Southeast Asia’s security landscape has never been as simple as the US-China binary suggests, but for decades, that binary provided its dominant logic: Washington as the primary guarantor for maritime states, Beijing as the dominant partner across much of the mainland.

Alongside that competition, middle powers like Australia, India, South Korea, and, above all, Japan have been quietly deepening their security footprints in the region, mostly through non-lethal means. But that will soon change in April 2026, as Japan’s decision to scrap its ban on lethal weapons exports changes the terms of that involvement decisively.

For years, Tokyo had been building a quiet architecture of defense relationships across the region through two main instruments. The first was a series of bilateral Defense Equipment and Technology Transfer agreements with the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia. This created the legal framework for non-lethal equipment transfers before the export ban was ever lifted. The second was the Official Security Assistance (OSA) program, introduced in Japan’s 2022 National Security Strategy and launched in 2023, which enabled Japan, for the first time, to provide military aid directly to the armed forces of like-minded countries.

This was a meaningful distinction from its longstanding Official Development Assistance, which explicitly prohibited military use. OSA crossed that line, signaling that Tokyo’s conception of regional security cooperation was expanding. OSA’s first recipients were the Philippines, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and Fiji, and the program has since expanded to include Indonesia, Thailand, and East Timor, with approximately $116 million budgeted in fiscal 2026. This was a 125 percent increase on the previous year. Through OSA, Japan delivered coastal radar systems and patrol boats to the Philippines, rescue boats to Malaysia, and, in 2024, signed a Reciprocal Access Agreement with Manila to facilitate joint exercises and logistics sharing.

However, in April 2026, the ceiling on the scope of that presence changed. Specifically, on April 21, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s cabinet approved scrapping Japan’s longstanding ban on lethal weapons exports. This decision opened the door to overseas sales of warships, missiles, fighter jets, and drones. However, exports remain limited to 17 countries with existing agreements, subject to National Security Council approval. Japan maintains a ban on transfers to countries at war, except in narrow cases affecting its own national security.

Wars in Ukraine and the Middle East have strained US weapon supplies and production, and stretched Washington’s commitments. Allies across Asia and Europe are diversifying as confidence in American guarantees wavers under the Trump administration. And Japan’s own defense industry, long limited to serving the Self-Defense Force, needed external customers to remain viable. As Takaichi put it: “No single country can now protect its own peace and security alone.”

From pacifist to arms supplier

The foundations were laid over a decade. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s 2014 reinterpretation of the Three Principles on Arms Exports allowed Japan to begin exporting non-lethal defense equipment to select partners. Early results were modest: patrol boats to Indonesia and Bangladesh, radar systems to the Philippines, and, in 2016, the leasing of five TC-90 trainer aircraft to the Philippine Navy.

This 2026 revision effectively removes five legacy export categories that had confined Japanese defense products to support roles: rescue, transport, surveillance, mine-clearing, and instead authorizes the transfer of complete weapons systems across air, land, and naval domains. This development is not a sudden break from pacifism, but rather the policy endpoint of a decade-long incremental shift.

The market Japan is entering

Japan’s biggest immediate deal is with Australia. On April 18, Tokyo and Canberra signed what is now Japan’s largest postwar defense export contract: Mitsubishi Heavy Industries will build the first three of a planned 11-ship fleet of upgraded Mogami-class frigates for the Royal Australian Navy, with the remaining eight to be constructed domestically by Austal in Western Australia. The initial three-ship contract is valued at approximately A$10 billion (US$7 billion), with the broader program potentially reaching A$20 billion over the decade. Australia selected Mitsubishi Heavy Industries over Germany’s Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems, not, as sometimes reported, over a South Korean bid. What made this deal incredibly unique was that, while it was agreed in 2025, the contract was only formally signed in April, signaling that the agreement was designed with Japan’s 2026 Arms export liberalization in mind.

In Southeast Asia, Japan is entering a market where South Korea already has a foothold. South Korea is the Philippines’ top defense supplier, with Korean-made systems including FA-50 light attack aircraft, frigates, and patrol vessels worth around $3 billion delivered over the past decade. Indonesia has purchased six Jang Bogo-class submarines from Korean shipbuilders and co-developed the KF-21 fighter with Seoul. Malaysia acquired 18 FA-50 aircraft in 2023. South Korea’s more explosive growth, though, has come from Europe, which includes Poland, Romania, Estonia, and Norway, driven by post-Ukraine demand. In Southeast Asia specifically, Japan is not displacing a dominant supplier so much as entering a crowded field that already includes South Korea, India, France, and the United States. That crowding matters for the alliance-management problem that arises later.

The growing division

The reception to Japan’s policy shift maps almost exactly onto Southeast Asia’s existing fault lines.

