White House appoints female diplomat in charge of Asia region

The White House has appointed Susan Thornton as the new diplomat in charge of East Asia and the Pacific.

Ms. Susan Thornton, acting assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs. Photo: Reuters

According to Buzzfeed, the decision to appoint Ms. Susan Thornton is a great victory for US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and at the same time a heavy blow to the nationalist faction in President Donald Trump's administration.

Previously, some close advisers of President Trump tried every way to remove Ms. Susan Thornton from the US State Department.

Ms. Thornton, currently acting assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, is one of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's most trusted diplomats. She is fluent in Mandarin.

The reason Ms. Thornton has had fierce conflicts with the nationalist faction in the White House is because this group believes that she does not have a strong and resolute enough stance in handling issues of relations between the US and China.

Ms. Thornton had “won” the “retention” battle when Mr. Stephen Bannon was still the White House chief strategist last summer. Mr. Bannon had made no secret of his desire to remove her from the US State Department.

In an interview in August this year, Mr. Bannon bluntly declared: "I will remove Ms. Susan Thornton (acting in charge of East Asia and Pacific affairs) from the State Department."

The aggressive moves by Mr. Bannon and those who shared the White House chief strategist's views at the time in making it difficult for Ms. Thornton to be appointed made Secretary of State Tillerson very uncomfortable.

Those frustrations came to a head during a June White House meeting when Mr. Tillerson harshly criticized Mr. Johnny DeStefano, the president’s chief of staff, for not taking his personnel decisions seriously enough.

"She (Susan Thornton) is someone who brings essential views on Mr. Tillerson's policies and will help create a counterbalance to the more hawkish views in other parts of the administration," said Mr. Scott Kennedy, an Asia scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Although the White House's decision to appoint Ms. Susan Thornton will still have to be approved by the Senate, this result also shows a different signal about the position and internal influence of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson after a series of recent US media reports about the possibility of his dismissal.

There is also another noteworthy piece of information related to the US State Department's personnel. A White House official revealed that another political ally of President Trump will also join the diplomatic agency in charge of the Asia region.

Accordingly, Mr. Alex Wong, former foreign policy advisor to Senator Tom Cotton, is also preparing to join the US State Department staff as deputy assistant secretary in charge of East Asia and Pacific affairs.

According to Tuoi Tre