即时发布
美国国务院
发言人办公室
2021 年 12 月 14 日
印度尼西亚雅加达
印度尼西亚大学（Universitas Indonesia）
安东尼·布林肯国务卿讲话：“一个自由开放的印太地区”

布林肯国务卿：大家早上好。很高兴与大家见面。库苏马亚蒂 (Kusumayati) 医生，非常感谢您的热情介绍。但更重要的是，感谢您几十年来为改善公共卫生事业和培育下一代医生和护士付出的努力，并成为担任大学公共卫生学院院长的第一位女性。从对生育健康的研究到对印度尼西亚新冠肺炎疫情特别工作组的领导，您对社区的奉献令人深受鼓舞，我向您表示感谢 （掌声）。
在座各位早上好。Selamat pagi（马来语“早上好”）。回到雅加达真是太好了。我上次在政府任副国务卿时，曾几度来到这里，我一直期待着有机会重返这个东南亚最大的民主国家。
我想对于今天在场的学生们来说，回到校园的感觉真好。我知道你们中许多人已经远程学习了一段时间，并期待着重回教室。我很高兴我们今天稍微有个借口，让你们一起回来。医生，我知道您和工作组都希望学生们回来，我知道每个人都多么期待那一天。
我在这里，我们在这里，是因为在印太地区发生的事情将会比任何其他地区更影响到 21 世纪世界的走向。
印太地区是地球上发展最快的地区。它占世界经济的 60%，占过去五年全部经济增长的三分之二。这里是世界一半以上人口的家园，15 个最大经济体有7个在这里。
它拥有极为丰富的多样性，有3000 多种语言和众多宗教信仰，跨越两大洋和三大洲。
即使像印度尼西亚这样一个国家也是一个多彩多姿的百纳之地，除了用多样化来形容，难以一语概括。这个国家的座右铭是：Bhinneka Tunggal Ika，在多元中统一，这在美国人听起来很熟悉。在美国，我们说“合众为一”(E Pluribus Unum)，表达的是同一个理念。
美国长期以来一直是、现在是并将永远是一个印太国家。这是一个地理事实，从我们的太平洋沿岸各州到关岛，我们的领土横跨太平洋。这是一个历史事实，由我们与这个地区长达两个世纪的贸易和其他纽带关系体现出来。
今天，美国最大的贸易伙伴中有一半是在印太地区。这个地区是我们近三分之一出口的目的地，是美国 9000 亿美元外国直接投资的来源，为我们50 个州创造了数百万个工作岗位。我们在这一地区的驻军人数超过了除美国大陆之外的任何地方，保障着对地区繁荣至关重要的和平与安全，让我们所有国家受益。
当然，我们是由我们的人民连接在一起，这种连接可上溯许多代人。在美国生活着 2400多万亚裔美国人，其中包括金成(Sung Kim) 大使——当他不在世界这里或那里为国家效劳时，他已经效劳30年。
在疫情之前，有超过77.5万来自印太地区的学生在美国高校学习。你们在印度尼西亚大学的美国同学是数百万来这个地区学习、工作和生活的美国人的一部分，其中有一位后来成为我们的总统。
我知道有一个从小就教给孩子的印尼谚语：“我们有两只耳朵，但只有一张嘴”。这即是说，在我们说话或采取行动之前，我们必须倾听。在本届政府执政的第一年，我们大量听取了印太地区人民的声音，以了解你们对这个地区及其未来的愿景。
我们在美国接待了来自这一地区的领导人，包括拜登（Biden）总统在上任后最早接待的日本和韩国的两位领导人，以及我荣幸地在国务院接待的所有外交部长，包括长雷特诺 (Retno) 外长。我们也前来访问了你们的地区，包括哈里斯(Harris)副总统、奥斯汀(Austin) 国防部长、雷蒙多 (Raimondo) 商务部长和其他许多内阁成员，更不用说还有我团队中的许多国务院高级官员了。
总统参加了由主要地区机构举办的多个领导人会议：亚太经济合作组织 (APEC)；美国-东盟和东亚峰会（U.S.-ASEAN and East Asia Summits）；以及与印度、日本、澳大利亚共同组成的四方伙伴关系 (Quad)。我也和其他国家的外交部长举行了会议，包括主办湄公河-美国伙伴关系部长级会议（Mekong-U.S. Partnership Ministerial）。拜登总统还在海外会见了印太地区的领导人，包括在格拉斯哥（Glasgow）第26届联合国气候变化大会 (COP26) 期间与佐科(Jokowi)总统进行了非常富有成效的会谈。
但我们不只是听取领导人的意见。我们在这个地区各地的大使馆和领事馆以及我们的外交官用双耳倾听各行各业人士的意见，包括学生、活动家、学者和实业家。
虽然这是一个有着不同利益和不同观点的非凡多元的地区，但我们看到，我们从印太地区听到的愿景与我们自己的愿景高度一致。
这个地区的人民和政府希望为本国所有人提供更多、更好的机会。他们希望在国家内部、国家之间和世界各地有更多连接机会。他们希望对像我们正在经历的疫情这样的危机有更好的准备。他们希望和平与稳定。他们希望美国的更大存在和参与。最重要的是，他们希望地区更加自由和更加开放。
所以我今天想努力阐明那个共同的愿景，以及我们将如何共同努力实现这个愿景。我想重点谈一谈五个核心要素。
首先，我们将推进一个自由开放的印太地区。
对自由开放的印太地区，我们已经谈论了很多，但往往我们并未界定它究竟意味着什么。自由的含义是，要能够书写你的未来并对你所在社区和国家发生的事情发表意见，无论你是谁或认识谁。自由会自然而然地带来开放。有自由的地方对新的信息和观点是敞开的。他们对不同的文化、宗教和生活方式持开放态度。他们乐于接受批评、自我反省和更新。
当我们说我们想要有一个自由开放的印太地区时，在个人层面，我们是指人们在日常生活中是自由的，是生活在开放的社会中；在国家层面，我们是指各个国家能够选择自己的道路和自己的合作伙伴；在地区层面，我们是指世界这一地区的问题将得到公开处理，规则是以透明的方式建立和以公平的方式运用，货物、观念和人员可以在陆地、网络空间和公海自由流动。
确保世界上这个最具活力的地区不受胁迫和对所有国家畅通与我们所有国家利益攸关。这对整个地区的人民都有好处。这对美国人民有好处，因为历史表明，这个广阔地区自由开放时，美国就更加安全繁荣。因此，我们将与这一地区的合作伙伴一起努力实现这一愿景。
我们将继续支持这一地区各地的反腐败和透明度团体、调查性新闻工作者、智囊团，例如斯里兰卡的阿德瓦卡塔研究所（ Advocata Institute）。在我们的支持下，该研究所为银行和航空公司等亏损很大的国有企业建立了公共记录，并提出了一些改革方案。