The impact of Japan’s policy shift is shaped by existing regional divides. Mainland states offer limited opportunities: Cambodia and Laos maintain close ties with Beijing. Thailand, though officially a US treaty ally, has been diversifying its arms purchases toward Chinese suppliers. Without serious maritime disputes, demand for Japanese naval platforms across most of the mainland is thin. Myanmar is excluded from Japanese arms transfers due to restrictions on exporting to conflict-affiliated areas.

Vietnam is the interesting exception. Historically reliant on Russian-origin equipment, it has been quietly diversifying toward Japan, India, South Korea, and the US as Moscow’s position weakens. A 2020 agreement for six Japanese coast guard-based patrol vessels was an early signal of that shift. But Vietnam’s Four No’s policy limits how openly it can engage with Japan, which is increasingly aligned with the US-led security architecture. Hanoi will take what it can get without being seen taking sides.

In contrast, maritime Southeast Asia is where Japan’s new posture will be most consequential. Indonesia is reportedly negotiating to acquire Mogami-class frigates, with four potentially constructed by state-owned shipbuilder PT Pal under a 2021 technology transfer agreement. Malaysia has deepened its defense partnership with Tokyo through bilateral agreements since 2018 and was among the first recipients of OSA. The Philippines has been the most openly enthusiastic: Defense Secretary Teodoro welcomed the policy change as a contribution to “regional stability through deterrence,” and Japan has already delivered 12 coastguard patrol vessels to Manila. Japan is also considering transferring decommissioned Abukuma-class destroyer escorts to the Philippines, though, as of late April 2026, no formal offer has been made, and discussions remain at the inspection stage.

Ultimately, maritime Southeast Asia, facing real Chinese pressure in the South China Sea, is gravitating toward a Japan-US security network. In contrast, mainland Southeast Asia, insulated from such pressures and economically integrated with Beijing, is not. Japan’s expansion of arms exports will not by itself create these divisions; they already exist, but the new export policy could deepen them, and ASEAN’s claim to regional centrality will bear the cost.

Market-alliance management

Japan is entering a market it helped build. A decade of quiet diplomacy, non-lethal transfers, and OSA grants has given it real relationships across maritime Southeast Asia. Now it arrives with far more powerful tools. The risk is proportional.

The instructive precedent is AUKUS. When the US, UK, and Australia announced their submarine partnership in 2021, France was not merely outbid; it was blindsided and shocked when Australia suddenly canceled the Submarine contract it had enthusiastically agreed to in 2016. Paris had treated its submarine contract with Canberra as the cornerstone of its Indo-Pacific strategy. What collapsed was not just a contract but a relationship that took years to rebuild. Paris recalled its ambassadors to Washington, London, and Canberra, an extraordinary diplomatic rupture between supposed allies. While diplomatic tensions were eased, the scars they left still affect confidence between France and its allies in the Indo-Pacific.

Japan faces an analogous risk. If Tokyo signs a defense deal with the Philippines or Indonesia that undercuts an existing arrangement with the US, a European partner, or South Korea, without prior consultation, it risks the same rupture. South Korea warrants particular care. It is simultaneously Japan’s most direct competitor in Southeast Asian naval and aviation markets and a critical security partner in any scenario involving China or North Korea. Their complicated bilateral history makes missteps here politically costly, extending well beyond the defense market. Whether Japan can compete with South Korea’s well-established export industry, which has a strong track record of timely delivery, remains to be seen. Japan must still demonstrate that it can be a dependable supplier as expected by its partners, especially given that delivery delays were among the key reasons Australia walked away from its submarine agreement with France in 2021, which triggered a diplomatic crisis.

US Ambassador to Japan George Glass called the export rule change a “historic step.” Washington’s enthusiasm is genuine. But enthusiasm from the top doesn’t automatically translate into coordination on the ground, and Japan’s defense ministry is now engaged in simultaneous discussions with multiple Southeast Asian partners. Managing those relations in market terms, without disrupting confidence among countries that rely on each other, will require diplomatic discipline Tokyo has not yet demonstrated at scale.

Japan spent a decade earning regional trust through restrained, non-lethal security cooperation. That credibility is now being staked on its transition to an arms exporter.

This article reflects reporting and analysis made by The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier. If you have additional context, a different take, or a perspective we’ve missed — whether you’re a researcher, a policy practitioner, or someone living with these realities on the ground — this is an evolving story and we’d like to hear from you. Drop a comment below or get in touch.

The United Nations Security Council has shaped the fate of global peace, but Southeast Asia has rarely had a front-row seat in the council. The Philippines’ bid for a non-permanent seat in 2027-2028 is not just a national ambition; it is a rare opportunity to bring ASEAN’s growing voice into the room where the world’s most influential security decisions are made.

