One SE Asia, one security doctrine?

One SE Asia, one security doctrine?

An ASEAN-security doctrine for the whole of Southeast Asia
may be a matter worth considering, argues Bunn Nagara.

A security doctrine works as a body of guiding principles
governing strategic perceptions, embodying political concerns,
based on state interests, drawn from realistic choices, and aimed
at preserving a certain order conducive to these ends. Since
security concerns tend to preserve the status quo, such doctrines
serve more to help maintain a preferred order than to create a
radically new one.

There are traditionally two kinds of security doctrine: the
domestic and the imperial. Domestic or national security
doctrines are commonplace, varying in scope and intent,
depending on perceived threats -- whether internal or external --
to the state. Imperial security doctrines are a feature of major
powers, particularly those intent on policing spheres of
influence and thus tend to be prescriptive impositions on other
(or otherwise) sovereign states and regions.

The Monroe and Nixon Doctrines are classic examples of the
latter. For the countries of ASEAN, typically, national security
doctrines have been the norm, especially given their relative
insularity, modest resources, and their decades-old battles
against insurgent forces.

With limited size, power, influence and interests, neither
ASEAN nor any of its constituent states is in any position to
adopt an imperial security doctrine. This is as true today as
it was before -- and in the foreseeable future, despite the
various apparent agglomerations that are said to attend the
enlargement of ASEAN membership. Yet, changes in the regional
strategic equation are said to exert compelling forces in a new
direction.

One essential development is the growing significance of
certain ASEAN countries, a development based chiefly but not
wholly on economic power. Another important development is the
growing significance of ASEAN itself, not simply because of its
increasing size but also because of related institutions like
AFTA, intra-ASEAN "growth triangles" and ASEAN's leading role in
wider groupings like the ASEAN Regional Forum.

While none of this provides any substantive basis for assuming
that ASEAN now has or should have an imperial security doctrine,
it might suggest that ASEAN may be ready to venture beyond the
individual national security doctrines of its constituent states.
If necessary, ASEAN could evolve a different variety of security
doctrine as an overlay to integrate its various individual
national security doctrines.

At this point, it is sometimes said that ASEAN already
possesses a security doctrine of its own. References are made to
the Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) and the Treaty
of Amity and Cooperation (TAC) in Southeast Asia, these being
hallmarks of ASEAN as an institution. However, even if the
cogency of these charters remains indefinitely, and the ASEAN
community of nations becomes synonymous with the Southeast Asian
region, it is still questionable whether ZOPFAN or TAC can,
singly or together, amount to a regional security doctrine as
such.

ZOPFAN is essentially a declaration of an ASEAN state's
foreign policy posture in the region, and one which varies in
individual interpretation and commitment. While its essentials
remain pertinent, some states might be disposed to appreciate the
spirit of it less than what a common regional security doctrine
deserves.

While TAC is a more detailed document requiring states
acceding to ASEAN membership to be signatories, it is no more a
doctrine than ZOPFAN. Indeed, while its contents are no less
valid today, its official stature within the ASEAN institution
could characterize it more as a formality than as an active and
decisive body of guiding principles on regional security.

While ASEAN continues to prosper, neither the institution nor
Southeast Asia as such can be said to possess a security doctrine
common to the member states. This may partly be due to their
separate and individual histories, and partly to the fact that
given their experience and development, there has been no need
and little prospect for a common security doctrine. But have not
times changed enough for the region to occasion or necessitate a
change in the tempo of its geostrategic development?

Any answer in the affirmative or near-affirmative needs to be
carefully qualified. Much of it will involve the relationship
between a "security doctrine" as a set of abstractions,
reifications and extrapolations, and the reality of security
itself. It may not even be necessary to have a security doctrine
to be assured of security.

Empirically, it might be argued that states in an identifiable
region, particularly those in a regional organization like ASEAN,
will evolve the kind of security for their region in their mutual
relations through whatever means seem expedient, doctrine or no.
The sum total of these measures and their premises may then
sketch a semblance of a doctrine, or they might not -- in which
case, they need not. Alternatively, a need may be felt for a
common security doctrine owing to its perceived intrinsic worth,
to which individual sets of national policy on security may then
approximate.

