A recent satirical headline gone viral online is worthy of the Onion , the American comedic publication: “We’re Having Trouble Finding Asian Countries Willing to Shoot Missiles at China.” The subhead chastises those countries for not being “democratic enough” to be willing to risk the lives of their citizens for the great American endeavour. The writer is supposedly Raymond L. Bloodthirst Jnr. Satire succeeds when it speaks the truth in a funny way. When US President Joe Biden last week declared US relations with Asean nations were entering a “new era” of cooperation, it mostly meant sending the White House National Security Council’s chief of staff as the new envoy to the region. The message is clear: bullets, not butter, for Southeast Asia. Biden was hosting leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Washington. Satire exaggerates to make a point; it’s not always fair. So, let us try to present a fairer picture. Asean nations actually want the United States for the security and stability it has traditionally provided in their region. It also wants China for the trade and prosperity it has to offer for their economies. However, Washington now demands the kind of security which amounts to an alliance of containment against China, a so-called Asian Nato. Meanwhile, Beijing is more than happy to exploit its economic prowess and trade advantages to gain leverage or even dominance over the region. But as Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong warned recently, the US must refrain from pressuring Asian nations to reject China’s overtures of cooperation. Speaking about the US pivot in Asia, Lee said that while Singapore supported Washington’s presence in the region, “that does not mean we fight your wars or that we are expecting you to ride to our rescue should something happen to us”. “There is a certain flexibility to it,” he said, warning against a regional arms race or dividing the region into hostile blocs. “I think it is best to keep it like that, because the countries in the region, we are not lined up eyeball to eyeball. I have my friends, you have your friends, and we both have some friends in common, and we both do business with one another, a lot of business with one another.” As China, US vie, Asean states put their own needs first, experts say At the moment, everything is fluid; alliances and priorities are shifting. There lies the danger. Regional peace and prosperity depend on the outcome of this triangular relationship between a group of small nations and two competing superpowers. The regime change or paradigm shift in the region has to do with the relative decline of the unquestioned US dominance after the second world war to the rise of practically every country and economy in the region, but especially China, in recent decades. Peace may be had if the competing powers evolve and develop a modus operandi or power-sharing – what diplomats and historians have long called the balance of power. Except for China, most Asian countries don’t want the US to leave the region. Unfortunately, America has a habit of oscillating between neglect and dominance. Now, US militancy is in the ascendance while Beijing is slowly but surely building up one of the world’s powerful navies. When the two superpowers see each other as a threat and attempt dominance as self-defence, they can easily come to blows. Asean nations don’t want to take sides, but it can’t be business as usual like it was in the last century. It’s left to them to play the balancer. They have, for decades, been described as no more than a talking shop. And individually, there is not much any one of them can do. They need skilled diplomats, now more than ever. This time may be really different. The old sheriff is undependable, the new wannabe is unpredictable. The situation is combustible. It’s left to Asean members to act, wisely and collectively, to save themselves and, just maybe, even the superpowers.