On the Sino-US frontier

The Obama administration will host a summit tomorrow with the leaders of the 10 member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. This should be welcome as a follow-up to an inaugural summit held in Singapore in November last year on the sidelines of the wider gathering for Apec (the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum).

The summit is a sign that the United States is pursuing its ambition to engage Asia in a more multilateral and equal way. In contrast, the previous administration focused on China and India, the Asian giants.

But there are current limitations that both sides must understand even if they cannot be openly discussed. First, US-Asean engagement is more symbol than substance. Much of the preparations for the summit have been about the logistics, and whether to hold the meeting in Washington or New York. The agenda identified at the first summit has not progressed significantly.

In part, this is because while US President Barack Obama has the spirit to engage Asean, the American body politic is distracted. Take the president's thrice-postponed visit to Indonesia, the largest country and epicentre of Asean. Each time, his visit was postponed because of domestic exigencies - jobs, health care and oil spill.

In part, it is also because Asean as a group has yet to agree on what it hopes the US engagement can bring to the region. One need is for security. It is a long-standing role played by the United States, and there is a re-emergent perception that it is still needed.

At the recent Asean Regional Forum, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton singled out Chinese declarations over disputed islets in the South China Sea. This was welcomed by many Southeast Asian states who also have claims and who fear Chinese projections of power.

Yet it would be unwise for Asean to be overly dependent on the United States. Asean must not give the impression that it seeks for the US to contain China. Over the past decade, China has engaged Asean consistently, and generally with benevolence, and Asean should wait to see how Beijing responds to concerns over this issue.