I - POLITICAL OUTLOOK: Southeast Asia 1994-95

Summary

Overview

The prospects for peace and stability in the overall East Asian/ Western Pacific region for 1994-95 remain largely positive. A credible U.S. military presence will remain, Japan will still be anchored in the security alliance with the United States, and Russia preoccupied with domestic problems. China is likely to experience more domestic stresses but there will be no reversal of the policies of economic reform. North Korea remains the biggest uncertainty. In a much changed world, will change in North Korea, which is inevitable, be managed peacefully? And will North Korea be nuclear-armed?

While in the short term the strategic landscape will thus remain largely unchanged, with many familiar sign posts still in place, over the longer term a new balance of power will be shaping. It is clear that China wants to be a powerful military player and would want to acquire the necessary power projection capabilities. Japan sees this coming. Despite the reassurance provided by the Clinton Administration's new five-year defence plan, doubts remain as to whether the United States will retain credible military power or the will to carry the burdens of international security by the turn of this decade. If the economic sums do not work out as planned by a president elected to solve the country's domestic problems, the defence budget can easily become politically the least unpalatable target for more cuts. The anxieties of many countries in the Asia- Pacific region over such longer-term concerns were reflected in the establishment in 1993 of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), an Asia- Pacific-wide forum for security discussions. Its purpose is to foster better understandings and confidence.

Yet such anxieties should not be unduly exaggerated for there are also positive longer-term trends. First, there is the economic dynamism and growing interdependence of the Asia-Pacific region. Secondly, the very establishment of the ARF in such a short time indicates that there is a will among the various countries to build a climate of confidence. Thirdly, there are indications that America sees its economic destiny increasingly linked to Asia.