Quad here to stay: Leaders underline endurance of grouping

This spirit of reaffirming Quad’s continued presence was then reflected in the Wilmington declaration.

When PM Narendra Modi, US President Joe Biden, Australian PM Anthony Albanese and Japanese PM Fumio Kishida stepped out for a family photo of Quad leaders on Saturday afternoon right before the summit commenced, a reporter asked Biden if the Quad will survive beyond November.

Putting an arm around Modi, with a smile, Biden said, “Way beyond November. Way beyond November.” Modi laughed and gave a thumbs up sign. Not only would he host the next summit in India, Modi will also become the most senior leader who has stayed at the helm the longest in the group of four democracies that has changed the architecture of the Indo Pacifi.

At one level, the presence of the four leaders in Biden’s hometown and high school, Archmere Academy, was a tribute to the American president’s leadership of the group and acknowledgment of him raising the group’s engagements to the level of leaders.

But at another level, it was a signal from all four leaders, both to domestic constituencies and external adversaries, that irrespective of the political change that is the staple of democracies — this will be both Biden and Kishida’s last summit — the group will stay. The fact that it was under Donald Trump’s administration that foreign ministers of the four countries began meeting, and that the US Senate and House have just set up a bicameral and bipartisan Quad caucus, also lends it an element of rare unity in an otherwise polarised American polity.

This then also became the key theme of the opening statements of the leaders at the summit. Modi, Biden, Kishida, Albanese and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken sat around a table inside the high school. Behind Modi were external affairs minister S Jaishankar, foreign secretary Vikram Misri, and Indian ambassador to the US Vinay Kwatra among other officials. Behind Blinken were US national security adviser Jake Sullivan, deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell, US ambassador to India Eric Garcetti, and US ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy among other officials.

Biden said, “Quad is here to stay”

In his remarks, Modi hailed Biden’s contribution to Quad, and declared that Quad wasn’t against anyone else. “All of us support a rules based international order, respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity and peaceful resolution of all disputes. A free, open, inclusive and prosperous Indo Pacific is our shared priority and shared commitment…Our message is clear. Quad is here to stay, to assist, to partner and to complement.”

Kishida said, “It is ever more important for us, the Quad, who share values such as freedom and democracy, to continue to demonstrate our firm commitment to our common vision of FOIP, the free and open Indo Pacific, to the international community.” And Albanese added Australia’s voice to express continued commitment to the group and spoke about Quad’s short history allowing it not to be confined by tradition but leaving room to evolve and contribute.

This spirit of reaffirming Quad’s continued presence was then reflected in the Wilmington declaration. In the final section of the text, Quad leaders said that they had met six times, including four times in person, in the last four years. Quad foreign ministers had met eight times in the last five years. Quad country representatives, including ambassadors in various countries, met on a regular basis. The declaration announced that Quad commerce and industry ministers would meet for the first time, as would the heads of the respective development finance agencies of the four countries.

And the declaration said, “Altogether, our four countries are cooperating at an unprecedented pace and scale. Each of our governments has committed to working through our respective budgetary processes to secure robust funding for Quad priorities in the Indo-Pacific region to ensure an enduring impact. We intend to work with our legislatures to deepen interparliamentary exchanges, and encourage other stakeholders to deepen engagement with Quad counterparts. We look forward to the next Quad Foreign Ministers’ meeting hosted by the United States in 2025, and the next Quad Leaders’ Summit hosted by India in 2025. The Quad is here to stay.”

That was clearly the big message from Wilmington. Quad retains its flexibility, as the shift in venue from India to the US at a pretty late juncture in the diplomatic calendar showed, but it is also steadily moving towards institutionalisation and permanence as a feature of international political system.