Speech
of
His Excellency Fidel V. Ramos
President of the Philippines
To the Center for Strategic and International Studies

[Delivered in Washington, D.C., U.S.A., November 22, 1993]

Sharing in peace
and growth

THE PAST WEEK has been a historic time for America and the Asia-Pacific, and we meet today in the glow of its proud achievements: the meeting of leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Seattle and the approval of the North American Free Trade Agreement by the U.S. House of Representatives here in Washington, D.C.

As President Clinton has himself described it, this has been “a defining moment” for America—of its role in the world and its relations with other nations.

For us in Asia, this too has been a momentous week—a time of new hopes and undertakings.

Regional peace and security

In years to come, it may well be that we will look upon the APEC meeting in Seattle as a turning point in relations between our sides of the Pacific. Yet before the high hopes raised by the meeting are realized, there is much work for us all to do.

Within your own organization—the Center for Strategic and International Studies—you have no doubt already begun to analyze and build scenarios on what is in store for the Asia-Pacific region.

I can hardly instruct you in the work of analysis, but perhaps I can tell you something about how we in Asia see these new opportunities rising in the Asia-Pacific, and the problems that we must face, particularly those concerning peace and security in the region.

Lady Margaret Thatcher likes to remind us all that we should not forget to mind the security store, for as she points out, when the Cold War ended it did not necessarily mean that peace had broken out.

She is right, of course. The end of the Cold War has not ended all threats to peace and stability. Superpower rivalry has vanished, but regional and local power rivalries are emerging. Ethnic and religious conflicts previously suppressed by the requirements of the East-West confrontation are erupting or dangerously building up pressures. And the threat of nuclear destruction still hangs over the regions of the world as nuclear disarmament falters and nuclear proliferation persists.

Economic interdependence

Those of us who gathered in Seattle the other day would do well to give as much attention to the security, as we did to the economic underpinnings of the Asia-Pacific.

We were wise to gather in Seattle, if maybe a little late. And we were smart to begin with the subject of economic cooperation.

The Asia-Pacific has evolved into a region composed of countries highly interdependent economically on one another. For instance, nearly as much as 70 percent of the trade of these countries is with the other countries of the Asia-Pacific. This integration of the Asia-Pacific economies into a regional economy has for a long time been evolving without government support, direction or perhaps even advertence.

The establishment of APEC four years ago marked the acceptance by the governments in the region of the desirability of actively promoting the evolutionary process long under way. The APEC leaders’ meeting was an effort to engage the governments at the highest level in the promotion over the long term of the process of Asia-Pacific integration. And I congratulate President Clinton for convening such a historic meeting.

But the movement toward the integration of the Asia-Pacific economies cannot be sustained, let alone speeded up, unless a stable security environment is provided to ensure that the region’s businessmen can trade, produce, build and interact in peace and tranquility.

Our Association of Southeast Asian Nations is increasingly convinced that it should do its share in addressing the security requirements of the region. As the only functional intergovernmental organization in the region, it has lately emerged as a force for developing mechanisms to manage the region’s security concerns. Its initiatives represent a diplomatic approach toward securing a stable security environment for the region.

Asean initiatives

In 1992 ASEAN added a security dimension to the political and economic dialogue that it regularly holds with its dialogue partners—the United States, the European Community, Japan, Canada, Korea, Australia and New Zealand. This development gratified the Philippines because it had been pressing for such a move.

In the same year ASEAN invited and witnessed the accession of Vietnam and Laos to the Southeast Asian Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, which bound signatories to the peaceful resolution of disputes. As observers and eventual members of ASEAN, it was hoped that these two neighbors would increasingly be drawn into the ASEAN way of managing potential conflicts in the subregion of Southeast Asia.

This year ASEAN established the ASEAN Regional Forum, at which questions of regional security and stability can be periodically examined and discussed together by all countries concerned. Participants in this Forum, which will be convened in December, include, in addition to the ASEAN member countries, the U.S., Canada, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, China, Russia, Vietnam and Laos. As my Secretary of Foreign Affairs recently reported to the United Nations, through this Forum the countries of the region may strive to ensure that regional security concerns will remain the subject of cooperation and consensus rather than of contention and conflict.

Writing in this month’s issue of Foreign Affairs, Nicholas D. Kristof observes: “The most likely site for a war is probably the South China Sea, which China claims as its own 1,000-mile-long pond. This huge sea, encompassing the Paracel and Spratly island groups, covers major international shipping routes, including those that carry oil from the Gulf to Japan. The area is also claimed in part by Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Taiwan and the Philippines.”

It is also well to note that China and Vietnam have fought naval battles in the area in 1974 and 1988, and the danger of conflict may be growing because some experts believe that there are extensive oil and natural-gas deposits in the area.

A force for peace

In this troubling dispute, ASEAN is exerting itself as a force for peace. Three of those claiming the Spratly Islands are ASEAN member countries: Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines. What ASEAN has been doing during the past few years is to bring the disputed area under a regime of peace, cooperation and mutual confidence.

Beginning in 1990, Indonesia, which is not a party to the dispute, hosted three workshops on the subject of managing potential conflicts in the South China Sea. As a result of these workshops, the Philippines hosted this year a working group meeting among claimants to the Spratlys on marine scientific exchanges. This represented the first concrete form of cooperation in the area, as well as a tangible confidence-building measure.

In 1992, at the initiative of the Philippines, ASEAN issued a Declaration in Manila calling on claimant nations to desist from the use or the threat of force to resolve the dispute and appealing to them to set aside the issue of sovereignty and explore the possibility of cooperation in the area.

