Group 8

Thesis Statement:

                The plan to increase the presence of United States (US) Military forces in Asia, which is a direct consequence of the honing of Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) into a security alliance, is definitely not just a result of September 11 but of the broader American foreign policy hinged on its aspirations for global hegemony and thus will not be working for the interest of Southeast Asia.

I.                     Background: In the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) held in Brunei last year, the US Secretary of State Collin Powell stressed the importance of the ARF in the struggle against International Terrorism enunciated in the Joint Declaration for Cooperation to Combat International Terrorism between the United States and ASEAN.

II.                   As evident in previous policy statements and declarations, the desire of the US to form a security alliance with the ASEAN members is not just a result of the 9-11 Attack.

A.     Commander-in-chief of the Pacific Command (CINCPAC) Admiral Dennis Blair at the Carnegie Conference held on March 16, 2000 had expressed the “troubling” pattern of development in Asia and how this can be contained by way of establishing “security communities.”

B.      The Pentagon’s Joint Vision 2020 in June 2000, a key “defense guidance,” envisions Asia instead of Europe as the prime focus of US Military in the coming decades, identifies China as a “peer competitor,” and sees even closer military coordination between the US and Japan

C.      The “think tank” RAND Corporation has been vocal in implicitly and explicitly discussing the containment of China even before the September 11 attacks.

III.                 The proposed security alliance will not work for the Philippines because it only serves the interests and purposes of the US.

A.     The US will again use the Philippine territory as a springboard for its military forces.

B.      The presence of military forces will impinge (yet again) on the sovereign rights of the Filipino people

C.      The primary interest of the US is how it can keep its dominance over the region for fear of the growing Chinese economy.

IV.                 Conclusion: The plan to increase the presence of United States (US) Military forces in Asia, which is a direct consequence of the honing of Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) into a security alliance, is definitely not just a result of September 11, as proven by pre-9/11 policy statements and declaration, but of the broader American foreign policy hinged on its aspirations for global hegemony and thus will not be working for the interest of Southeast Asia.

Group VIII: ASEAN as a Security Alliance: Will it work?          

The United States’ proposal of forming a multilateral security alliance, with the countries involved in the ASEAN Regional Forum, which ground was warranted by the country’s campaign for its “War on Terrorism”, could be viewed in terms of the issued policy statements and declarations, particularly those by the Pentagon “think tank” Rand Corporation. Analyzing a study commissioned by RAND recommending the so-called “New Strategy and Force Posture” of the United States towards Asia, it could be deduced that the security alliance being proposed to the ARF is but a promotion of already established US foreign policy, geared up even before the justification it had found on the “War on Terrorism” campaign. And thus under this mantle, the United States would be able to use the proposed security alliance in promotion of its hegemonic aspirations in the Asia Pacific region, with considerably lessened obstacles.

(The study and other references, which will be mentioned hitherto, unless specified, will be coming from the documents of RAND Corporation, available online at http://www.rand.org.)

RAND Corporation: A Brief Introduction

RAND, short for Research and Development, is a non-profit organization created by the United States Armed Forces (USAF) back in 1946 and is the first one to be called a “think tank.” It had been commissioned to do studies, which involved aircrafts, rockets, satellites and even with the invention of the Internet. According to their homepage, the organization’s task is to “help improve policy and decisionmaking [sic] through research and analysis.” This, they achieve through developing new knowledge to inform decision-makers, sometimes without suggesting any specific course of action, often going further by “spelling out range of available options and by analyzing advantages and disadvantages” and on many other occasions, even “advance specific policy recommendations.” These policy recommendations, studies and even the actions of Pentagon itself suggest, the US government puts much weight on and consequently heeds in most cases. Notably, among RAND’s many areas of expertise are on the fields of International Policy and National Security.

RAND Policy Declarations Concerning the Asia Pacific Region and the US Proposal for a Multilateral Security Alliance

Among the many policies conceptualized by the corporation, the RAND study released in fall 2000, more than a year before the September 11 incident, will give us one of the preeminent clear-cut view in the understanding of the US Government’s take on the “War on Terrorism” matter and how it has manipulated this campaign to work for its best interests by establishing its military arms in the Asia Pacific region subsequently maintaining strong influence and pushing forth its global hegemonic aspirations. Entitled The United States and Asia: Toward a New U.S. Strategy and Force Posture, the RAND study “proposes an approach [which] the US can take to help preserve stability in Asia in the face of the region’s changing security environment.”

The study poses the perceived new “challenges” in the region, which include, firstly the improved relationship between North and South Korea that may culminate the Korean unification, which in turn, the research predicts might result to the dramatic altering of existing security arrangements and profoundly affect current U.S. force posture. This “threat” is clearly not addressed to the security of the region per se but rather definitely will work against the strategies of the United States with its military bases in South Korea. With the unification of the two Koreas, which in fact, one might perceive to be a good thing, the United States force posture might be altered if not altogether booted out of the peninsula. Thus, they need to develop a security alliance that the North Korean government would scorn keeping them apart from the aligned South and therefore securing the prolonged, even permanent base set up of the US in the Korean peninsula.

