A military name change signals a broader strategic and diplomatic shift.
Foreign Policy
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A military name change signals a broader strategic and diplomatic shift.
By Derek Grossman, a professor of political science and international relations at the University of Southern California.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Donald Trump meet with journalists at the White House in Washington, on Feb. 13, 2025.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Donald Trump meet with journalists at the White House in Washington, on Feb. 13, 2025. JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images
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June 17, 2026, 2:45 PM
In a surprise move this week, the U.S. Defense Department announced that Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM)—the Hawaii-based headquarters for all U.S. armed forces in the Pacific and eastern Indian oceans—would revert to its original name, Pacific Command, or PACOM. The Pentagon argued, “Restoring the legacy [of the] USPACOM designation honors the command’s deep historical roots, fostering a sense of pride and collective spirit among all who serve in the Pacific.” This may be true, but it’s at least equally true that returning to the original name aligns more comfortably with U.S. President Donald Trump’s desire to tone down competition against China in favor of engagement and deal-making.
Indeed, it was Trump himself who, during his first term in 2018, decided to change the name from PACOM to INDOPACOM. Speaking on Trump’s behalf, then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis noted that the new designation reflected “the increasing connectivity between the Indian and Pacific oceans.” The switch did not alter the command’s geographic area of responsibility, stretching from the U.S. West Coast to the waters off India—or “Hollywood to Bollywood,” as former commander Harry Harris used to say. Rather, the name change bolstered the first Trump administration’s vision of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific,” which Trump first announced during his visit to Vietnam in 2017. That vision—which then became official U.S. strategy—originally came from former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who wanted democratic countries, including Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, to work together to prevent authoritarian China from converting the South China Sea into “Lake Beijing.”
In a surprise move this week, the U.S. Defense Department announced that Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM)—the Hawaii-based headquarters for all U.S. armed forces in the Pacific and eastern Indian oceans—would revert to its original name, Pacific Command, or PACOM. The Pentagon argued, “Restoring the legacy [of the] USPACOM designation honors the command’s deep historical roots, fostering a sense of pride and collective spirit among all who serve in the Pacific.” This may be true, but it’s at least equally true that returning to the original name aligns more comfortably with U.S. President Donald Trump’s desire to tone down competition against China in favor of engagement and deal-making.
Indeed, it was Trump himself who, during his first term in 2018, decided to change the name from PACOM to INDOPACOM. Speaking on Trump’s behalf, then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis noted that the new designation reflected “the increasing connectivity between the Indian and Pacific oceans.” The switch did not alter the command’s geographic area of responsibility, stretching from the U.S. West Coast to the waters off India—or “Hollywood to Bollywood,” as former commander Harry Harris used to say. Rather, the name change bolstered the first Trump administration’s vision of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific,” which Trump first announced during his visit to Vietnam in 2017. That vision—which then became official U.S. strategy—originally came from former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who wanted democratic countries, including Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, to work together to prevent authoritarian China from converting the South China Sea into “Lake Beijing.”
For the first Trump administration, the term Indo-Pacific also connoted leveraging stronger ties not just with India, but across the Indian Ocean region and with friendly littoral and island states in Southeast Asia and Oceania. The plan was to force Beijing to divert some of its attention and resources away from its sovereignty disputes over Taiwan, the East China Sea, and the South China Sea. Ultimately, the Indo-Pacific became the organizing concept for a U.S. grand strategy focused on balancing China’s growing power and influence.
But the second Trump administration’s decision to revert to PACOM suggests something different: not necessarily an accommodation of China’s goals in the region, but a departure from the strategic logic that underpinned the Indo-Pacific concept in the first place.
More than anything else, the original INDOPACOM designation reflected Washington’s belief that India would play a central role in balancing China’s rise. The term “Indo-Pacific” was intended to elevate the strategic importance of the Indian Ocean, strengthen ties with New Delhi, and encourage greater cooperation among like-minded powers stretching from East Africa to the Western Pacific. The goal was to constrain Chinese influence across multiple theaters rather than only in East Asia.
Today, however, those assumptions no longer appear central to Trump’s foreign policy. Although India remains an important partner, Trump has repeatedly signaled that it no longer enjoys the privileged position it once held in U.S. strategic thinking. Since last summer, Trump has demonstrated a willingness to risk serious tensions with India in pursuit of other objectives. He was angered by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s refusal to support his Nobel Peace Prize aspirations following a four-day war between India and Pakistan, which Trump claimed to have helped resolve. Last year, his administration pressured India over purchases of sanctioned Russian oil and Trump expressed frustration over disagreements about a bilateral trade agreement. Last year, he reportedly canceled his participation in a planned Quad summit in India because of these frictions, bringing embarrassment to New Delhi.
Trump has further cultivated closer ties with Pakistan despite long-standing Indian concerns about Islamabad’s relationship with terrorist groups. Most notably, Trump has relied heavily on Pakistani Field Marshal Asim Munir as a key intermediary in U.S.-Iran diplomacy, elevating Islamabad’s importance at a time when relations with New Delhi have become increasingly strained.
Trump’s decision to restore PACOM also comes on the heels of his highly publicized trip to Beijing last month, where he sought to stabilize relations with Chinese President Xi Jinping after months of tensions over tariffs, technology restrictions, and the conflict with Iran. Rather than emphasizing strategic rivalry, Trump focused on areas of potential cooperation, including trade, energy security, and regional stability. Both leaders portrayed the visit as a reset in bilateral relations, reviving the leader-to-leader diplomacy that characterized much of Trump’s first term.
While major disagreements remain unresolved, the Beijing summit reinforced the perception that Trump increasingly prefers one-on-one engagement and transactional deal-making with Xi over organizing broad regional coalitions designed to constrain China’s rise. Viewed in that light, the return to PACOM appears consistent with a broader effort to reduce the prominence of the Indo-Pacific framework as the defining lens for U.S. policy toward China.
While officials still occasionally invoke the Indo-Pacific concept, the administration’s language has increasingly emphasized economic relations and power balance in the Asia-Pacific rather than the coalition-based Indo-Pacific framework that Trump himself championed during his first term. Notably, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not use Indo-Pacific during his speech at the annual Shangri-La Dialogue conference in Singapore last month.
Abandoning the INDOPACOM label may be less about geography than strategy. The move suggests an administration that is less focused on building a long-term coalition to balance China and more interested in pursuing transactional relationships that advance immediate diplomatic and economic objectives.
To be sure, PACOM’s restoration will not change military operations, force posture, or the command’s area of responsibility. Yet names are rarely just names in strategy. The Indo-Pacific concept embodied a vision of India as a pivotal partner, coalition-building as a source of strength, and sustained competition with China as the defining challenge of the century. By restoring PACOM, Trump may be signaling that those assumptions no longer guide Washington’s strategy to the same extent they once did.
This post is part of FP’s ongoing coverage of the Trump administration. Follow along here.
Geopolitics
China
India
Derek Grossman is a professor of political science and international relations at the University of Southern California, the founder and chief analyst of Indo-Pacific Solutions, a former analyst at the Rand Corp., and a former daily intelligence briefer to the U.S. assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs. X: @DerekJGrossman
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