Prime Minister Shinzo Abe must have been elated when U.S. President Donald Trump chose Tokyo for his "first visit to the Indo-Pacific region" during his Asia tour last November. After all, the term "Free and Open Indo-Pacific" was a broad Asia strategy that Abe introduced in 2016 — an idea he has built on since his first tenure as prime minister in 2007.
Abe has been selling the strategic idea to Washington since the early days of the Trump administration. To Abe's pleasure, Trump called Vietnam the "heart of the Indo-Pacific" when he arrived in Danang last November for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, seeming to embrace an Asia strategy that Abe conceptualized.
Trump, who seeks to dismantle his predecessor's policies — ranging from foreign policy to health care, climate change, immigration and trade — is also trying to reframe America's Asia policy.