Additional focus was placed on the region with the Obama administration's 2012 "Pivot to East Asia" regional strategy,[3] whose key areas of actions are: "strengthening bilateral security alliances; deepening our working relationships with emerging powers, including with China; engaging with regional multilateral institutions; expanding trade and investment; forging a broad-based military presence; and advancing democracy and human rights."[4] A report by the Brookings Institution states that reactions to the pivot strategy were mixed, as "different Asian states responded to American rebalancing in different ways."[3]
There has been strong perception from China that all of these are part of US' China containment policy.[5] Proponents of this theory claim that the United States needs a weak, divided China to continue its hegemony in Asia. This is accomplished, the theory claims, by the United States establishing military, economic, and diplomatic ties with countries adjacent to China's borders.