The Accelerated Military Withdrawal of the United States from Afghanistan and its Turn to East Asia: Changing the Path of Forced and Political Hegemony

Changing geopolitical dynamics, with China's emergence as a key player and the declining role of the United States as a superpower, have shifted focus toward the Asia-Pacific region.Today, the region has become home to numerous flashpoints as China seeks to turn power balance in its favor, while the United States is leery of Chinese intentions.Nevertheless, to mitigate this threat, the United States under the Obama administration had already turned foreign policy focus from the Middle East to the Asia-Pacific with the policy of "Pivot to Asia."Along with Trump came a newfangled strategy of a Free and Open Indo-Pacific thereby including the Indian Ocean as part of the great game.Hitherto, the most relevant discourse for explaining this power competition between the two competitors is the "Thucydides Trap."According to which, in a binary setting where both a rising and declining power exists, war is inevitable.However, this oversimplified assumption has limited the cognizance of the Asia-Pacific region, which emerged as a result of the liberal order and is heading toward complex interdependence, even superseding the West as the epicenter of economic development.Therefore, this article argues that there are multiple discourses to understand the Asia-Pacific region with the small powers playing an important role in