Jakarta. A senior Pentagon official said Thursday that the US harbored no intention of expanding its territory in Indonesia.

US Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby is on a four-leg Southeast Asian trip and had just wrapped up his Jakarta visit. Colby told a virtual press briefing that the US already has an “enormous” territorial size on its own, signaling that expansion to the also “very large” archipelagic Indonesia would not make sense.

“The US has no territorial claims. We are not seeking to expand our territory here,” Colby said, while saying he understood that the bilateral engagements would also hinge on mutual benefits.

“We are not coming, telling, and wagging our finger. We’re saying: ‘Look, here are the kinds of things that we need to work on that make sense for that balance of power, peace, and strength perspectives. That’s not designed to control or undermine Indonesia.”

Colby — who also met President Prabowo Subianto — stressed that Washington’s interest was in “strong countries that are capable of defending their own sovereignty”. 

The Donald Trump administration has increasingly been pushing the country’s partners to spend more on defense, citing that they also need to bear more of the burden for regional security.

In a separate statement on Colby’s visit, Defense Minister Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin had said that the US’ defense partnership with Jakarta was “not directed at establishing an American military base in Indonesia”. 

In April, both governments had clinched a “major defense cooperation partnership”, which covered military modernization.

Around that time, the Indonesian government found itself in hot water following reports that the US had nudged Jakarta into letting its military planes fly through its airspace without strict clearances. Defense Ministry spokesman Rico Ricardo Sirait had told the Jakarta Globe that such arrangements were still far from final.

Add as a preferred source on Google +