informed look at international relations, conflict, security, and statehood.
The modern international system is built around the idea of independent sovereign
states - countries that, nominally at least, have full control over their own affairs.
However, there's a concept that appears to blur these principles.
Originally developed to aid decolonisation,
'free association' offers territories full internal self-government while allowing an
outside state to manage aspects of their defence and Foreign Affairs.
Today, there are five examples of this rather unusual arrangement:
the Cook Islands and Niue, which are associated with New Zealand, and the Marshall Islands,
Micronesia, and Palau, which are in free association with the United States.
But as a fundamental part of the agreement between Washington and
these three countries comes up for renegotiation,
questions are now being asked whether these special relationships might now be at risk?
The Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia,
and the Republic of Palau stretch across the eastern part of the Pacific.
Made up of over 2,000 small Islands,
taken together their total land area is a mere 1,350 square kilometres, or 520 square miles.
Even combined, this would make them only the 171st largest member of the United Nations.
However, if one includes their wider maritime boundaries,
they cover around 5.6 million square kilometres, or 2.2 million square miles.
This would give them the world's seventh largest exclusive economic zone.
As for their population, this stands at just over 175,000.
Of this, approximately 113,000 live in Micronesia,
46000 in the Marshall Islands, and just 18,000 in Palau.
Their per capita GDP ranges from $3500 in Micronesia to $12,000 in Palau.
With economies based on subsistence farming, fishing, and tourism, all three are highly
dependent on U.S aid and grants, which amount to up to a third of their annual budgets.
While the history of the islands stretched back thousands of years, our story really
begins in the 16th century when Spain began expanding into southeast Asia and the Pacific.
As well as the Philippines, the Spanish East Indies would eventually include
the Caroline Islands, the Marshall Islands, the Palau islands, and the Mariana Islands;
the last of which also incorporated the island of Guam, located at the southern tip of the chain.
However, this came to an end in 1898 when Spain
lost the Philippines and Guam to the United States.
Having already passed the Marshall Islands over to German control in
the 1880s, Madrid now sold the remaining territories to Berlin.
But German colonial rule would be short-lived.
In December 1920, following the First World War,
the League of Nations passed control of the islands to Imperial Japan.
But its control would also last just a couple of decades, coming to an end during the Second World
War when U.S forces seized the various Island chains - often after extremely brutal fighting.
Following the war, the future of the islands was put before the Trusteeship Council - the main body
of the newly established United Nations tasked with overseeing the process of decolonisation.
In April 1947, the Security Council designated the United States the
administering authority of what now became the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.
Divided into seven administrative districts, and originally run by the U.S Navy,
during the late 1940s and 50s the territory came to international
prominence as the Marshall Islands became the centre for the testing of U.S nuclear weapons.
Starting with the first explosions in July 1946 on Bikini Atoll,
over the next 12 years the United States will carry out a total of 67 tests.
All this would have a catastrophic environmental and health impact on the islands.
Meanwhile, as the process of decolonisation gathered pace internationally, pressure
grew on the United States to relinquish its control over the Pacific island territory.
Having introduced the first steps towards self-rule in 1964,
during the 1970s Washington offered the islands a
choice between formal integration or independence under free association.
In 1975, the Northern Mariana Islands voted to retain ties to the United States.
Having become a commonwealth, today it's one of five unincorporated U.S territories,
alongside Guam, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, and the U.S Virgin Islands.
In contrast, the remaining districts opted for free association.
But while four of them would eventually merge to form the Federated States of
Micronesia in May 1979, the Marshall Islands and Palau rejected membership;
instead said becoming separate self-governing republics in 1979 and 1981 respectively.
By 1984, the United States and the islands had agreed the terms of their future relationships.
Under the so-called Compacts of Free Association, the territories would be self-governing states.
They would also have the right to conduct their own foreign affairs,
including signing treaties, albeit in consultation with Washington.
On top of this, their citizens would have the right to live and work in the U.S.
In return, the United States would assume full authority
and responsibility for their security and defence.
This included the right to block other states from having military access to the countries.
At the same time, the U.S. would also provide significant financial assistance
for a period of 15 years and allow the states to participate in certain federal economic programs.