我们也在政府部门寻找合作伙伴，如维克多·索托 (Victor Sotto)。他是菲律宾帕西格市 (Pasig) 的市长。维克多设立了一条全天候热线电话，供选民举报腐败。这使政府合同的颁发过程更加透明，让社区性组织对城市资源的使用拥有发言权。他是我们在今年早些时候宣布的国务院第一批全球反腐先锋人士之一。
我们将继续学习其他民主国家的最佳做法。这也是在拜登总统上周召开的民主峰会（Summit for Democracy）——佐科总统在会上发言，并且是第一位发言人——以及刚刚在印度尼西亚举行的第十四届“巴厘民主论坛”（Bali Democracy Forum）——我在会上发言——背后的理念。
我们反对那些不尊重人民权利的领导人，就像我们目前在缅甸所看到的那样。我们将继续与我们的盟友和伙伴一道，向该政权施压，要求停止其滥施暴力，释放所有被不公正拘留的人士，给予不受阻碍的准入，并使缅甸重新走上共融性民主的道路。
东盟已达成“五点共识”（Five-Point Consensus），并呼吁该政权与各方进行建设性对话，寻求一项尊重缅甸人民意愿的和平解决方案。我们不会放弃这个目标。
我们促进自由和开放的另一种方式是捍卫开放的、可互操作的、安全和可靠的互联网，反对那些力图使互联网更加封闭、更加割裂和更加不安全的势力。我们将与我们的合作伙伴共同捍卫这些原则，并帮助建立一个为其奠定基础的安全和可信赖的系统。在今年早些时候举行的文在寅-拜登领导人峰会 (Moon-Biden Leaders’ Summit) 上，韩国和美国宣布了 35 亿多美元的新兴技术投资，包括对安全的 5G 和 6G 网络的研发。
最后，我们将与我们的盟友和伙伴一起努力，捍卫我们几十年来共同建立的基于规则的秩序，以确保这一地区的开放和畅通。
让我明确这一点：捍卫基于规则的秩序其目标不是要压制任何国家。相反，它是为了捍卫所有国家选择自身道路的权利，不受胁迫和恐吓。这不是一个以美国为中心的地区或是一个以中国为中心的地区之间的较量。印太地区是自己的地区。相反，这里所关系的是要维护那些给该地区和世界带来了最和平、最繁荣时期的权利和协议。
这就是为什么从东北亚到东南亚、从湄公河到太平洋岛屿，人们对中国政府的咄咄逼人行动如此担忧，它将公海声称为己有，通过对国有企业进行补贴扭曲开放的市场，拒绝那些与其政策相左的国家的出口或撤销交易，以及从事非法、不报告和无管制的捕捞活动。这一地区的国家希望改变这种行为。
我们也希望如此。这就是为什么我们决心确保南中国海 (South China Sea) 的航行自由，北京在那里的咄咄逼人行为威胁着每年价值超过3万亿美元的商业活动。
需要指出的是，与3万亿美元这个庞大数字相连的是全世界数百万人的实际生计和福祉。贸易无法穿越公海意味着农民无法运输他们的产品；工厂不能运出他们的微芯片；医院无法获得拯救生命的药物。
五年前，国际法庭作出了一项一致且具有法律约束力的裁决，坚决驳回非法的、扩张性的南中国海海洋主权伸张，视其不符合国际法。我们和其他国家，包括南中国海的主权申索国在内，将继续抵制这种行为。这也是为什么我们对台湾海峡 (Taiwan Strait) 的和平与稳定有着持久的利益关注，它与我们的长期承诺一致。
第二，我们将加强这一地区内部以及外部的联系。我们将深化与日本、韩国、澳大利亚、菲律宾和泰国之间的条约联盟。长期以来，这些纽带为地区的和平、安全和繁荣奠定基础。我们还将促进这些盟友之间更广泛的合作。我们深化美日韩三边合作，以及与澳大利亚和英国签署具有历史意义的新安全合作协议便是我们这种努力的一部分。我们将找到把我们的盟友与我们的合作伙伴联系在一起的途径，就像我们通过重振四方伙伴关系所做的那样。我们将加强与强大和独立的东盟的伙伴关系。
东盟的中心地位意味着，我们将继续与东盟合作并通过东盟进一步深化我们与这一地区的接触，因为我们的愿景与东盟对印太地区的展望是一致的。
10 月份，拜登总统宣布提供一亿多美元，以加强我们与东盟在关键领域的合作，包括公共卫生和赋予妇女权能。在未来几个月里，拜登总统将邀请东盟领导人参加在美国举行的峰会，讨论如何深化我们的战略伙伴关系。
我们正在加强与这一地区其他国家的战略伙伴关系，包括新加坡、越南、马来西亚，当然还有印度尼西亚。这就是我此行的原因。
我们也在加深人民之间的联系。“东南亚青年领袖计划” (YSEALI) 是赋予东南亚新兴一代领导人权能的一个标志性项目，成员超过15万，并且还在不断增加。
最后，我们将努力使我们在印太地区的关系与该地区以外无与伦比的联盟和伙伴关系连成一体，尤其是在欧洲。欧盟最近发布了一项与我们的愿景高度一致的印太战略。在北约 ，我们正在更新我们的战略概念，以反映印太地区日益增长的重要性，并应对新的威胁，例如气候危机对安全的影响。我们将东盟的中心地位作为我们与伙伴们合作的核心要素。几天前，七国集团（G7）的部长们在英国开会时就这样做了，并且第一次与东盟同行会晤。
我们这样做的原因很简单：它使我们能够组建最广泛、最有效的联盟来应对任何挑战、抓住任何机会，实现任何目标。我们能够基于共同利益团结得国家越多，我们就会越发强大。
第三，我们将促进广泛的繁荣。美国已经在印太地区提供了超过一万亿美元的外国直接投资。这一地区明确告诉我们，它希望我们做得更多。我们决心满足这一要求。在拜登总统的指示下，我们正在为实现我们的共同目标建立一个全面的印太经济框架，包括贸易和数字经济、高新技术、健强的供应链、脱碳和清洁能源、基础设施、劳工标准以及共同感兴趣的其他领域。
我们的外交将发挥关键作用。我们将帮助美国公司发现它们自己无法找到的机会，让它们更容易将其专业知识和资本带到新的地方和新的领域。我们的驻外机构——包括我们在印太地区的各个大使馆——已经在这方面走在前头。我们将大幅度提升其能力，以便它们可以做更多的事情。来自该地区的 2300 多名商界和政府领导人和我一起参加了今年的“印太商业论坛”（Indo-Pacific Business Forum），这次论坛由我们与印度共同主办，我们在会上宣布了近 70 亿美元的私营部门新项目。
我们将与我们的伙伴们合作，在数据隐私和安全等关键问题上为不断发展的数字经济制定规则，但规则要反映我们的价值观，并为我们的人民创造机会。如果我们不制定规则，其他国家就会来制定，而这些国家很可能不会以促进我们的共同利益或共同价值观的方式来制定这些规则。
