ARMS BUILD-UP IN ASIA
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INTRODUCTION: One fundamental assumption we have made is that rightly or wrongly, rationally or irrationally, sovereign states have felt a need for military force. ‘his is true for states large and small. New and old for those that have some, specific internal or external threat in the face of which their forces can be planned and structured. During the cold war era, there were huge accumulations of arms and ammunition especially by the US and former USSR. But in the aftermath of the cold-world era, new developments are taking place. One of the foremost features influencing the developments in the post-world war era has been the supply on large scale, of lethal arms to Asian countries. DEVELOPMENT OF THOUGHT: The end of the cold war has seen disarmament in Europe on a large scale. Bat in the absence of super-power rivalry many small and big conflicts in the Asian region are developing. An alarming trend has been the frantic phase of weapons stockpiling. The world is worried too much over a potential nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan despite denials from both the nations. The ASEAN countries are also on an arms-purchasing spree. All this has led to an uncertain security scenario in Asia. CONCLUSION: To conclude, it is worth mentioning that there should be a stop or at least a moratorium and gradual annihilation of this nefarious trade in agents and agencies of death and both the donors and buyers of these arms are brought in the dock. The sooner this trade, transfer and race for armament comes to an end, it is better. |
The Cold War, the costly affliction that devoured massive sums of money poured into the huge military-industrial complexes in both the military blocs, may have ended with the collapse of the Soviet empire and provided respite to those looking for corners to cut and check military spending but its end has unleashed a hot phase of arms stockpiling in Asia.
The end of the Cold War has also suddenly turned the locus do conflicts which had been obscured by the dichotomy of the two superpowers. Indeed, some of these conflicts localized in regions of East, South-East and South Asia suddenly seem to assume global significance as the dust of the Cold War settles and a clearer vision of the world emerges.
The world is worried that India and Pakistan, already engaged in a nuclear arms race, are on the brink of an atomic confrontation. Though both India and Pakistan have denied that they never came close to a nuclear confrontation, the situation had indeed been close to such a possibility.
The world which had until then believed that a nuclear war had been banished following the collapse of the Soviet Union was rudely woken from its complacent slumber. The West and Japan, providing assistance to the two hostile neighbours of the subcontinent, will now exercise even greater pressure on the two to abandon, slow down or yoke themselves to a formal mechanism—the Non-Proliferation Treaty is an example—for controlling nuclear proliferation.
Analysts have predicted that the nuclear issue will constitute the corner-stone of the Clinton administration’s policy towards India and Pakistan. The US has also exerted pressure on Russia to dissuade the latter from supplying sensitive materials to India, which could be used in the nuclear programme.
Russia had also agreed to cooperate with Pakistan in space and nuclear programmes—a prospect which has alarmed India’s strategic thinkers. Russia’s “new friend” Pakistan, would be getting conventional and nuclear power plants.
Such cooperation, although both sides harp on its “peaceful character”, would inevitably intensify the subcontinent’s arms race and could also change the region’s strategic constellation, with India moving closer to the US.
But South Asia is not the only region where the arms race has gained intensity.
The withdrawal of the US from the Philippines which played host to the two largest American bases outside the country will create a huge power vacuum in South East Asia.
A remarkable development, almost unnoticed by the world at large, but closely monitored by politicians in South East Asia, has come in the form of the Japanese Parliament’s endorsement of its government’s decision to send a contingent of Japanese soldiers under the flag of the United Nations to police trouble spots abroad.
Although the decision is not in itself of any strategic significance and will not impair the nation’s stability, it tends to generate nervousness among Japan’s neighbours who suffered under Japanese occupation during World War II.
The Philippine armed forces have also launched an armament programme which envisages modernization of the armed forces; Manila has ordered the construction of three ships equipped with Exocet rockets, another three equipped with conventional arms and two warships and has, done some arms shopping in Europe and the US, although Russia has also entered the competition arena and offered to sell warships to Manila on attractive terms.
Other member states of the ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations), of which the Philippines is a member, have been engaged in a ‘frantic shopping spree. Indonesia signed a contract with British Aerospace for the purchase of 24 Hawk combat planes. It has also, quietly, purchased 39 ships from the stock-pile of former East German armed forces. Jakarta is anxious to have an independent security policy which would be oriented to its “own national security” and not be at the “mercy of the whims and fancies” of external powers. Some ASEAN states, who had been mooting the idea of a South East Asian Security Pact, were disappointed when the former Indonesian defence minister Sutrisno opposed it in October 1992. Sutrisno argued that although regional cooperation in security issues was in order, a pact need not be the outcome of such cooperation. Indonesia was willing to perform missions under the aegis of the United Nations because such an undertaking did not have any long-term binding obligations.
The US withdrawal has spurred the regional powers to fill the power vacuum that has emerged. As other countries of the region had embarked on a modernisation programme, Singapore too armed itself for a quick and decisive strike, which was essential as a tiny country could not survive a long conflict.
Singapore’s joint naval exercises with India make sense in this context. The mandatory draft in Singapore extends to all male conscripts between the ages of 16 and 40. Singapore’s armed forces have conducted extensive naval exercises with units from Australia, Malaysia, Britain and New Zealand. Malaysia and Indonesia have also been conducting negotiations with India on areas of military cooperation.
A major factor in the defence planning of South East Asian countries has been China. The People’s Army with its huge size strikes awe among neighbouring Asian countries. However, China has been reducing the number of its soldiers for a few years but upgrading the quality of its weaponry. China has embarked on a wide-ranging programme of modernization of its navy. The Chinese submarine fleet has been expanded, a new frigate class introduced, and rocket-carrying ships modernized. China is also trying to buy an aircraft carrier ship under construction in Nikolajev, Ukraine.
With reactions of individual countries of South East Asia ranging from indifference through nervousness to paranoia, it is quite possible that Indonesia’s present leave me alone’, the policy may change as China’s ambitions in the region become obvious. The conflict potential is already there in the form of the Spratly Islands, to which a number of countries, including China, lay claim. In such an eventuality, Indonesia and other ASEAN states may form an alliance with Vietnam whose military strength is quite formidable. Indeed, Vietnam has already broken the ice with a number of ASEAN members and particularly with Indo—Asia with whom it has maintained “unproblematic ties” in the past even as the. Cambodian crisis soured its relations with the other members of the group.
China’s significance in the Third World’s arms shopping has been enhanced with its exports of what is described as “first generation nuclear technology”. China has already supplied an atomic reactor to Iran and has also been giving assistance to Pakistan’s professed ‘peaceful’ atomic energy programme. As the list of the potential candidates waiting to acquire a nuclear arsenal grows longer, the threat to world peace assumes dangerous dimensions
