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Buck-passing, Chain-ganging and Alliances in the

Multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific

Mason Richey

To cite this article: Mason Richey (2020) Buck-passing, Chain-ganging and Alliances
in the Multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific, The International Spectator, 55:1, 1-17, DOI:
10.1080/03932729.2019.1706390

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03932729.2019.1706390

Published online: 03 Feb 2020.

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THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR
2020, VOL. 55, NO. 1, 1–17
https://doi.org/10.1080/03932729.2019.1706390

Buck-passing, Chain-ganging and Alliances in the Multipolar

Indo-Asia-Pacific
Mason Richey
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Seoul

ABSTRACT KEYWORDS
Christensen’s and Snyder’s neorealist-based theory of buck-passing alliances; multipolarity; Indo-
and chain-ganging uses offence-defence balance to predict state Asia-Pacific; balance of
security policy choices under multipolarity. This approach is applic- power; Sino-US rivalry
able to the US-led alliance system in the multipolar Indo-Asia-
Pacific. Given regional Sino-US rivalry, hedging opportunities for
US ‘hub-and-spoke’ allies will dissipate, increasing the likelihood of
allies choosing to buck-pass or chain-gang in the face of conflict.
With defence superior in the region, it is more likely that US allies
will buck-pass rather than chain-gang. Beyond Indo-Asia-Pacific
states, this has implications for global actors – such as the EU –
seeking to raise their security profile in the region, as buck-passing
behaviour gives greater time to adjust to potential conflict scenar-
ios than chain-ganging.

Much has been written chronicling the disorder of the contemporary international
system (Haass 2017; Ikenberry 2018): the United States has wasted its unipolar
moment, trade barriers are threatening global economic integration, illiberalism
and authoritarianism are undermining democracies, and the balance of power is
in flux globally and within regions (Richey et al. 2019; Tow 2019; Zakaria 2019).
These changes in the global order and regional sub-orders are, moreover, linked to
increasing multipolarity portending instability and conflict.
This development is acute in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, where China’s rise is disrupt-
ing US post-World War II dominance, Japan is increasing its military role, North
Korea has developed nuclear weapons, New Delhi is a burgeoning competitor to
Beijing, Russia remains a diplomatic and nuclear power, and the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is central to Asian diplomatic architecture and
management of great power tensions.1 Serious regional security concerns arise from
these inter-related dynamics. The most frequently analysed of these is the prob-
ability of Sino-US conflict (Glaser 2010; White 2013; Pillsbury 2015; Allison 2017;
Taylor 2018). Experts have also focused on how traditional International Relations
notions of balance of power, nuclear deterrence and the security dilemma are
expected to function on a systemic level in an Indo-Asia-Pacific that both is multi-
polar and contains nuclear powers (Twomey 2011; Kroenig 2016; Clary 2017;

CONTACT Mason Richey mrichey@hufs.ac.kr

1
For the last point, see Ford (2018).
© 2020 Istituto Affari Internazionali
2 M. RICHEY

Jackson 2018; Wuthnow 2019). From a neorealist2 theoretical perspective, there are
indeed interesting questions about whether a multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific with
several nuclear powers will systemically: a) have no effect on regional conflict and
instability, b) reduce conflict and instability (perhaps due to escalation fears), or c)
exacerbate them (perhaps due to stability-instability or crisis instability dynamics).3
This article, however, focuses on a phenomenon at a lower analytical level than the
generalised system, namely security policy choice by states in this environment of Indo-
Asia-Pacific multipolarity. Thomas Christensen and Jack Snyder (1990) have shown that
Kenneth Waltz’s (1979; 1988) neorealist theory can predict the aggregate state of
a multipolar international system, but cannot provide determinacy about individual
state policies regarding the choice to chain-gang or buck-pass in the absence of hedging
possibilities. Yet the latter is important for policy-oriented specialists and practitioners,
especially with respect to Sino-US rivalry in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, where the US operates
a loosely networked system of bilateral alliances (the ‘hub-and-spokes’ system) with
Japan, South Korea, Australia, the Philippines and Thailand. These alliance partners
are likely to face difficult security policy choices as it becomes more and more difficult to
hedge between increasingly conflictual Washington and Beijing (Richey 2019).
This article applies Christensen’s and Snyder’s general theoretical insight on how
multipolarity affects alliance member security policy choices to the specific case of the
hub-and-spokes model in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Their crucial observation is that under
multipolarity one must factor in perception of the offence-defence balance as a variable
determining whether alliance members chain-gang or pass the buck in the face of conflict
arising from an inefficient, unstable balance of power (Christensen and Snyder 1990).
Perception of offensive advantage leads to chain-ganging, a form of over-balancing
characterised by near-unconditional support for and participation in an alliance partner’s
military conflict. Perception of defensive superiority produces buck-passing, a form of
under-balancing in which “balancing alignments fail to form in a timely fashion because
some states try to free ride on other states’ balancing efforts” (Jervis 1978; Christensen
and Snyder 1990, 144). Starting from the position that the overall offence-defence balance
in the Indo-Asia-Pacific currently favours defence (and is perceived so), I argue that
members of the hub-and-spokes alliance are likely to buck-pass as conflictual situations
emerge (notably involving the US and China). Such developments will have effects both
for the states of the regional Indo-Asia-Pacific system and for external actors – especially
Europe4 – engaged in advancing their security interests in the region. Thus global and
regional dimensions of multipolarity are inter-related.
This article proceeds as follows. After this introductory section, the following one sets
out two empirical assumptions. First, the multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific order will tend to
foreclose hedging opportunities for states seeking to avoid stark choices in the context of
Sino-US competition. Second, the perception of the general, overall offence-defence

