Putin Provokes Outrage, Worry in Southeast Asia
March 1, 2022
This quick take is part of our Crisis Crossroads series, which highlights timely analysis by CSIS scholars on the evolving situation in Ukraine and its security, economic, energy, and humanitarian effects.
Southeast Asian governments are not of one mind when it comes to the appropriate response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But they are mostly agreed on the facts and share similar concerns. The invasion has struck a chord in a region already worried about large revisionist powers seeking hegemony. Many in Southeast Asia read the news about Ukraine with a nervous eye to the north.
Singapore was the first and most vigorous in the region in condemning the invasion. The city-state has pledged to sanction Russian entities and co-sponsored a UNSC resolution condemning Moscow. In a statement to parliament on February 28, Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan declared,
This is an existential issue for us. Ukraine is much smaller than Russia, but it is much bigger than Singapore. A world order based on “might is right”, or where “the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must”, such a world order would be profoundly inimical to the security and survival of small states.
Most in the region seem to agree, if less forthrightly. Indonesia’s foreign ministry condemned the “violation of the territory and sovereignty,” though without mentioning Russia by name. The Philippines supported a UN General Assembly resolution condemning the invasion. Even Vietnam, Russia’s closest partner in the region, issued an anodine statement but has allowed the tightly controlled media to report freely on the conflict.
Alongside the region’s outrage toward Moscow are concerns that the crisis could, yet again, distract the United States from its self-described priority theater in the Indo-Pacific. But the Biden administration has done a good job so far of showing it can walk and chew gum. The invasion did not derail the release of the Indo-Pacific Strategy, the U.S.-ASEAN special summit planned for March 28-29, or the U.S. Navy’s most recent transit through the Taiwan Strait this past weekend. Those are exactly the signals most Southeast Asian partners are looking for at the moment.
Gregory B. Poling is a senior fellow and director for the Southeast Asia Program and the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
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