security cooperation in northeast asia: problems and prospects

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SECURITY COOPERATION IN NORTHEAST ASIA: PROBLEMS AND PROSPECTS Andrew Mack During the past five years there have been a growing number of proposals .for dialogue, "regimes" and other cooperative insatu- tions designed to enhance regional security. This article critically evaluates the key proposals and notes the objections that have been raised against them. It goes on to argue that many of these objections are without validity. The article contrasts the consider- able progress in this area, which has been achieved in Southeast Asia with the absence of progress in Northeast Asia-and sug- gests some reasons for the difference. The article concludes with an analysis of some of the contradictory elements of such concepts as "cooperative security, .... security cooperation" and "common security," which are gaining increasing currency in the region. INTROD UCTION Although various measures for security cooperation in Northeast Asia have been proposed in recent years none has made any real progress. Regional economic cooperation is a fact of life in the Asia-Pacific, but while multilateral economic regimes like the Pacific Economic Coopera- tion Council (PECC) and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) flour- ish, on the security front, cooperation has been far more difficult to achieve. This article examines some of the proposals for establishing security/dia- logues and regimes in Northeast Asia, analyses the causes of their lack of success thus far, contrasts them with the rather different situation in South- east Asia, and asks if any lessons may be learned from the Southeast Asian experience. PROPOSALS FOR REGIONAL SECURITY COOPERATION IN NORTHEAST ASIA The most far-reaching and ambitious proposals for regional security coop- eration to have been made thus far were those of the former Soviet Union. These were outlined by former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in major speeches at Vladivostok and Krasnoyarsk in 1986 and 1988 respectively and Andrew Mack is a professor and head of the Department of International Relations of The Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University.

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Page 1: Security cooperation in Northeast Asia: Problems and prospects

S E C U R I T Y C O O P E R A T I O N I N

N O R T H E A S T A S I A : P R O B L E M S

A N D P R O S P E C T S

Andrew Mack

During the past five years there have been a growing number of proposals .for dialogue, "regimes" and other cooperative insatu- tions designed to enhance regional security. This article critically evaluates the key proposals and notes the objections that have been raised against them. It goes on to argue that many of these objections are without validity. The article contrasts the consider- able progress in this area, which has been achieved in Southeast Asia with the absence of progress in Northeast As ia -and sug- gests some reasons for the difference. The article concludes with an analysis of some of the contradictory elements of such concepts as "cooperative security, .... security cooperation" and "common security," which are gaining increasing currency in the region.

INTROD UCTION

Although various measures for security cooperation in Northeast Asia have been proposed in recent years none has made any real progress. Regional economic cooperation is a fact of life in the Asia-Pacific, but while multilateral economic regimes like the Pacific Economic Coopera- tion Council (PECC) and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) flour- ish, on the security front, cooperation has been far more difficult to achieve.

This article examines some of the proposals for establishing security/dia- logues and regimes in Northeast Asia, analyses the causes of their lack of success thus far, contrasts them with the rather different situation in South- east Asia, and asks if any lessons may be learned from the Southeast Asian experience.

PROPOSALS FOR REGIONAL SECURITY COOPERATION IN NORTHEAST ASIA

The most far-reaching and ambitious proposals for regional security coop- eration to have been made thus far were those of the former Soviet Union. These were outlined by former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in major speeches at Vladivostok and Krasnoyarsk in 1986 and 1988 respectively and

Andrew Mack is a professor and head of the Department of International Relations of The Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University.

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by former foreign minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, again at Vladivostok, in 1990.

But while not being greeted with the same degree of hostility and suspi- cion as early proposals by Leonid Brezhnev, none of the Gorbachev/ Shevardnadze proposals gained much support among pro-Western states in the region. The reasons were simple enough.

First, both Washington and the pro-Western regional states believed that U.S. military superiority was the best guarantor of security in the region since it offered the best protection against aggression. That superiority was an established fact and was unlikely to be challenged since the Soviet economy was moving into crisis. The Soviet agenda for confidence- and security- building measures (CSBMs) was clearly designed to reduce U.S. regional maritime military superiority. There was thus no point in engaging in nego- tiations with Moscow.