2
Space constraints preclude examining institutionalist and constructivist perspectives. The decision to elide these
theoretical frameworks is also informed by this article’s concentration on offence-defence balance, which, owing to
hard-power focus and security dilemma implications, dovetails more with (neo)realism than institutionalism and
constructivism.
3
What is interesting about (a) is the possibility that nuclear weapons might provide stability counter-balancing the
theoretically assumed rise in instability stemming from greater multipolarity.
4
Both the European Union (EU) and individual member states (e.g., France), as well as the UK, active in Indo-Asia-Pacific
security provision.
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 3

balance in the Indo-Asia-Pacific favours defence due to geography, military force size/
posture and military technology. The third section explains why, under conditions of an
inefficient and unstable balance of power, particular hub-and-spoke alliance members
will be incentivised by perceived defensive superiority to pass the buck in the face of
(especially) conflict arising from Sino-US rivalry.5 This section also looks at factors
mitigating the predicted behaviour. The final section addresses how these dynamics in
the Indo-Asia-Pacific will affect Europe’s role as a security actor in the region.

From hedging to the offence-defence balance

Hedging in the Indo-Asia-Pacific
This article makes the empirical assumption that hedging behaviour – which avoids
destabilising consequences (due to under-balancing or over-balancing) when the balance
of power is upset – will be decreasingly available to Indo-Asia-Pacific states seeking non-
conflictual paths between US and Chinese demands. Until now, US allies have largely
been able to hedge between Chinese economic pressure to weaken the bilateral ties of the
hub-and-spokes system, and US pressure for stronger ally commitment to Washington’s
regional security and defence strategy (Jackson 2016). What has changed such that
continuation of this hedging strategy will be compromised?
Over the last three decades China, North Korea and India have increased their
regional power considerably, while Russia has recovered some of the military prowess
it lost during the 1990s.6 Beijing has modernised its military (including expansion into
the South China Sea (SCS)) and become comfortable coercing neighbouring states
through grey zone/hybrid tactics, displaying its military might and leveraging its dis-
proportionate economic size (USDOD 2019a; Richey 2019; Park et al. forthcoming;
Zhang 2019). North Korea has become a de facto nuclear weapon state and does not
disguise its intention to use nuclear weapons as leverage for coercive foreign policy
(Richey 2018). India’s economic growth has been accompanied by military modernisa-
tion (including nuclear weapon improvements) and a willingness to show its capabilities
for advancing New Delhi’s Indo-Asia-Pacific interests (Kristensen and Korda 2018).
Meanwhile, member states of ASEAN, which has grown in economic importance and
adopted an independent vision of the Indo-Asia-Pacific, continue to have elevated levels
of defence spending growth in comparison to most other regions/states of the world
(Tian et al. 2018; Mun 2019).

5
Besides buck-passing and chain-ganging, bandwagoning would be another choice available to regional states. I do not
focus on this option for several reasons, beyond the evidence that bandwagoning is comparatively rare (Walt 1990).
First, as behaviour better suited to small, weak states with numerous neighbouring enemies, bandwagoning is
disincentivised given the geopolitics of the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Moreover, as Mearsheimer (2001) argues, buck-passing
and/or chain-ganging make more sense in multipolar orders (e.g., the Indo-Asia-Pacific) than bandwagoning, which is
better suited to bipolar systems. This is even truer in a defence-dominant system, in which aggressors would be
perceived as reckless. Finally, given the US-led alliance system in the region, many states would not be bandwagoning
from a non-aligned position, but would have to abandon the US as alliance partner to bandwagon with China. This
represents an additional hurdle to an already fraught possibility.
6
Although Russia is a Northeast Asian power (although not an Asia-Pacific power more broadly) due to its nuclear arsenal,
diplomatic reach and energy supplier role, this article minimises it. This is due to space constraints, but also because, as
a Russian official stated in private conversation, Moscow has substantially ceded to Beijing strategic initiative in the
Indo-Asia-Pacific. For more on why Russia has recently not been a significant player in the Asia-Pacific, and why this will
continue, see Lo (2019).
4 M. RICHEY

