{"id":48190,"date":"2019-06-11T11:00:20","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T01:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=48190"},"modified":"2019-06-11T10:44:59","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T00:44:59","slug":"anzus-and-alliance-politics-in-southeast-asia-revisiting-the-southern-flank","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/anzus-and-alliance-politics-in-southeast-asia-revisiting-the-southern-flank\/","title":{"rendered":"ANZUS and alliance politics in Southeast Asia: revisiting the \u2018southern flank\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

President Donald Trump assumed office in January 2017 embracing a \u2018transactional\u2019 outlook<\/a> towards alliance politics. US alliances would be managed less on traditional friendship and more on assessments of how the United States would gain alliance affiliation. For America\u2019s longstanding Southeast Asian regional treaty allies as Thailand and the Philippines, the implications of the new US administration\u2019s transactional posture for future relations with Washington were unclear. Both of these allies had already moved far towards hedging against the US by substantially upgrading their economic\u2014and, in Thailand\u2019s case, military\u2014ties with China.<\/p>\n

More than halfway through his elected term of office, however, Trump has drifted back towards implementing a strategy for the Indo-Pacific that\u2019s more in tune with those of previous US administrations. He announced his support for a \u2018free and open Indo-Pacific\u2019 during a November 2017 trip to Asia and confirmed it the following month with his release of a new national security strategy. The fundamental precepts<\/a> included the principles of freedom of navigation and overflight, the rule of law, freedom from coercion, respect for sovereignty, private enterprise and open markets, and freedom of independence of all nations.<\/p>\n

As I explain in a new ASPI report<\/a>, released today, the national security strategy\u2019s obvious emphasis on maritime and commercial interests dovetailed naturally with a renewed US focus on the \u2018southern flank\u2019 component of its Indo-Pacific alliance network and on greater Southeast Asia. The southern-flank portion of the US regional alliance network\u2014also known as the \u2018San Francisco system\u2019\u2014includes formal bilateral defence treaties with Thailand and the Philippines and the ANZUS Treaty with Australia. It also involves substantial American strategic partnerships with such ASEAN states as Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam that complement the more formal components of US alliance networking in the region.<\/p>\n

ASEAN\u2019s geographical location places it squarely in the centre of two key sea lanes of communication through which much of the world\u2019s maritime commerce flows\u2014the Malacca Strait and the South China Sea. If the US were denied access to\u2014and the ability to control\u2014such conduits during war or high crises, its influence within, and its ability to traverse and trade throughout, the entire Indo-Pacific region would be critically impeded. To preclude such outcomes, various Southeast Asian states must, combined with their ANZUS counterparts, work to sustain an enduring balance of power in the region.<\/p>\n

Trump has worked visibly to modify the tensions with both the Philippines and Thailand that intensified under the Obama administration. He repeatedly praised<\/a> Rodrigo Duterte when attending the 2017 ASEAN summit which the Philippines leader hosted, downplayed<\/a> the human rights issue and emphasised continued US support for Philippine counterterrorism operations.<\/p>\n

In March 2019, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited the Philippines and outlined a significant shift in Washington\u2019s traditional interpretation of the US\u2013Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty by explicitly warning<\/a> that \u2018[a]ny armed attack on Philippine forces, aircraft or public vessels in the South China Sea will trigger mutual defence obligations\u2019.<\/p>\n

Trump hosted Thailand\u2019s Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha at the White House in October 2017. The visit partially modified<\/a> Thai\u2013American tensions over human rights and facilitated increased US\u2013Thai security cooperation. Bilateral Thai\u2013US military exercises were also accelerated<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the broader Indo-Pacific, the US has, for well over a decade, cultivated upgraded defence ties with India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam. Indonesia\u2019s strong legacy of non-alignment, and its self-appointed role as ASEAN\u2019s guardian against external great-power competition, still render Indonesia\u2019s partnership with both Australia and the US, however, as qualified. Closer US\u2013Malaysian defence ties are being developed as a counterweight to the \u2018China factor\u2019. For example, the Cope Taufan 18 bilateral tactical airlift exercise<\/a> held in July 2018 focused on air superiority, airborne command and control, interdiction, air refuelling, and tactical airlift and airdrop.<\/p>\n

Despite its relatively small size and population (approximately 5.7\u00a0million), Singapore is viewed<\/a> by many in Washington and Canberra as a de\u00a0facto ally with its own highly modernised military underpinned by a comparatively high defence spending rate and motivated by common threat perceptions, including fears of an unstable South China Sea. Australia and Singapore signed a comprehensive strategic partnership agreement in 2015.<\/p>\n

The US\u2013Vietnam Bilateral Defence Cooperation Memorandum of Understanding in 2011 initiated collaboration in maritime security. US assistance in developing the Vietnam Coast Guard\u2019s participation in the Rim of the Pacific maritime exercise, and the lifting of a long-term American ban on arms sales to Vietnam in 2016, have been reciprocated by at least tacit Vietnamese support for US naval activities in the South China Sea. This positive momentum is tempered, however, by Vietnam\u2019s still constrained posture that precludes alienating the more geographically proximate and economically crucial China relationship.<\/p>\n

US regional allies and partners remain uncertain about American staying power in their neighbourhood. The slow development of the Australia\u2013India\u2013Japan\u2013United States Quadrilateral Defence Initiative, the relatively modest US funding to promote Southeast Asia\u2019s regional security (US$300 million<\/a>) and China\u2019s determined efforts to cultivate enhanced regional influence have reinforced ASEAN\u2019s propensity to apply hedging strategies designed to preclude either American or Chinese dominance over their region. But America\u2019s continued presence is supported throughout Southeast Asia.<\/p>\n

In these circumstances, applying the ANZUS alliance to breathe new life into the San Francisco system\u2019s southern flank and its peripheries may well be worth pursuing. Three such measures immediately come to mind and are offered as policy recommendations here. One is upgrading joint policy planning between the ANZUS allies and Manila on how to respond forcefully and credibly to Chinese challenges of Philippines-claimed territories in the South China Sea. A second is for the US and Australia to extend their already well-established diplomatic posture of ceding the political destiny of Vietnam to the Vietnamese people to both the Philippines and Thailand. Finally, any Australian government, of whatever persuasion, must remain steadfast in encouraging US policy consistency in its alliance politics in the Indo-Pacific.<\/p>\n

The durability of the San Francisco system remains one of the democratic community\u2019s most valued security frameworks. ANZUS policymakers could do far worse than to assist in ensuring that it stays that way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Donald Trump assumed office in January 2017 embracing a \u2018transactional\u2019 outlook towards alliance politics. US alliances would be managed less on traditional friendship and more on assessments of how the United States would gain …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":252,"featured_media":48192,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[131,17,2047,25],"class_list":["post-48190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-anzus","tag-australia","tag-australia-us-relations","tag-southeast-asia"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nANZUS and alliance politics in Southeast Asia: revisiting the \u2018southern flank\u2019 | 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\/anzus-and-alliance-politics-in-southeast-asia-revisiting-the-southern-flank\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"ANZUS and alliance politics in Southeast Asia: revisiting the \u2018southern flank\u2019 | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"President Donald Trump assumed office in January 2017 embracing a \u2018transactional\u2019 outlook towards alliance politics. 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