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3 June 2023

Southeast Asian states, defence cooperation and geopolitical balancing


Southeast Asian states are seeking to deepen defence partnerships as part of their ongoing military-modernisation plans, but are reluctant to take sides in the increasingly polarised regional political and security environment.

Southeast Asia is an important locus in the intensifying strategic competition between China and the United States. Any military conflict involving the two powers would critically affect all ten member states of the Association of Southeast Asia Nations (ASEAN) (soon to be eleven with the admission of Timor-Leste). For example, a conflict over Taiwan would threaten the nearly 700,000 migrant workers on the island who are citizens of Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

All Southeast Asian countries have relatively close ties to Beijing and their economies to Chinese markets. Regional political and business leaders have particularly looked to China to support their post-pandemic recoveries. This is despite many of these countries having had acrimonious histories with Beijing, which is also engaged in ongoing territorial or maritime disputes with most of the littoral countries of the South China Sea. This explains why regional defence leaders have been developing closer ties with the US and its allies. The US, for its part, has recently expanded its military exercises with Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand.

Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam have acquired next-generation fighters, frigates, submarines, anti-ship missiles and other complex platforms over the past decade or will seek to procure them in the next. According to data from IISS Military Balance+, this group collectively spent US$60.9 billion on weapons procurement and defence research and development from 2013 to 2022 (using constant 2015 US dollars). Over the same period, the group’s combined annual defence budget increased 20.7%, to US$43.8bn. The budgets in 2023, however, call for spending only 1.39% of GDP on average.

Some analysts have argued that this Southeast Asian military modernisation is meant to balance against China, especially given that it has been paired with efforts to increase defence ties with the US and its allies. Yet no country in the region has overhauled the organisational, doctrinal and operational outlooks of their armed forces with the goal of deterring and fighting a war against China.

As we will likely see at the 20th IISS Shangri-La Dialogue, to commence on 2 June 2023, Southeast Asian states will continue to seek a middle position between the US and China, hedging against the uncertainty inherent in their competition. Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, to different degrees and in different styles, will likely express their continued concern about the rivalry and the spread of geopolitical competition to economic, technological and military domains. Regional policymakers have said that they would like Beijing and Washington to reopen closed lines of communication as a start, and some may even be hoping for a complete strategic reset, as unlikely as this may be.

Regional officials hope that both powers can work together on some areas in Southeast Asia, including on regional economic integration, climate change and the energy transition. These expectations come as the region struggles with slow post-pandemic economic recoveries and the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine. While countries appreciate the involvement of neighbouring powers such as Australia and Japan in solving some of these issues – and may eventually warm to new minilaterals such as AUKUS and the Quad – they still prefer to use ASEAN as the primary format for regional engagement.

The Philippines has been particularly active of late in redefining its security priorities. Manila’s focus has shifted from internal to external security, particularly territorial defence, given China’s recent aggressive actions towards Philippine vessels within the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) claimed by Manila. Key political leaders in the Philippines support the current modernisation plan, which adds naval and air assets to the force to support the territorial-defence mission and places less emphasis on army assets than was previously the case. The revival of the country’s alliance with the US – from the expansion of the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement in early April 2023 to the ongoing development of a security-sector assistance road map – will play a critical role in this effort.

Bangkok, fresh from a mid-May general election in which progressive and anti-establishment candidates showed surprising strength, may reconsider its strategic policies across key issues, from the worsening post-coup crisis in Myanmar to its broader relationship with Washington and Beijing. Malaysia, under the leadership of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim since November 2022, will likely continue to follow its traditional approach characterised by geopolitical hedging, though it may be tempted to join China in new engagements likely to support economic growth. Vietnam, likewise, will continue to rely on China, but primarily as a political-ideological ally, even as it seeks legitimisation from and a limited security relationship with Washington.

Jakarta, meanwhile, has often leveraged ASEAN as a strategic buffer between competing great powers and currently holds the rotational chairmanship of the group. It plans to host an Indo-Pacific forum on the sidelines of the East Asia Summit in early September and will use the meeting to give greater form and purpose to the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific, a consensus statement of principles. Indonesia’s defence ministry has also taken the lead in drafting defence-specific principles and cooperative activities as part of this effort, working through the mechanism of the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting.

Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand are confronting several security challenges – from natural disasters, countering transnational crime, terrorism and insurgencies to securing their claimed EEZs – not immediately related to great-power competition in the region. Meanwhile, fiscal constraints and bureaucratic hurdles will likely hamstring their ambitious attempts at military modernisation. Yet China’s aggressive behaviour in enforcing its territorial claims and the increasing prospect of a future US–China conflict have provided new rationales to Southeast Asian states in advancing their pre-existing military procurement plans. Their need to strengthen domestic defence-industrial bases provides further support.

Overall, we are likely to see Southeast Asian defence officials at the Shangri-La Dialogue emphasising the need for participating countries to improve collaboration on solving a range of regional security challenges. This will include a call for Beijing and Washington to manage their competition more effectively, and for deeper defence partnerships with key countries, including South Korea, the US and many in Europe. For many states in the region, the real challenge will be in finding ways to strengthen these defence partnerships to address security needs without joining one side in the polarising regional competition between China and the US.

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