The competitive regional environment will incentivise these countries to use their
increasing power to augment their regional influence, rendering risk-weighted decision-
making more complex (prone to miscalculation) and the regional system itself more
intensively and extensively multipolar – and thus more unstable (as neorealists argue).
All this will increase the necessity of hedging, even as the complicated, multipolar
chessboard will make doing so successfully more challenging.
The most aggressive revisionist actor in this context is China, which is attempting to
construct a sphere of influence7 encompassing Northeast Asia, the SCS and beyond (out
to the second island chain), and extending into the eastern Indian Ocean (Jackson 2016;
Vorndick 2018; Work and Grant 2019). Beijing’s drive to advance the Belt and Road
Initiative (BRI), militarise the SCS, build out anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) capabil-
ities, modernise its conventional and nuclear armed forces, and use economic leverage to
compel neighbouring states to act against their sovereign interests is evidence of strategic
behaviour aimed at realising an Indo-Asia-Pacific sphere of influence.
The construction of spheres of influence is historically illiberal and violent, and the
same will likely hold in the contemporary Indo-Asia-Pacific. Thus, the current Chinese
iteration of the phenomenon will change the nature of the regional international system
and be accompanied by conflict as Beijing increases efforts to compel neighbouring states
to align with Chinese strategic interests.
The US will not stand idle during this period of attempted power transition. Starting
with US President Barack Obama’s comprehensive ‘rebalance’ to the Asia-Pacific and
continuing with the Trump administration’s diplomatic and military focus on the region
(including the upgrading of the US-Australia-India-Japan ‘Quad’ to ministerial level, and
increased spending on military assets for the region), as well as the Trump-led trade and
technology war with China, the US has demonstrated that it will attempt to counter
China’s rise toward power sufficient to establish an Indo-Asia-Pacific sphere of influence
(Henry 2019; US Embassy & Consulates in India 2019; USDOD 2019b). US national
security and defence documents (e.g., the National Security Strategy and National
Defense Strategy) reinforce this in identifying China as the US’s principal strategic
competitor and US-led alliances as an asymmetric advantage in this competition
(White House 2017; USDOD 2018a). As part of its strategic response, the US will
pressure allies to remain committed to the US vision of the international security and
economic architecture of the prevailing Indo-Asia-Pacific order.
The collision of US and Chinese regional interests, and strategies for realising them,
will tendentially foreclose the ability of US allies to avoid difficult choices via hedging.
Major war between the United States and China remains improbable, but conflict, even
limited high-intensity kinetic conflict, is imaginable under multipolar conditions in
which Washington and Beijing, given different interests and values, are in a power
transition window (Lemke and Tammen 2003; Levy 2008; Ohn and Richey 2012). This
emerging likelihood of Sino-US conflict highlights the need to understand the regional
offence-defence balance, as growing limits on the efficacy of hedging by US allies would
increase the possibility that they will pass the buck or chain-gang. Knowledge of the

7
Spheres of influence are “zones of exclusion and control” encompassing both military aspects and core-periphery
“partnerships” that leverage the core’s “economic centrality to [the periphery] by deliberately linking trade, investment
and aid with political and security cooperation”. This is widely seen as China’s strategy in its neighbourhood (Jackson
2019, 4).
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 5

prevailing perception of the Indo-Asia-Pacific offence-defence balance is needed for

predicting which behaviour is more likely.

Offence-defence balance in the Indo-Asia-Pacific

Three variables are critical for evaluating the offence-defence balance in the Indo-Asia-
Pacific: geography, force size/posture and military technology. Currently, each militates
toward viewing the offence-defence balance as defensively weighted and thus security
dilemma tendencies as limited, although this is clearer for geography than for force size/
posture and military technology (Lieber 2011; Sharma 2015; Beckley 2017; Pietrucha
2019).

Geography
Concerning geography, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery’s dictum still holds:
“Don’t go fighting with your land army on the mainland of Asia.” The Indo-Asia-
Pacific’s extensive maritime spaces, mountainous terrain and chokepoints make target-
ing and manoeuvring, force flow and basing, and supply lines/logistics challenging, in
turn rendering difficult offensive power projection and holding seized territory. This is
especially true for the US in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, as its warfighting doctrine relies
heavily on logistical superiority and precision strikes. US difficulty in projecting
offensive power across the Pacific Ocean is only partially mitigated by forward-
deployed forces and materiel on the territory of allies, who are wary of entanglement
in US-initiated conflicts.

Force size/posture
The force size/posture and military technology aspects of the offence-defence balance in
the Indo-Asia-Pacific are less clear and more dynamic, but net assessment points to
defensive superiority (Beckley 2017; USDOD 2019b; IISS 2019). First, defence is generally
advantageous because of ease of materiel prepositioning and battlespace saturation,
defender terrain knowledge, more options for time/space trade-offs and other factors.
Additionally, military budgeting also signals defensive advantage. US military spending
far exceeds that of other regional actors (even China), but it has to support a global
footprint that no other Indo-Asia-Pacific state shares.
Currently, the United States Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) has within its
area of responsibility about 370,000 soldiers/sailors/airmen and civilians/contractors, 2,000
aircraft and 200 ships and submarines (USDOD 2019b). This allows the US to compete with
China in the region. But given China’s larger number of soldiers/sailors/airmen and increas-
ingly modernised hardware supported by a significant, growing military budget, neither
Washington nor Beijing can dominate the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Indeed China’s military-
technical offset strategy aims to deter US military intervention in the Indo-Asia-Pacific so
that Beijing can engage in other forms of coercion with minimal geopolitical and geostrategic
blowback, rather than undertake offensive warfare (Work and Grant 2019). Other regional
actors, including Japan, South Korea, India and Australia, have significant hard power
projection capabilities and defence budgets, but they remain small compared to the US and
China. All of these factors are prima facie evidence of regional power parity, which boosts the
defensive side of the offence-defence ledger.
6 M. RICHEY

