Speech by Minister for Defence, Dr Ng Eng Hen, at the Seventh Plenary on "Developing Models for Cooperative Security" at the Shangri-La Dialogue on 4 Jun 2023

Introduction

On behalf of my colleagues at the Ministry of Defence, Second Minister of Foreign Affairs Maliki Osman, Senior Minister of State for Defence Heng Chee How and Zaqy Mohamed, thank you all for joining us for this 20th edition of the SLD. Your presence here makes it very special. Let me also take this opportunity to personally thank John Chipman. He has been here from the start. Thank you for bringing the SLD to greater heights. Indeed as John mentioned, the SLD has grown, with over 40 Ministerial-level representatives, and nearly 600 delegates from more than 40 countries. It is a great honour to be on the same plenary as Deputy Prime Minister of Cambodia Tea Banh and Deputy Prime Minister of Australia Richard Marles. We can all take heart in this expansion of participants, as a clear sign that countries recognise the need and value of face-to-face engagements, not only when circumstances and relationships are favourable but even more so, in testing times.

And indeed there is much geopolitical turmoil, not least because of two significant disruptive events – the COVID-19 pandemic and the unlawful invasion of Ukraine by Russia. What lessons and applications should apply to Asia? I think the foremost priority of government leaders must be to avoid a physical conflict here, at least for the coming decade, to scope our goals and ambitions. Simultaneous conflicts in Europe and Asia would be disastrous and blight the future for an entire generation. As leaders, we must do all we can to avoid this nightmarish scenario. I do not think there is anyone here who would disagree with those statements, but unfortunately the reality and trajectory of geopolitics diverges.

Global Uptick in Defence Expenditures

Military spending around the world has gone up over the past two decades and is expected to rise even further in the coming decades. Global military expenditure reached a high of US$2.2 trillion last year. Central and Western European states spent US$345 billion on defence last year. In real terms, this surpasses levels that were seen during the Cold War. The obvious stimulant there is the Russia-Ukraine war. But even within the Asia-Pacific region without any physical conflict, combined military expenditures has increased to US$575 billion, 45% more than a decade ago. Excluding China, defence spending increased by almost 30% to US$283 billion.

Military spending is set to grow for the coming decade. By 2030, spending will be nearly a trillion (US$) for the US and about half a trillion for China. So too, middle powers in Asia – US$180 billion for India; Japan to over US$60 billion, similar to France then; and around US$40 billion for Australia. By 2030, ASEAN's military spending will increase by 40% to US$130 billion.

Increased defence spending per se need not be a sign or source of instability. Indeed, core to defence deterrence, which Singapore practises, is an adequate defence budget that deters aggression. But in the absence of a strategic framework of engagement and mutual restraint, cooperation despite competition, that balance tilts away from deterrence and the risk of conflict increases. In that context, the increased military spending veers towards an arms race with greater potential for destruction.

A Different World

I started with the military domain, at least in terms of defence spending, but trade, finance, and the economy are also vital domains that facilitate stability.

From the perspective of ASEAN Member States and Asia, the last 30 years have seen unparalleled economic growth from globalisation, largely championed by the US and fuelled by China's economic growth. The International Monetary Fund estimates that the global economy has tripled from 1990 to 2015, with nearly 1.5 billion people lifted out of extreme poverty in that period, and over 70% of that figure – 1.1 billion people – were in Asia alone. It is an economic miracle. The people of Asia, particularly the poor, have benefitted en masse from globalisation.

But today, a different geopolitical zeitgeist dominates, emanating from domestic politics but inevitably spilling outwards. As a stark manifestation, the US is out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, now replaced by the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, and which, instead, China has applied to be part of. It is a significant change. The US, as the prime mover of globalisation for the past three decades with its various instruments and institutions, has changed tack. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership is another economic bloc of 15 Asia-Pacific nations that collectively accounts for about 30% of global GDP, of which China, but not the US, is part of. More recently, the US launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework in 2022, with 14 participating countries representing 40% of the world's GDP. It is an important initiative to anchor and sustain the US' economic interests in this region with other partners.

Averting Future Crises

Rising military spending, shifting military and trade alliances, and de facto nativist economic policies are strong winds of change. How do we weather the storms to come? For Asia and the wider Indo-Pacific region, the US-China relationship is central to stability. That is the core. But the penumbra of relationships of other countries outside this core is also important for stability.

No country I think wants war. But our working assumptions and scenarios must be that unplanned incidents can occur, as it did when the US Navy's EP-3 aircraft collided with the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy's fighter jet over Hainan Island in 2001, or the albeit accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in 1999. More recently, and as recent as yesterday, close encounters, some mere meters apart, have occurred between US and Chinese ships and planes on and over the South China Sea or Taiwan Strait.