Second, the fact that Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan were all, to a greater or lesser degree, dependent on the United States for their security, meant that it was unlikely they would have challenged Washington's opposition to Moscow's overtures even if they had wished to--which they didn't.

Third, the particular bilateral relations which Northeast Asian states had with Moscow were a further complication. The People's Republic of China had never demonstrated much interest in the naval confidence-building pro- posals that were high on the Soviet agenda, while the Sino/Soviet territorial disputes, which w e r e important for Beijing, were clearly best handled on a bilateral basis. SeouI had been antagonistic towards Moscow because of So- viet support for the DPRK; while Tokyo had made improvement in Soviet/ Japanese relations contingent on the resolution of the so-called "Northern Territories" issue.

The Russian proposals were not the only ones. In October 1988, South Korean President Roh Tae-Woo proposed a six-nation "Consultative Confer- ence" comprised of the United States, the USSR, the two Koreas, Japan, and China which would "deal with a broad range of ideas concerning stability, progress, and prosperity within the region." In a subsequent speech in the United States in June 1991, Roh called for a "structure of cooperation" in the region) It subsequently became clear that the South Korean initiative was intended to focus primarily on security issues on the Korean peninsula. It was opposed by China and North Korea and later, like the Soviet initiatives, it was overtaken by events.

In 1989, Mongolia put forward an initiative for an eight-nation forum (Mongolia, the USSR, the United States, Canada, the Koreas, Japan, and China), but it generated little attention and even less support.

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MACK 23

THE AUSTRALIAN AND CANADIAN INITIATIVES

In 1990, Canada and Australia also called for multilateral security discus- sions in the region. Australia's initial proposal, spelled out by Foreign Minis- ter Gareth Evans in Melbourne in July 1990, was for a Conference on Secu- rity and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). Australia's proposal generated con- siderable regional interest and criticism.

Canada called for a North Pacific Cooperative Security Dialogue (NPCSD) which might include the "adaptation to the Pacific region of confi- dence-building measures which have proven successful in Europe. ''2

Within the region the reaction to these proposals ranged from cool to hostile. Australia's CSCA proposal irritated the United States considerably and in November 1990, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker wrote to Evans suggesting that he drop the idea)

This was a time when Washington was still concerned about possible Soviet threats to the region and U.S. officials saw the CSCA idea, like Canada's NPCSD proposal, as providing the Soviets with a diplomatic entr6e to the region for which they would have to pay no price, and conferring on them the unwanted status of legitimate regional security "players."

Washington believed that Moscow would take advantage of multilateral security forums to push for security measures (such as naval arms control) which might have seemed superficially attractive but were inimical to the United Sta tes- and thus regional - security interests.

Some critics have seen the obdurate U.S. rejection of arms control in the Asia-Pacific (except on the Korean peninsula) as perverse. In fact, the U.S. stance has a clear--though not necessarily security-enhancing--strategic logic. The United States had supported arms control in Europe because it was seen, correctly, as a useful institutional mechanism for reducing the USSR's conventional military advantage over NATO. Indeed the CFE negotiations were achieving precisely that goal before the Soviet Union broke up. Mos- cow had agreed to massive asymmetric cuts which, if implemented, would have tilted the military balance in NATO's favor.

In other words, in Europe, the United States had supported arms control because it enhanced NATO's military position; in the Pacific, where security had a more maritime focus and the military balance was tilted in America's favor, Washington opposed arms control because it would have enhanced Moscow's position.

But neither the United States nor its allies made this case publicly in their rejection of various proposals for regional arms control/confidence-building regimes. The United States and regional critics of such proposals have used rather different arguments. They have stressed - to Canadians as well as Aus- tralians-that the Asia-Pacific region was fundamentally different from Eu-

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rope and that these differences meant that CSCE-type structures were simply unworkable in Asia. In particular they argued that:

• There was no bloc system in Asia comparable to that of Europe. China's position between the superpowers--sometimes leaning to one side, sometimes to the o ther -had no European equivalent;

• Superpower force structures were highly asymmetric-the USSR was a land power; U.S. military strength was in the maritime realm;

• The strategic geography of the Asia-Pacific region generally is a maritime one--the many key states are either islands, peninsulas, or archipelagos. In Europe, the major strategic confrontation was across a long land frontier;

• There was no tradition of arms control in Asia as there was in Europe; • There were many unresolved territorial and sovereignty disputes in the Asia-

Pacific which had no analogue in Europe. The Helsinki process had been predi- cated on the resolution of territorial disputes. (This particular objection has been outdated by the upsurge of territorial conflicts in what was Yugoslavia and the CIS.);

• There were also n e w - o r newly contentious-conflicts arising out of the cre- ation in the 1980s of 200-mile EEZs. The current conflict over the Spratly Islands provides a classic example.

Most of these arguments were correct, but they missed the point.

Canadian Secretary of State Joe Clark, who was the guiding force behind the NCPSD, had argued specifically that Canada was not:

advocating that we transplant mechanisms that have been successful elsewhere, notably in Europe, into the unique, political and cultural context of the Asia Pacific region. 4

Similarly Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans had reacted to the critics of his CSCA idea by arguing that:

Nobody is naive enough to think that the CSCE process can simply be recreated in the Asia-Pacific region. There are too many obvious differences for that: no single East-West confrontation to contend with, but a heterogeneous collection of cross- cutting cultures and conflicts and cleavages. But just because institutional pro- cesses can't be translated half a world away, that is not to say that the relevant habits of mind cannot be translated either. 5

In May 1991, Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke gave a speech that

spelled out what is still the current Australian position:

We do not think it is appropriate or necessary at this state to propose the establish- ment of a new regional forum or institutions for discussing security issues. It is not yet possible to say whether such forums or institutions would have a useful role. In particular we must recognize that we cannot translate the emerging European security architecture into our own region. 6

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THE ROLE OF SECURITY DIALOGUES

Perhaps the most important common element in the Canadian and Austra- lian proposals, and one which is gaining increasing acceptance in the region, is their stress on the need for multilateral security dialogues. It is difficult for regional off ic ia ls-or the United S ta tes - to object to "dialogue"-which is, after all, the normal discourse of diplomacy. "Dialogue" is a much less con- fronting idea than "arms control."

Moreover dialogues do not necessarily have to involve officials in the first instance. The Canadian NPCSD involves an official track (which would in- clude diplomats and foreign ministry officials from Canada, the United States, and Northeast Asia). But there is also a non-official track which involves non-government analysts from Canada and the region. The non- official track is funded by Ottawa, but is organized by scholars at Toronto's York University and consists of a series of workshops/conferences which bring together academics and regional security experts to discuss a range of North Pacific security issues.

There have been other "Track Two"-non-off ic ia l - regional security dia- logues. These include the Malaysian Institute for Strategic and International Studies Roundtables in Kuala Lumpur, now in their sixth year; the ongoing ASEAN ISIS dialogues between the key ASEAN strategic studies institutes; the series of meetings sponsored by the UN's Disarmament in Kathmandu- ongoing since 1989, and the three Indonesian-sponsored meetings on security and other issues in the South China Sea.

The advantage of these sorts of meetings is that they provide an excellent opportunity to "fly kites." Particular proposals can be advanced and the re- gional responses to them noted by officials attending the meeting under the polite fiction that they are present in their "private capacity." In Joe Clark's words such meetings can:

tell us a great deal about both the issues that officials should be concerned with and the feasibility of dialogue at the official level. 7

There is no doubt that support for the idea of multilateral security dia- logues is much greater in Southeast Asia than Northeast Asia. In 1991, high- level government-initiated s "roundtables" in Manila and Bangkok endorsed precisely the sort of official multilateral dialogues on security issues which Canada had unsuccessfully sought to initiate in the North Pacific.

The ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference (PMC) is now an approved fo- rum for official dialogue. The PMC involves not only the ASEAN states but also the so-called "dialogue partners" (Australia, South Korea, Canada, the EEC, Japan, New Zealand, and the United States.) China and Russia are prospective members, and were admitted to the 1992 PMC meeting as

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"guests." Vietnam and Laos, which have just signed the ASEAN Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, have "observer status. ''9

Since ASEAN has long been reluctant to engage in formal multilateral discussions on security issues, the elevation of security onto the ASEAN and ASEAN-PMC agenda represents a considerable shift in regional security thinking. There are a number of reasons for this. First, the end of the cold war has made the issue of security more salient in the region. Second, the APEC meetings have tended to become the dominant regional forum for dealing with regional economic issues-regional security has been pushed hard as a PMC agenda item, not only by "dialogue partners" like Australia, but also by the influential ASEAN-ISIS institutes which, in 1991, presented a series of proposals for regional security dialogues to the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting. In 1992, security was a high priority item on the PMC agenda. According to one report, the Manila PMC:

focused almost totally on security issues, completing the break with ASEAN's long tradition of eschewing political/strategic matters which began two years ago. ~o

The PMC security dialogue process is not without real difficulties, how- ever. First, the fact that neither North Korea nor China are yet PMC "dia- logue partners" means that neither of the two most risk-prone conflicts in the region-i .e . , those involving competing claims to the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea and the Korean peninsula--can be resolved within the PMC context. The fact that Taiwan is not a member makes discussion of Taiwan Straits security difficult. (Economic issues tend to be less sensitive than secu- rity issues, which may explain why Taiwan--and Hong Kong-have a place at the APEC table but not at the ASEAN PMC.)

Second, while there is now a consensus that security dialogues are desir- able, there is no consensus about what the dialogue agenda should include, although there have been a number of nonofficial proposals for concrete initiatives, tl Then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke argued in a major speech on regional security on May 24, 1991, that a regional security dia- logue could lead to such confidence-building measures as:

procedures agreed among regional states for handling naval incidents at sea. In- creased cooperation in such areas as maritime surveillance, air-space surveillance, and intelligence exchanges could also grow out of regional dialogue on mutual security needs. 12

None of these ideas have been officially endorsed in the region. At the 1992 PMC, Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans made a number of even more modest proposals. He suggested:

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exchanges of maritime information to assist in combating piracy, the possibility of setting up regional security planning discussions, and the development of a re- gional arms register. 13

The extreme modesty of these proposals is underscored by the fact that: a) the exchange of information to assist in combating piracy is not concerned with security in the traditional sense at all; b) the "possibility" of setting up "regional security planning discussions" is simply a recommendation for more talk; and c) all states in the region are committed by their votes at the UN to the principle of creating an arms transfer register, while the idea of a regional arms transfer has already been floated by the Malaysian defense minister.

The modesty of Australia's current proposals-- and their sharp contrast to the far-reaching vision of Senator Evans' CSCA proposal of 1990-reflects a realistic assessment of what may be acceptable at this time in the region. 14

Third, for multilateral cooperation to succeed at the subregional level of the ASEAN states themselves, there is a "need to overcome ASEAN's insti- tutional weaknesses and inadequacies. . , and low ASEAN-centricity among member states. ''15 For regional security cooperation to succeed there needs to be a greater prior commitment to regionalism and regional cooperative pro- cesses within A S E A N - this contrast with Europe is frequently noted. 16

Fourth, many of the confidence- and security-building measures that seem relatively nonproblematic to Western arms control experts will be difficult to implement in ASEAN. This is a region where there is no habit of "transpar- ency" in military affairs-ASEAN states do not publish Defense White Pa- pers, for exampleJ 7 It also is by no means clear that all Southeast Asian states will be prepared to publish data on their arms transfers as the Malay- sian defense minister has proposed.

Moreover, on some security issues ASEAN defense planners still harbor suspicions about the intentions of their neighbors. Such suspicions, though rarely articulated publicly, will be taken into account in strategic planning and make regional states understandably reluctant to be genuinely f r ank - i.e., "transparent"- in their dealings with their neighbors.

NORTHEAST ASIA

Notwithstanding these difficulties it is clear that more progress has been achieved in creating security dialogues in Southeast Asia than in Northeast Asia. The official "track" of Canada's NPCSD initiative is currently dead in the water, stopped by a combination of regional indifference and lack of domestic support for the initiative following the departure of Joe Clark to a domestic portfolio. The current minister has little interest in the Pacific.

Moreover there are no ongoing unofficial intraregional security dialogues

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in Northeast Asia comparable to those pursued by the influential ASEAN- ISIS institutes--although there are comparable security studies institutes in Northeast Asia (e.g., the Korean Institute for Defense Analysis in Seoul, the Institute for Peace and Disarmament in Pyongyang, the Research Institute for International Peace and Security in Tokyo, and the Beijing International Insti- tute of Strategic Studies). Nor have there been any Northeast Asian official/ NGO meetings comparable to the officially sponsored Manila and Bangkok ASEAN Regional Security Roundtables, or workshops-like the three South China Sea meetings which have been hosted by Indonesia in Bali, Bandung, and Jogjarkata and which have focused on specific regional security con- cerns.

I outlined above some g e n e r a l reasons why there had been so much resis- tance to proposals for multilateral security forums in the Asia-Pacific. But clearly today that resistance has lessened somewhat-the ASEAN-PMC has

become a forum for tentative multilateral security dialogues. But most of the regional proposals for security cooperation have come from Southeast Asia (I include Australia's contributions). Why have the Northeast Asian states been so much less forthcoming?

Perhaps the single most important reason is that relations between the key Northeast Asia states--Japan, the Koreas, China, Russia, and Taiwan -- are very different from those between the ASEAN states. Relations between the former range from cool to hostile.

There are a number of other reasons. First, Moscow, which was the great enthusiast for cooperative security

forums in the late 1980s, has become understandably preoccupied with its economic crisis at home. Despite its continued (though reducing) military presence in the region, Russia is a far less active participant in regional politics today than it was during the cold war days. In the early 1980s, the USSR's military presence in the region was the security issue for the United States and its allies; today it rates relatively little real attention.

Second, China has never evinced any interest in multilateral security dia- logues of the type proposed by the Canadians. As Jin Dexiang told the ASEAN Manila conference in June 1991, security cooperation, like economic cooperation, should proceed cautiously in a step-by-step way:

Progress should be made gradually from the partial to the whole, from bilateral to multilateral and from rudimentary forms to high-level forms. 18

In the short term this dearly rules out the Canadian idea of multilateral security dialogues in the North Pacific. Moreover:

On the level of contacts and meetings, I think we should hold more non-govern- mental academic discussions, to be accompanied by official meetings at lower level. 19

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Third, the key security issues in Northeast Asia are nearly all b i l a t e r a l -

the two Koreas; China/Taiwan; the Sino/CIS border question; and the Rus- sian dispute with Japan over the so-called "Northern Territories." Most re- gional states see the solutions to these problems lying primarily, if not exclu- sively, in the relevant bilateral relationships.

Fourth, the United States has been the dominant security player among the pro-Western states of Northeast Asia. It has an alliance relationship with two s ta tes-South Korea and Japan, and a special relationship with a third-- Taiwan. In each relationship, the United States was unquestionably the domi- nant partner with the consequence that the junior partners are unlikely to challenge U.S. preferences on security arrangements and forums. Multilateral security institutions would risk diminishing U.S. inf luence- which is another reason the Soviets sought such forums and the United States rejected them. In the multilateral NATO alliance, for example, Washington's allies could, and sometimes did, combine to pressure the United States to accept policies it would have preferred to reject. So, as Stewart Henderson has noted, in the Pacific, the United States saw no reason to:

replace the successful model of U.S.A.-directed bilateral military alliances with some as yet to be determined multilateral forum where United States influence would necessarily be diluted. 2°

In Southeast Asia only one state, the Philippines, has an alliance relationship with the United States which involves the stationing of U.S. forces on its so i l - and this too will cease as the United States pulls out of its Philippines bases. So Southeast Asian states are less dependent on the United S ta tes - and thus less susceptible to U.S. pressure to agree to a particular security line.

Today Washington recognizes that ad hoc multilateral approaches to re- solving particular security issues are sometimes useful. As James Baker noted last year:

Multilateral security approaches to security are slowly emerging... At this stage of a new era we should be attentive to the possibilities for such multilateral actions without locking ourselves into an overly structured approach. In the Asia-Pacific community, form should follow function. 2~

What this means in practical terms is that the United States may be pre- pared to lead, or join in, ad hoc coalitions of states dealing with particular re- gional security i s sues - the UN Permanent Five negotiations on Cambodia is one case in point; U.S. coordination of pressure against North Korea on the nuclear issue is another. But the United States continues to reject the idea of multilateral security institutions on the grounds that they are unnecessary- "solutions in search of a problem," according to one senior U.S. official.

The parallel argument that, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," which has also

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been used by U.S. officials as an argument against new regional security proposals, is particularly unhelpful. It assumes that because regional security relations are (with some exceptions) relatively benign at the moment, there is no need to seek to improve them. The logical corollary of this position is that the regions should wait until security relations break down before act ing- which is clearly absurd.

America's presence in the region is valued by almost all states because it is perceived as a stabilizing force. A withdrawal of U.S. commitment would, it is believed, create "power vacuums" which would tempt aspiring regional hegemons to move in-China is sometimes mentioned in this context, but most regional concern focuses on Japan. Thus from the point of view of most regional states, the United States fulfills, in the region, its most valuable security function simply by being there. Exactly what America's role is apart from mere presence is difficult to say--and not easy for U.S. officials to explain.

America's security role in the region has been described as that of "bal- ancing wheel," "intercessor," and "security guarantor. ''22 But what this means in practice is quite unclear.

There is little doubt that the United States would assist South Korea if it were attacked by the North-U.S. troops on the ground would automatically be involved. But it is not clear that the "regional balancer" would do anything if there were a military confrontation between China and Taiwan, or if armed conflict were again to erupt over the Spratly Islands. Yet U.S. officials rate the conflict over the Spratlys as the second most serious regional threat.

Finally, there is the interesting case of Japan. Japan's security policy in the past has been greatly influenced by its hostility to Moscow, focused in large part on the disputed islands ("Northern Territories") issues, and by its con- cern not to challenge the United States on security issues. It would, however, be naive to assume that these factors will continue to be as important in the future as they have been in the past. The end of the cold war and America's relative decline mean that old assumptions about regional security will be- come decreasingly tenable. Meanwhile Japan's conception of "comprehen- sive security," its stress on the economic dimension of security and, above all, its stunning success in achieving global influence via economic means, suggest that, in the future, Tokyo may play a creative role in articulating and promoting new conceptions of security for the region. 23

SECURITY COOPERATION OR COOPERATIVE SECURITY?

The security discourse in the Asia-Pacific region is sometimes confused by the fact that the terms "security cooperation" and "cooperative security" are often used as though they were interchangeable; in fact they may be very

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different. "Security cooperation" generally refers to the cooperative policies allies pursue toge ther -common exercising and access to each other's mili- tary facilities in peacetime, for example, and common operations in war. America's RIMPAC and "Team Spirit" exercises are classic examples of security cooperation.

Security cooperation is associated with alliances, and alliances of states tend to be formed against another state, or a group of states. What defines the alliance is common opposition to a common foe. Security cooperation is predicated on the assumption that, in joining an alliance, states gain in secu- rity because there is "strength in numbers. ''24 Military preponderance is as- sumed to enhance deterrence. Deterrence is seen as necessary because with- out it there would be no constraint against aggression.

Cooperative security - sometimes known as "common secur i ty"- is based on a somewhat different set of assumptions. Here the focus is less on prevent- ing unprovoked aggression ~t la Saddam Hussein or Hitler, but rather to counteract the more probable causes of w a r - those which arise out of "secu- rity dilemmas" and "conflict spirals." "Security dilemmas" arise when the defensive preparations of one state are taken as evidence of hostile intent by rival states, which in turn increase their defensive capabilities-creating con- cern in the first state and so forth. These concerns can lead to "conflict spirals" where the essentially defensive actions of the two sides generate ever-increasing suspicion and hostility, an arms race, and finally lead to a military confrontation that neither side originally sought. Such confrontations are more likely to lead to war if both sides have offensively oriented force postures-which provide incentives for shooting first in crises.