Flowing from force size/posture and military0 technology, operational concepts are also
geared defensively. This is well known, although evolving, in the case of China, whose
hardware and doctrine are overweighted to defending territory, armed maritime struggle,
fighting local (limited, albeit high-intensity) conflicts, engaging in coercive tactics short of
armed conflict (i.e., grey zone/hybrid actions) and participating selectively in regional and
global security governance enforcement (USDOD 2018b; Zhou 2019; Ministry of National
Defense of the People’s Republic of China 2019).
On the US side, the tyranny of distance is an obstacle to offensive operational concepts in
the Indo-Asia-Pacific, and other evidence also reinforces this bottom line. Two developments
are instructive. First, the US Marine Corps’ planning guidance, outlining force design,
warfighting and core values for the Indo-Asia-Pacific, has been updated to reflect the reality
that its primary mission should not be amphibious assault (or, generally, classic Marine
amphibious manoeuvre warfare), but rather, in General David H. Berger’s words (2019),
“an extension of the Fleet (Navy)” operating in contested maritime spaces. More specifically,
the leader of the US Marine Corps believes its primary mission is joint fighting (from, if
possible, prepositioned locations) with the Navy, with an overriding objective of presenting
China with A2/AD challenges. This conceptualisation of the Marines’ role is interesting per se,
but as important is what it implies about the US Navy: it can no longer control vast swathes of
the Indo-Asia-Pacific maritime theatre on its own, needing instead land-prepositioned fire
complexes to defend vital sea lanes. This is a conservative, defensive understanding of the
Indo-Asia-Pacific strategic chessboard.
Second, US combatant commands in the Indo-Asia-Pacific are postured defensively.
US Forces Korea (USFK), which is stationed in South Korea primarily for deterrence
against North Korea, is representative. This is true with North Korea now a de facto
nuclear weapon state, but it was also true previously, as evidenced by President Bill
Clinton’s refusal in 1994 to strike North Korea because of the possibility of unacceptably
high casualties (both civilian and military) following from potential escalation to major
conventional hostilities. Notably, Clinton was briefed on the “sobering estimate of
staggering losses both sides would suffer if war broke out” (Carpenter 2017). Although
especially stark for the North Korean case, the risk of unpredictable, escalating warfare in
the region is a deterrent for all US forces stationed in the Indo-Asia-Pacific.

Military technology
The clearest way of judging the role of military technology in the offence-defence balance
in the Indo-Asia-Pacific is by examining the five warfighting domains: land, sea, air, space
and cyber. Approaching the offence-defence balance in this way also indicates defensive
superiority, as only the cyber domain appears advantageous for the offence.

Land. As adumbrated in the Montgomery quote above, the offence-defence balance for
land war in the Indo-Asia-Pacific significantly favours defence, with the objective of
seizing, securing and occupying significant territory considered fanciful. The Asian
landmass – vast, topographically extreme (mountains, deserts, jungles) and climatically
diverse – remains highly challenging for armed invasion. There is little to make one think
armies, whether those of the US, China or other Indo-Asia-Pacific states such as South
Korea or Japan, have changed so dramatically as to obviate these challenges, which led to
stalemate in the last two major Asian land wars (the Korean War and the Vietnam War).
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 7

Indeed, the US has significant numbers of troops stationed in only one mainland Asia
country, South Korea. Moreover, at least for the US, conceptually the Indo-Asia-Pacific is
primarily considered a maritime theatre, with the Army (given limited strategic depth in
the region) focused on coastal defence and the Marines on either coastal defence or land-
based naval support (Jackson 2015).

Sea. The maritime military geography of the Indo-Asia-Pacific displays uneven con-
testation. Some areas, the SCS and the East China Sea (ECS), are clear flashpoints in
which actors such as the US, China and Japan have major (even vital) interests to be
advanced by growing militarisation that portends security dilemma dynamics. Other
areas, including stretches of the Indian and western Pacific Oceans, are calmer and
without strategic value.
Within this geostrategic context, China has modernised its navy considerably since the
mid-1990s, constructing aircraft carriers, more and better non-carrier surface ships, and
submarines to create a blue water navy (O’Rourke 2018). Beijing has procured and
improved platforms and weapons including anti-ship ballistic and cruise missiles,
unmanned vehicles, anti-submarine warfare (ASW) technology and C4ISR (command,
control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance).
Most visibly, China has asserted control over disputed territory in the SCS, some of
which it has militarised with bases for naval and air operations.
This all functions together as part of China’s largely successful A2/AD strategy for
degrading relative US maritime power. This strategy, however, is not classically offensive,
but instead dedicated to establishing an Indo-Asia-Pacific sphere of influence via grey zone/
hybrid coercion rather than kinetically expansive revisionism. From a US perspective, the
overarching issue is therefore countering this through the efficacy of the Joint Concept for
Access and Maneuver in the Global Commons (JAM-GC, formerly the Air-Sea Battle
concept), the US’s main regional operational concept. Yet this aims primarily at offsetting
Chinese A2/AD, rather than being a doctrine for offensive warfighting8 in the Indo-Asia-
Pacific.

