In The News

Re "The U.S. Is Losing Its Military Edge in Asia, and China Knows It," by Ashley Townshend and James Crabtree (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, June 15):

I agree with the authors' call for increased resources to the Indo-Pacific, but I disagree with their singular focus on enhancing U.S. military resources in the region. Instead, the United States must focus on increasing diplomatic and development resources to the Indo-Pacific if we want to counter China's growing aggression effectively.

For the past decade, U.S. foreign assistance to East Asia and the Pacific has hovered around 3 to 5 percent of the global total of U.S. foreign assistance in our base budget. U.S. assistance to the wider Indo-Pacific region has barely broken 10 percent of the global total in the past five years.

An overemphasis on defense resources will continue to allow Beijing to employ political and economic coercion with impunity. Those are the very actions that often stop regional partners from working more closely with the United States on the very deterrence that Mr. Townshend and Mr. Crabtree hope to reinforce.

To be sure, the United States must maintain a robust military posture in the region. But any discussion of expanding U.S. resources to the Indo-Pacific must start with diplomatic and development resources.

Ami Bera
Washington
The writer, a California Democrat, is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, Central Asia and Nonproliferation.