If inadvertent war arising out of "security dilemmas" and "conflict spirals" is seen as the key security problem, then deterrence is not the solution. Indeed deterrence strategies may exacerbate "security dilemmas" and "conflict spi- rals" and may ultimately help trigger the very war they intended to prevent.

As Senator Evans puts it:

The central idea of "common security" is that lasting security does not lie in the upward spiral of arms development, fueled by mutual suspicion, but in a commit- ment to joint survival, to taking into account the legitimate security anxieties of others, to building step-by-step military confidence between nations, to working to maximize the degree of interdependence between nations: putting it shortly, to achieving security with others and not against them. 25

Common security policies require strategies which emphasize reassurance rather than deterrence. Reassurance strategies stress the need for military transparency and openness rather than military secrecy; they stress arms con- trol rather than arms build up as a means of enhancing security; they rely on a range of CSBMs designed to reduce the risks of misunderstanding, and fi-

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naily they advocate that force structures be configured so that they are strong on the defensive, but have relatively weak offensive capabilities. "Non-pro- vocative" force postures are seen as enhancing stability.

Common security policies do not require a specific enemy. They are based on the proposition that within a community of states there will inevitably be a range of more or less serious disputes, but that generally states would prefer not to resort to war to deal with those disputes. Common security policies offer the military means (arms control/confidence-building/defensive restruc- turing) intended to reduce the probability that such disputes will escalate and lead to a war that none of the parties originally intended. Common security policies are not an alternative to creative diplomacy and conflict resolution strategies but rather complement them.

However since unprovoked aggression always remains a risk in the mod- ern world (albeit a declining one), it is necessary to construct security policies for the region which balance the requirements of adequate deterrence with those of reassurance. This balance can be difficult to achieve because too much emphasis on deterrence can undermine policies of reassurance, while too much reassurance could be seen by potential aggressors as evidence of weakness and actually encourage aggression.

But in Northeast Asia there is little doubt that the balance is skewed much too far towards the deterrence end of the spectrum. Despite the end of the cold war, China, Taiwan, and South Korea are all increasing their defense budgets by about 10 percent in real terms. Japan's defense budget this year will increase by about 3 percent. The budgets of North Korea and Russia are both down--with Russian defense spending down dramatically this year.

No one expects long-held security habits to be changed overnight and thus the prospect that common security policies be adopted soon in Northeast Asia is remote--although Japan's policy of refusing to acquire long-range offen- sive weapons systems that could threaten regional neighbors has important common security elements. But what would be of immediate value in the current context is a debate within and between regional security institutes a n d - ul t imately-at the official level, about the assumptions which underpin security policy in the region today.

Is it the case that the "peace through strength" policies of the cold war are necessari ly the most appropriate for a new era is which "soft" economic power is seen as more and more relevant than "hard" military power? Such questions, critically important for the security future of the region, are almost never asked. It is perhaps time they were.

N O T E S

1. Cited in the valuable review of regional security initiatives by Stewart Henderson, entitled "'Canada and Asia-Pacific Security: the North Pacific Security Dialogue: Recent Trends," North Pacific Cooperative Security Dialogue, York University, Toronto, 1992, p. 8.

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2. Joe Clark cited in Pacific Research (August 1990), p. 21. 3. See David League, "Regional Security Despite U.S. Objection," Financial Review (April

12, 1991). 4. Speech to North Pacific Security Dialogue conference, Victoria, British Columbia by Right

Honorable Joe Clark, April 6, 1991, p. 5. 5. Gareth Evans, "The Asia Pacific and Global Change," address to the Trilateral Commission,

Tokyo, April 20, 1991, p. 6. 6. R. J. Hawke, "Australia's Security in Asia," The Asia-Australia Institute, Sydney, May 24,

