New Cartoon Commentary: ‘Quad Dialogue’ or ‘Maintaining Hegemony and Containing China?’

From Sept. 21 to 22 local time, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue summit of the U.S., Japan, India and Australia was held in the United States. Although they keep saying that they are not targeting China, in the joint statement issued after the summit, the U.S. and the others made accusations of “coercion and intimidating [maneuvers]” in the South China Sea, with the clear purpose of making a fuss about China and fueling the China threat narrative.

Although the U.S. has attempted to rally its allies and show solidarity by casting China as an imaginary enemy, the Quad has been on shaky ground from the start. Since its formation, beyond making various unfounded claims to discredit and target China, it has made almost no real progress in other areas, let alone taken on the responsibility of tackling global challenges.

The Quad is essentially a tool for the U.S. to maintain its hegemony and protect its own interests like a puppet master. In recent years this small, U.S.-led multilateral arrangement has repeatedly made its views known on issues such as the South China Sea. U.S. anxiety about its maritime supremacy and the threat to its dominance of the Western Pacific is behind it.

The U.S. is going against current global trends and is bound to fail if it continues to cling to its obsession with maintaining its dominance, containing China and putting together such limited and exclusive small circles.