Air. As indicated by the aforementioned JAM-GC (Air-Sea Battle) concept, the

aerial space in the Indo-Asia-Pacific is closely connected to joint operations with
naval forces. To the extent that the air is a separate domain in the Indo-Asia-Pacific,
it is best viewed as evenly weighted toward offence and defence. In the first place,
air power, via fighter and bomber aircraft, as well as operations via high-tech, stand-
off weaponry, including missiles and rockets, is inherently difficult to convert into
sustained offensive success (NATO 2018). It is impermanent and cannot hold
territory itself. Historically it has also been payload-limited, relatively vulnerable
and frequently reliant on ‘exquisite’9 systems. In short, air power seeks to impose
a combatant’s will on an adversary with limited sacrifice and risk, and is thus best
understood offensively as a part of joint operations. Nevertheless, as mentioned, the
8
Despite improvements in low-observable surface ships and silent attack and strategic submarines, which support a more
offensive view of the sea domain, the value of low-observable surface ships remains battle-untested, while ASW
technology has improved.
9
Very expensive, sophisticated, scarce platforms that are high performance yet fragile, difficult to replace and obvious
targets of low survivability relative to the cost of cheap, numerous systems deployed to destroy or disable them.
8 M. RICHEY

land and sea domains are defensively weighted in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, and thus
limit the offensive value of air power. Of note is also that the US has only a small
number of permanent air bases in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, constraining its ability to
use air power offensively in the region (Pietrucha 2019).
Viewed from another angle, however, some aspects of air power can be assessed as
offence-dominant. Low-observable aircraft allow for opening up naval manoeuvre space,
and several Indo-Asia-Pacific states have augmented exquisite piloted systems with
cheaper, more numerous, unmanned platforms. Meanwhile ‘drone swarm’ systems,
combining lethality, artificial intelligence and cost-effectiveness, are being developed by
regional military powers (notably the US, China, Japan, South Korea, India and Russia).
Finally, the missile balance is offensively weighted. China and (to a degree) North
Korea possess significant arsenals of short-/medium-/intermediate-range ballistic mis-
siles (SRBMs/MRBMs/IRBMs) both on land and at sea for regional (theatre) objectives
(CSIS 2019; CRS 2019). China also deploys modern cruise missiles launched from various
platforms. For Beijing and Pyongyang, these missile systems provide both A2/AD
capabilities and means to coercion within revisionist strategic aims.
This is not offset by ballistic missile defence, which remains fragile and vulnerable to
MIRVs (Multiple Independently-targetable Re-entry Vehicles), decoy features, saturation
salvos and sophisticated guidance systems for evading missile defence systems (such as the
SM-3/6, Aegis BMD, PAC-3 and THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense)) (Jeong
2019; Roblin 2019). The US also has significant air- and sea-launched missile capabilities in
the Indo-Asia-Pacific, and, following the 2019 dissolution of the Intermediate Nuclear
Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), is seeking to station land-based MRBMs/IRBMs in the region.
The strategic direction of this latter development remains unclear, although signs indicate
increased risk of security dilemma dynamics and (in a conflict environment) heightened
chance for miscalculation, discrimination problems and escalation.
In sum, if used well for strategic purposes, some air systems may offer offensive
benefits that could outmatch defensive systems. Nonetheless, the offence-defence balance
for air power is roughly equal in the Indo-Asia-Pacific.

Outer space. Contemporary outer space is a defence-dominant domain. It is codified

this way by international treaty, which prohibits its weaponisation (Bureau of Arms
Control, Verification and Compliance 1967). However, space-based assets provide sen-
sors, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), command-and-control (C2),
navigation and other capabilities with both offensive and defensive roles. The problem
for the offensive side of the space domain is that space-based assets are vulnerable to anti-
satellite weapons (ASATs) (Colby 2016). Indeed China and India have demonstrated
ASATs in live tests, while the US and its allies also have ASAT capabilities (Macias and
Sheetz 2019). Such fragile satellite systems are not sufficiently survivable during conflict
to function reliably as offensive force multipliers.

