Rice arrived in Australia Wednesday evening and begins three days of meetings Thursday, culminating in the first ministerial-level Trilateral Security Dialogue with the Australian and Japanese foreign ministers, Alexander Downer and Taro Aso.
The top US diplomat, who will also hold separate talks with Prime Minister John Howard, has said Beijing's military and economic rise would be the focus of the trilateral meeting since it was the major force driving regional changes.
On top of the US-India alliance that is growing and Indian-Australian discussions, the major players are coming on board to deter China from an aggressive foreign policy.
Really, it just goes to show you how unthreatening we are in the big picture despite our power. In classic international relations theory, you'd expect nations to ally against America to balance our power.
In practice, few people really believe we are about to use that power to create a new empire (notwithstanding the hyper-ventilating going on at organic markets over the trail mix bin). In practice, people worry about a far weaker China getting even a little stronger and cooperate with us to block Peking.
Even Russia's alliance with China is more about fear of China than fear of America. The Russians are pointing China at America to keep Peking from thinking of threatening Russia while Russia is weak.
As much as I think we need to keep a vigilant eye on Peking, I'd never trade places with them. Not for all the tea in -- oh never mind.
