ASEAN Member States are moving forward with cooperation and integrationto build Southeast Asia into a region of peace, stability anddevelopment. The ASEAN Charter coming into effect has ushered in a newera of regional cooperation that would lead to the creation of a strongASEAN Community by 2015 with three pillars – Political-SecurityCommunity, Economic Community and Socio-Cultural Community. ASEAN hasbeen also boosting its cooperation with external partners to enhancebroader peace, stability and development.
Inrealising the Blueprint for establishing ASEAN Political-SecurityCommunity, the Association has increased cooperation activities,establishing the ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting (ADMM) besides otherarrangements such as the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC),Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (SEANWFZ), Declaration onthe Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC), the ASEAN RegionalForum (ARF) to preserve security in the region, especially when it isfaced with non-traditional security threats.
The achievements gained so far in the comprehensive cooperation amongASEAN Member States have laid a firm foundation and served as a drivingforce for their defence and military cooperation to develop, aiming tomeet the 2015 community building goal. In the past years, ASEAN hascontinued to sustain channels of dialogue, interaction and cooperationamong its defence forces through annual and regular meetings and events.As a result, the defence and military cooperation has gained moreground to grow in a substantive and effective direction.
The ADMM was founded in 2006 to be the highest ministerial defenceand security consultative and cooperative mechanism for regionalsecurity issues among the ASEAN Member States. After four years ofdevelopment, it has scored admirable progress and achievements inbuilding confidence, consolidating solidarity, facilitating andcoordinating the multi-facetted defence cooperation. DefenceMinisters of ASEAN countries have had an annual exchange of views onregional and international security. Furthermore, ADMM has created aframework for the practical cooperation among ASEAN militaries ondefence and security issues. Among other initiatives, ministers haveadopted two concept papers, namely “ The Use of ASEAN Military Assetsand Capacities in Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief ” and “ASEAN Defence Establishments and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs)Cooperation on Non-Traditional Security ”. The fourth ADMM, which washeld in Vietnam in May 2010, further moved these initiatives forward bysupporting the building of implementation roadmaps. The meeting aslosupported the idea of ASEAN cooperation in defence industry. Moreimportantly, all the necessary legal basis for establishing theADMM-Plus was finalized and adopted at the fourth ADMM, paving the wayfor the broadening of cooperation between ASEAN and its key externalpartners, pooling resources to deal with securitty challenges,contributing to the promotion of peace and stability in the region andassisting the ASEAN in community building effort.
Within the framework of ADMM, besides preparatory meetings as ADSOMand ADSOM WG, it is worth to mention the Track II Network of ASEANDefence Institutions (NADI) as a supporting tool for the ADMM. Foundedin 2007, NADI is a forum where scholars and reaseachers in ASEAN meetand exchange on defence and security matters that are relevant toADMM, with a view to seeking innovative recommendations to ADMM. Inaddition, NADI facilitates closer relationship among ASEAN defenceresearch institutions. The third NADI held in Vietnam in April 2010after reviewing and assessing the situation, recommended forstrengthening defence and military cooperation in a broader regionalcontext.
In parallel with cooperation throughdefence channels, military-to-military cooperative activites have beenconducted at various levels. ASEAN Chiefs of Defence Forces, Chiefs ofArmies, Navies and Air Forces meet at annual or regular meetings such asASEAN Chiefs of Defence Forces Informal Meeting - ACDFIM (since 2001),ASEAN Chiefs of Army Multilateral Meeting - ACAMM (since 2000), ASEANNavy Interaction – ANI (since 2001), and ASEAN Air Force ChiefsConference - AACC (since 2004). There is also ASEAN Military IntelligentInformal Meeting - AMIIM. All in all, the growth and expanding ofmilitary-to-military interaction and cooperation have contributed tobuilding mutual confidence and understanding, cementing the solidarityamong ASEAN defence forces.
In cognizant ofincreasing and more complicated non-traditional security challenges thatface the region, ASEAN militaries are trying to gradually gather theirefforts for a collective deal. The resolution of the seventh ACDFIM inMarch 2010 made it clear that militaries in ASEAN need to work closertogether in response to non-traditional security concerns as terrorism,natural disasters, infectious diseases, food and energy security,climate change, human trafficking, illegal arms trade and piracy. At theseventh ACDFIM, ASEAN Chiefs of Defence Forces also agreed to considerthe building of a mechanism for cooperative activities of humanitarianassistance and disaster relief (HADR). They adopted a 2- year workplan,covering annual meetings and seminars/workshops that aim to shareexperience and expertise in areas of maritime security, peacekeepingoperations, counter-terrorism as well as exchange activities among ASEANmilitaries. According to this workplan, the ASEAN Chiefs of MilitaryMedical Meeting and a tabletop excersice will be held in 2011 for thefirst time. ACDFIM’s decisions are important in that they directly guidethe activities of effective practical cooperation in the coming time.It is neccesary to mention socio-cultural exchanges among ASEAN youngofficers from Army, Air Force, with events like ASEAN Armies Rifle Meetand other sport tournaments.
Apart fromcooperative activities under the multilateral frameworks, ASEANmilitaries have engaged in several bilateral cooperative interactionssuch as exchange of delegation at different levels, education andtraining exchange, establishing hotlines of communication betweennavies, joint patrols both on land and at sea, and exercises of searchand rescue.
With regard to external cooperativerelations, ASEAN has been increasing the defence cooperation with itspartners outside the region under the framework of ASEAN Regional Forum(ARF), specifically the ARF Security Policy Conference (ASPC), ARFDefence Officials’ Dialogue (DOD) and ARF Heads of DefenceUniversities/Colleges /Institutions Meeting (HDUCIM). Theparticipation and engagement of defence officials in ARF-relatedmeetings have received growing recognition as a positive contribution tothe forum. In its year of ARF chairmanship, Viet Nam has organizedfour DoD and one ASPC meetings. At these meetings, participants hadextensive discussions on regional security issues, taking stock of therole of defence establishments in the evolving regional securityarchitecture and mapping out future plans for ARF defence cooperationwhich will boost the experience exchange in maritime security, HADR,natural disaster and climate change. Furthermore, ASEAN countries haveincreased defence dialogues with China and Japan so as to promotemutual understanding and trust.
The year 2010has seen a breakthrough in ASEAN’s external defence cooperation with theestablishment of the ADMM-Plus, the highest ministerial mechanism ofconsultation and cooperation between ASEAN and its key partners ondefence and security issues. The ADMM-Plus aims to facilitate strategicdialogues among defence ministers and promote practical cooperationthrough leveraging resources, experience and expertise to collectivelyaddress common security challenges in the region. It is expected thatthe ADMM-Plus will add new values to ASEAN’s existing defencecooperation mechanisms, thus tangibly contributing to regional peace,stability and development as well as the building of ASEAN Community by2015.
The defence and military cooperationwithin ASEAN and between ASEAN and its partners so far has been donethrough various, specific ways and means, which are in practicalorientation and suitable with conditions and capabilities ofparticipating countries. The momentum of ASEAN intra-cooperation hasbeen maintained and increased and now is gearing for the enhancedeffectiveness and improved capabilities. At the same time, thecooperation between ASEAN and its key Dialogue Partners has made a greatleap forward with the realisation of ADMM-Plus. All these developmentscontribute to ensuring our regional security, peace, stability anddevelopment, substantively support for the building of ASEAN Communityin general and ASEAN Political-Security Community in particular./.