Cyber. Cyber is the only warfighting domain with near consensus favouring offence,
both generally and in the Indo-Asia-Pacific specifically (Slayton 2017; Garfinkel and
Dafoe 2019). Indeed, the US, China, Russia and North Korea have all engaged in
offensive cyber exploits, while Japan, South Korea and Australia have the requisite
capabilities. The cyber domain’s offence dominance rests on the peculiarities of
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 9

cyberspace. First, cyber capabilities and operations are largely unconstrained by geogra-
phy, rendering irrelevant the tyranny of distance, a classic marker of defensive dom-
inance. Moreover, threat assessment in the cyber domain is opaque for reasons including
cyber attack’s low cost, rapidly evolving cyber techniques and exploits, difficulty in
identifying cyber threat sources, ease of defenders overlooking vulnerabilities and opacity
about the effects of cyber attack. This makes defence against offensive cyber operations
very hard. Finally, cyber attack attribution is more prone to error than in physical-world
domains. This makes deterrence via retaliation more fraught, as an attacked state may
delay, reduce and/or withhold retribution due to fear of identifying the wrong actor for
punishment.
In sum (Table 1), of the five major warfighting domains, only the cyber domain is
clearly offensive, strongly buttressing the perception that the offence-defence balance in
the Indo-Asia-Pacific tilts toward defence.
A final aspect of security and conflict, nuclear weapons, also supports the conclusion
that defence dominates in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. The region contains five nuclear weapon
states (the US, China, Russia, North Korea and India) and several latent nuclear powers
(Japan, South Korea and Taiwan), while Australia has the technology base for nuclear
weaponisation. Despite increasing potential for offensive nuclear weapon use – either
tactically as an element of escalation-controlled warfighting, or due to misapprehension/
miscalculation – in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, all the regional nuclear weapon states (or
potential states) currently view nuclear weapon use defensively, overwhelmingly for
deterrence, and reserved for existential threat.
The ‘nuclear taboo’, the international norm against nuclear weapon use, is robust and
widely shared, even if under moderate pressure (Tannenwald 2018). Moreover, the
nuclear postures and doctrines of the nuclear powers are tailored for deterrence. China
and India have explicit ‘no-first-use’ policies, and both feature reduced warhead deploy-
ment and extensive peacetime warhead de-mating (Kristensen and Korda 2018;
Kristensen and Norris 2018). Although somewhat opaque because of relative outsider
ignorance about its nuclear force posture, North Korea’s nuclear doctrine seemingly
excludes offensive attack against the US or neighbouring states due to fallout risks and US
retaliation. Pyongyang’s nuclear doctrine instead suggests possible pre-emptive nuclear
weapon use under a ‘use-it-or-lose-it’ scenario, as well as ‘limited demonstrative use’
aimed at demoralising the leadership of enemies imminently threatening the existence of
the Kim regime (Barannikova 2019). Russia’s nuclear forces are directed toward the US
and Europe rather than the Indo-Asia-Pacific, while the US’s nuclear weapons mostly
function for primary deterrence against attacks threatening US territory, as well as
extended deterrence to protect its Indo-Asia-Pacific allies South Korea, Japan and
Australia (USDOD 2018c). Beyond extended deterrence, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty (NPT) provides powerful international institutional incentives preventing prolif-
eration by South Korea, Japan and Australia.
Nonetheless, there are reasons to view nuclear weapons in the Indo-Asia-Pacific as
trending more offensively. All five regional nuclear weapon states are modernising their
arsenals, in some cases with the goal of increasing tactical/theatre usability (albeit
justified with the argument that increased usability enhances deterrence). This moder-
nisation risks creating regional security dilemma dynamics, made more worrisome by the
dissolution of the INF Treaty and the possible expiration of the New Start Treaty in 2021.
 10
M. RICHEY

Table 1. Overview of offence-defence balance for Indo-Asia-Pacific warfighting domains

Domain Land Sea Air Space Cyber
Offence/defence Defence Defence Even Defence Offence
Primary reason(s) Geography makes armed Dominance of A2/AD technologies Difficulty converting air superiority Space not weaponised, Lack of geographic
invasion difficult; and operational concepts to sustained offence; by treaty; constraints;
Conceptualisation of Missile technologies favour Vulnerability of Difficulties for defensive
theatre as maritime offence satellites to ASATs threat assessment;
Attribution challenges
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 11

Table 2. Overview of the Indo-Asia-Pacific strategic situation

Offence-defence Offence-defence bal-
Hedging balance ance (force size/ Offence-defence balance
Factor possibilities (geography) posture) (military technology) Nuclear balance
Evaluation Diminishing Defence dominant Defence dominant Defence dominant Defence
(deterrence)
dominant

With the INF Treaty no longer in force, Washington has stated its intention to station
conventional ground-launched IRBMs in the Asia-Pacific, to which Beijing and
Pyongyang have responded with promises to change their nuclear programs, strategies,
doctrines and postures (Kuhn 2019). If New Start is allowed to expire in 2021, the US and
Russia would, for the first time in fifty years, no longer be subject to any international
treaties restraining their nuclear arsenals. Nonetheless, these are currently incipient
developments, and nuclear doctrine, posture and strategic policy for all nuclear weapons
states in the region remain oriented toward deterrence.
Given the defence-dominant strategic situation in the region (Table 2), conflict in
a multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific is unlikely to be characterised by major, widespread
warfare. Meanwhile, reduced hedging possibilities will test states’ ability to navigate the
competing demands of major powers, notably rivalrous China and the US.
In this context, revisionist China will continue to employ grey zone/hybrid tactics,
although limited, yet high-intensity conflict could occur over flashpoints in which Beijing
considers itself to have vital interests, such as the SCS or Taiwan (Taylor 2018). The US,
a status quo power, is prepared to engage in limited, high-intensity conflict against some
Indo-Asia-Pacific actors (e.g., China, possibly North Korea) to maintain its current
critical interests. Other significant regional states (South Korea, Japan, Australia, the
Philippines, Thailand, as well as Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, inter alia) are also status
quo powers interested in avoiding destabilising conflict. However, this section has out-
lined why hedging will become increasingly more difficult for such states, as China and
the US heighten their regional rivalry, as well as why the offence-defence balance
indicates that lesser regional powers will face incentives to pass the buck. The following
section examines this for US hub-and-spoke allies.

