Publication

This paper examines US policies in Southeast Asia. The author argues that apart from the important stabilizing role of the US military presence in the region, it is likely that the continuing importance of the US to ASEAN will lie less in the realm of policy initiatives than in the private trade and investment actions of American companies and the still-coveted US market. In addition, the paper states that in the absence of a clear strategy toward Southeast Asia, US interests and influence will depend importantly on day-to-day cooperation among US departments and agencies across a range of issues such as trade disputes, narcotics, counterterrorism operations and other non-traditional security issues as well as ongoing military-to-military relationships.