在 11 月举行的亚太经济合作组织会议上，拜登总统为我们如何在该地区开创共同的前进道路提出了明确的愿景。在数字技术方面，他谈到我们需要建设一个开放的、可互操作的、可靠的和安全的互联网；他还谈到我们对投资网络安全和制定数字经济标准的浓厚兴趣，这些标准将使我们所有经济体能够在未来参与竞争。11 月，当美国贸易代表戴琪和我率领代表团参加亚太经济合作部长级会议时，我们的关注重点是有必要确保高新技术服务于一个自由和开放的印太地区。
我们还将促进公平和持久的贸易。“东盟一站式服务” (ASEAN Single Window) 就是一个例子。这是美国支持的一个项目，旨在创建一个用于整个地区清关的单一自动化系统。它通过使贸易更加透明和安全、降低企业成本和消费者价格来帮助简化贸易过程。即使在疫情隔离期间，从纸质海关到数字海关的转型也保证了跨境贸易继续进行。
在疫情的第一年，该平台上最活跃国家的贸易活动增加了 20%，而大多数其他跨境贸易实际上都在下降。在 10 月份举行的美国-东盟峰会上，拜登总统承诺为东盟一站式服务提供额外支持。我们将与伙伴们合作，使我们的供应链更加安全和健强。我认为，通过这次疫情，我们都看到了供应链的脆弱性和供应中断的破坏性，包括口罩和微芯片的短缺以及港口的货物堆积。
我们一直致力于国际社会的团结，努力解决瓶颈问题，增强抵御未来冲击的能力。拜登总统召集了一次旨在加强供应链健强性的领导人峰会。哈里斯副总统在访问该地区期间将其作为会谈的一项核心内容。在最近对澳大利亚、新西兰、新加坡和马来西亚的访问期间，商务部长雷蒙多也探讨了这个问题。美国贸易代表戴琪设立了一个跨机构供应链贸易特别工作组，并在访问日本、韩国和印度时提出了这个问题。在新的一年里，商务部长吉娜·雷蒙多和我将共同召集来自世界各地的政府和私营部门领导人，在“全球供应链论坛”上解决这些问题。作为全球众多生产和商业活动的枢纽，印太地区将成为这些努力的核心部分。
最后，我们将帮助缩小基础设施方面的缺口。在该地区以及世界各地，基础设施的现有能力和需求之间存在着巨大缺口。港口、道路、电网、宽带——所有这些都是全球贸易、商业、连通性、机遇和繁荣的基石。它们对印太地区的包容性增长至关重要。但是，我们听到印太地区的政府官员、企业、劳工和社区越来越担心：如果基础设施工作做得不好会有何后果？例如，项目承包是通过不透明、腐败的程序，或海外公司输入自己的劳动力进行施工、攫取资源、污染环境，并使社区负债累累。
印太地区的国家希望有更好的基础设施。但许多人觉得这种基础设施费用过高，或者他们迫于压力按照别国设定的条件进行糟糕的交易，因为他们认为有交易总比没有好。因此，我们将与该地区的国家合作，提供这些国家的人民理应享有的高质量、高标准的基础设施。事实上，我们已经在这样做了。
就在本周，我们与澳大利亚和日本一起宣布与密克罗尼西亚联邦、基里巴斯和瑙鲁建立合作伙伴关系，铺设一条新的海底电缆，以改善这些太平洋国家的互联网连接。自 2015 年以来，四方伙伴关系成员国为该地区的基础设施提供了超过 480 亿美元的政府支持融资，资助了 30 多个国家的数千个项目，从农村发展到可再生能源，惠及亿万人的生活。
四方伙伴关系最近成立了一个基础设施协调小组，以促进更多投资，它正在寻求与东南亚在基础设施和许多其他共同优先事项方面的合作。美国将做的远不止这些。我们在 6 月份与七国集团合作伙伴共同发起了“重建更美好世界”（Build Back Better World）项目，致力于在未来几年里促成数千亿美元的透明和可持续融资。我们与澳大利亚和日本一起启动了“蓝点网络”(Blue Dot Network)，以开始认证符合 20国集团（G20）、经合组织（OECD）和其他机构制定的基准的高质量基础设施项目，并吸引更多投资者。
第四，我们将帮助建设一个更健强的印太地区。2019冠状病毒病疫情和气候危机凸显了这项任务的紧迫性。这场疫情已经夺走了该地区成千上万的生命，其中包括印度尼西亚的 14.3万多名男女老少。它还造成了巨大的经济损失，从工厂关闭到旅游业停摆。
虽然我们在国内也在与疫情作斗争，美国始终与该地区的人民站在一起。在美国向全球分发的三亿剂安全有效的疫苗中，有一亿多剂是提供给印太地区的。其中超过 2500 万剂运到这里，运到了印度尼西亚。到明年年底，我们将向全世界捐赠超过12亿剂疫苗。我们已经向该地区提供了超过 28 亿美元的额外援助以挽救生命，其中包括向印度尼西亚提供的 7700 万美元，用于从个人防护设备到医用氧气的许多方面。我们一直免费提供这种援助，没有任何附加条件。通过“2019冠状病毒病疫苗全球获取机制” (COVAX) 提供大部分捐赠使我们得以确保根据需要而非政治因素来公平分配这些捐赠。
与此同时，我们正在为根除这一流行病与我们的合作伙伴共同努力，四方伙伴关系的疫苗合作在其中发挥了关键作用。我们正在共同努力，以尽快融资、制造和分发，并为更多的人注射疫苗。许多国家正在加紧行动。印度最近承诺到 2022 年底再生产 50 亿剂疫苗。韩国和泰国也在增加产量。
我们正在动员私营部门为我们提供支持。在我上个月主持召开的一次部长级会议上，我们发起了一个名为“全球抗击冠状病毒团” (Global COVID Corps) 的组织。它是一个由大公司组成的联盟，将提供专业知识、工具和能力来支持发展中国家的物流和疫苗工作，包括最后一程交付，这对于确保疫苗接种至关重要。我们在世界各地越来越多地看到一种现象：疫苗生产增加了，疫苗也已经运出；但由于最终交付方面的困难以及需要解决的后勤问题，这些疫苗并没有被使用，而这正是我们所关注的焦点。
在我们与病毒作斗争的同时，我们正在印太地区和世界各地重建更好的卫生系统，以预防、发现和应对下一次疫情。事实上，我们知道如何做到这一点。几十年来，美国一直与合作伙伴共同加强该地区的卫生系统。在过去 20 年里，我们仅在东盟公共卫生方面的投资就超过了 35 亿美元。我们有很多值得展示的地方，无论是在显著改善公共卫生方面，还是在各地建立的深厚关系方面。
作为我们对东盟支持的一项内容，拜登总统最近宣布，我们将为“美国-东盟未来健康倡议”（U.S.-ASEAN Health Futures Initiative）提供 4000 万美元的资金，这将加速联合研究和加强卫生系统，并为新一代卫生专业人员提供培训机会。
我们还支持东盟公共卫生应急协调系统的发展。这将有助于该地区的国家协调对未来突发卫生事件的反应。我们今年夏天在河内开设的美国疾病控制与预防中心（U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention）的第一个东南亚地区办事处已经在当地为这些努力提供支持。
