U.S.–Southeast Asia Relations: Raised Stakes and Renewed Importance

Southeast Asia’s profile has risen dramatically in U.S. foreign policy circles in recent years. After the United States drifted away from the region following the end of its involvement in Vietnam in 1975, U.S. attention began to return in the early days of the George W. Bush administration, although at that time largely in the context of President Bush’s global war on terrorism. Toward the end of the Bush years, Washington began to wake up to the broader importance of the region as a hub of global growth and as an arena where competition for the future shape of Asia would take place in the context of China’s rising regional influence. In 2007 the Bush administration sent a strong signal of U.S. interest in deepening ties with the region when it made the United States the first country to nominate an ambassador to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Meanwhile, outside the U.S. government, Southeast Asia studies programs began to crop up in the Washington think-tank community, suggesting broad interest among foreign policy elites in reflecting more deeply on the region’s importance. This pattern accelerated dramatically under President Barack Obama.

This essay begins by describing developments in U.S.–Southeast Asia relations during the Obama administration and then outlines challenges that the Trump administration will face in the region. It concludes with policy recommendations for the Trump administration.

Rebalance within the Rebalance

U.S. engagement with Southeast Asia—both with the ten ASEAN countries bilaterally and with ASEAN as an institution—accelerated dramatically beginning in 2009 under the Obama administration. This surge in attention toward Southeast Asia followed decades of Northeast Asia dominating U.S. policymaking toward Asia. While the administration continued to pay considerable attention to Northeast Asia, a marked uptick in attention to Southeast Asia constituted a rebalance within the administration’s overall rebalance to Asia.

This shift was on clear display from the outset of the administration. When Secretary of State Hillary Clinton broke with 50 years of tradition and made her first trip as secretary to Asia, not only did she make stops in Northeast Asia powerhouses Tokyo, Seoul, and Beijing, but she also visited Jakarta to signal her intention to work more closely with Southeast Asia, including ASEAN’s de facto leader Indonesia. Furthermore, during that landmark visit, she became the first secretary of state to visit the ASEAN Secretariat, based in Jakarta. This move demonstrated that multilateral engagement with ASEAN would be a high priority in the administration’s regional approach, in line with Obama’s global re-engagement with multilateral structures.

President Obama delivered on this early intention to engage ASEAN more deeply in numerous ways. Multilaterally, he signed with ASEAN the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, paving the way for U.S. membership in the East Asia Summit. He made the U.S. ambassador to ASEAN resident in Jakarta (another first for a non-ASEAN country). Obama inaugurated annual 10+1 ASEAN-U.S. summits and later in his presidency hosted a landmark U.S.-ASEAN leaders retreat at Sunnylands in California. On the people-people front, the Clinton State Department launched the highly successful Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative, aimed at deeper engagement with ASEAN youth. The Department of Defense also became increasingly engaged with ASEAN as it embraced the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting-Plus forum. Perhaps most importantly, U.S. officials across the government began to make a habit of showing up at regional meetings at all levels, including through the secretary of state’s annual attendance at the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF).

Bilateral relations in the region also surged. The U.S.-Philippines alliance went from near irrelevance to a central component of Asia policy, with the signing of the landmark Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement bringing the relationship into a new era. Ties with Myanmar began anew when Obama seized the opportunity that reforms presented to ease sanctions and normalize relations, while the end of defense trade restrictions with Vietnam signaled a full normalization of ties. Throughout the region, the...