The Declaration received the strong endorsement of the United Nations and of many countries. Vietnam expressed full support for the Declaration, China expressed appreciation for some of the basic principles and indicated that it was ready to enter into negotiations with countries concerned when the conditions are ripe.

In addition, China proposed joint exploration and development of resources in the Spratlys zone until the sovereignty issue has been settled.

Such exercises in preventive diplomacy are conducive to the peaceful resolution of disputes, but they cannot check the ambitions of an adventurist power. This is why I believe the continued engagement of the United States in the region is necessary as a guarantor of regional stability.

The U.S. role

So far we have avoided in the Asia-Pacific the kind of conflicts that have erupted in Eastern Europe. A hate-filled conflict between ethnic and religious groups like those in the Balkans and the Caucasus has not occurred. And the lid on conflict long kept by the Cold War has been sustained. One major reason is economic growth.

Overall there is in Asia today a new attitude of dealing with the security challenges of the post-Cold War era, not in ideological terms, but in a realistic and pragmatic way. And one major point of convergence is that Asian security today depends not so much on military power as on the economic strength, technological capability and social cohesion of each country.

Asia can think this way because America’s vigil over the peace during the Cold War has triumphed and given it the breathing spell to grow and prosper in peace and freedom.

Today, most of Asia believes that no state need aspire to hegemony—because it can attain its goals through peaceful commerce and integration in the community of nations. A truly global market has risen, and it is founded not on force but on mutual benefit.

Today, economic interdependence is a fact. It binds separate nation-states together and reconciles even the most bitter ideological enemies of the past. Against the gravitational pull of mutual benefit, ideology cannot prevail. Even the most obstinate nationalism in Asia is giving way to economic cooperation and synergy.

The meeting in Seattle serves to confirm this new thinking about security in Asia: that we can best promote peace in the region and the world by using economic progress and economic interdependence as our essential building blocks.

Common security

Nevertheless, there are dangers. Some could arise from the clash of civilizations and cultures as the political scientist Samuel Huntington has warned. And others could be the result of new geopolitical rivalry and struggle within the Asia-Pacific—principally because of China’s rise to power and preeminence, and the uncertainties posed by North Korea’s nuclear capability.

We can hardly forget that the specter of nuclear proliferation has not been exorcised. Right now, ten countries have nuclear weapons. By the year 2000, the number could reach 21.

Against these threats on the horizon, we need to hold fast to our new concept of common security, which is built on mutual confidence, not mutual deterrence, on seeking security with other countries, and not against them.

Among us in Asia, we have moved some distance in building a multilateral system of consultation and cooperation on economic matters that helps to build peace and understanding.

But to complete this system of mutual reassurance, we must have America’s continued engagement in Asia. We need America to help us build the new framework necessary to ensure that no power dominates the region.

This may sound curious coming from the leader of a country that rejected a new bases treaty with the United States. That basing agreement, however, belonged to the Cold War era. In the same way that the Philippine Senate in September 1991 believed that their usefulness was over, so America’s own defense restructuring requirements have dictated, if belatedly, that the bases had to go.

Today a different kind of security arrangement is needed—one that does not require extensive U.S. military presence in the region, but certainly requires U.S. leadership. The Philippines regards itself as an integral component of the network of security arrangements the United States maintains in the region.

Similarly, the Philippines, as a treaty ally under the Philippine-U.S. Mutual Defense Treaty of 1951, supports the development of a high degree of interoperability between the forces of the U.S. alliance network. Interoperability calls for closer coordination, similarity in military training and doctrine, knowledge of weapons and equipment and compatible policies. Enhancement of such interoperability makes possible a coalition type of strategy which calls for the United States to maintain a level of sufficient strength around which its allies can coalesce.

Multilateralism

For the Philippines to attain that level of interoperability requires that it develop a credible external defense capability to protect its maritime borders. We have embarked on a modernization program for our Armed Forces.

When we consider the changes that have taken place in the post-Cold War era, we have to consider “multilateralism” as perhaps the best approach to meeting new challenges and opportunities. As in the economic sphere, we have learned quite well how to use multilateralism as a means to advance our common interests, so in the security sphere it must be considered.

In particular, the Philippines would support the idea of establishing a multilateral security arrangement for the Asia-Pacific region under the auspices of the United Nations. The burdens of such a security system can be shared by the countries of the region, and it can be led by the United States.

The Philippines would be willing to consider the training of a battalion of light or specialized forces for peacekeeping and humanitarian/disaster relief roles within a multilateral security arrangement. Given our record in Korea, Vietnam and more recently in Cambodia, we can contribute greatly to these tasks.

Overall the prospects for peace and growth in the Asia-Pacific are good, but we can realize them only to the extent that we make the adjustments required by changed circumstances.

Building new structures

If we cling to the old structures, the old attitudes, the old fears, then we will have difficulty in our transition into the new. Russia and Eastern Europe today are a reminder of how the process can be traumatic when people are not ready for change.

Asia in contrast seems to be adjusting much more quickly and better to the post-Cold War era. But there is no room for complacency. We have to speed up the building of new structures, institutions and rules in our transpacific relationship.

Frank Gibney, author of The Pacific Century, has noted a gap between wish and reality in Asia-Pacific affairs, especially as America sees it: “While praising Pacific economic development, promising a continued security presence, and predicting a rosy cross-oceanic future, the United States has neglected to develop a strong government infrastructure worthy of this goal . . . . The active participation of the United States is vital to the continued growth and peace of the Pacific Basin.”

Seattle, as we in Asia see it, signifies the end of America’s recent tendency to look inward and focus solely on its domestic cares. It could well be the beginning of real partnership in peace and growth in the Asia-Pacific.