The Philippines’ UNSC bid through an ASEAN lens

The Philippines’ renewed bid for a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council for 2027-2028 is not just a domestic diplomatic project; it is an opportunity to amplify ASEAN’s voice inside the world’s most powerful security organ. Manila’s campaign explicitly links its candidacy to the Association’s collective interests, such as peaceful dispute settlements, climate resilience dialogues, and post-conflict peacebuilding. This positions the Philippines as a regional conduit rather than a lone nationalist actor. If elected to a non-permanent seat, the Philippines would become the first ASEAN member state to sit on the Council in years, underscoring the bloc’s underrepresentation in a Council that shapes global security while ASEAN remains largely absent from the permanent table.

From an ASEAN viewpoint, a Philippine seat would greatly strengthen the region’s leverage in debates over maritime disputes, climate-related security, and as well as its expertise in post-conflict governance. The Philippines’ experience with the Bangsamoro peace process and its participation in UN peacekeeping operations gives it practical lessons in conflict resolution and regional stability that are directly relevant to ASEAN’s own security challenges. When ASEAN’s Foreign Ministers and the Philippines coordinate their positions, the impact is clear. The bloc reaffirms its commitment to multilateralism and the UN Charter, and the Philippines, in turn, projects ASEAN’s concerns and views, such as the need for climate-security integration and inclusive peace processes by delivering it in the Security Council deliberations.

The Philippines’ bid for a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council faces both domestic skepticism and as well as a tight international competition, complicating the regional representation. Domestically, some Philippine officials and commentators raise questions to the narrative of prioritization of the UNSC campaign amid pressing socioeconomic and governance crisis within the nation, arguing that resources and diplomatic capital could be better allocated toward domestic reforms or for more concrete regional security mechanisms like the ASEAN rather than multilateral prestige. Internationally speaking, the Philippines is not alone in bidding for a non-permanent seat for one of the Asia-Pacific seats in the council. Central Asian nation Kyrgyzstan also vies for a 2027-2028 non-permanent seat, and has already secured backing from several UN member states and regional blocs, sharpening the race for the limited spots and raising the risk that the Philippines could be out-organized or out-mobilized in behind the scenes diplomacy. These dual pressures, as well as domestic criticisms about the cost-benefit and external competition for thin quotas of support, could mean that Manila must not only justify the bid in ASEAN-centric terms but also demonstrate that the Philippines’ presence in the council is a strategic regional necessity, not just a symbolic national aspiration.​

ASEAN-centric observers also note that Manila’s campaign is framed as a “pathfinder and peacemaker” role, not as a platform for narrow bilateral disputes. The Philippines have emphasized that for decades, the Philippines bring experience in multilateralism and readiness to listen, engage, and represent the broader Asian and global interests, including ASEAN’s own priorities. Having an UNSC Seat means ASEAN would have a voice in the global security architecture.

​Domestically, the bid is often read through a national pride viewpoint where the Philippines could take advantage of prioritizing the south china sea disputes alone. Yet from a regional standpoint, the more compelling argument is that ASEAN is needed in global representation. In a body where the Asia-Pacific is chronically underrepresented, the Philippines can serve as a regional bridge, especially on issues like maritime disputes, climate-related displacements, and post-conflict governance. This then aligns with ASEAN’s doctrine of centrality and multilateralism, and if the bid succeeds, it signals that a dynamic and middle-power ASEAN member can project the bloc’s values into the center of global security decision-making.

This article reflects reporting and analysis made by The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier. If you have additional context, a different take, or a perspective we’ve missed — whether you’re a researcher, a policy practitioner, or someone living with these realities on the ground — this is an evolving story and we’d like to hear from you. Drop a comment below or get in touch.

Restrictions in the Strait of Hormuz have exposed the structural dependence of the Philippines on oil imports. In response, the administration of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. recalibrated into a pragmatic approach in the South China Sea (SCS)–a joint oil and gas exploration with China. Analysts believe Trump is making China win, who only needs to watch its rival collapse from within without firing a single shot. A joint oil and gas exploration in the Philippine Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), or within the West Philippine Sea (WPS), is indeed transformative for Filipinos, but it would also hand another win for China. Viewed historically, it is a reactive fallback, not a strategic choice for the smaller country trapped in asymmetric relations and a global energy crisis. Although triggered by a 21st-century war, the eventuality of this move is path-dependent on decades of institutional paralysis and underinvestment in a unified maritime strategy that integrates resource use.

This is the third time since the 2005 Tripartite Agreement for Joint Marine Seismic Undertaking (JMSU) between the Philippines, China, and Vietnam, and the 2018 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Cooperation on Oil and Gas Development between the Philippines and China, that the two countries are exploring the possibility of a hydrocarbons cooperation in disputed waters. In 1994, a consortium among the Philippines, China, and the United States was also proposed but never pushed through.

Each attempt fails for the same reasons. The ownership and exploitation of natural resources by wholly-owned foreign corporations is unconstitutional. More importantly, the legal and political implications of joint exploration remain deeply contentious.