Predicting ally behaviour

Christensen’s and Snyder’s (1990) argument builds off Waltz’s (1979; 1988) neorealist
analysis of system-level behaviour by incorporating offence-defence balance as an addi-
tional variable for predicting how individual states will choose between buck-passing and
chain-ganging when presented with this foreign and security policy decision under
conditions of multipolarity. In principle, their analysis covers all states in the interna-
tional system, including the Indo-Asia-Pacific region discussed here. Consequently, this
article does not specifically apply the theoretical analysis to each state individually.
Nonetheless, it is useful to test the theoretical logic within the empirical context of the
Indo-Asia-Pacific.
Starting from the assumption of international anarchy, structural neorealists consider
the complexity of multipolarity to produce inefficient, unstable power balancing, which
12 M. RICHEY

results in conflict. However, the theory is under-determined vis-à-vis individual states’

actions – especially those of allies – within this context, as they face the choice of chain-
ganging or buck-passing. Chain-ganging arises when security-interdependent alliance
partners perceive an obligation (for their own security) to support another ally’s conflict
(even a reckless one) because remaining uninvolved endangers the security of the conflict
initiator to the point that the other alliance members (and the alliance per se) would face
major security degradation. In an environment of rising conflict risk, passing the buck
occurs when states fear the costs of balancing or believe they can achieve potential relative
power gains by free-riding on the balancing of other states (especially alliance partners).
Perceptions of the relative offence-defence weighting resolve the dilemma (Jervis
1978). Offensive advantage incentivises chain-ganging because superior offence means
that states may become rapidly vulnerable under attack; defensive advantage incentivises
buck-passing because even states battling alone can stalemate aggressors.
As shown earlier, a multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific will both tend to foreclose hedging
opportunities and likely produce buck-passing behaviour in the face of crisis and conflict,
as offence-defence weighting within the regional system clearly benefits defence. How
might this play out among members of the US-led hub-and-spokes alliance system:
Japan, South Korea, Australia, Thailand and the Philippines?
To begin, the US-China dyad is the likeliest conflict source, for example in the SCS or
Taiwan (Taylor 2018). Additional typical flashpoints include the Korean peninsula
(involving potentially the US, South Korea, North Korea and China), the ECS (involving
Japan and China) and the eastern Indian Ocean. In all cases, the character of conflict is
likely to range from grey zone/hybrid action to miscalculation/misapprehension of
security developments or highly limited, yet intense conventional battle. Sustained, large-
scale warfare is very unlikely, but the stability-instability paradox is operative and
escalation risks do exist.
Among the US’s hub-and-spoke allies, Thailand and the Philippines are most likely to
pass the buck if confronted with Sino-US conflict. Beyond the already elucidated regional
systemic factors, both states’ alliance relationship with the US is fragile.10 The US-
Thailand alliance is nearly moribund due partially to Bangkok’s recent period of military
junta rule. Similarly, the US-Philippines alliance has been put under strain as Manila has
become increasingly illiberal under President Rodrigo Duterte. Both Thailand and the
Philippines thus have a discord of values with the US, in addition to heavy economic
dependence on China and a recent history of hedging against US wishes (inter alia on the
SCS and BRI).
Although Japan faces the same systemic factors as all US allies in the Indo-Asia-
Pacific, it has some characteristics that mitigate incentives to buck-pass. Its liberal
political values remain aligned with those of the US, and its economy is sufficiently
diversified to resist Chinese economic pressure. Moreover, Japan’s national defence is
intertwined with Washington via extended deterrence, US basing and conventional
military interoperability. Finally, Tokyo’s strategic culture privileges tight security and
defence cooperation with the US, and accepts Japan’s role as rival to and offshore
balancer of China. Indeed, Tokyo has recently shown vigour in resisting Chinese grey

