...and into 1995's uncertainties

HONG KONG (JP): The death, incapacity, or even the continued survival of two East Asian dictators will seriously affect the politics of the region in 1995.

Currently, China and Taiwan have developed more tangible ties than have North and South Korea. But if shocks await in 1995, it is much more likely to be the sudden reunification of Korea rather than of China.

The one 1994 public appearance of a very frail-looking Deng Xiaoping, on television footage shown around Chinese New Year, strongly suggested that he will be "going to meet Marx", or whoever is the patron saint of capitalist roaders, sometime in 1995. If that happens, the succession struggle within China will soon follow, probably intensifying as a result of having been long delayed.

The speed and substance of China's economic reforms, and the direction of Beijing's foreign policy could well be affected by the predictable political jockeying. A worst case scenario would have China's economic bubble bursting almost simultaneously with the succession struggle arising.

Then, on the one hand, it would be more urgent for China to make economic reforms but much less likely that it would do so. On the other, in the ensuing political combat, it would come as no surprise if some of the combatants sought to subordinate foreign policy to the demands of Chinese nationalism.

This is not far-fetched because it is already happening. As it prepares to take back Hong Kong on July 1, 1997, the Chinese government appears far more concerned about avenging the Opium Wars in the last century than carefully preserving a dynamic international finance center for the next century. Periodic assertions of Chinese sovereignty over the whole of the South China Sea similarly place nationalist assertiveness ahead of economic and foreign policy pragmatism.

President Jiang Zemin, visiting Hanoi in November 1994, stressed such pragmatism by agreeing to set up a committee to discuss Vietnam's and China's rival claims to the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. An opponent seeking to dislodge Jiang from his position in the hierarchy might well find it expedient to accentuate China's sovereignty claims.

Even if Deng Xiaoping survives, this does not necessarily improve matters by extending the current political stalemate. Whatever his drum beaters say, Deng is long past being able to direct the Chinese polity with his former verve and vigor. A sustained political standoff now may result in greater turmoil later on.

But Deng is not the only leader whose demise or survival may send ripples through the region in 1995. Increasingly the likely endurance of Kim Jong-il, and the future of the dynasty which his late father, President Kim Il-sung, sought to establish, is questionable.

The excuses given for Kim Jong-il not quickly inheriting his father's titles now appear to be Confucian clap-trap. The hundred days of mourning which he was supposed to observe before becoming president and party secretary-general are long since past. The all too numerous reports of various ailments afflicting Kim cannot all be dismissed. As the old year has ended, North Korea handled the downing of a U.S. helicopter in such a way as to suggest more trouble ahead in 1995.

If Kim has to struggle to assert himself, that could herald further conflict. Kim Jong-il's memory of American appeasement in the face of his threat of war does not help. A power struggle in North Korea could even turn the continuing cold war there hot -- especially as Pyongyang now rejects the formalities of the armistice agreement.

Alternatively, should Kim fail or fall, North Korea could yet collapse. A united Korea could emerge quicker than a unified China but only after a great deal of turbulence.

On a more positive note, 1995 could highlight the further sensible development of the ASEAN Regional Forum, (ARF), bringing positive consequences for regional stability and the balance of power in its wake.

ARF was initiated in 1994 as a potential Asian arrangement for collective security. Together with the six countries forming the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), it includes all the major powers except one -- India.

ARF will automatically strengthen if, as expected, Vietnam becomes the seventh member of ASEAN in 1995. This move -- unthinkable only a few years ago -- will further assist in the creation of a modest but necessary balance of influence between Southeast Asia and China.

However strong their economies become, there can never be an indigenous balance of power between ASEAN and China. China is simply too huge for any such balance to develop. But a Southeast Asia diplomatically united from Hanoi to Jakarta is a grouping China cannot ignore and similarly cannot afford to alienate. If the seven ASEAN nations firmly unite in the belief that their conflicting claims to parts of the South China Sea will never be settled by force, that stance must influence rational Chinese strategists to follow along the same path.

Conversely, the South China Sea remains a potential flashpoint for conflict, second only to Korea, mainly because such rationality by Beijing cannot yet be taken for granted.

The practitioners of realpolitik in the Chinese leadership compound at Zhongnanhai will, of course, pursue either collective security or nationalist self-assertion according to their calculations of the balance of power.

In this field, too, 1995 should see a positive step if, as promised, the new Republican majorities in the U.S. Congress bring to an abrupt halt the headlong American defense rundown that has characterized the years 1989 through 1994, notwithstanding the brief period of the Gulf War.

At heart, it is an old story. Despising calculations such as the balance of power, the Americans quickly arm themselves only when a moral cause is politically perceived, and as rapidly run their defenses down once victory is attained. The consequent damage, from such rundown, to the global perceptions of the balance of power make it inevitable that, before long, the Americans will be forced to find another moral cause. This frequently repeated cycle has re-emerged in the wake of the U.S. proclamation of "victory" in the Cold War.

Consider only the fate of the U.S. force of vital concern to nations bordering the Pacific -- the Navy. The U.S. Navy has in four years rapidly descended from being a near-600 ship fleet to one of less than 400 ships. Many more vessels, especially those in the crucial arena of amphibious warfare, are still due for decommissioning in the next few years. A global fleet of around 300 ships, insufficient for serving two oceans, is the likely consequence.

The net result of this latest hasty rundown is that major powers such as China may calculate they can more easily dominate regional balances of power. Medium powers such as North Korea may likewise readily estimate that U.S. resolve is weakening. Irresponsible powers, or warlords in non-countries, like Somalia, Serbia, Iraq, or Haiti under the former generals, have felt or will feel it is safe to push the U.S. around in pursuit of their dubious ambitions.

In 1995, as for the rest of the century, sustained American power and sensible purpose will be essential for East Asian well- being. The 50th anniversary of the ending of World War II in 1995, with Tokyo trying extra hard to remind everyone that Japan was the innocent victim of that conflict, will not make it a time when Asian nations, with the probable exception of Malaysia, want to talk about Japan's future role in the balance of power. Bitter remembrance of Japan's role as an aggressor, still not alleviated by an appropriate sense of Japanese war guilt, will make sure of that.

It would be more fitting, perhaps, if Southeast Asia remembered the role of Indian forces in restoring the Asian balance of power in 1945. Such recollections might move forward the day when ASEAN invites India to attend ARF -- or, failing that, when Indian diplomats politely suggest the mutual advantage in extending such an invitation.

Window: In 1995, as for the rest of the century, sustained American power and sensible purpose will be essential for East Asian well- being.