While UNCLOS allows joint exploration in contested waters, the 2016 arbitration’s nullification of the nine-dash line makes the WPS legally undisputed. To enter a “joint” arrangement would imply that the waters are disputed after all, undermining Manila’s own legal victory. Domestic politics compounds the dilemma. No administration wants to be remembered as the government that compromised sovereign rights in favor of accommodation with Beijing, particularly when anti-China sentiment remains a matter of political legitimacy.

From China’s perspective, “setting aside disputes and pursuing joint development” has been a constant call in its dispute settlement since the 1980s. In principle, it promises mutual economic gains for both sides. However, it comes at the cost of accepting China’s sovereignty, binding smaller states into its laws that must govern operations, and thereby normalizing its status quo presence, albeit illegal. Furthermore, there is a trust deficit in China’s commitment to comply with rules and agreements.

There are both risks and opportunities in pursuing joint exploration with China in the WPS. However, what is often missing from public discourse is a deeper scrutiny of the prevailing assumption that compromise is the only way to harness the energy sources sitting in the WPS, and that China’s aggression is the only thing that has been stopping the Philippines from doing so independently. This is not to critique joint exploration itself; if carefully structured and aligned with legal grounds and developmental objectives, a negotiated arrangement may indeed prove to be the most practical move. Rather, the more important question is how the Philippines arrived at a point where such a compromise is perceived as the only path forward.

Other Southeast Asian claimants have not accepted this option.

In the history of SCS disputes, multiple claimants have employed several approaches to assert territorial claims. These are not limited to China’s active maritime enforcement and militarization of the features, or the Philippines’ media transparency, defense alliances, and international law. Vietnam and Malaysia’s strategies, despite China’s protests and periodic harassment, also include economic integration in sectors such as hydrocarbons and fisheries. Arguably, sovereignty must not be asserted merely through legal rhetoric or militarization, but through sustained physical and economic presence. After all, territorial demarcations in contested areas are also driven by the need to determine who gets access to which resources.

Historically, the Philippines pursued hydrocarbon exploration in the WPS since the 1970s. It was also one of the early movers in Southeast Asia to occupy several features in the Kalayaan Island Group (KIG) and legalize the claims. But rather than a politically sustained strategy of physical assertion, occupied islands never truly expanded, and oil and gas explorations remained an economic activity separate from sovereignty and discouraged by weak enforcement, years of stalled operations, and risk aversion or defensiveness.

Today, the Philippines stands as the only major Southeast Asian claimant not actively developing new hydrocarbon resources in waters contested by Beijing. And this was not always due to China.

Successful extraction has been conducted with state-owned and private service contractors in safer, nearer oil and gas blocks in offshore Palawan, outside core contested areas. This includes the almost-depleted Malampaya, the decommissioned Nido-Matinloc Complex, and ongoing exploration and production in the Galoc, Malampaya-East (extension), and Calamian oil fields, among others. Limited deepwater drilling technology, geological uncertainty, and commercial viability concerns that require years of exploration before production largely constrain operations. It was only in the 2010s that security concerns became a decisive factor in hydrocarbon operations. The 2011 Reed Bank incident involving MV Veritas Voyager and the 2019 Reed Bank collision involving the Filipino vessel Gem-Ver conducting survey work for Forum Energy were turning points.

Yet by then, the Philippines had already lost valuable time on an investment that takes years to generate returns.

This reflects a deeper institutional weakness in Philippine maritime policy and the persistent tendency to oscillate between legal-diplomatic and military approaches instead of employing a broader statecraft, one that integrates a market-centric lens.

Philippine exploration at Reed Bank (Recto Bank) was halted for decades by both Manila’s legal moves and fear of Beijing’s retaliation. In 2014, the government banned oil and gas activities in the WPS while the arbitration trial was ongoing. Even after the ruling and calls from contractors to lift the moratorium in Reed Bank, persistent Chinese aggression prevented companies from consistently exploring the WPS. Reed Bank is believed to be almost on par or even greater than the Malampaya gas field, which has been supplying 30% of Luzon’s energy until its expected depletion by 2027.

Following the 1995 Mischief Reef incident, Fidel Ramos responded by modernizing the armed forces. The incident caught the Philippines off guard, exposing maritime incapacity due to its delayed discovery of China’s construction activities. Although Ramos already ordered the expansion of facilities, including the construction of lighthouses in 1994 to reinforce claims and expand petroleum exploration, major renovations only began in 2018, largely due to institutional paralysis. In the end, the only “solution” that materialized at the time was the signing of the 1998 Visiting Forces Agreement with the United States, which at the time was looking for an alternative military base in Southeast Asia after it left Subic in 1991.

