The ASEAN states that are the subject of Auslin’s primary focus offer little about which to be hopeful—again, with the possible exception of Singapore. Though he rightly notes that Singapore’s restrictions on free speech and related restraints on the media could lead to popular unrest, he concedes that this is not the case today. Indeed, it is arguable that Singapore’s strong economy and social safety nets, as well as its careful cultivation of Malay, Indian and other minorities, all militate in favor of stability for the foreseeable future.

Other ASEAN states may not be so fortunate. Indonesia currently is relatively quiet, but it has faced insurrection in the past, notably in Aceh, as well as religious tensions and violence, particularly in South Sulawesi (surprisingly, Auslin does not mention either place). And, as a moderate Muslim country, it continually faces the threat of religious extremism. Malaysia is even more stable than Indonesia, in part because the government has protected its Chinese population. Chinese have been the subject of past pogroms in both Indonesia and Malaysia, however, and such eruptions could happen again. Moreover, Malaysia is plagued by corruption and political infighting. Myanmar has yet to come to terms with its Rohingya population, which it continues to persecute (even the otherwise heroic Aung San Suu Kyi has been virtually silent about their plight), while Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia all remain under the thumb of authoritarian regimes. And then there is Thailand, racked by violence in the south and political instability in its capital, and now without the unifying presence of its long-time ruler King Bhumibol Adulyadej. His son and successor, Vajiralongkorn, is an eccentric figure who had his dog promoted to three-star general; he is unlikely to command the respect that his father did.

 

TURNING TO the region’s lack of political community, Auslin first addresses the region’s lack of unifying organizations, such as NATO or the EU, and the absence of any leader other than China, which its neighbors fear rather than follow. Auslin fails to mention that there was once a regional alliance, SEATO—the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, consisting of the United States, Australia, France, New Zealand, Pakistan (including East Pakistan, now Bangladesh), the Philippines, Thailand and the United Kingdom. It was founded thanks to an initiative by the American cold warrior and secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, and more of its members were from outside Southeast Asia than within it. As a military organization it never amounted to very much; its member states contributed insufficient military or other resources to give it much credibility. France and Britain refused to allow SEATO to support America’s intervention in Laos in 1962, and prevented it from providing political cover for the war in Vietnam. Pakistan withdrew from SEATO in 1972, after it lost East Pakistan in its 1971 conflict with India. France stopped providing funding in 1975, and the organization was dead not long thereafter.

Although few analysts and virtually no politicians mention the SEATO experience today, it is arguable that its collapse was one reason why the East Asian states shied away from a successor organization. America’s defeat in Vietnam may have provided another reason for dealing cautiously with the West. And the rise of China has led many of its neighbors to balance accommodation with Beijing and an increasingly close—but not tight—relationship with the United States without entering into formal treaties with Washington. Indeed, formal alliances have not prevented both Thailand and especially the Philippines from standing aloof from the United States; the 1951 U.S.-Philippines Treaty did not prevent Manila from closing down the American naval base at Subic Bay and Clark Air Force Base exactly four decades later.

Ten Southeast Asian nations comprise the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, but the organization operates by consensus, and its membership is so diverse that it often has difficulty taking a stand on an issue involving one or more of its member states. In recent years, the ASEAN Regional Forum, which includes China, India, Australia, Canada, Russia and the United States as well as numerous others, has taken on some importance as a venue for discussing security issues. Recent summit-level discussions at ASEAN+3 fora—Japan, China and South Korea—have afforded a vehicle for most leading East Asian states (not all of them, as Auslin, asserts, since Papua New Guinea and East Timor are not yet ASEAN members), to discuss issues of mutual concern. The East Asian Summit, which includes ASEAN+3, plus India, Australia, New Zealand, the United States and Russia, likewise has offered a vehicle for discussion. The verb that characterizes all these meetings is “discuss”; in practice, they are all little more than talking shops.

