{"id":21125,"date":"2015-06-22T06:00:35","date_gmt":"2015-06-21T20:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=21125"},"modified":"2015-06-22T09:39:41","modified_gmt":"2015-06-21T23:39:41","slug":"asias-history-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/asias-history-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"Asia\u2019s history challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

ASEAN\u2019s leaders are worried about what history tells them about the future of Southeast Asia. The fears about the lessons of history are a discordant note as ASEAN steps up to a great moment in its history\u2014the creation of an economic, political-security and social Community<\/a> in December 2015.<\/p>\n

Perhaps this moment of historic creation\u00a0is partly driven by dark understandings of history. As ASEAN embraces a date with regional destiny, its leaders are invoking some tough history as reference points.<\/p>\n

The President of the Philippines, Benigno Aquino, stirs headlines by comparing China with Hitler\u2019s Germany. In this metaphor, the Philippines has the role of Czechoslovakia. Aquino ran this line last year to The New York Times<\/a>\u00a0<\/em><\/span>and during his recent visit to Japan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The point about Aquino\u2019s history isn\u2019t just the Germany\u2013China analogy, but the casting of the US in the Britain\/France role\u2014the great powers that stood mute while the small state (the Philippines as Czechoslovakia) got monstered.<\/p>\n

Another history that keeps popping up is Thucydides\u2019 account of the Peloponnesian war 2,500 years ago, the conflict between Athens and Sparta. The Thucydides trap that ASEAN sees is different to the Thucydides trap that worries China and the US. Different aspects of history for different folks.<\/p>\n

Professor Graham Allison\u2019s version of the trap<\/a> is the danger posed when a rising power confronts a ruling power.<\/p>\n

For Allison, the crucial news is this line: \u2018It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this inspired in Sparta that made war inevitable.\u2019 Applied today, this becomes China\u2019s rise, US fear and inevitable conflict:<\/p>\n

<\/i>Never has a nation [China] moved so far, so fast, up the international rankings on all dimensions of power. In a generation, a state whose gross domestic product was smaller than Spain\u2019s has become the second-largest economy in the world. If we were betting on the basis of history, the answer to<\/span> the question about Thucydides\u2019s trap appears obvious. In 11 of 15 cases since 1500 where a rising power emerged to challenge a ruling power, war occurred.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The trap has captured the attention of China\u2019s leader, Xi Jinping. He told the Berggruen Institute<\/a>:<\/p>\n

<\/i>The argument that strong countries are bound to seek hegemony does not apply to China. This is not in the DNA of this country given our long historical and cultural background. Also China fully understands that we need a peaceful and stable internal and external environment to develop ourselves.\u00a0We all to need to work to<\/span>gether to avoid the Thucydides trap<\/span>\u2014destructive tensions between an emerging power and established powers, or between established powers themselves.<\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When ASEAN leaders go to Thucydides, however, they are interested in a different trap \u2013 what big powers can do to the small.<\/p>\n

The Malaysian Prime Minister, Najib Razak, had his Thucydides moment<\/a> at the Asia Pacific Roundtable last year, with this bit of dark history<\/a>:<\/p>\n

<\/i>Imagine a world where institutions, rules and norms are ignored, forgotten or cast aside; in which countries with large economies and strong armies dominate, forcing the rest to accept the outcome. This would be a world where, in the words of the Greek historian Thucydides, <\/span>\u2018The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must<\/span>\u2019.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Going Peloponnesian a few weeks ago, Singapore\u2019s Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong, worried about the same history<\/a>:<\/p>\n

It should not be a world where might is right, where the strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must. It should be a world where legitimacy and constructive engagement are the international norm, and every country, big and small, can compete peacefully for the chance to prosper.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The strong doing as they will and the weak suffering as they must is what Athens told the small state of Melos in the Melian dialogue, demanding surrender and payment of tribute. Melos refused to yield, claiming the right to remain neutral (or lean towards Sparta) on grounds of justice and honour. After a siege, Athens infamously carried out its threat to kill every Melian male of arms-bearing age and sold the women and children into slavery.<\/p>\n

Such history speaks to core aims of ASEAN neutrality and centrality. Neutrality for individual ASEAN states has a distinct Melian flavour\u2014the right to stand aloof or to lean between China and the US, depending on the issue. The ASEAN fear is of not being central to decisions and being forced to pick sides under duress.<\/p>\n

The ASEAN version of the Thucydides trap is another version of the conundrum expressed by Wang Gungwu<\/a>:\u00a0ASEAN\u2019s problem is to form a realistic assessment of China\u2019s intentions and America\u2019s resolve.<\/p>\n

Musing on the prospect of tough choices is such a habit it qualifies as part of the ASEAN way. Coral Bell\u2019s line was that NATO is ever in crisis; in the same manner, ASEAN is ever tormented by existential angst. The history lessons feed the angst.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ASEAN\u2019s leaders are worried about what history tells them about the future of Southeast Asia. The fears about the lessons of history are a discordant note as ASEAN steps up to a great moment in …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":21126,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[189,354,52,66],"class_list":["post-21125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-asean","tag-asia","tag-china","tag-history"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAsia\u2019s history challenge | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/asias-history-challenge\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Asia\u2019s history challenge | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"ASEAN\u2019s leaders are worried about what history tells them about the future of Southeast Asia. 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