显然，气候危机是我们必须共同应对的另一个全球性挑战。整个印太地区的人们已经感受到这一灾难性影响：全球 70% 的自然灾害发生在该地区；2019 年，这一地区有超过 9000 万人受到气候相关灾害的影响。2020年，在美国的太平洋沿岸地区，加利福尼亚州经历了历史上六次最大野火中的五次。
目前，该地区许多最大的排放国已认识到需要采取紧急行动，我们也看到它们在第26届联合国气候变化大会上作出了雄心勃勃的承诺。在格拉斯哥，包括印度尼西亚在内的 15 个印太国家签署了“全球甲烷承诺协议”（Global Methane Pledge），以在未来十年内将排放量减少 30%。如果所有最大的排放国都加入我们的行列，那将比所有船舶停航和所有飞机停飞更能减少变暖效应。
但是，仅仅从威胁的视角来思考气候变化是错误的。这是因为地球上每一个国家都必须减少排放，并为气候变化之不可避免的影响做好准备。并且，向新技术和新行业进行的必要转型也为创造新的高薪工作提供了千载难逢的机会。
我们相信这一机会遍布存在于印太地区，我们已经在与我们的伙伴们合作，以抓住这些机会。仅在过去五年里，美国就为该地区动员了超过 70 亿美元的可再生能源投资。随着我们加紧努力，我们将有效地利用我们多年来所建立的独特伙伴关系群：多边组织和维权团体、企业和慈善机构、研究人员和技术专家。
以我们本月推出的“清洁能源优势行动计划” (Clean EDGE Initiative) 为例，它将汇集美国政府和私营部门的专业知识和创新成果，帮助推动整个地区的清洁能源解决方案。例如，拜登总统最近为美国-东盟气候变化未来倡议承诺提供超过 2000 多万美元的资金；再如，美国国际开发金融公司 (International Development Finance Corporation) 上周宣布提供五亿美元的资金，帮助印度在泰米尔纳德邦 (Tamil Nadu) 建造一座太阳能设备制造厂。
该工厂由美国的第一太阳能公司 (First Solar) 建造，年产能为 3.3 吉瓦。这足以为 200 多万个家庭供电。建设和运营该设施将为印度创造数千个工作岗位，其中大部分为适合女性的岗位，并在美国创造数百个工作岗位。并且，这只是美国帮助印度实现到 2030 年可再生能源装机容量达到 500 吉瓦之宏伟目标的途径之一，而这反过来又会帮助世界避免气候灾难。
我们认识到，即使向绿色经济的过渡创造大量就业机会——我们相信能够做到这一点——并非所有这些职位都会由在这次转型期间在旧行业和旧部门失去工作的工人来填补。因此，我们有义务不让任何人落伍。
第五，也是最后一点，我们将加强印太地区的安全。威胁正在演变，我们确保安全的方法也必须与时俱进。我们将在确保人民安全方面寻求更密切的合作，以应对暴力极端主义、非法捕鱼、人口贩运等各种挑战。我们将采取一项联合战略，在各种国家安全工具——外交、军事、情报——的运用方面与我们的盟友及合作伙伴更紧密地配合。我们的国防部长劳埃德·奥斯汀将这项战略称为“一体化威慑”( integrated deterrence)。
这关系到加强我们的实力，以便我们能够维护和平，正如我们在该地区几十年来所做的那样。我们不希望印太地区发生冲突。因此，我们寻求与朝鲜民主主义人民共和国进行认真和持续的外交沟通，最终目标是实现朝鲜半岛去核化。我们将与盟国及伙伴们合作，采取精准的、切实可行的方法来应对其核计划和导弹计划所构成的威胁，同时加强我们的延伸威慑。
因此，拜登总统上个月告诉习主席 ，我们肩负着确保我们国家之间的竞争不会转向冲突的重大责任。我们以最严肃的态度来承担这一责任，否则我们各方都将承受灾难性后果。
1962 年 2 月 14 日，美国司法部长罗伯特·肯尼迪（Robert F. Kennedy）曾来到这所大学演讲。他谈到了我们两国人民共同经历的持久斗争。他说，这场斗争必须由像今天在座的学生这样的年轻一代进行下去。他还引用了他的哥哥、当时的美国总统约翰·肯尼迪（John F. Kennedy）阐述的我们对世界的看法。肯尼迪总统说：“我们的基本目标保持不变：一个和平的世界，一个由自由和独立国家组成的社区，可以自由选择自己的未来和自己的制度，只要不威胁他人的自由。”
尽管在肯尼迪总统的这番讲话之后的近 70 年里已发生了翻天覆地的变化，但令人赞叹的是，这一愿景与我们的共同愿景是如此相似。能够在这所大学与同学们以及我们的许多青年领袖项目的校友们共同讨论这个问题，我心存感激，因为今天你们仍然是将这一愿景发扬光大的人。在你们履行这一使命的时候，请记住：在美国和我们共享的整个印太地区，人们的希望和命运与你们息息相关，在为一个更开放、更自由的印太地区奋斗的过程中，他们将是你们坚定不移的伙伴。
非常感谢各位听我演讲（掌声）。
 
欲查看原稿内容: https://www.state.gov/a-free-and-open-indo-pacific/
本译文仅供参考，只有英文原稿才可以被视为权威资料来源。

A Free and Open Indo-Pacific
SPEECH
ANTONY J. BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE
UNIVERSITAS INDONESIA
JAKARTA, INDONESIA
DECEMBER 14, 2021

MS KUSUMAYATI:  Excellency, ambassadors, ASEAN Secretary General, Honorable Rector of Universitas Indonesia, and the chairperson of the U.S.-Indonesia Board of Trustees, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:
First of all, let’s praise our God Almighty for the blessings that we receive, so today we can gather here in healthy and wealthy condition.  I am honored to extend our warmest welcome to the campus of Universitas Indonesia here in Depok City.
