By Matthew Ribar
Balancing alone does not explain the build-up of conventional military assets in Southeast Asia.
The ongoing proliferation of submarine capabilities among Southeast Asian states is a hot topic in international politics. Arms races have been sparse since the end of the Cold War, so any series of events that appear to have those characteristics is widely studied. Most scholars have explained the arms build-up as a balancing of forces; however, such demand-side explanations overlook an underlying supply-side explanation, which is the global buyer’s market for arms.
The navies of Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam all boast submarine forces, with the Philippines announcing plans in December to acquire similar capabilities. The submarines are foreign made, and often second hand. The submarines range from Swedish Challenger-class (for Singapore), French Scorpène-class (Malaysia), German Type-209 submarines (Indonesis), and Russian Kilo-class (Vietnam). Most of these acquisitions have been recent, and this flurry of activity is what observers have called a force build-up.
Naturally, scholars have set about providing explanations for this force buildup. A particularly common explanation is that these states are balancing their military capabilities against various states. Some commentators have speculated that Southeast Asian states are balancing against each other, citing an inter-ASEAN naval arms race. But military balancing activity within a strong regional organization is rare behavior. Even though ASEAN’s focus on security cooperation is secondary, it would still be strange for states within such a well-institutionalized regional organization to be squaring off against each other in the manner suggested by the rate of naval acquisitions.
More commonly, observers link a naval buildup to the desire to balance aggressive Chinese actions in the South China Sea and more generally. Vietnam specifically had engaged in a naval stand-off with China in the summer of last year over a Chinese oil rig placed in waters claimed by Vietnam, but nearly all of these Southeast Asian states have maritime disputes over China’s claimed “nine-dash line.”
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