All four members have seen their relationships with China deteriorate. Chinese incursions around islands that Japan controls but that China claims in the East China Sea have grown ever more frequent. Australia has faced Chinese restrictions on all manner of exports, from wine to coking coal, following its call for an independent inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. Indian and Chinese troops have clashed on their disputed border, resulting in the first fatalities in 45 years.
As a result, America has expanded its naval patrols in the South China Sea. Last year America, India and Japan invited Australia to re-join the annual Malabar naval exercises after a 13-year gap, giving the Quad a de facto naval face (India insists the Quad and Malabar are entirely separate). A new “Blue Dot” infrastructure network, aimed by America, Australia and Japan at countering China’s Belt and Road Initiative, promotes transparency and environmental sustainability (India is yet to sign up). In March the Quad’s leaders met for the first time, virtually, and agreed to expand vaccine manufacturing for South-East Asia. This month they were set to discuss co-operation on the pandemic, climate change, infrastructure, emerging technologies and of course security. China’s government, meanwhile, last week warned against forming “closed and exclusive ‘cliques’” and said the Quad was “doomed to fail”.
The Quad remains a work in progress. It has not yet really achieved all that much. It has certainly not stopped China from threatening its members. The promise of Asian vaccinations was predicated on supplies from India, which its enormous second wave stymied. The importance of unofficial “Quad-plus” partners has also grown, as shown in the AUKUS deal (how it will work with the Quad remains to be seen) and growing British and French naval patrols in the Pacific. But the leaders’ meeting this week is a statement of intent and energy. China’s hardening edge in military, diplomatic, economic and technological fields has given the grouping renewed purpose.
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