Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison (C) and US President Joe Biden attend a joint press conference via audio visual link (AVL) from The Blue Room at Parliament House in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia. - EPA PIC
Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison (C) and US President Joe Biden attend a joint press conference via audio visual link (AVL) from The Blue Room at Parliament House in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia. - EPA PIC

The intensifying Sino-American rivalry chalked up a notch or two with the surprise recent unveiling of a new clog in the United States global alliance architecture called AUKUS.

This is in reference to a tripartite agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom and US, by which the US will supply eight nuclear-powered submarines to Australia, with the UK providing some technical back-up.

This has been described by observers as a muscular beefing-up of American military commitment and readiness to counter a China that has been unabashedly assertive in recent years, particularly with the latter's controversial militarisation of disputed maritime features in the South China Sea.

The new alliance has met with a predictably mixed response from Asean countries.

Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, in a telephone conversation to explain the move with his Malaysian counterpart Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob, was told of Malaysia's concerns about a stepped-up arms race in the region.

Indonesia has expressed some reservations of its own with its southern neighbour's new submarines. The Philippines — like Malaysia, a disputant with China over overlapping maritime claims — came out openly in support of AUKUS, a stance Singapore evidently shares.

There are some understandable misgivings within the region about what the new alliance will mean for the vaunted concept of "Asean centrality", especially over regional security matters.

While Asean centrality has thus far been largely form (an elaborate annual feast of interlocking summits) over substance, the Sino-US rivalry will largely be played out within the maritime theatre surrounding Asean states.

The region thus has an existential stake in how the rivalry eventually plays out.

Asean centrality is perhaps a mostly misunderstood concept since, as the divergent stances over AUKUS by individual Asean members attest, there has never been much of any unified stance on issues confronting the regional group.

The concept is probably better understood as Asean setting the regional agenda since powers outside the region all agree to be represented at the highest levels in the plethora of Asean-crafted platforms designed to keep all concerned talking with each other rather than over each other. Jaw-jaw rather than war-war, as the saying goes.

If there is one thing that likely unifies all Asean states, it is their abjuring any imperative to choose between one superpower over another. This may be borne out of a practical streak present within Asean states.

In an era where national interests still trump over anything else, they can hardly be faulted for picking their own respective national side over that of any other country, however powerful that country may be. Such a pragmatic approach may also be a function of a central dilemma: neither the US nor China today has the overall preponderance in all facets of power and strength.

The US may still be the pre-eminent global military power but it is fast losing economic pre-eminence to China, particularly in this part of the world.

Much has also been made of the fact that as AUKUS was officially unveiled to the world, China — the obvious target — formally expressed an interest in acceding to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CP-TPP), the very trade bloc former US president Barack Obama conceived to check China's economic rise that his successor Donald Trump saw fit to withdraw from on his first day in office.

Despite US President Joe Biden's enthusiasm for continuing with his two immediate predecessors' efforts at countering China by way of an "open and rules-based Indo-Pacific", he has shown little interest in re-joining CP-TPP. It is as if on matters economic, the US is content to eventually concede the region to China-led rules.

Asean states, therefore, cannot be faulted if they have opted for continued hedging between the US and China; looking more towards Beijing for economic leadership even as they remain comfortable with the continued military presence in the region by the US to balance against greater Chinese assertiveness and adventurism in the South China Sea.

Asean centrality stays relevant in this regard precisely because all stakeholders within and without the grouping find it indispensable.


The writer views developments in the nation, region and wider world from his vantage point in Kuching, Sarawak

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times