Then the study brought up the challenge being caused by a growing Chinese economic, technological and military prowess. This, according to the study, in the near-term would call for the best response in case of Chinese aggression against Taiwan and in the long term, “the US must consider the strategic and military challenges China will pose should it seek to diminish U.S. influence in the region or aggressively pursue regional primacy.”  The Chinese “threat” had been echoed by the national organization, US-ASEAN Business Council, earlier this year. The Council particularly mentioned China’s proposed China-ASEAN Free-Trade Area, which according to it “could create a market of 1.7 billion people with a combined gross-domestic product of $2 trillion and total two-way trade of $1.2 trillion.”[1] With this perceived threat, the United States’ proposed security alliance could be manipulated against the rising China, should it seek to undermine US interests in the region.

Among the other perceived challenges mentioned by RAND are India’s growing role in the regional political and military affairs and its aspirations to great power status, which the study fears, may become a source of a deepening conflict with China, along with India’s ongoing dispute with Pakistan that entailed incursion, insurgency and terrorism coupled with nuclear weapon capabilities of both countries. Other situations that were perceived to threaten the stability of the current regional order in the Asia Pacific include Indonesia’s internal conflicts marred by separatist movements and civil strife and Japan and Russia’s aspirations to enhanced political and military status. It should be noted that while the Chinese threat is the most visible target of the United States’ strategic containment, the security alliance would be directed against any other force that might be in the way of the advancement of the US geopolitical strategy.

Given the mentioned new challenges in the region, the study went on to suggest a strategic plan that the United States must undertake only if it wanted to retain its grip in the Asia Pacific. The objective was for the “United States [to begin to] develop an integrated political, military, and economic strategy aimed at thwarting the growth of rivalries that may engender instability or conflict in the region,” clearly stating that of great importance is the need to “prevent the rise of a dominant power [a regional hegemon] that might seek to undermine the U.S. role in Asia.” Other objectives include the maintenance of stability in the region and the aid in managing Asia’s peaceful development while increasing economic access to the whole area.

In proposing the strategy, the study mentioned that the necessary pre-condition of the pursuance of its objectives would be the doggedness of American global leadership. “This assumes, in turn, that the United States will continue to make the necessary political, technological, and military investments to ensure its global preeminence. Economically, the United States should further Asia’s development by continuing to support the expansion of free-trade policies—e.g., by the expansion of the World Trade Organization (WTO) to include China as well as other countries.”

The objectives mentioned can be attained, as it were, by the study’s proposed four-part strategy, suggesting that the United Stated would need to:

·                   Complement its bilateral security alliances to create a broader security framework. This multilateralization could ultimately include Japan, South Korea, Australia, and perhaps Singapore, the Philippines, and Thailand.

·                   Pursue a balance-of-power strategy among key Asian states that are not part of the U.S. alliance structure, including China, India, and Russia.

·                   Discourage the use of force as a means of settling territorial disputes.

·                   Promote an inclusive security dialogue among all the states of Asia as a means of discussing regional conflicts, building confidence, and encouraging states to enter into a multilateral framework in the future.

This wide-ranging strategy, the study claimed, could be achieved through the shift of focus of the US military from Northeast Asia, to Taiwan, where basing is said to be “both politically and militarily problematic” and “to Southeast Asia where a permanent U.S. combat presence is currently lacking.” Now, with the proposed security alliance, which would consequently allow deployment of troops in Southeast Asia, the lack of combat presence mentioned by RAND would then be satisfied. In fact, in the Philippines, the recent Balikatan exercises had already signaled the implementation of this US strategy.

To operationalize this strategy, together with other military tactics being suggested by the study, would therefore more or less ensure the preservation of “U.S. influence in the face of trends that may dramatically alter the [Asia Pacific] region's geopolitical environment.” This operationalization is to be realized through the recently proposed security alliance being justified under the guise of President Bush’s “War on Terrorism.”

Will the ASEAN work as a security alliance?

It should be emphasized that the United States had been proposing to turn the ASEAN into a security alliance long before the September 11 incident. In fact, since its inception, the ASEAN had been coveted by the US as a security force, of course, under its influence. With the dismantling of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in 1975, the US has had no visible multilateral alliance in the region. It is only in Asia where a regional multilateral force aligned with the US is very much absent. Although it had always maintained its bilateral ties with the countries in Asia-Pacific, as it had been expressed in the objectives proposed by the RAND Corporation, the US would want to complement these alliances with a multilateral security alliance for a broader security framework.

          ASEAN is an organization created to promote chiefly the economic growth of its members. Thus, if transformed into a security alliance, ASEAN would go against its inherent structure. With the advent of the terrorist attack, the United States had found an effective ground to push forth its agenda in Southeast Asia. With increased security measures and the world sympathizing with its anti-terrorists campaign, it is now high time to bring up once more its long-coveted security alliance that, more than securing the suppression of anti-American uprisings in the region would establish the United States’ permanent hegemonic presence in Asia Pacific. As mentioned by RAND’s senior policy analyst Angel Rabasa, “In circumstances where their security is threatened, however, some ASEAN states would be more likely to agree to support an expanded U.S. military presence.”  Moreover, the materialization of this presence in the Philippines today is already pre-figured by RAND with Rabasa saying that, “Despite residual controversy over the U.S. bases, the Philippine government will probably allow U.S. operational use of facilities in [the] country if Philippine security interests are directly at stake.”

          The ASEAN had been branded as a mere “talk shop”, a conferential group, which works only as a venue for junkets and excuse for leaders to travel. The transformation of the ASEAN Regional Forum into a multilateral security force would yet be another factor that would be accelerating the demise of ASEAN as an organization. With the formation of a security alliance in the region would surely mark the beginning of the end of ASEAN.

Conclusion: