Watch Singapore’s Ambassador to the U.S., H.E. Chan Heng Chee discuss the upcoming high level conference on Singapore-U.S. relations held at CSIS in Washington, D.C. with Southeast Asia Program Senior Fellow Murray Hiebert. To learn more about the February 8th Conference, click here.
ASEAN
Myanmar @ End of January 2012
By Rajiv Bathia This post was released in the ICRIER Wadhwani Chair India-U.S. Insight Newsletter here. Re-posted with permission.
Myanmar’s Tatmadaw (military) strategists and pundits who gave the finishing touches, some two years back to their 2003 plan to bring about controlled political change, have ample reasons to celebrate the extent of success achieved so far.
Each arm of the triangle of Myanmar’s politics comprising the Government, NLD and ethnic minorities, has registered progress as compared to the situation prevailing in January 2010. Government-NLD relations have improved considerably, with Suu Kyi and her other party candidates ready to participate in April by-elections as a prelude to entering the Parliament. Following the release in batches of a sizable number of political prisoners, new winds of freedom are blowing in the land. The Government has concluded ceasefire agreements with several insurgent groups, the Karens being the most important of them all NLD and other political forces continue to back national reconciliation, while being conscious that nothing substantial can be achieved in a hurry and the Government remains the indispensable interlocutor and planner of future moves.
Likewise, the country’s relations with the international community look more promising than ever before. An unending series of high-level visits has lent new legitimacy and prestige to President Thein Sein’s government. He now plans an early tour of ASEAN capitals. Foreign travels by Suu Kyi are also likely to begin in the coming months. Sanctions by the US and EU are under review even as the EU has already lifted visa restrictions on top leaders. Purse strings for aid flows are getting loosened. Western corporate leaders are also beginning to consider anew investment prospects. (more…)
US Should Join Efforts to Negotiate East Asian FTA
By James Wallar

Market in Shanghai. Would EAS serve as a broader platform for U.S. trade focus than TPP? Source: d'n'c's flickr photostream, used under a creative commons license.
CSIS took another great initiative in launching the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) series on January 6. It is important that this series not fall prey to a Washington-centric focus. The first session, which began with a keynote address by Michael Froman, deputy national security advisor for international economics, ran the risk of doing so, but this was avoided by the brilliant presentations by Matthew Goodman, senior economics advisor at the State Department, and Susan Schwab, former U.S. Trade Representative, who lifted the veil on the broader Asian context.
Few would dispute that the U.S. government needs to be engaged in Asia, where more than half the world’s growth is generated and where U.S. political security interests loom large. The U.S. government’s Asia “pivot” is a welcomed and necessary redirection of the U.S. administration’s energies. The question is whether the TPP is a sufficiently robust platform for the United State’s Asian engagement.
“Where are the markets?” was Schwab’s rhetorical question. Countries participating in the TPP negotiations account for a small share of U.S. trade. China, India, Korea, Japan, and Indonesia, where the real markets are, are not yet part of the TPP. The speakers at the CSIS conference did not give comfort that any of them would be welcomed to join soon. We were informed that the TPP negotiations will continue apace. Which countries will want to join an agreement that they have not been involved in shaping to reflect their economic interests? (more…)
New Zealand’s Place in Asia from ASEAN’s perspective
By Daljit Singh
A country of just 4 million people, New Zealand punches above its weight in soft power. It is admired in Asia for its good governance, strong support for international institutions and the rule of law, and expertise in niche areas like dairy and agricultural produce, forestry, disaster management and education, including English language training.
It has reached out to Asia, the destination of most its exports, with remarkable success. It enjoys excellent relations with the major Asian powers and is the only OECD country to have entered into a comprehensive free trade agreement with China with whom relations have been especially warm. New Zealand is a member of all the ASEAN-centred regional organisations. It is trusted and valued in ASEAN for its steadfast support of ASEAN goals, provision of good counsel, effective technical assistance, and non-confrontational style.
However, New Zealand needs to be more alert to the power shifts in the Asia-Pacific region which are generating unease among Asian states and also in Australia and America on whom the security of New Zealand ultimately depends. New Zealanders may not have sufficiently recognized these powerful currents because distance deprives them of any real sense of threat, even though there have been some changes in official thinking recently. (more…)
White is Not Quite Right
By Ernie Bower
My friend and colleague Hugh White does a brilliant job of asking the hard questions when it comes to assessments of U.S. and Chinese power in Asia and their impact on foreign policy and national security. His writings sometimes provide an equally compelling opportunity to clarify various positions and strategies. In a recent note in the East Asia Forum entitled “Obama and Australia’s vision of Asia’s future,” Professor White argues that “American vision is that Asia will divide into two camps, with China on one side and the rest, under U.S. leadership, on the other. It hopes that if the rest of Asia stays strong and united by America’s side, China will eventually see the error of its ways and join the US-led camp as well, thus restoring America’s uncontested primacy.”
Almost right, Hugh, but not quite. The grand strategy and the plan behind the headlines you are reading about President Obama’s current trip to the region is indeed to convince China to join its neighbors around the region, but not in a regime dominated by U.S. primacy. This old Cold War like polarity seems to have fixated Dr. White into trying to understand power in Asia as zero sum. That is not and should not be the U.S. strategic goal.
(more…)





