Aukus may send Asian countries a huge bill for services provided

ASIA'S small and middle powers are experiencing uncertainty caused by the formation of the new Australia-UK-US (Aukus) security and technology alliance that has been portrayed as a neo-imperial formation that may reshape Indo-Pacific geopolitics.

The launch of the Aukus in September this year clutters the regional security space which already has a handful of regional alliances and poses new challenges to countries in the region. The Aukus follows in the wake of the revival of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) in 2017 consisting of the United States, Japan, India and Australia, and the evolving US Indo-Pacific strategy to contain China.

The Aukus and the Quad have come as a challenge to Asean, which will struggle to preserve its neutrality, assert its centrality in the region, and maintain its often-fragile cohesion.

There are legitimate concerns over the nuclearisation of the region as, under the Aukus, Australia will develop a nuclear-powered submarine programme with British and American help. The three will also cooperate in artificial intelligence and advanced technologies.

Then there is the race factor. The Aukus may be a new gamechanger representing an all-white club whose agenda is obviously to collectively confront the challenge posed by an assertive China. Asian countries may benefit from the Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) but there are no free lunches. The time will come sooner or later when the Aukus will send its bill for services provided.

The Aukus will stage naval deployments by the UK and Australia at considerable cost with no clear revenue model for recouping their investment, in addition to existing US deployments. The key beneficiary of the Aukus is the US that will reimpose its sway over the region by employing its junior partners, the UK and Australia.

The Aukus countries would seek a return on their investment in multiple ways such as greater investment and trade access to Asian markets, more Asian investment inflows to their countries, loyalty and obedience in regional matters, and strong diplomatic support on regional and global issues. In other words, Asians would be requested to do the bidding of the US-led group.

ASIA MUST WEIGH CAREFULLY

Asian powers would need to calculate the degree to which they should align with the Aukus, and what sort of return on investment the Aukus powers may aim to extract for their naval deployments in the Indo-Pacific. The UK, Australia and the US would want Asian states to invest in their own sputtering economies, under their well-known burden-sharing model.

The Asian powers directly affected by the white-only club are Asean, India, South Korea, and Japan, and peripherally the smaller states of South and South-east Asia. The Aukus is understood to be aimed at China that bulks large over the raison d'etre of Aukus.

The security partnership may directly impact the centrality of Asean that operates on the principle that the 10 Asean states are the key players in maintaining peace and stability in the region. It is yet to be seen if Aukus will make Asean a sideshow.

On the one hand, this may well be the path ahead because from the perspective of the Aukus, Asean has not confronted Chinese assertiveness. The Aukus is expected to speak in a louder voice than Asean and may undermine Asean's policy of gentle engagement with China on contentious issues.

On the other hand, the question of Asean becoming a sideshow is irrelevant in view of its strong record as an intergovernmental organisation. Asean will continue engaging the major global powers in a balancing diplomacy and will argue that the only workable approach is its peaceful engagement of countries outside the region. Yet Asean's reluctance to stand up to China on the South China Sea issue has left a strategic vacuum that the Aukus may occupy.

Not all the Asean countries are on the same page on the China issue. It is inevitable that certain Asean countries will be more favourably disposed towards the Aukus and the Quad than others. This will sharpen divisions within Asean going forward.

Moreover, India and Japan should be concerned by the Aukus which is, at the core, an alliance of white countries that has overshadowed the Quad. The Indian Foreign Secretary Harsh Shringla clarified that while Aukus is a "security alliance", the Quad would deal with matters such as the Covid pandemic, new and emerging technologies, climate change, infrastructure, maritime security, education, humanitarian assistance, and disaster relief.

JAPAN

Japan has welcomed the Aukus for the role it may play to strengthen its engagement in the Indo-Pacific. But the commentator Yuki Tatsumi of the Stimson Centre explains that Japanese government leaders should not be surprised by the unwillingness of Aukus to include Japan.

Tatsumi argues that "an Aukus-like partnership that cuts across various industrial sectors relevant for national security is only possible when the countries that are involved already have a history of deep security cooperation, including intelligence sharing, and have mutual confidence in safeguarding the sensitive information that will be exchanged among them as part of the process of developing cooperative programmes".

Tatsumi adds that "given that the US, UK and Australia enjoy a long-standing security relationship not only as allies but also as 'Five Eyes' partners (an intelligence sharing alliance), the level of confidence that is required for a cooperative arrangement at this depth already exists among the three".

The very mention of the "Five Eyes" should send up all sorts of red flags. It is an intelligence network consisting of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and the US, dating back to World War II, which scholars have demonstrated has kept Japan out of its membership owing to its exclusive racist approach. Despite discussions on admitting Japan, the group has not included it yet.

Asians must be alert that Aukus does not use the containment of China as a pretext to reimpose imperial hegemony along racist lines. At the same time, both China and the Anglo-Saxon powers should be properly balanced through diplomacy.

The presence of Aukus navies in Indo-Pacific oceans will eventually come at a cost. Aukus will extract the price of its military presence in some form. Asia's small and middle powers may be asked to foot the bill.

• The writer is the editor-in-chief of Rising Asia Journal