In 2011, before the Scarborough Shoal standoff in 2012, and the filing of the arbitration case in 2013, Benigno Aquino III created the Zone of Peace, Freedom, Friendship and Cooperation (ZOPFF/C) to separate non-disputed and disputed waters based on international law. The goal was to determine areas for marine conservation and national development, where a “Joint Cooperation Area” may be conducted under applicable laws. Central to this approach is the Philippine Coast Guard’s role in upholding the “white-to-white, gray-to-gray” principle, where civilian vessels (“white hulls”) should enforce civilian law, and reserve military assets (“gray hulls,” such as naval ships) for military encounters to prevent escalation. It did not last long when the Philippine Navy arrested Chinese poachers, which then escalated into a military standoff with China that most likely saw this as an opening to seize control of the Scarborough Shoal. In 2013, this forced the government to pursue arbitration. Since then, fishers and enforcement authorities have been restricted from the area.

These present a pattern: initiatives were never institutionalized into a long-term, unified maritime doctrine. There is evident fragmentation across maritime institutions and non-state actors that have stakes in the dispute. Philippine policy remained reactive, responding to crises after they emerged rather than shaping facts before they did. The sudden revival of joint exploration talks with China triggered by the war in Iran is the price of a state confronting the consequences of having waited too long to invest in oil and gas exploration as part of its maritime policy. Not to mention underlying structural vulnerabilities caused by an overreliance on oil liberalization and imports.

Now, years of strategic failures leave Manila cornered. With Malampaya nearing depletion, energy supply vulnerable to geopolitics, and a Filipino public demanding tangible actions from the government, the pressure to exploit WPS is intensifying. But after decades of delay, the Philippines now confronts that imperative under far worse conditions as China’s physical presence becomes more entrenched than it was in the pre- to early 2000s.

There could be more than just institutional (in)competence why the Philippines has been less willing than its Southeast Asian counterparts to pursue unilateral, high-risk exploration in contested waters. There is a need for more public data and scholarship to conclusively attribute legal, geographic, commercial, or alliance-related considerations in shaping Manila’s calculus in the WPS. This includes deepwater drilling costs, investor risk tolerance, uncertainty over reserve viability, and the differing intensity of Chinese presence across claimant states. In this light, the Philippines’ repeated linkage of offshore development to joint exploration with China may also reflect a broader recognition that unilateral development has become politically and operationally difficult under present conditions.

If joint exploration is the way forward, the debate should not be simply whether it should proceed, but how it should be pursued. Any future arrangement must be anchored in full transparency to ensure public trust and avoid the secrecy that undermined previous initiatives such as the JMSU. Negotiations should clearly affirm that any agreement remains subject to Philippine laws. Equally important is the inclusion of non-state stakeholders that have long been left out in WPS policies in overall consultative processes, not only in matters of energy resources, to ensure that strategic decisions are not made solely within closed political channels.

This article reflects reporting and analysis made by The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier. If you have additional context, a different take, or a perspective we’ve missed — whether you’re a researcher, a policy practitioner, or someone living with these realities on the ground — this is an evolving story and we’d like to hear from you. Drop a comment below or get in touch.

About Shane Yumikura

Shane Yumikura worked at the Department of Trade and Industry and the Department of National Defense, and served as the Philippines’ Media Liaison Officer at Expo 2020 Dubai. She studies China at the University of the Philippines and majored in Consular and Diplomatic Affairs at De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde.

The United States’ Artemis program is more than just NASA’s traditional scientific mandate; the Artemis program is a pivotal move of Western power through the multinational alliance aimed at countering China’s International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) ambitions. This space rivalry marks the beginning of the global power marathon to set the next domain for global and space dominance, the lunar race between the US and China presents profound implications for Southeast Asia and the Pacific as both regions are involved in both powers’ alliances. Far from a mere discovery race, the new space race signals a new era of space warfare, where lunar footholds dictate the pace for future Mars missions, resource control, and terrestrial influences. Policymakers must view it as such to safeguard strategic equities. The new era for the space race is no longer a showing of scientific innovation prowess of the two sides, but it transcends space exploration as the next battlefield for global and space power.

The US’ Artemis program was launched in 2017, in close collaboration between the United States of America, Japan, Canada, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the United Arab Emirates under the Artemis Accords, which now has 45 nation signatories. Artemis targets a sustainable lunar presence by 2028, including a Lunar Gateway station and south pole bases that are believed to be rich in water ice for rocket fuel and life support to test humanity’s capabilities before taking on the next step, going to Mars.

This is no isolated NASA ingenuity, but a deliberate counter to China’s ILRS that aims to put the first non-American foot on the moon by 2030 with international partners like Russia, Pakistan, and others through the “Group of Governmental Experts.” China’s Tiangong station and Chang’e missions have demonstrated rapid progress, aiming for lunar helium-3 mining and military tech like precision landing. Artemis positions the US to enforce the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 norms, such as the peaceful use and no sovereignty claims. While China denies unilateral dominance. Think of it as NATO for space, wherein shared infrastructure secures US leadership in cislunar space (Earth-Moon sphere), where it is vital for satellite defense and supply lines.