1991, p. 10. 7. Clark, Speech to North Pacific Security Dialogue Conference, p. 8. 8. The attendees were a mix of officials and NGO experts. 9. One proposal floated at the Bangkok regional security seminar was for a two-day PMC

meeting with the second day being "ASEAN-PMC plus" which would include Russia, China, Vietnam, and North Korea along with the regular dialogue partners. See Jusuf Wanandi, "An ASEAN Initiative for a Multilateral Dialogue on Political-Security Develop- ment in the Asia-Pacific Region," paper presented to the International Roundtable on Pros- peers for Regional Security Cooperation in the 1990s, Bangkok (November 4-6, 1991). APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) is also sometimes mentioned as a possible forum for region-wide security dialogue, but APEC includes both Hong Kong and Taiwan, which would make comprehensive discussions on security extremely difficult.

10. Steve Burrell, "Security Dominates ASEAN Concerns," FinancialReview (July 27, 1992). 11. The most detailed of these is Desmond Ball's Building Blocks for Regional Security,

Canberra Papers on Strategy and Defence No. 83 (Strategic and Defenc¢ Studies Centre, Australian University, Canberra, 1991).

12. Hawke, "Australia's Security in Asia." 13. Steve Burrell, "Security Dominates ASEAN Concerns." 14. The original Evans CSCA idea was also much broader in focus-encompassing in principle

the whole Asia-Pacific. Today, Australia focuses its attention primarily on the Southeast Asian subregion.

15. Mohamed Jawhar, "ASEAN-ISIS Proposal Relating to Consolidation and Enhancement of ASEAN," paper presented at the International Roundtable on Prospects for Regional Secu- rity Cooperation in Southeast Asia in the 1990s, p. 2.

16. ASEAN is comparatively weak as an institution. The ASEAN Secretariat, for example, cur- rently has an annual operating budget of only $1.65 million and a total staff complement of 52. The contrast in institutional strength between ASEAN and the EEC is frequently noted.

17. In this respect there is already more transparency in Northeast Asia than the ASEAN states--Japan, South Korea, and most recently, Taiwan all publish Defense White Papers.

18. Jin Dexiang, "China and Southeast Asia in a Changing Security Environment," paper pre- sented to conference on ASEAN and the Asia-Pacific Region: Prospects for Security Coop- eration in the 1990s, Manila (June 1991).

19. lbid., p. 8. 20. Henderson, "Canadian and Asia-Pacific Security," p. 10. 21. Ibid., p. 4. 22. See Richard Solomon, "Asian Security in the 1990s: Integration in Economics; Diversity in

Defense," USIS, November 1, 1990; and Richard Solomon, From "Cold War to Hot Econo- mies: America and Asian Security in an Era of Geoeconomics," Pacific Rim Forum confer- ence, San Diego, May 15, 1992.

23. The Japanese have already started to improve relations with Moscow despite the fact that the "Northern Territories" issue is not resolved. In October last year (1991) Japanese and Russian officials started an ongoing dialogue on a range of regional security issues. On July 2 this year (1992), Prime Minister Miyazawa argued for a "two track" approach to enhanc- ing regional security. One track would be via region-wide political/security dialogue, with the ASEAN-PMC playing a crucial role, the other would be the promotion of subregional cooperation to settle disputes. See Mr. Miyazawa's address to the National Press Club, July 2, 1992.

24. The historical evidence is not very encouraging for those who believe that alliances enhance security. Except for the nineteenth century, most alliances have been followed not by peace

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34 JOURNAL OF NORTHEASTASIAN STUDIES / SUMMER 1992

but war. Alliances also tend to spread w a r s - i.e., involve more states than would have been the case had there been no al l iance-and increase their cost and intensity. The historical evidence also suggests that, in general, alliance partners cannot be t rusted-they tend to renege on their commitment. Finally being a member of an alliance makes very little difference to the probability of victory in war. See details of these arguments and supporting data in Andrew Mack, "Forward to the Past: Structural Realism and Security in the Post- Cold War World," Department of International Relations, Australian National University, February, 1991.

25. Evans, "The Asia Pacific and Global Change," p. 4.

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