The 21st century’s central economic nexus will be centred on the Indo-Pacific region. Simultaneously, the intensifying US-China competition in the Indo-Pacific is deepening. Regional middle powers must negotiate this competition to ensure their interests remain intact. This article applies a realist framework to analyse the strategic alignment of Australia, Japan, and India in response to the great power competition. It examines the strategy each middle power is pursuing to protect their interests and the motivations behind their approaches.

Since 2012, Japan’s foreign policy under Prime Minister (PM) Abe has been characterized as assertive, welcome or provocative. By employing the fear of abandonment/entrapment theory as the analytical framework, this article finds that Japan’s regional foreign policy under Abe is characterized by consolidation and investment in broad-based multilateralism, proactive engagement with partners in the region, including China, and strategic hedging.