In the context of the Southeast Asia region, the region’s chokepoints amplify lunar stakes as US allies like Japan, Australia, Singapore, and the Philippines, which is an active signatory of the Artemis Accords, bolster its program with tech and basing rights, this move counters China’s existing Belt and Road space ties with Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Cambodia.​

The Philippines hosts US rotational forces under its Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) with the United States. This enables Pacific launch monitoring, like Australia’s Harold E. Holt station, which tracks lunar trajectories, and Japan’s H3 rocket, which supports Artemis cargo.

Other Southeast Asian nations are also active on China’s bid on lunar missions, as Indonesia is eyeing ILRS radar tech. Thailand, on the other hand, is a signatory of both the Artemis Accords and China’s space alliance with Thailand, which trains Chinese astronauts. Malaysia is also an active agent as its space agency partners with China’s Chang’e mission data.

Its implications are that lunar success yields pacific leverage, the United States bases could track hypersonic threats from lunar relays, which China could weaponize lunar south pole helium-3 for fusion energy, tilting ASEAN energy security that is currently in a volatile state. Tensions mirror the current South China Sea disputes as space assets could jam regional GPS or enable surveillance, forcing SEA nations like Vietnam (US partner) or Laos (China partner) into alignment dilemmas.

This scientific race for a breakthrough also echoes a race for new global and space power. Take a closer look, as this is a hybrid warfare in orbit. Lunar bases enable persistent presence for kinetic anti-satellite tests, cyber ops on rival sats, or even resource denial, which both sides have done in the past. This 21st-century space race echoes Cold War proxy battles but with trillion-dollar economics at stake as the lunar economy is projected at least $100 Billion by 2040.

China’s 2024 anti-satellite test debris has endangered the International Space Station. Artemis envisions armed defense under the US Space Force. It is not just a race for discovery, but a race for domain control. The winners claim regolith rights, propellant depots, and Mars gateways, heavily marginalizing the loser of this race.

Lunar victories precondition future missions to Mars. Artemis’ Gateway tests deep-space habitats, while China’s ILRS prototypes nuclear propulsion. By 2039, which is NASA’s Mars goal, lunar helium-3 could fuel reusable Starships, while ILRS enables rival landers. A US-led Moon secures Pacific Mars trajectories. China’s race for dominance invites exclusionary blocs, risking arms races. For Southeast Asia, Mars tech spillovers promise economic growth, but alliance choices lock in dependencies, as the US is for open access, while China is for closed tech transfer.

This article reflects reporting and analysis made by The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier. If you have additional context, a different take, or a perspective we’ve missed — whether you’re a researcher, a policy practitioner, or someone living with these realities on the ground — this is an evolving story and we’d like to hear from you. Drop a comment below or get in touch.

In mid-2025, gunfire broke out near the Temple of Ta Muen Thom, a centuries-old Khmer ruin sitting on the contested border between Thailand and Cambodia. Over the following days, clashes spread across twelve border locations.

For a region whose diplomatic identity is built on consensus, restraint, and the careful avoidance of public rupture, it was a striking image. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has long prided itself on managing regional tensions through consultation rather than confrontation. Border clashes, despite having historical precedence, between member states were not part of the script.

And yet de-escalation came. Not through ASEAN’s formal mechanisms, but through Malaysia, whose Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim stepped in to broker talks, with the quiet assistance of the United States and China, even after Thailand’s Foreign Minister had rejected third-party mediation outright.

While most have criticized ASEAN for taking a back seat, a better question is: if the formal institution did not resolve the crisis, what did? And what does that tell us about how regional order in Southeast Asia actually works?

The answer, this article argues, is that ASEAN operates not just through a single channel, but through two distinct souls, one institutional and one political.

The case of two ASEANs

The idea that ASEAN contains more than one logic within itself is not new. Jose Bagulaya, a professor at the University of the Philippines, argues in ASEAN as an International Organization that the organization has always operated with two souls: one legal, one political. The ASEAN Charter formally confers decision-making power to the Summit, but remains silent on what the organization is actually empowered to enforce, effectively placing matters of compliance in the realm of politics rather than law. For Bagulaya, this is not a design flaw. It is a design choice. As he puts it, “ASEAN is a political animal, and the States wearing of the ASEAN mask is just one of the many ways of performing politics.” The result is a permanent tension between acting in accordance with the rule of law and acting in accordance with power politics.

This tension is not merely theoretical. It has a structure. The first soul of ASEAN is institutional. It is structured around the ASEAN Charter, three community pillars (Political and Security, Economic, and Socio-Cultural), and key bodies such as the ASEAN Summit, Coordinating Council, and Secretariat. All of which are consensus-bound, meaning that all member states must agree before mechanisms are adopted and statements are issued. This makes ASEAN deliberately slower to address crises like border clashes than most regional organizations, but for a reason.

According to Bilahari Kausikan, former UN Representative of Singapore, a consensus decision is not a weakness but a preservation mechanism. It ensures that smaller states do not get overwhelmed by the will of bigger states such as Indonesia, and it reassures that the bigger states will not be overwhelmed by a coalition of smaller states. In this line of thinking, consensus is what keeps ASEAN intact.

”Achieving consensus among member states is the central mechanism of ASEAN’s functionality. This consensus is founded upon the idea that the regional interest is interlinked with each member state’s national interest,” Kausikan noted.

The durability of this consensus model was seriously tested in 2012. In July that year, under the Cambodian chairmanship, ASEAN ended a ministerial meeting without issuing a communiqué for the first time in its 45-year history. Following the maritime stand-off in the Scarborough Shoal between China and the Philippines in April 2012, Phnom Penh refused to allow mention of the South China Sea dispute in the joint statement. Vietnam and the Philippines resisted, and the Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong remained firm, arguing that the foreign ministers’ meeting was not a court and had no business issuing verdicts on bilateral disputes.

“I requested that we issue the joint communique without mention of the South China Sea dispute ... but some member countries repeatedly insisted to put the issue of the Scarborough Shoal… I have told my colleagues that the meeting of the Asean foreign ministers is not a court, a place to give a verdict about the dispute,” Namhong argued.

Yet ASEAN still did not collapse. The deadlock exposed the structural limits of consensus, but it also demonstrated ASEAN’s capacity for internal repair. Then Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa undertook rapid shuttle diplomacy across regional capitals, eventually securing agreement on a six-point consensus on the South China Sea. It was not an ASEAN mechanism that resolved the crisis. It was a member state, moving faster than the institution could, using bilateral initiative to do what collective consensus could not.

It is at this point that the second soul of ASEAN becomes visible. It does not replace the foundational mechanisms of ASEAN, nor does it openly defy it. Rather, it comes in at moments where consensus is slow or has not been reached. Usually, it operates through bilateral initiatives, shuttle diplomacy, and quiet coalition-building. It is political in exactly the way Bagulaya describes: the ASEAN mask is still worn, but the hands moving underneath it belong to individual states.

The political ASEAN in practice

Malaysia’s mediation between Thailand and Cambodia was unexpected, but only if you were watching the institutional ASEAN. Thailand’s Foreign Minister had already rejected third-party mediation outright. Yet Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim moved ahead with the involvement of both the United States and China. As Dr. Ilango Karuppannan, a retired Malaysian Ambassador, observed, Cambodia’s acknowledgment that the meeting was “co-organized by the U.S. with the presence of China” did not diminish Malaysia’s role; if anything, Malaysia’s willingness to host and announce the talks swiftly was what made it possible. Kuala Lumpur did not wait for institutional endorsement.

And this pattern of a Southeast Asian state moving faster than ASEAN’s mechanisms is not entirely new. Indonesia took on a mediating role in the peace process between the Philippines and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in the 1990s. When an impasse was reached between the Philippines and the MNLF, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) expanded its committee and placed Indonesia in charge of mediating talks. This has led to facilitated negotiations that eventually produced the 1996 Final Peace Agreement, which aimed to fully implement the 1976 Tripoli Agreement and established the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. Moreover, up to the early 2000’s, Indonesia has provided personnel to the OIC for ceasefire monitoring.

More recently, during Indonesia’s 2023 Chairmanship, Jakarta engaged in extensive quiet consultations with multiple stakeholders, including the junta and opposition-linked actors. Rather than publicly confront Naypyidaw, Indonesia pursued what officials described as “silent diplomacy,” attempting to operationalize the Five-Point Consensus through sustained engagement.

Dr. Karuppannan argues that such intervention became necessary precisely because ASEAN’s formal mechanisms were not designed for speed, but for regional unity.

”Its foundational norms of consensus and non-interference, which are critical to regional unity, also inhibit timely responses to intra-regional crises. The Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC) provides for peaceful settlement and even a High Council, but these mechanisms remain inactive,” Dr. Karuppanan noted.

In the Thailand-Cambodia case, the situation was further complicated by the fact that the ASEAN Secretary-General at the time was Cambodian, which made it politically difficult for the Secretariat to assume a visibly mediating role. In such circumstances, bilateral and informal mechanisms became, as Dr. Karuppannan described, the “default approach.”

When the institutional ASEAN stalls, individual member states step into the gap, not to replace the organization, but to do what it cannot do quickly enough. The ASEAN mask, as Bagulaya might put it, is still on. The hands moving underneath it simply depend on the moment.