Universitas Indonesia are humbled and delighted to be the host of the honorary speech will be delivered by the Honorable U.S. Secretary of the State, Mr. Antony Blinken.  Universitas Indonesia, as the name suggests, take the pride to carrying the name of the nation.  We equally recognize this as the privilege as well as also our responsibility.
Our visions underscores the importance of science, technology, and culture, and how we take them forward to benefit the people in Indonesia as we are asked in the world.
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, as we all experience, far-reaching and complex problems are unfolding around us. The COVID-19 pandemic, natural disaster, global warming, climate change, are some among others.  There are no instant solutions of those matters, but we believe in investing our time to meet our minds together our ideas and acquire inspirations, and then transform it to collaborations, policies, and actions.
Today marks a unique moment for us.  We are privileged to have His Excellency the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken present among us to share his view.  Many key figures from different backgrounds and expertise are here already with us, and we really believe that the diversity of knowledge will align into one goal: to safeguarding our future generations while at the same time to solve the challenges that we have faced at the present days.
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Honorable U.S. Secretary of State, Mr. Antony Blinken. (Applause.)
SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good morning, everyone.  It is wonderful to be with all of you.  And Dr. Kusumayati, thank you so much for the generous introduction.  But more than that, thank you for decades of service working to improve public health, to educate the next generation of doctors and nurses – including as the first woman to serve as the University’s Dean of the School of Public Health.  From your research on reproductive health to your leadership on Indonesia’s COVID task force, your dedication to your community is truly inspirational, and I thank you. (Applause.)
And good morning to everyone here. Selamat pagi.  It is wonderful to be back in Jakarta.  I was here on a couple of occasions when I was last in government as deputy secretary of state, and I was looking forward to this opportunity to return to Southeast Asia’s largest democracy.
And for the students who are in this room, I expect it feels good to be back on campus.  I understand many of you have been studying remotely for some time and are looking forward to actually getting back in the classroom, and I’m glad we’ve had a little bit of an excuse to bring you back together today.  I know, Doctor, you and the task force want the students back, and I know how much everyone is looking forward to that.
I’m here, we’re here, because what happens in the Indo-Pacific will, more than any other region, shape the trajectory of the world in the 21st century.
The Indo-Pacific is the fastest growing region on the planet.  It accounts for 60 percent of the world economy, two-thirds of all economic growth over the last five years.  It’s home to more than half the world’s people, seven of the 15 biggest economies.
And it’s magnificently diverse, more than 3,000 languages, numerous faiths stretching across two oceans and three continents.
Even a single country like Indonesia is home to a rich patchwork that is hard to distill, except for its variety.  And this nation’s motto holds – Bhinneka Tunggal Ika, unity in diversity – which sounds pretty familiar to an American.  In the United States we say E Pluribus Unum, out of many, one.  It’s the same idea.
The United States has long been, is, and always will be an Indo-Pacific nation.  This is a geographic fact, from our Pacific coast states to Guam, our territories across the Pacific.  And it’s a historical reality, demonstrated by our two centuries of trade and other ties with the region.
Today, half of the United States’ top trading partners are in the Indo-Pacific.  It’s the destination for nearly one-third of our exports, the source of $900 billion in foreign direct investment in the United States, and that’s creating millions of jobs spread across all 50 of our states.  And more members of our military are stationed in the region than anywhere outside the continental U.S., ensuring peace and security that have been vital to prosperity in the region, benefiting us all.
And of course, we’re tied together by our people, whose connections go back generations.  There are more than 24 million Asian Americans living in the United States, including Ambassador Sung Kim, when he’s not serving his country in one part of the world or another, as he has been for the last three decades.
Before the pandemic, there were more than 775,000 students from the Indo-Pacific studying at U.S. colleges and universities.  And your American classmates here at Universitas Indonesia are among the millions of Americans who have come to the region to study, to work, to live, including one who went onto become our president.
There’s an Indonesian proverb – one that I’m told kids are taught from a young age: “We have two ears, but only one mouth.”  That means that before we speak or act, we have to listen.  And we’ve done a lot of listening to people in the Indo-Pacific in the first year of this administration to understand your vision for the region and its future.
We’ve welcomed leaders from the region in our country, including the first two foreign leaders President Biden hosted after taking office from Japan and South Korea, and all the foreign ministers whom I’ve had the privilege of hosting at the State Department, including Foreign Minister Retno.  And we’ve come to your region – Vice President Harris, Secretary of Defense Austin, Secretary of Commerce Raimondo, and so many other Cabinet members, not to mention many senior State Department officials from my team.
The President has participated in multi leader-level summits held by key regional bodies: APEC; the U.S.-ASEAN and East Asia Summits; and the Quad, made up of India, Japan, and Australia.  I’ve done the same with fellow foreign ministers, including hosting the Mekong-U.S. Partnership Ministerial.  And President Biden has met with Indo-Pacific leaders overseas as well, including a very productive meeting with President Jokowi in Glasgow during the COP26.
But we’re not just listening to leaders. At our embassies and consulates across the region, our diplomats are using two ears to take in the views of people from all walks of life – students, activists, academics, entrepreneurs.
