The United States’ refusal to sign the recent AI Action Summit declaration should be seen as a strategic shift rather than a diplomatic snub to the rest of the world. AI is as much about innovation as it is about driving economic security and military power. Therefore, Washington’s decision reflects its intent to maintain an edge in AI development, free from global constraints.
For Indo-Pacific nations, this shift deepens their strategic dilemma. The region risks being caught between emerging doctrines—balancing between Europe, China and the US, between regulate and don’t regulate, between mitigating social harms and advancing military capabilities.
Meanwhile, China’s influence over AI rules and standards continues to grow. Beijing has embedded itself in global rule-setting bodies and the launch of DeepSeek, further demonstrates China’s ability to develop and scale competitive AI applications commercially.
If regional democracies want to avoid being absorbed into Beijing’s AI orbit, they must take US and Chinese interests at face value and take ownership of a governance model that is neither US-centric nor China-dominated.
The AI Action Summit, convened by French President Emmanuel Macron and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 10–11 February, was the latest in a series of leader-level AI summits. Britain and South Korea hosted AI safety summits in 2023 and 2024, expanding commitments towards responsible AI development.
For the Trump administration, the Paris summit was an early opportunity to lay out its vision for AI and technology governance. Vice President JD Vance did not mince words when he delivered four messages:
First, the US is not ready to share. The US is still an AI leader and the administration will ensure the US dominates the full technology development chain—from semiconductors to algorithm design, applications and compute power.
Second, halt the regulators. The US takes a pro-growth approach to AI policies; deregulation will give big tech, little tech, start-ups and students free reign with some of the most groundbreaking applications. Other states are welcome to join but shouldn’t be ‘handwringing’ about safety. Above all, other states should refrain from ‘tightening the screws on US tech companies’.
Third, don’t worry about disinformation and AI-enabled interference. ‘We can trust our people to think, to consume information, to develop their own ideas, and to debate with one another in the open marketplace of ideas’, Vance said.
And finally, AI is a jobs-creator not an employment-eraser.
Vance’s anti-regulation message of ‘free-for-all AI’ is quite the about-face in US tech policy, even compared to Trump’s first term. Some countries in the Indo-Pacific will see the US’s message as an opportunity for economic gains, but many others will be concerned about the potential disruptive effects on social cohesion and national security.
We should expect Beijing to capitalise on US messaging, doubling down on its narratives of Global South solidarity, respect for sovereignty and AI for the purpose of sustainable development, despite being known for embedding surveillance and state control into its governance model.
China has already laid the groundwork for future leadership in AI. ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker shows that, between 2019 and 2023, Chinese institutions have produced 36.5 percent of the world’s high-impact AI research, more than double the US’s 15.4 percent. This is the result of sustained investment and strategic planning.
Also, as other ASPI research has shown, the development of AI and other persuasive technologies in China has already progressed substantially enough that it now offers Beijing tools to dictate the information space.
The Pentagon is convinced it needs AI to maintain a competitive edge against China. According to Commander of US Indo-Pacific Command Admiral Sam Paparo, without it, the US cannot keep pace with China’s expanding military capabilities. The Trump administration believes that regulation would curb the potential of US innovation, which is predominantly undertaken by the private sector, and put the US at a commercial and strategic disadvantage. In a deregulated environment, this means it must restrict competitors—particularly China—from accessing the AI supply chain, including advanced semiconductors and research collaborations.
With the US resisting regulation and China assertively setting rules—both in pursuit of their narrower self-interests—the Indo-Pacific nations stand at a crossroads. While China may have signed the AI Action Summit declaration, there’s no guarantee that Beijing will follow through on its commitments.
To avoid being pulled into either the current US or Chinese AI orbit, the technology-mature nations of the region—such as Japan, India, Australia, South Korea and Singapore—need to acknowledge that a one-size-fits-all global AI governance approach isn’t feasible, and they must work towards a regional AI compact. Such a compact should recognise the security and military dynamics of AI but respect democratic values, promote responsible innovation and adhere to consensual international collaboration.
If Indo-Pacific nations don’t take matters into their own hands now, they risk being passive adopters of AI governance models that don’t reflect their interests—further eroding their digital sovereignty and strategic autonomy.
