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New ‘security’ ideas in East Asia

- PHOTOS: AFP

Kevin Rudd and George Bush.. emerging thoughts on security architecture in East Asia.

Is it the thinking season in East Asia for new ideas on its future ‘security architecture,’ at a time when the spectacular Beijing Olympics have turned global attention to this part of the world? The answer is ‘yes,’ going by the latest thoughts of two leaders with stakes in East Asia.

On the eve of the Olympics, United States President George W. Bush, after holding talks with his South Korean counterpart Lee Myung-bak in Seoul, issued a joint statement, which contained a core idea for the avid ‘architects.’ And, four days after the grand opening of the Olympics, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd spoke in Singapore about his new ideas. When he first outlined them in Sydney, the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) expressed scepticism.

Mr. Bush and Mr. Lee said on August 6 that they “agreed to further strengthen strategic coordination and cooperation ... with a view to the ... creation of a new peace structure on the Korean peninsula and in Northeast Asia.”

For the first time since North Korea tested a nuclear weapon almost two years ago, Mr. Bush has revealed a clear U.S. intention to create a new security order in East Asia in the longer term. The basic idea of wanting “a new peace structure” is not really new at all. What he has now conveyed, though, is U.S. political will, at the highest level, to create a new order.

Relevant indeed is the exposition by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice about the need to scale up the current Six-Party Talks (SPT) as a security-related forum for Northeast Asia. The SPT, centred now exclusively on the ‘denuclearisation’ of North Korea, has brought together not only the two Koreas and the U.S. but also China, as the Chair, Japan, and Russia.

See this idea against the existing realities. The omnibus ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) is too big to be an effective action-oriented grouping or even a reasonably efficient entity for dialogue. The ARF includes all the SPT countries and others like India, Australia, and even the European Union. But the ARF is just a forum for the exchange of ideas.

The other key grouping of direct interest to the SPT is the East Asia Summit (EAS), which excludes the U.S. In the broader East Asian region, there are other fora, which, too, exclude the U.S. – the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the India-China-Russia dialogue, and the China-Japan-South Korea mechanism. In contrast, the U.S.-Japan-Australia conclave, called the ‘Trilateral Strategic Dialogue,’ is a huddle among military allies.

Mr. Bush’s declaration favouring the creation of “a new peace structure” is, therefore, a pro-U.S. initiative. It is meant to seek a renewed mandate for a continued U.S. military presence in Northeast Asia. The hallmark of the current no-war “structure” is the pervasive presence of the U.S. military in South Korea and Japan.

It is against this background that Mr. Rudd, speaking in Singapore on August 12, sought to dispel the ASEAN’s misgivings about his idea of a new “Asia Pacific Community.” He said the “ASEAN remains the absolute core of the region’s [existing] architecture” and this grouping, as “a benchmark of success,” could play “a continuing central role in the evolution of the concept of Asia Pacific Community.” His initiative would bring not only the U.S. but also India and Australia onto the centre-stage of this wider region on a permanent basis and would not diminish the roles of China and Japan, either.

In Mr. Rudd’s world view, the existing mechanisms do not suffice and a new grouping is needed to reflect the distribution of power in the 21st century East Asia.

The ASEAN, an outfit of several small states and a few potential medium powers, is not amused at Mr. Rudd’s effort to rewrite the rules of creating a security forum for Greater East Asia, the next big theatre in world politics.

As the architect of the ARF, the first regional exercise in security-related dialogue, the ASEAN tends to believe in its own importance as the potential nucleus of a new group that could serve as the guarantor of Asia-Pacific peace. While willing, therefore, to let the ASEAN have a key role in the evolution of the concept of an Asia Pacific Community, Mr. Rudd is obviously looking for an institution with internal checks and balances among the major powers. To this extent, the ASEAN cannot hope to remain the central player in guaranteeing Asia-Pacific peace over the long term. A top ASEAN leader has told this correspondent that major powers, for the obvious reason of their importance, will want to take over even the EAS leadership from the ASEAN at some point in time. Right now, the ASEAN pilots the EAS.

At another level, revealing indeed is Mr. Rudd’s response to a question from this correspondent about his attitude, as a free-thinking ally of the U.S., to its anticipated pro-India move in the Nuclear Suppliers Group. His answer is that Australia “will not stand in the way.” The hint of such passive support shows that a protagonist of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) such as Australia is willing to trim its sails to the changing winds. Especially so, if the U.S. really stays the course of making an exception in the case of India, a non-NPT state with nuclear weapons, and allowing it access to civil nuclear commerce.

This does not, of course, mean that the U.S. and India are in the same league. In contrast, some experts, like C. Fred Bergsten and others, have suggested that the U.S. and China should form a “Big Two” group to “steer the global governance process” in the economic domain. On balance, though, true major powers will be able to re-shape the world order, with or without their participation in small or big groups for regional or global peace and economic progress.

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