And while it’s an extraordinarily diverse region with distinct interests, distinct views, we see a great deal of alignment between the vision we’re hearing from the Indo-Pacific and our own.
People and governments of the region want more, better opportunities for all of their people. They want more chances to connect – within their nations, between their nations, around the world.  They want to be better prepared for crises like the pandemic that we’re living through. They want peace and stability.  They want the United States to be more present and more engaged. And above all, they want a region that is more free and more open.
So what I’d like to do today is to try to set out that shared vision, and how together we’re going to work to make it a reality.  And there are five core elements that I’d like to focus on.
First, we will advance a free and open Indo-Pacific.
Now, we talk a lot about a free and open Indo-Pacific, but we don’t often define what we actually mean by that.  Freedom is about the ability to write your future and have a say in what happens in your community and your country, no matter who you are or who you know.  And openness naturally flows from freedom.  Free places are open to new information and points of view.  They’re open to different cultures, religions, ways of life.  They’re open to criticism, to self-reflection, as well as to renewal.
When we say that we want a free and open Indo-Pacific, we mean that on an individual level, that people will be free in their daily lives and live in open societies.  We mean that on a state level, that individual countries will be able to choose their own path and their own partners.  And we mean that on a regional level, that in this part of the world problems will be dealt with openly, rules will be reached transparently and applied fairly, goods and ideas and people will flow freely across land, cyberspace, and the open seas.
We all have a stake in ensuring that the world’s most dynamic region is free from coercion and accessible to all.  This is good for people across the region.  It’s good for Americans because history shows that when this vast region is free and open, America is more secure and more prosperous.  So we will work with our partners across the region to try to realize this vision.
We will continue to support anti-corruption and transparency groups, investigative journalists, think tanks across the region like the Advocata Institute in Sri Lanka.  With our support, that institute created a public registry of state-owned enterprises like banks and airlines that operate with big losses, and proposed ways to reform them.
We’re finding partners in government, too, like Victor Sotto.  He’s the mayor of the city of Pasig in the Philippines.  Victor set up a 24/7 hotline for constituents to report cases of corruption.  It has made the awarding in public contracts more transparent, has given community-based organizations a say in the way the city spends its resources.  He’s part of the State Department’s first group of global anti-corruption champions that we announced earlier this year.
And we’ll continue to learn best practices from our fellow democracies. That’s the idea behind the Summit for Democracy that President Biden convened last week, where President Jokowi spoke – indeed, he was the first speaker – and the Bali Democracy Forum that Indonesia just held for the fourteenth time, and where I had an opportunity to speak.
We’ll also stand up against leaders who don’t respect their people’s rights, as we are seeing now in Burma.  We will continue to work with our allies and partners to press the regime to cease its indiscriminate violence, release all of those unjustly detained, allow unhindered access, and restore Burma’s path to inclusive democracy.
ASEAN has developed a Five-Point Consensus, and it calls on the regime to engage in constructive dialogue with all parties to seek a peaceful resolution that respects the will of the Burmese people, a goal we will not give up on.
Another way we will promote freedom and openness is by defending an open, interoperable, secure, and reliable internet against those who are actively working to make the internet more closed, more fractured, and less secure.  We’ll work with our partners to defend these principles, and help build the secure, trusted systems that lay the foundation for it.  At the Moon-Biden Leaders’ Summit earlier this year, the Republic of Korea and the United States announced more than $3.5 billion in investments in emerging technologies, including research and development on secure 5G and 6G networks.
Finally, we’ll work with our allies and partners to defend the rules-based order that we’ve built together over decades to ensure the region remains open and accessible.
And let me be clear about one thing: the goal of defending the rules-based order is not to keep any country down.  Rather, it’s to protect the right of all countries to choose their own path, free from coercion, free from intimidation.  It’s not about a contest between a U.S.-centric region or a China-centric region.  The Indo-Pacific is its own region.  Rather, it’s about upholding the rights and agreements that are responsible for the most peaceful and prosperous period that this region and the world has ever experienced.
That’s why there is so much concern, from northeast Asia to southeast Asia, and from the Mekong River to the Pacific Islands, about Beijing’s aggressive actions, claiming open seas as their own, distorting open markets through subsidies to its state-run companies, denying the exports or revoking deals for countries whose policies it does not agree with, engaging in illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing activities.  Countries across the region want this behavior to change.
We do, too, and that’s why we’re determined to ensure freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, where Beijing’s aggressive actions there threaten the movement of more than $3 trillion worth of commerce every year.
It’s worth remembering that, tied up in that colossal number, $3 trillion, are the actual livelihoods and well-being of millions of people across the world.  When commerce can’t traverse open seas, that means that farmers are blocked from shipping their produce; factories can’t ship their microchips; hospitals are blocked from getting lifesaving medicines.
Five years ago, an international tribunal delivered a unanimous and legally binding decision firmly rejecting unlawful, expansive South China Sea maritime claims as being inconsistent with international law.  We and other countries, including South China Sea claimants, will continue to push back on such behavior.  It’s also why we have an abiding interest in peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, consistent with our longstanding commitments.
Second, we will forge stronger connections within and beyond the region.  We’ll deepen our treaty alliances with Japan, the Republic of Korea, Australia, the Philippines, and Thailand.  Those bonds have long provided the foundation for peace, security, and prosperity in the region.  We’ll foster greater cooperation among these allies, as well.  That’s one of the things we’ve done by deepening U.S.-Japan-South Korea trilateral cooperation, and launching an historic new security cooperation agreement with Australia and the United Kingdom.  We’ll find ways to knit our allies together with our partners, as we’ve done by reinvigorating the Quad.  And we’ll strengthen our partnership with a strong and independent ASEAN.
ASEAN centrality means we will keep working with and through ASEAN to deepen our engagement with the region all the more, given the alignment between our vision and ASEAN’s outlook on the Indo-Pacific.
In October, President Biden announced more than $100 million to bolster our cooperation with ASEAN across key areas, to include public health, women’s empowerment.  And the President will be inviting ASEAN’s leaders to a summit in the United States in the coming months to discuss how we can deepen our strategic partnership.
We’re strengthening strategic partnerships with other countries in the region:  Singapore, Vietnam, Malaysia, and, of course, Indonesia.  And that’s the reason I’ve made this trip.
We’re also deepening ties between our people.  YSEALI, the signature program to empower the rising generation of leaders in Southeast Asia, has more than 150,000 members and counting.
Finally, we’ll work to connect our relationships in the Indo-Pacific with an unmatched system of alliances and partnerships beyond the region, particularly in Europe.  The European Union recently released an Indo-Pacific strategy that aligns closely with our own vision.  At NATO, we’re updating our Strategic Concept to reflect the Indo-Pacific’s growing significance, and address new threats, like the security implications of the climate crisis.  And we’re putting ASEAN’s centrality at the heart of our work with partners.  We did that just a few days ago, when the G7 ministers were meeting in the UK, and met with their ASEAN counterparts for the first time.
We’re doing all this for a simple reason:  it allows us to assemble the broadest, most effective coalitions to tackle any challenge, to seize any opportunity, to work toward any goal.  The more countries that we can rally around common interests, the stronger we all are.
Third, we will promote broad-based prosperity.  The United States has already provided more than $1 trillion in foreign direct investment in the Indo-Pacific.  The region has told us loud and clear that it wants us to do more.  We intend to meet that call.  At President Biden’s direction, we’re developing a comprehensive Indo-Pacific economic framework to pursue our shared objectives, including around trade and the digital economy, technology, resilient supply chains, decarbonization and clean energy, infrastructure, worker standards, and other areas of shared interest.
Our diplomacy will play a key part.  We’ll identify opportunities that American firms aren’t finding on their own, and make it easier for them to bring their expertise and their capital to new places and new sectors.  Our diplomatic posts, our embassies across the Indo-Pacific are already leading on this, and we’re going to surge capacity so that they can do more.  More than 2,300 business and government leaders from the region joined me for this year’s Indo-Pacific Business Forum, which we co-hosted with India, and where we announced nearly $7 billion in new private-sector projects.
We’ll work with our partners to shape the rules of the growing digital economy on key issues like data privacy and security, but in a way that reflects our values, and unlocks opportunities for our people.  Because if we don’t shape them, others will.  And there’s a good chance they’ll do it in a way that doesn’t advance our shared interests or our shared values.
At APEC in November, President Biden set out a clear vision for how we can build a common way forward in the region.  On digital technologies, he talked about the need for an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure Internet, and our strong interest in investing in cybersecurity and developing digital economy standards that will position all of our economies to compete in the future.  And when U.S. Trade Representative Tai and I co-led our delegation to the APEC ministerial in November, we focused on the need to ensure that technology serves a free and open Indo-Pacific.
We’ll also promote fair and resilient trade.  That’s the story of the ASEAN Single Window, a project the United States supported to create a single automated system for clearing customs across the region.  It helped streamline trade by making it more transparent and secure, lowering costs for business and prices for consumers.  And the move from paper to digital customs has made is possible to keep cross-border trade moving, even during the lockdowns.
During the first year of the pandemic, the countries that were most active on the platform saw their trade activity rise by 20 percent, when most other cross-border trade was actually falling.  And at the U.S.-ASEAN Summit in October, President Biden committed additional U.S. support to the Single Window.  We’ll work with partners to make our supply chains more secure and more resilient.  I think we have all seen, through the pandemic, just how vulnerable they are, how damaging disruptions can be, including shortages of masks and microchips and pileups at ports.
We’ve been leading efforts to bring the international community together to try to resolve bottlenecks and build greater resiliency against future shocks.  President Biden convened a Leaders Summit on supply chain resilience.  Vice President Harris made it a core focus of her meetings during her visit to the region.  Commerce Secretary Raimondo has tackled the issue with Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, and Malaysia on her recent travel.  And U.S. Trade Representative Tai launched the interagency Supply Chain Trade Task Force, and raised the issue in her travel to Japan, the Republic of Korea, and India.  In the new year, the Commerce Secretary, Gina Raimondo, and I will team up to convene government and private-sector leaders from around the world to tackle these issues at a Global Supply Chain Forum.  As the hub of so much of the globe’s production and commerce, this region, the Indo-Pacific, will be core to these efforts.
Finally, we’ll help close the gap on infrastructure.  There is, in this region as well as around the world, a large gap when it comes to infrastructure needs and what’s currently being provided.   Ports, roads, power grids, broadband – all are building blocks for global trade, for commerce, for connectivity, for opportunity, for prosperity.  And they’re essential to the Indo-Pacific’s inclusive growth.  But we’re hearing increasing concerns from government officials, industry, labor, and communities in the Indo-Pacific about what happens when infrastructure isn’t done right, like when it’s awarded through opaque, corrupt processes, or built by overseas companies that import their own labor, extract resources, pollute the environment, and drive communities into debt.
Countries in the Indo-Pacific want a better kind of infrastructure.  But many feel it’s too expensive, or they feel pressured to take bad deals on terms set by others rather than no deals at all.  So we will work with countries in the region to deliver the high-quality, high-standards infrastructure that people deserve.  In fact, we’re already doing that.
Just this week, together with Australia and Japan, we announced a partnership with the Federated States of Micronesia, with Kiribati, and Nauru to build a new undersea cable to improve internet connectivity to these Pacific nations.  And since 2015, the members of the Quad have provided more than $48 billion in government-backed financing for infrastructure for the region. This represents thousands of projects across more than 30 countries, from rural development to renewable energy.  It benefits millions of people.
The Quad recently launched an infrastructure coordination group to catalyze even more investment, and it is looking to partner with Southeast Asia on infrastructure and many other shared priorities.  The United States will do more than that.  Build Back Better World, which we launched with our G7 partners in June, is committed to mobilizing hundreds of billions of dollars in transparent, sustainable financing over the coming years.  And together with Australia and Japan, we launched the Blue Dot Network to start certifying high-quality infrastructure projects that meet the benchmarks developed by the G20, the OECD, and others, and to attract additional investors.
Fourth, we will help build a more resilient Indo-Pacific.  The COVID-19 pandemic and the climate crisis have underscored the urgency of that task.  The pandemic has taken the lives of hundreds of thousands of people across the region, including more than 143,000 men, women, and children here in Indonesia.  It has also inflicted a massive economic toll, from shuttered factories to the halt of tourism.
The United States has been there with the people of this region at every step, even as we battle the pandemic at home.  Of the 300 million doses of safe, effective vaccines that the United States has already distributed worldwide, we’ve sent more than 100 million doses to the Indo-Pacific. And over 25 million of those have come here, to Indonesia.  By the end of next year, we will have donated more than 1.2 billion doses to the world.  And we’ve provided over $2.8 billion in additional assistance to the region to save lives, including $77 million here in Indonesia for everything from personal protective equipment to medical oxygen for hospitals.  And we’ve been providing this aid free of charge, with no strings attached.  By making most of these donations through COVAX, we have ensured they are distributed equitably, based on need, not on politics.
