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Russia's retreat from Southeast Asia
By Stephen Blank
Southeast
Asia was a major battleground of the great powers
throughout the Cold War. And since the global war on
terror began it again has been the scene of major police
operations and rising interest by both China and the
United States as both those governments jockey to bring
the area into a closer relationship with themselves,
either through trade pacts or through security
agreements. However, nowhere to be found in these
maneuvers is Russia. Indeed, the decline in Russian
power and presence in Southeast Asia has continued under
Vladimir Putin without letup.
Undoubtedly
financial weakness underlies much of the problem. Russia
publicly abandoned its base at Cam Ranh Bay even before
its lease was up and even before September 11, 2001,
because Vietnam's price for retaining its lease was
unaffordable. Moreover, Russia no longer has important
defense and security interests in Southeast Asia so
there is no compelling need to maintain the base under
conditions of financial weakness. Indeed, Russia, as its
leaders well know, can barely hold on in Northeast Asia,
part of its territory and thus the source of vital
security interests. In this light a base in Cam Ranh Bay
becomes an unaffordable luxury.
But Russia's
problems do not end here. Recently it was revealed that
Russia is cutting back on its participation in major oil
projects off Vietnam's shores and in its territorial
waters (see Russia refines Vietnam oil ventures,
January 3). This clearly is an important sign of the
times regarding Russia's position in Asia generally and
the vagaries of its energy industry's place there.
Energy is the most important export that Russia has to
offer. At the same time there has been a lot of
publicity and hype concerning major projects involving
Russian energy deposits in Northeast Asia. In one case,
Sakhalin, Russia has secured backing from Indian, US and
Japanese firms, and is talking of building a pipeline
for the gas to China as well. But most of the other
major projects under consideration have yet to be
consummated contractually, let alone implemented as
construction projects. Therefore it is essential for
Russia's future in Asia that these projects move toward
fulfillment.
Accordingly, much of Russia's
policy toward Southeast Asia, to the extent that one
could discern it, involved an effort to elicit Southeast
Asian participation in major energy and infrastructural
projects in both Russia and in their own territory. The
purposes of these projects, beyond the obvious one of
selling Southeast Asian regimes the energy they need to
meet rising demand, were to demonstrate Russia's
reliability as a partner, make money for investment back
home in energy and other industries, and ultimately to
restore a significant Russian economic and political
position in Southeast Asia.
However, just as it
can no longer sustain military power in this area,
Russia apparently cannot sustain or pay its share of
these major projects. As a result it does not look like
an attractive investment partner for major energy
projects and cannot push for them because it cannot
afford them in any case. While its other major export,
weapons, is sometimes attractive to Southeast Asian
states, they do not compete well with Western,
especially US, systems (see Russia shoots to rule Asian skies,
July 20, 2002). And once India begins to produce
indigenously made Russian weapons, as is envisaged under
recent Indo-Russian agreements, and starts selling them
to Southeast Asia, those weapons will compete with
Russia's and probably drive them out of the market (see
India, Russia: Friends in arms,
April 13, 2002). As China too is increasingly competing
for the Southeast Asian arms market now dominated by
Western firms, there does not appear to be too much
space for a major upsurge of interest in Russian weapons
that could allow Russia to regain a place in the
regional defense agenda due to real power rather than
courtesy.
Russia's continuing failure to secure
reliable footholds in critical areas of Southeast Asia's
interests bespeaks not just its ongoing failure to
formulate and implement a viable strategy and policy for
this area of the world. It also showcases the larger
dangers of Russia's economic-strategic marginalization
in East Asia more generally. Putin and other elites have
frequently pointed out the danger of losing de jure or
de facto control of the Russian Far East and the danger
of falling too far behind in major economic competition
for influence and access there. They also have
repeatedly warned that the area is increasingly one of
major security challenges and risks to Russia. Therefore
the continuing retreat of Russian power from Southeast
Asia is part of the larger process of marginalization
that these officials have warned against and a telling
sign of the ongoing failure of the Russian state to
fulfill its policy responsibilities and devise effective
policies for Asia.
Not surprisingly, since
nature abhors a vacuum, other major powers have begun to
fill the place vacated by Russia. The United States has
substantially stepped up security cooperation with
Southeast Asian states against the threat of indigenous
Muslim terrorism and is clearly eyeing Cam Ranh Bay as a
port of call if not a permanent lodgment. Washington has
also begun security cooperation with India in the Indian
Ocean. This cooperation is also part of India's grand
design or Look East policy to augment its influence in
Southeast Asia and curtail what it perceives to be
potential Chinese threats there. Both China and Japan
have signed major trade arrangements with Southeast Asia
in order to create free-trade agreements and they are
furiously competing with each other for preeminence in
the regional economy. China has also signed a major
agreement with the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) that in essence secured its position and
claims regarding the potentially rich and strategic
Spratly Islands (see The Spratlys pact: Beijing's olive
branch, November 6, 2002). This agreement virtually
ensures that there will be no major controversy over the
islands for the foreseeable future, an outcome that
basically confirms China's previous land grabs there.
All these moves testify to the fact that
Southeast Asia's potential importance as a strategic
area is again on the rise and that it will become the
object of sustained major power rivalry, though not
necessarily of externally supported or inspired
violence. Russia, for the foreseeable future, will have
little or no role here and will be in essence a
spectator to those trends. It may be invited to
participate in the annual ASEAN Regional Forum out of
courtesy, but unless it institutes major changes in its
politics and economics that presence will be one of
courtesy, not one due to its large regional presence.
But this spectator status threatens to become
the situation in Northeast Asia as well for Russia
unless the requisite changes are made. Therefore the
recent announcements of reduced Russian presence in and
around Vietnam's energy programs as well as its
withdrawal from Cam Ranh Bay are events that have more
than a regional significance. While on the one hand they
are merely the latest chapter in the epochal retreat of
Russian power from Asia, on the other hand there are no
signs that this retreat is over or of what it really
portends.
Stephen Blank is an analyst
of international security affairs residing in
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
(©2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com
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