India, Oct. 4 -- Trump's instinct to leverage alliances as bargaining tools against China undermines the very deterrence they are meant to provide. Alliances are not poker chips. They are the scaffolding of U.S. power and credibility in Asia.

The durability of America's alliances in Asia has long been the bedrock of regional stability. Yet President Donald Trump's transactional approach to foreign policy risks reducing these alliances to bargaining chips in negotiations with Beijing. South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines are not expendable assets; they are sovereign partners whose security guarantees form the architecture of the Indo-Pacific order. To treat them otherwise is to invite instability, embolden China, and erode U.S....