Suppose, then, that the states of Southeast Asia and the
region as a whole have had adequate security but not a properly
constituted regional security doctrine, either because they
never needed it or circumstances simply did not occasion it to
develop. What would now indicate a need for it, or at least the
circumstances allowing for it to develop? Would it then
complicate existing relations between states, or serve to improve
relations through a greater consensus on perspectives, and
facilitate the articulation of a common set of concerns?

Perhaps the single most significant change strategically in
recent years has been the collapse of the Soviet Union. While the
demise of bipolarism generally exerted greater repercussions in a
Europe shaped and colored by the Cold War, the implications of
the Soviet implosion combined with certain regional factors have
been no less dramatic in East Asia. The socialist states of
Indochina have opened up, largely in the direction of ASEAN;
China continues to stride forward through economic reform and
modernization; trans-Pacific relations center on economics like
never before; strategic alliances have become obsolete or
questionable; and security cooperation among previous partners is
now less of a political given.

Some perceived changes remain mythical: imminent conflict on
the Korean peninsula or in the South China Sea is an exaggerated
if not speculative prospect; so too is a "China threat" to anyone
including Taiwan, so long as foolhardy Taiwanese do not make
policy.

The redirection of the Indochinese states towards ASEAN has
been most opportune for both clusters of Southeast Asian
countries. It has reaffirmed ASEAN as the region's paramount
institution, and it has given new prospects for the future of
Indochina. It has also renewed a sense of regionalism among the
older members, as by transcending Thailand's earlier notions of a
suwannaphum (golden peninsula) in which Bangkok would carve out
an economic sphere of influence in Indochina.

How the U.S. treats China will be key to much of the new
security realities in the Pacific region, with all the inevitable
repercussions for Southeast Asia. The U.S.-Japan trade
relationship is well-known, limited to specific industries apart
from the trade deficit, and mitigated by their security
arrangement. The U.S.-China relationship, even where it focuses
on economics, can be quite different: much of it is still
unknown, China's potential may dwarf Japan's, and Beijing has no
political or strategic commonalities with Washington beyond
regional peace and stability.

Vietnam has had conflictual brushes with China, with its
highly strung relations in the South China Sea being only the
latest expression of many long years of territorial and border
disputes. That is not the way ASEAN conducts itself, whether with
external powers or among member states. The single most notable
contribution ASEAN has made and will continue to make to the
region is its cultivation of a low-key, yet effectual style of
containing conflict, if not also of resolving disputes. This high
diplomacy, low-decibel style will serve to inform new members
unaccustomed to consensus through consultation, as much as to
remind old members of its continuing cogency.

Given the alternatives, such as they are, ASEAN'S more
accommodating manner is the more pragmatic option for regional
relations and security. This regional "resilience" -- which
has seen ASEAN at variance with Western states over Myanmar, and
now increasingly over China -- has long been an identifying
feature of ASEAN. This resilience should figure prominently
in any realistic, non-doctrinaire security doctrine for Southeast
Asia.

The addition of a regional security doctrine to existing
national security doctrines does not imply a quantitative, but
instead a qualitative, change in threat perception in Southeast
Asia.

Its essential purpose would be to harmonize the individual
national security doctrines of the region, now that ASEAN is
being rejuvenated to a fully-fledged regional organization.
In this sense, the rationale of an endogenously motivated ASEAN
is reaffirmed, by nurturing regional strategic commonalities
through accommodating different national concerns within a single
regional entity.

As ASEAN completes its third decade, and approaches a new
century and millennium with a full regional membership, it may
well consider a regional security doctrine to call its own. This
will have to complement TAC and ZOPFAN, and spin-offs like the
Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone, as well as the renewed
imperatives of stability and prosperity common to all the
countries of a modern Southeast Asia.

An ASEAN-type regional security doctrine, if there is to be
one, will thus represent a third and new category. It will be
something more than the individual national security doctrines
that have gone before, and yet nothing like an imperial security
doctrine of hegemonistic powers.

Bunn Nagara is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Southeast
Asian Studies, Singapore.

Window A: ...ASEAN'S more accommodating manner is the more
pragmatic option for regional relations and security. This
regional "resilience" -- which has seen ASEAN at variance with
Western states over Myanmar, and now increasingly over China --
has long been an identifying feature of ASEAN.

Window B: As ASEAN completes its third decade, and approaches a
new century and millennium with a full regional membership, it
may well consider a regional security doctrine to call its own.