Southeast Asia-US Relations: Strategic Shifts
Tuli Sinha
Research Scholar, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
e-mail: tuli_sn@yahoo.com
Security issues have become prominent in Southeast Asia because of the presence of global players, and rising great powers, which intersect in complicated ways. Security is the only dimension of a pattern of international relations that makes the Southeast Asian sub-system an important unit of the global international system. A strategic and competitive power play between a superpower and a regional power has brought about major shifts in the present regional dynamics of Southeast Asia.
During the Cold War era, the Southeast Asian regional grouping served as a critical front against international communism. The strategic goal of the US in its relations with Southeast Asia was to build a regional block as a counterweight to the influence of the Soviet Union, Vietnam and China. On the other side, Southeast Asia needed US engagement and support for its motive to build an “anti-communist” grouping, so that its self-interest in consolidating the political and economic foundations to ward off the communist threat and to remain firmly in the American camp could be fulfilled.
The post-Cold War environment in Southeast Asia highlighted the emergence of China as an important actor in Southeast Asia with a wide range of national interests concerning economic, political and security issues. For the first time since the Second World War, the US preponderance of power in the region was challenged by a power whose reach was not yet global, but regional. Previously, the USSR’s power in the region had been one-dimensional that is, military and Japan’s only economic. The US was multidimensional, and so was China in its economic, political, and even in relative terms, military capabilities. This began a new era in great power relations in Southeast Asia.
Since the end of the Cold War, US policy in Southeast Asia had come under pressure to respond to new threats and new trends. Viewing Southeast Asia as a “second front” in the global war against terrorism post-9/11, Washington moved to strengthen relations with the insular states where Muslim populations are largest, notably Indonesia and Malaysia. Even the US-Singapore security relationship was enhanced with the addition of a counter-terrorism element.
An analysis would show how and why the recognition of the newest formulation of American security interests and engagements in Southeast Asia overlays a complex set of broader and deeper political, economic, cultural and international interests that link the US to the Southeast Asian countries. These interests are promoted bilaterally and in multilateral settings. US interests complement and compete with the interests of Japan, China, the European Union (EU), and other countries.
The regional implications which may arise from China’s rise may be one of the factors because of which the US is using terrorism as a significant tool to keep its linkages with Southeast Asia at the political and military levels. There lies even a possibility that the Southeast Asian states are interested in having US presence to counter Chinese domination in the area. A comparison reflects upon the fact that the two regions are primarily concerned about similar issues namely, rise of China and terrorism. In fact, one would realize that the emergence of East Asian regionalism is not welcomed in Southeast Asia without the involvement of the United States.
The critical question of the legitimacy of American intervention in the regional dynamics of Southeast Asia is an important aspect that needs to be examined. The disjuncture between the actual and the pretence of United States involvement needs to be evaluated with respect to the rise of East Asian regionalism, concentrating on the emergence of China as a key player. Even the critical factor of Southeast Asian response and interest in superpower involvement vis-à-vis the rise of China in the region is important to understand the two sided game.
A closer look at the real picture of the US-Southeast Asia relations will explain the obscurity of a regional power play and the subtle connotations to eclipse the potency of the rising East Asian actors, especially China. The recent Hillary Clinton visit to the region is just a symbol of America’s re-engagement in the region to counter any regional power domination in the future. The region of Southeast Asia should be able to view through the veil of the new policy of appeasement that the US is applying to deal with the rising role of China in the region. Will this then lead to a new era of Cold Wars in the years to come?
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