Strategic Consequences of U.S. Withdrawal from TPP

Posted: March 26th, 2017

By Timothy Heath

Timothy Heath is a senior international defense research analyst at the RAND Corporation and member of the Pardee RAND Graduate School faculty. Prior to joining RAND in October 2014, he served as the senior analyst for the USPACOM China Strategic Focus Group for five years. He worked for more than 16 years on the strategic, operational, and tactical levels in the U.S. military and government, specializing on China, Asia, and security topics.

Since negotiations concluded for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in late 2015, observers have argued that Asian policymakers would interpret failure of the pact as a sign of America’s declining interest in the region or inability to assert leadership. Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong warned in 2015, “Failing to get the TPP done will hurt the credibility and standing of the U.S., not just in Asia, but worldwide.” Now that the U.S. has abandoned the pact, have the warnings proven prescient or overblown?

The TPP is a regional trade agreement involving the U.S. and 11 other Asian-Pacific countries that together comprise 40 percent of the world’s economic output. The TPP’s economic objectives included liberalization of trade in Asia, market reforms, and strengthened trade rules to support America’s competitive industries and accord with the modern realities of digital commerce.

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