Timor Leste’s new approach

On February 2, 2026, judicial authorities in Timor-Leste opened legal proceedings against the Myanmar junta, including Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The case was initiated after the Chin Human Rights Organization presented a criminal file to a senior Timorese prosecutor in Dili two weeks prior. The file documented specific atrocities allegedly committed against the ethnic Chin minority, including targeted killings, sexual violence, and aerial attacks on civilian infrastructure protected under international law. It was the first time an Association of Southeast Asian nations (ASEAN) member state had initiated such proceedings against a fellow member.

However, the move was not new. In 2023, Timor-Leste engaged with the National Unity Government, Myanmar’s government in exile, which led to the expulsion of their top diplomat in Yangon.

What explains Timor-Leste’s willingness to act where others have not? Deputy Research Director of the Lowy Institute, Susannah Patton, argues that Timor Leste has a distinct international personality from its Southeast Asian counterparts.

”Timor-Leste may be in ASEAN, but its leadership will not quickly assimilate the political culture of the group,” Patton argued.

This does not come as a surprise. According to the ISEAS State of Southeast Asia Survey in 2025, respondents from Timor-Leste placed a higher priority on the Myanmar crisis than any other ASEAN country except Myanmar. Moreover, respondents from Timor-Leste reported being less concerned about the principle of non-interference than those from other ASEAN countries.

The deeper explanation may also be historical. Timor-Leste’s international identity is shaped by its own history of occupation and international advocacy. Its path to sovereignty was secured not through consensus, but through the help of the international community and UN peacekeeping missions. This background may explain why Dili appears more willing to externalize disputes rather than absorb them into ASEAN. The solidarity framing was made explicit by Salai Za Uk, Executive Director of CHRO, who noted that “given Timor Leste’s history, and the indignities the Timorese people suffered in their struggle for independence, there is a real sense of solidarity with the people of Myanmar.” For Dili, the instinct to externalize a crisis rather than absorb it into ASEAN’s diplomatic space is not a departure from its international identity but an expression of it.

This is where Timor-Leste’s move complicates the two-soul framework. The political ASEAN described in the previous section, Malaysia’s mediation and Indonesia’s shuttle diplomacy, works within ASEAN’s diplomatic culture even as it moves faster than its mechanisms. This is because it is centripetal; it pulls crisis response back toward the regional frame, keeps the ASEAN mask on, and resolves tensions without rupturing the organization’s foundations.

Timor-Leste’s legal action is something different. By relocating the contestation from ASEAN’s diplomatic space into the international arena, Dili is stretching the second soul toward something centrifugal. The proceedings do not openly defy ASEAN because Timor-Leste remains a member and has not called for Myanmar’s expulsion. But the logic of juridical escalation such as appointing prosecutors, building criminal files, pursuing accountability through domestic courts, operates on a different axis than consensus and quiet mediation.

Whether this represents a new direction for the political ASEAN, or an outlier shaped by Timor-Leste’s singular history, remains to be seen. But it suggests that the second soul is not monolithic. It too contains multitudes.

Does this strengthen or weaken ASEAN centrality?

At first glance, these episodes appear to strain ASEAN’s foundational norms. But ASEAN has long possessed mechanisms for consultation and dispute management. What these crises reveal instead is a tension between process and urgency.

ASEAN’s formal mechanisms are consensus-bound and intentionally rooted in deliberate diplomacy rather than speed. But crises move faster than consensus. When that happens, Southeast Asian states increasingly supplement institutional procedure with their own initiatives.

The immediate interpretation is that this weakens ASEAN centrality. If mediation is conducted by individual states and if legal proceedings are pursued outside collective endorsement, it’s easy to see how ASEAN can be easily put on the sidelines.

However, this interpretation assumes that centrality requires institutional monopoly. That may no longer be the case.

Even when member states act independently, they rarely depart from ASEAN’s diplomatic culture. Mediation remains consensual, and no state openly calls for expulsion or structural rupture. In this sense, ASEAN may not always execute a crisis response, but it continues to define the boundaries within which crisis response occurs.

Now, Timor-Leste’s legal action tests this logic. By moving the contestation into the international legal arena, Dili stretches ASEAN’s principle of non-interference. Yet it does not abandon the organization; it remains within ASEAN as its newest member while pressing on Myanmar.

The durability of ASEAN centrality, therefore, may not depend on whether ASEAN leads every crisis response. It may depend on whether member states continue to recognize ASEAN as the frame within which the regional order is negotiated.

ASEAN was always a political animal. What these crises reveal is not its weakness, but the full range of its instincts.

This article reflects reporting and analysis made by The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier. If you have additional context, a different take, or a perspective we’ve missed — whether you’re a researcher, a policy practitioner, or someone living with these realities on the ground — this is an evolving story and we’d like to hear from you. Drop a comment below or get in touch.

About Matthew Parra

Matthew Parra is a student at the University of Santo Tomas and the founder and Executive Director of The Southeast Asia Pacific Frontier — an independent analytical platform dedicated to rigorous, evidence-grounded analysis of Southeast Asia and the Pacific across economics, society, and geopolitics.