Auslin closes his analysis with an overview of the tensions that could bring war to East Asia. He reviews the well-chronicled disputed claims to sovereignty over the South China Sea’s Spratly and Paracel Islands, China’s dubious nine-dash-line claim over virtually the entire sea, its ongoing military buildup on the sea’s real or artificial rocks and its virtual seizure of Scarborough Shoal from the Philippines. He also describes the tensions in the East China Sea over the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands (which China calls Diaoyu); the Kuril Island dispute between Japan and Russia that dates back to the waning days of World War II; and the Japanese dispute with Korea over what the former call the Takeshima Islands, and the latter, Dokdo Islands.

Though Japan is involved in three of the aforementioned disputes, no one anticipates it going to war to resolve any of them. But China is another matter. Auslin documents China’s growing military power—strategic nuclear, naval, air and cyber. Beijing is not reluctant to flex its increasingly powerful muscles. In response to Trump’s apparent flirtation with Taiwan, China sent its one aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, through the Taiwan Strait, forcing Taipei to scramble aircraft in response. Auslin correctly posits that China does not want war, but, he adds, “Beijing is acting like a classic rising challenger to the status quo.” The voyage of the Liaoning underscores his point. Two decades ago, two U.S. carriers entered the Taiwan Strait in response to Beijing’s firing missiles near the Taiwanese ports of Keelung and Kaohsiung, and to demonstrate that China could not prevent the United States from coming to Taiwan’s aid. Now it was China demonstrating that it too could deploy a carrier to the Strait, and that it was capable of denying access to American forces. Though he notes the ongoing threat of North Korean aggression, especially as it seeks to wed its nuclear weapons with long-range missiles, Auslin sees the “large and growing gulf between China and its neighbors” as the region’s primary destabilizing factor. Whether or not he is right about the relative gravity of threats from Pyongyang and Beijing, he certainly is correct in noting the fundamental change to the regional balance resulting from China’s military rise.

Auslin concludes his study by arguing that the greatest near-term danger to Asian stability rests in the realm of security: “What should most worry us is that nearly all . . . security risks . . . involve one or more of the region’s great powers, including the United States. That creates the potential for a larger confrontation.” Given the region’s inability to organize itself for security in any meaningful way, Auslin looks to the United States to be the anchor of regional stability, as it has been since World War II. To be effective in the twenty-first century, Auslin calls for the United States to foster a set of “concentric triangles,” an outer one consisting of Japan, South Korea, India and Australia, and an inner one connecting India, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, with participation by Thailand and outreach to Vietnam. Washington would be the catalyst, encouraging not only military cooperation, but the creation of “a more liberal Indo-Pacific that provides stability and opportunity for growth.” It is a worthy dream that is unlikely to be realized any time soon.

Donald Trump’s election to the White House has cast a shadow over all America’s alliances. At the same time, the smaller Asian states continue, with great wariness, to balance their relationships with Beijing and Washington, and are likely to be even more even-handed should Trump make good on some of his promises, which he has already begun to do by ditching the TPP. In any event, it is hard to see America playing a newly energized, activist role in Asia, other than in the military sphere: Trump has promised a buildup that, if carried out, would result in a more potent American military presence in Asia. Certainly, Auslin’s hopes for Washington to work with other liberal democracies to spread democratic and liberal values in Asia need to be put on hold for at least several years: Trump has made it clear that he has no interest in democracy promotion.

The End of the Asian Century has its flaws: a rather sparse review of the challenges faced by several of the poorer ASEAN states; little glitches, such as reference to Singapore’s Sir Stamford Raffles (not Stanford); the statement that all of NATO’s members were democracies (Spain and Portugal were dictatorships until the mid-1970s); mention of the Gandhi dynasty (it was Jawarhalal Nehru’s dynasty; and citing Argentina as the country of the future (actually, “Brazil is the country of the future, and always will be”). But these errors, and a few others like them, do not detract from what is surely an important study. For what Auslin is telling us is that peace, stability and prosperity in Asia cannot be taken for granted. That should be a warning—and a watchword—for the Trump administration.