Raisina Dialogue: Quad like soft Beatles, members can release solo albums, says Japan minister

In the first panel discussion between the Quad Foreign Ministers at the Raisina Dialogue, Hayashi said, “This is a band like The Beatles, where the member is fixed. And they always played together for 10 years. But this is more of a soft group, so that even within the Beatles, Paul McCartney could release an album solo.”

But, he said, each member is close to the other.

Referring to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong, the Japanese minister said: “We can share information, any idea…. I can open up with these three friends here. It’s pretty nice to talk about all these issues because we have a trust between the four of us…the same values and the same beliefs such as democracy, freedom and everything. So without worrying about those big conditions, we can really freely talk within this group and communicate.”

Hayashi said Quad as a whole will coordinate all key efforts of the four countries so that “we can do much better than just one plus one plus one plus one is four”. But, he said, “the one plus one plus one plus one could be six, seven or eight by coordinating and listening.”

Hayashi said Quad is a platform for practical cooperation and it is not trying to exclude anyone.

Jaishankar said the Quad is now working because “we have greater strategic clarity. I also think we have leaderships with a greater sense of purpose, who are less encumbered by baggage. But to me, a big difference is actually our inter se relationship which today has become so much more confident and so much deeper.”

Asked about their statements about not being a military group, Jaishankar said, “So, we do stand for something. What I would not like to be defined as is standing against something or somebody, because that diminishes me. That makes it as though some other people are the centre of the world, and I am only there to be for them or against them.”

Blinken said, “If we allow with impunity Russia to do what it’s doing in Ukraine, then that’s a message to would-be aggressors everywhere — that they may be able to get away with it, too.”

Australia’s Foreign Minister Wong said she views the Quad grouping as a “lighthouse”. She said, “It enables choices by these countries working for a region…by virtue of the practical work that we seek to do together.”