Part 2 of 2: Africa, Asia and global security

Juwono Sudarsono, Jakarta

Over 70 percent of the world's financial, investment, banking and trading companies command the capital, services, human skills that define the accumulation, distribution and legal underpinnings of global capital movements. These movements drive the demand and provision of strategic energy, minerals and other wealth creating value-added goods and services. The "24/7" nature of these global transactions fuel the industrial, commercial and military reach of the powerful nations that define security at the regional and global levels.

Of critical importance within African and Asian states are the dangers of acute internal disparities between those who gain from financial services through globalization and those who remain in deep inertia because they cannot gain access to the human and technological skills needed to be connected with the outside world.

Of the more than 90 percent of international trade transported by sea, more than 70 percent of commercial fleets are owned, controlled or operated by countries and firms constituting less than 20 percent of the world's population. Of the more than 2200 warships and 5000 strike aircraft worldwide, more than 40 percent are owned by the United States and its NATO allies.

Together they command more than 80 percent of the available nuclear and conventional air firepower. It follows that the security of the global trading system is underpinned by powerful military forces guaranteeing free flow access and openness to the world's seas and skies.

African and Asian nations seek to redress the balance of these deeply unjust military power inequities by persuading the countries of the developed world that unless military spending in the rich countries are re-allocated to provide economic assistance to the world's poorest countries, the vengeance of transnational crimes -- illegal immigration, drugs and narcotics profiteering, small arms smuggled to fuel violent crime in the urban centers of the rich countries -- will visit the rich world from time to time.

The success of the New Asia Africa Strategic Partnership will depend on how the powerful engines of growth of China and India will be sustained through 2050. Assuming that the combined population of China and India will reach 4.2 billion out of a world total of 9 billion by 2050, the "center of economic gravity" will focus on these two economies.

The very size of the two countries as vast markets in Asia will define the scope and speed of the scientific and technological advancement that industry standards have to maintain in order to produce enough of the manufacturing goods needed to feed, house and provide adequate water and electricity of their large populations.

The actual spin-offs emanating from the production and distribution of these giants will benefit the economies of Southeast Asia, largely through the geographical proximity and commercially viable access to energy, mineral and timber resources. With Japan repositioning itself to the rising competitive forces from China and India, a more Asian-centric identity can be created.

The combined North-East Asia, Southeast Asia and South Asia community could shift the distribution of power to the Asia- Pacific and the Pacific. The more difficult proposition would be to connect the Asia-centric rise of India, China and Japan with the more fragmented poles of regional development of Southern Africa, West Africa and East Africa.

Japan has long looked to the whole world as it sources energy for its industries, going as far as Brazil and Central America for its mineral resources. China has developed plans to extend its reach to the energy sources available across Russia into the hinterland. It has also expanded its reach to the resource-rich countries of West Africa and beyond. India seeks new access to oil and gas by building and financing pipelines across Pakistan to the oil-rich Central Asia republics.

The energy-market nexus linking Asia and Africa is harder to connect and consolidate largely because the majority of African states south of the Sahara do not have as many mineral resources as the gas fields and undersea resources of the Asian mainland. Connection is made more difficult by the relative low purchasing powers of the majority of the African states. South Africa, West Africa and East Africa do not have the same geographical proximity and economic mutuality that favors the Japan-China- India triangle.

In addition, so long as many countries in southern Africa face dire political and economic conditions arising from endemic ethnic tension, internal conflict and violence over claims of tribal identity and territorial integrity, it would remain difficult to inject strong commitment to widen and deepen political and economic links with Asia.

In the final analysis, while the nations of Africa and Asia seek to redefine the terms and conditions of global security in the wider sense, they will have to depend more on the persuasive forces of market attraction than on the application of credible coercive means of compliance.

Until the economic and military imbalances are adequately restructured and reformed, the quest toward a more equitable global security system will remain tenuous. In the past, widening gaps between rich and poor have led to numerous movements against global injustice.

The industrialized world has only recently realized that conducting a Global War On Terror (GWOT) only exacerbates the sense of injustice and humiliation felt by many of Asia's and Africa's youth. The change to a Strategy Against Violent Extremism (SAVE) can only succeed if the industrialized world provide outreach and sustenance for the many countries in Asia and Africa that remain trapped in grinding poverty.

Correspondingly, throughout 2005-2050 leaders in Asia and Africa must consistently pursue policies and actions that provide greater opportunities for employment, education and health care for the poor within their borders. As with global security, domestic security can only long endure if it is increasingly underpinned by a broader network of social and economic justice.

Global security ultimately depends on broader-based social and economic justice within the regions in Asia and Africa. Regional peace and security in turn depends on domestic distributive justice, a necessary pre-condition for regional stability. If the nations of Asia and Africa wish to play a more effective role in galvanizing global security, then all leaders of Asia and Africa must have a greater commitment to social justice at home. Hi-tech guns, tanks, ships, sensors, munitions and strike aircraft alone do not insure sustainable security.

The greatest test for the leaders and nations of Asia and Africa is that their search for global security must begin with broader and fairer social justice at home. That is the ultimate challenge for the next 50 years

The writer is the Minister of Defense for Indonesia.