10
For more on the moribund US-Thailand alliance, and why it is unlikely that Thailand would provide the US with
significant military assistance (especially vis-à-vis China), see Harding (2018). For the Philippines, see Cook (2019).
 THE INTERNATIONAL SPECTATOR 13

zone tactics in the SCS and in disputed Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) airspace.
An interesting litmus test for Japan’s propensity to buck-pass will be its response to
potential US requests to station intermediate-range missiles on its territory as part of US
efforts to match Chinese A2/AD in East Asia.
South Korea and Australia are perhaps the most interesting alliance cases from the
standpoint of how domestic decision-making might mitigate Indo-Asia-Pacific regional
systemic incentives to pass the buck. South Korea is highly dependent economically on
China, and consequently has demonstrated hedging behaviour in response to US
requests for stationing THAAD systems on its territory. Yet Seoul and Washington
share political values, deeply interoperable hardware and command structures, and
perceptions of the threat of North Korea’s conventional and nuclear forces (South
Korea relies on US extended nuclear deterrence).
For its part, Australia also has heavy economic dependence on China, and
a population with relatively low positive perceptions of the US, given the maturity
of the US-Australia alliance (ARN 2016). There is also a pervasive governmental-
bureaucratic split between DFAT (Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) and
DoD (Department of Defence), with the former supporting policies that do not
endanger economic relations with China and the latter privileging security/defence
ties with the US. These divisions militate toward buck-passing, yet Canberra shares
political values with Washington, participates widely in bilateral and ‘minilateral’
alliance activities (including military exercises) with the US, hosts US Marine forces
in Darwin and joint intelligence operations at Pine Gap (as part of the ‘Five Eyes’
intelligence group), and is also covered by US extended nuclear deterrence. Both
Australia and South Korea (like Japan) will likely face a litmus test of alliance
loyalty, if the US requests stationing of intermediate-range missiles on their respec-
tive territories.
Finally, à propos the US, it faces similar regional systemic incentives to buck-pass if
one of its allies were to get into a conflict in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Domestic factors point
in this direction, as President Trump’s transactional foreign and security policy has been
centred on Washington’s support for allies being conditioned on near-term interest
accrual to the US (rather than long-term order-building).

Conclusion. Global reflection of a regional issue: Europe at an Indo-Asia-

Pacific crossroads
This article has applied to the specific case of the hub-and-spokes model of US defence
alliances in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region Christensen’s and Snyder’s general theoretical
insight on how multipolarity and offence-defence balance affect alliance members’
decisions to buck-pass or chain-gang. The demonstrated overweighting of defence in
the region indicates that one should expect Indo-Asia-Pacific hub-and-spokes states to
buck-pass, rather than chain-gang, absent viable hedging options. This seems especially
likely in the event of US-China conflict.
The regional element of this phenomenon has a global context. Given the state of
affairs outlined above, non-Indo-Asia-Pacific actors with a foreign and security
policy profile in the Indo-Asia-Pacific will have interests to advance as the region
experiences instability and potential conflict. In reality, there is only one non-Indo-
14 M. RICHEY

Asia-Pacific global power pole – Europe11 (the European Union (EU), particularly
France, as well as the United Kingdom) – with such a profile of being a security
provider in the region (Richey et al. 2019). Europe will likely soon face significant
foreign and security policy choices in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Considering the difficult
choices awaiting powers navigating a multipolar Indo-Asia-Pacific in crisis or con-
flict, the preferred strategic choice for Europe is regional order-building that max-
imises the likelihood of successful prevention and containment of crisis before it
becomes conflict. To this end, the EU, the UK and France should work with
partners (the US, Japan, South Korea, Australia, India) and competitors (China)
to establish multi-lateral security institutions and mechanisms, which the Indo-Asia-
Pacific currently lacks.
Failing that, hedging is the expected initial European foreign and security policy
response to crisis in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. Just as for states within the region, however,
hedging will tend to become less viable, albeit perhaps over a longer timeframe than for
states geographically within the Indo-Asia-Pacific system, as the primary mechanism for
that foreclosure – Sino-US rivalry – is less acute globally than regionally. Nonetheless, the
reality of multipolarity and defensive superiority at the Indo-Asia-Pacific regional level is
reflected at the global level in a power distribution including the US, China, Russia, Europe,
India, ASEAN, MERCOSUR and several Middle East and African states. Consequently,
when refracted through a global lens, European incentives for acting in the Indo-Asia-
Pacific will be subject to the same buck-passing/chain-ganging (under-balancing/over-
balancing) pathology as states within the region. As the global international system is
multipolar and defensively weighted, one should expect Europe to buck-pass. Beyond
structural reasons to expect buck-passing, it is worth recalling that the US cannot legiti-
mately employ NATO for collective security assistance in case of violations of its sover-
eignty (e.g., attack on Guam) or critical interests in the region. Indeed, Washington Treaty
Article 5 obligations cover only the North Atlantic.
Theoretical, analytical predictions of buck-passing do not make it normatively wise;
indeed, buck-passing is by definition pathological under-balancing. It is easy to imagine
attacks, ranging from shipping-lane blockages to cyber attacks to tactical nuclear weapon
use, on Europe’s Indo-Asia-Pacific partners that threaten Europe’s vital interests. It is
thus advisable that the EU and its major member states (especially France), as well as the
post-Brexit UK, develop strategies for external balancing in a range of crisis and conflict
scenarios in the Indo-Asia-Pacific.

Notes on contributor
Mason Richey is Associate Professor of International Politics at Hankuk University of Foreign
Studies, Seoul, South Korea.

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