Trilateral Commission Asia Is Fed Up with U.S. Policy toward China

The Trilateral Commission, founded in 1973 as a secretive organization of the would-be elites of the United States, Europe and Japan, held a meeting of its Asia Pacific Group on Nov. 19-20. For the first time ever, one news service was invited to attend all the sessions, namely Nikkei Asia.

The publication’s editor-in-chief, Shigesaburo Okumura, reported Nov. 25, that “Many of the participants seemed sick and tired of the decoupling with China imposed by the U.S. under the name of ‘Democracy vs. Autocracy’ dualism. Some of them worried about the arbitrary and unpredictable nature of trade sanctions and their implementation by the U.S. (…) [T]heir anxiety over the confrontation between the two strongest hegemonic nations is serious…”

Two reporters from Nikkei quote, in their article (behind a paywall), one Japanese leader of the organization who stated outright: “We feel that the U.S. policy toward Asia, especially toward China, has been narrow-minded and unyielding. We want the people of the U.S. to recognize the various Asian perspectives.” A former Japanese official was rather shocked by the confrontationist attitude of the U.S. ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, pointing out “If we force countries to choose sides, the Southeast Asian nations will choose China. The key is not to force them to choose.”

There were no Chinese in attendance at the event, although some had been invited, according to the organizers. Different members stressed that Chinese participation was indispensable to deal effectively with global issues. A Trilateral member from the Philippines was quoted saying there is no point in discussing Asia without China. He is particularly worried about the division of the world into competing blocs: “When two elephants fight, the ants get trampled. And we’re feeling it. When two elephants fight to the death, we will all be dead. And the question is: ‘What for?’”