At the same time, we’re working together with our partners to end the pandemic.  The Quad vaccine partnership is playing a key part in that.  We’re working together to finance, to manufacture, to distribute, and to put as many shots in arms as quickly as possible.  Individual countries are stepping up.  India recently committed to produce an additional 5 billion doses by the end of 2022.  The Republic of Korea and Thailand are ramping up their production as well.
We are rallying the private sector to our side.  At a ministerial that I convened last month, we launched something called the Global COVID Corps.  It is a coalition of leading companies that will provide expertise, tools, and capabilities to support logistics and vaccine efforts in developing countries, including the last mile, and that is critical for actually getting shots into arms.  This is what we’re seeing increasingly around the world, where the production of vaccines has increased, they are getting out there, but then they are not getting into arms because of the last-mile difficulties, the logistics that need to be solved, and that is exactly what we are focusing on.
At the same time, as we fight the virus, we’re building the health systems back better in the Indo-Pacific, around the world, to prevent, detect, and respond to the next pandemic.  And the thing is, we actually know how to do this.  The United States has been working with partners to strengthen health systems in the region for decades.  In ASEAN alone, we’ve invested more than $3.5 billion in public health over the past 20 years.  And we have a lot to show for it, both in significant improvements to public health, and also in deep relationships that we’ve built on the ground.
As part of our support for ASEAN, President Biden recently announced that we’ll provide $40 million for the U.S.-ASEAN Health Futures Initiative, and that’s going to accelerate joint research, strengthen health systems, train a rising generation of health professionals.
We’re also supporting the development of an ASEAN Public Health Emergency Coordination System.  That’s going to help countries in the region coordinate their response to future health emergencies.  And the first Southeast Asian regional office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which we opened in Hanoi this summer, is already supporting these efforts on the ground.
The climate crisis, of course, is another global challenge that we have to tackle together.  People across the Indo-Pacific are already feeling its catastrophic impact:  70 percent of the world’s natural disasters strike in this region, and over 90 million people in the region were affected by climate-related disasters in 2019.  The following year, on our own Pacific coast, California endured five of the six biggest wildfires in its history.
Now, many of the biggest emitters in the region have recognized the need to act urgently, as we saw in the ambitious pledges that they set out at COP26.  In Glasgow, 15 Indo-Pacific countries, including Indonesia, signed the Global Methane Pledge to cut emissions by 30 percent over the next decade.  If all the biggest emitters join us, that would do more to reduce warming than taking every ship out of the seas and every plane out of the skies.
But it would be a mistake to think about climate only through the prism of threats.  Here is why: every country on the planet has to reduce emissions and prepare for the unavoidable impacts of climate change.  And that necessary transformation to new technologies and new industries also offers a once-in-a-generation opportunity to create new, good-paying jobs.
We believe that opportunity runs through the Indo-Pacific, and we’re already working with our partners to seize it.  In the last five years alone, the United States has mobilized more than $7 billion in renewable energy investments in the region.  As we step up our efforts, we’re bringing to bear the unique constellation of partnerships that we’ve built up:  multilateral organizations and advocacy groups, businesses and philanthropies, researchers and technical experts.
Consider the Clean EDGE Initiative that we’re launching this month, which will bring together the expertise and innovation of the U.S. Government and private sector to help advance clean energy solutions across the region.  Consider the more than $20 million that President Biden recently committed to a U.S.-ASEAN Climate Futures initiative, or the $500 million in financing announced just last week by the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation to help build a solar manufacturing facility in Tamil Nadu, India.
The factory, being built by the American company First Solar, will have an annual capacity of 3.3 gigawatts.  That’s enough to power more than two million homes.  Building and operating this facility will create thousands of jobs in India, the majority for women, and hundreds more jobs in the United States.  And that’s just one of the ways in which the United States will help India reach its ambitious goal of 500 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity by 2030, and, in turn, help the world avoid a climate catastrophe.
Now, we recognize that, even if the transition to a green economy produces a big increase in jobs, which we’re confident it will, not all of those positions will be filled by workers who lost jobs in old industries and old sectors during this transition.  So we have an obligation that we are committed to, to bring everyone along.
Fifth, and finally, we will bolster Indo-Pacific security.  Threats are evolving.  Our security approach has to evolve with them.  We’ll seek closer civilian security cooperation to tackle challenges ranging from violate extremism, to illegal fishing, to human trafficking.  And we’ll adopt a strategy that more closely weaves together all our instruments of national power – diplomacy, military, intelligence – with those of our allies and our partners.  Our Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, calls this “integrated deterrence.”
And it’s about reinforcing our strengths so that we can keep the peace, as we’ve done in the region for decades.  We don’t want conflict in the Indo-Pacific.  That’s why we seek serious and sustained diplomacy with the DPRK, with the ultimate goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.  We’ll work with allies and partners to address the threat posed by the DPRK’s nuclear and missile programs through a calibrated, practical approach, while also strengthening our extended deterrence.
And that’s why President Biden told President Xi last month that we share a profound responsibility to ensure that the competition between our countries does not veer into conflict.  We take that responsibility with the greatest of seriousness, because the failure to do so would be catastrophic for all of us.
On February 14th, 1962, the United States Attorney General, Robert F. Kennedy, came to speak at this university.  He talked about the enduring struggles that our people shared, which, he said, had to be carried forward by young people like the students here today.  And he quoted something that his brother, John F. Kennedy, then President of the United States, said about our vision for the world.  President Kennedy said, “Our basic goal remains the same:  a peaceful world, a community of free and independent states, free to choose their own future and their own system, so long as it does not threaten the freedom of others.”
For all that’s changed in the nearly 70 years since President Kennedy spoke those words, it’s remarkable how much that vision aligns with the one we share.  And the reason I am so grateful to be able to speak about this here at this university, with students and alumni of so many of our youth leadership programs present, is because you are the ones still today who will carry forward that vision.  As you do, know that you have people across the Indo-Pacific, including in the United States, whose hopes and fates are tied up with yours, and who will be your steadfast partners in making the Indo-Pacific, this region that we share, more open and more free.
Thanks so much for listening.  (Applause.)