I'm John Bachelor, Gordon Chang at Gordon G. Chang.

Conversation in Asia, The conversation's progenitor

was the U.S. Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, at the Asia Security Conference Shangri-La Dialogue.

This happens every year held in Singapore. And the remarks by the Secretary of War and Defense, Mr. Hegeseth, were striking

in the room when it came to what was the end product, what happened. What happened must include

what I'm told is an unusual event, maybe unprecedented. The Japanese defense minister asked a question in the public part of questions and answers

with Mr. Hegesath.

I stopped there because I turned to Gordon who tells me that this is extremely unusual.

What does it mean, Gordon?

And what was the question?

Good day to you.

Good day, John. Hello, Scott. This was unprecedented.

Never happened before. After Secretary Higgs said speech, the Japanese defense minister,

Shinjiro Koyazumi, got up and asked a question from the floor. And the question was, how can you reassure the America's friends and partners in the region

that America's commitment to the Indo-Pacific is unwavering?

And then we heard the answer from the Secretary of War.

But it was quite interesting because this had been never done

before. We welcome our colleague, Scott Harold, the senior political scientists at the RAND

Corporation, a professor of policy analysis at the RAND School of Public Policy. Scott,

I'd always come to you for precedent on this matter. What is striking about this event to you? Good day to you.

Good morning, John. And good morning, Gordon, and to your listeners around the world, John.

I think there are several things from the Secretary's remarks. It's particularly important, I think,

...