Channels of communication – both formal and informal – must exist so that when these unplanned incidents occur, those channels can be used to de-escalate and avoid conflict. Despite the Cold War, the Strategic Arms Limitations and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaties were signed between Leonid Brezhnev and Richard Nixon in 1972. During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, President John F. Kennedy's offer for a mutually acceptable compromise was delivered by then-US Attorney General (GEN) Robert Kennedy to Soviet Ambassador Drobynin.

The salient point is that such channels of communications must be built over time. It will be too late to start or activate them only in moments of crisis. Seasoned diplomats compare unfavourably the lines of communication between the US and Soviet Union in the Cold War with what exists today between the US and China, now at its ebb.

As recent as a decade ago, regular exchanges were conducted between American and Chinese officials at all levels. There was the US-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED), where Ministers and top officials met every year to discuss both economic and security issues. The last S&ED took place in 2016.

For their militaries, the then-Chief of the PLA's General Staff Department, GEN Chen Bingde, accepted an invitation to the US by then-Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff ADM Mike Mullen in May 2011, where he visited several US military bases and defence institutions. The PLA Navy was invited to participate in the US' RIMPAC naval exercise in 2014 and 2016. Those activities have all ceased. The last time their Defence Ministers visited each other's countries was in 2018.

It is not our place and certainly not my intention to comment on the diplomatic efforts of other countries. But I state these observations on declining touch points between the American and Chinese military establishments knowing full well that Singapore and other ASEAN states are not disinterested bystanders. Both the US and China have said that they do not want our countries, ASEAN countries, to take sides. But ASEAN Member States, with a vivid recollection of great power rivalry in our pasts and the devastating consequences, we are acutely concerned that worsening relationships between these two powers, the US and China, will inevitably force difficult choices upon our individual states.

Last year, at the SLD, the US and China defence establishments did discuss the need to "maintain open lines of communication". A hotline between Beijing and Washington was set up in 2008 between the defence establishments, though rarely used. When unplanned incidents occur, that line of communication could make a crucial difference in the de-escalation of hostilities.

For ASEAN, both through bilateral ties of individual member states and collectively with the US and China through the ASEAN Defence Ministers' Meeting (ADMM)-Plus, we have sought inclusivity and engagement as key platforms for pre-emption and confidence building.

Within the ADMM framework, we continue to pursue multilateral exercises that involve all our eight Plus partners. These interactions strengthen practical cooperation, like the Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea, to reduce the risk of accidents and miscalculations. Through the ADMM-Plus' Experts' Working Group framework, over 20 exercises have been conducted in the past decade, despite differences and disagreements among countries.

Conclusion

At the heart of our engagements, as fully exemplified at this SLD, is that desire to seek peace even as we security chiefs strengthen our militaries to protect our individual nations. At times, the progress seems painfully slow, but we owe it to our citizens and the next generation to persist and forge breakthroughs.

The adage applies, "to whom much is given, much is expected". The people whom we serve, expect us as leaders, influencers, movers and shakers, the people here, to deal with security challenges and keep them from harm's way. That phrase has been repeated so often, that I am worried that we might become inured. So let me share on quick anecdote to humanise this expectation.

We have nearly 600 delegates here, but it takes thousands more to make sure that things over the last few days work smoothly. I know that you would want me to thank, on all our behalves, the police, the security troops, liaison officers, the IISS staff, the transport and serving staff of the hotel. We thank them all. After each SLD, it has become a habit for me to actually meet some of them, some of the staff, to thank them personally. Some of the hotel staff here in fact, because this is an established hotel, have attended every SLD since inception. They have grown old with us, or at least with me. They feel part of the SLD. They go home to their families and tell them that they were part of something important. Between plates of food and drinks of wine, they hear words – the Ukraine conflict, the South China Sea rivalry – that they whisper to their friends in hushed tones. They believe that what we do here can make a difference, even that of peace or war. They hope that by providing good service, it will help our discussions along. Are their great expectations reasonable or realistic of us and the SLD? How can mere words stop steel and fire?

What else do we have, if not words? Meeting like-with-like, simply escalates. As leaders, we owe it to our people, like those have served us these past three days, to secure peace through dialogue. Simple hopes and expectations, but not very far from the truth or valid expectations of us as leaders.

In that hope, I wish all of you a safe journey back, and hope to see you here for future SLDs. Thank you.

More Resources

Dr Ng: Channels of Communication Important for De-escalation and Avoiding Conflict