The spectacular rise of China over the past four decades has brought to the world unprecedented opportunities and challenges. No region has felt the effects of this new geopolitical reality more keenly than South-East Asia, despite the fact that the world has faced extraordinary opportunities and challenges as a result of China’s phenomenal ascent in the past 40 years. The 11 countries in the region have reaped huge economic benefits from China’s development. However, they are also the first to experience the hammering motions of the rising Asian Giant. China’s ascent has changed the economic and strategic environment of the region, as well as how China’s smaller neighbours have struggled to deal with the burgeoning powerhouse.

Each of these 11 countries deals with China in a similar way, but in different methods. Their various historical perspectives and assessments of the opportunities and risks brought on by China’s growth have prompted them to adopt various strategies. Vietnam is the most suspicious of China among the nine nations, while Brunei and East Timor are excluded and Cambodia is the most pro-China. Vietnam has profited economically from China’s expansion. Beijing is now Hanoi’s largest commercial partner and source of imports. However, Vietnam is continuously apprehensive of China’s expanding influence due to its bitter past experience with invasions and the simmering South China Sea issue. Hanoi has only permitted the development of one Confucius Institute because it is hesitant to join China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). In order to balance China in the South China Sea, Vietnam has also been enhancing its military capabilities and relations with the US and its allies.

Instead, despite Beijing’s support for the Khmer Rouge and Hun Sen‘s fiercest adversaries during the 1970s and 1980s, Cambodia has unwaveringly welcomed China. The advantages China has provided for Cambodia in terms of trade, investment, tourism, favourable loan terms, and particularly its support for Hun Sen’s authoritarian administration outweigh any potential security risks by a wide margin. According to several analysts, Cambodia even went so far as to represent China in the South China Sea dispute. Although most of them attempt to maintain a moderate position, the other seven middle-class nations are essentially on opposite ends of the love-hate China continuum.

Given the close economic ties between the two nations, Singapore has attempted to be a friendly partner of China. However, due to Beijing’s unwarranted political influence and its expansive South China Sea claims that threaten Singapore’s own survival and prosperity as a micro-state heavily dependent on adherence to international law and maritime trade, Singapore has also been forthright in resisting them. This has led to significant tensions between the two countries, including China seizing nine Singaporean armoured personnel carriers in 2016 while they were travelling to participate in military drills in Taiwan. Later in 2017, Singapore expelled an US academic, who was born in China, for allegedly trying to sway Singapore’s foreign policy on behalf of an unnamed foreign government that is widely believed to be China.

Meanwhile, Malaysian elites, particularly those in the military, have started to worry about China’s expanding might as a claimant state in the South China Sea. However, Malaysia has so far taken a conciliatory stance toward China, particularly while Najib Razak was the Prime Minister. Beijing’s willingness to support an embattled Najib amid his ongoing Malaysia Development Berhad corruption scandal and China’s enormous investments in Malaysia’s infrastructure projects under the BRI have all played a role, in addition to the close bilateral cultural and economic ties maintained by the Chinese Malaysians, who make up almost a quarter of the nation’s population.

The depth of China’s influence over South-East Asia, which is built in close bilateral commercial relations and the strong connections maintained by generations of ethnic Chinese migrants who have lived in the region, stands apparent. However, this influence is also unstable and brittle; the region would not soon become a firmly established sphere of influence for China. Aside from the South China Sea conflict that puts ongoing strain on relations, China’s diplomatic fortunes may also be affected by domestic political changes in various countries, as demonstrated by the examples of Myanmar and Malaysia.

Recently, nations, like the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia, have also taken action to modify their cordial relationships with Beijing. More crucially, the escalating geopolitical rivalry between the US and China means that if regional nations approach China too closely, Washington DC will be watching them more closely. Even China’s closest allies, such as Cambodia and Laos, would be hesitant to share China’s fate.

Source: Talk Diplomacy (Instagram)

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das