Crucially, while the compacts would be subject to regular review,
the agreements could be terminated by mutual consent.
Following referendums to confirm the deal, and having obtained US Congressional approval,
the compacts with the Marshall Islands and Micronesia came into force in 1986.
However, while the United States now recognised them both as fully
independent states, and informed the UN that the trust territory no longer existed,
the Soviet Union blocked the formal approval of this.
As a result, the two countries had to wait until the end of the Cold War to join the UN,
becoming full members in September 1991.
Meanwhile, following delays in its ratification,
Palau finally passed its compact three years later, becoming a UN member in December 1994.
In the years that followed, the three countries - collectively often known as
the Freely Associated States - became useful, if relatively minor, partners for the United States.
As well as securing U.S. control over a significant part of the
Pacific and providing military facilities,
including an important ballistic missile test site in the Marshall Islands, the countries
also provided useful diplomatic cover for Washington on certain contentious issues.
Meanwhile, in 2003 and 2004, Congress extended the financial assistance elements of the compacts for
another 20 years - a deal that's estimated to amount to around 229 million dollars for Palau,
a billion dollars for the Marshall Islands, and 2.1 billion dollars for Micronesia.
And it's these agreements that are now up for renewal and causing so much concern.
Visiting Micronesia in August 2019, the then US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, announced
that the US was ready to start negotiations to renew the financial assistance provisions.
However, from the start the process proved tougher than expected.
As well as having to agree on the term and levels of funding, other issues now emerged.
For example, all three countries want assistance to manage the effects of climate change.
On top of this, the Marshall Islands are also seeking further compensation for
the nuclear tests conducted in the 40s and 50s.
However, having already paid half a billion dollars to the country,
Washington is firmly resisting this.
But what's made the whole process so tricky and important is, of course, the Chinese factor.
As Beijing extends its economic, political and strategic influence across the region,
it's been steadily increasing its support for the Pacific.
This presents a major problem for Washington.
If the talks fail, there are very real fears
that the states may be tempted to engage more actively with China.
As well as reducing U.S. influence, this could also see the Marshall Islands and Palau - two of
the remaining 13 UN members that still recognise Taiwan - switch their recognition to Beijing.
Most seriously, there will also be worries that this could eventually see the states
end their compacts altogether - although there's no sign of this
now and the compacts will remain in force even without the financial arrangements.
This would rob Washington of its 'right of strategic denial',
a potential barrier against Beijing's wider military ambitions.
Indeed, the value of the relationships was openly recognised in the most recent
documents outlining U.S strategy in the Indo-Pacific region,
which called the Freely Associated States, "the Bedrock of the U.S role in the Pacific."
As a result, and despite a slow and difficult start to the talks,
in part caused by the pandemic, the past year has seen a growing sense of urgency.
In March 2022, the Biden Administration appointed a Special Presidential Envoy for the negotiations.
Likewise, there have also been calls from Congress for the negotiations to be prioritised.
The importance of a new deal has also been underscored by
continuing Chinese efforts to win over the region.
In May 2022, and just weeks after signing a security pact with the Solomon Islands,
Beijing called for a major new security relationship with 10 Pacific Island States.
Despite promising major financial incentives and free trade, this was apparently blocked
by Micronesia, which called the initiative "a threat to regional stability" - thereby
underlining its ongoing value to Washington, even though it has recognised the People's
Republic of China since 1989 and has been actively courted by Beijing in recent years.
Meanwhile, Washington has also stepped up its own efforts to win over the region.
In late September 2022, it hosted the first ever Summit with Pacific island
leaders - a meeting attended by President Biden and the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken.
At the same time, Blinken also took part in the latest round of compact negotiations,
which was held with the presidents of the three
countries at the State Department in Washington on 29 September.
And yet, for all these efforts, there's still no sign of a final agreement.
Despite hopes of a breakthrough,
at least on the broad elements of a new arrangement, 2022 ended without a deal.
With the clock now ticking, this all means that 2023 could well be vital for
U.S. efforts to preserve its special and very unusual link to these three
small Pacific States - states that Washington now admits lies at the
very heart of its attempts to counter growing Chinese strategic influence.
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