 We're back. And I hope you guys all enjoyed that dose of current. It's always refreshing and thought-provoking. And I think he's given us a lot to think about in this panel. We are truly honored to have a fantastic panel to discuss security-related issues in Asian architecture. And I'll introduce my panelists. And then I will start to ask them some questions to kick us off. And then I want to integrate the audience. So please get ready with your questions. And the only rules there are I'd like you to identify yourself and any affiliation that you have when I introduce you. I've been asked to remind everybody who's online with us that the Twitter information, if you want to follow the live Twitter feeds for this program, are at Southeast Asia DC, at Shoal Chair. That's S-C-H-O-L-L Chair, at CSIS. And the hashtag to track all of that is hashtag CSIS live. We're kicking off here. It's 11 o'clock. And we have an hour of discussion. Let me briefly introduce our panelists. They are all strategic thinkers. And all have played a current or past role in directly making and implementing policy. And it's a real treat to be up here with them. Let me first introduce His Excellency Wen Quoc Cong, who's the ambassador of Vietnam to the United States. He presented his credentials to President Obama in July of 2011. He's no stranger to the United States. He's worked on multilateral issues in his ministry. He came to this position from a position as deputy foreign minister in Hanoi. He went to school here. He went to the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Boston at Tufts. He got his master's there. And he's also studied at the Maxwell School of Public Administration at Syracuse and attended classes at Harvard. He's a strategist, a great thinker, and he's coming off a real high of the visit of his president, President Song, to the United States, which was, by all accounts, a great success. And in part, I should say, largely due to his leadership in working with American counterparts to make sure that visit was successful. Next to him is Vikram Singh. He is deputy assistant secretary of defense for South and Southeast Asia at the Department of Defense. Vikram's world includes all of ASEAN, all of South Asia, except for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, Timor-Lesson, the Pacific Islands. So he's a man that his wife doesn't see much because he's usually in a plane somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. He's been a great leader, and I think Kurt mentioned earlier, a real innovator with his team at the Pentagon. He's just coming back from a four-country trip to Southeast Asia with Secretary Hagel. Those same four countries that President Barack Obama will be visiting in October and has done some really interesting work there. And we're going to want to tap into that set of issues. And finally, my colleague and our fearless leader here at the Asia team at CSIS, Mike Green, is senior vice president for Asia here and Japan chair at CSIS. He's also associate professor at the Edmund Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown. As you probably know, Mike had many positions in the government, I think most notably, senior director for Asia, where he ran basically the same shop on the inside. And so we all just pretend that we're in the NSC when we're here and we sit around Mike's table and try to devise things to do. But he's a great leader, and we're happy to have him. Gentlemen, I want to kick off. I think Kurt sort of threw down the gauntlet and described the importance of strengthening ASEAN institutions using the architecture that's been built and applying that to the way we think about security in the Asia Pacific. Let me kick off with the first question. Last year, President Obama visited Thailand, Myanmar, and Cambodia ahead of the East Asia Summit. This year, he's headed to Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia, and the Philippines. He'll attend the APEC Leader Summit in Brunei and the East Asia Summit and the ASEAN Summit in Indonesia. And then he has bilateral visits to Malaysia and the Philippines. Let me turn to Vikram and start with you, Vikram. What does the administration hope to accomplish with the president's trip this year? What are the security signals that we can watch for when the president is in the region? Ernie, first of all, thank you very much for hosting this. And again, I have to echo Kurt's comments that I think a few short years ago, we wouldn't have been able to always fill huge halls with people thinking and working on and worrying about Southeast Asia. And it's a real testament to CSIS and the work that you and your team have done that you can regularly bring us together for these kinds of forums and that you really see thinking about Southeast Asia, regional architecture, the Asia Pacific writ large, developing into a focus, not just for this administration, but I think for our business community, I think for people of both parties, I think it's really a national focus. And so it's a privilege to be with you. As I think Kurt mentioned, the president's trip has not been announced. So I think we're all looking forward to being in the region and hope that will come to pass. What I do know is that I was just there with Secretary Hagel and assuming all goes according to plan, I think we'll be hearing that as you see with us being engaged so comprehensively in Asian regional architecture, what you see is a layering of American messages, American interest, American commitment. And to just echo something that Kurt said, I think the key is that we think the United States, one, has a critical interest in the development of regional architecture in Asia, in the trajectory that takes so that it will increasingly be able to deal with even very difficult challenges, even very troubling, persistent, tough issues. And we also have, I believe, a very important role in ensuring that that and helping that architecture develop in a way that follows from ASEAN's values, ASEAN's centrality and ASEAN is really in and of the region. And Kurt talked about that a little bit. He said that we have an important role in linkages and we have an important role in helping Asia itself realize this vision. So we're spending a lot of time supporting our partners showing that we're working closely with partners and allies, trying to innovate how we cooperate. And we see the emerging architecture in Asia as really the most fruitful area for a lot of these activities. This is where countries are coming together and doing things together that will increase confidence, be that exercises, be that going to these meetings, be that having policy discussions, be that engaging on tough issues with one another in a whole bunch of different configurations. So sometimes that is, the regional architecture itself reflects all these different configurations. So I think what you'll see is this is about our commitment to the region, our commitment to the rebalance of focus, which again, not away from things, but focusing heavily on Asia, recognizing the importance that Asia plays in our national security and in our future in the United States and being sure that we're there at the table involved and helping to take Asia in the right direction, particularly when it comes to what those norms and values and processes are going to be for dealing with hard issues and ensuring that the Asia-Pacific remains on a positive trajectory is an engine of growth, stability and prosperity for us and the region and really the whole world. Mike, do you wanna add anything? I don't disagree with Vikram's points. I think they're right. And I think the administration's approach to the region, to Southeast Asia in particular and to the US has been right. The only thing I'd mentioned, which Vikram for obvious reasons can't is, one of the complications for the president is gonna be where Syria is a month from now. He may end up wishing on the way to Southeast Asia that he had hit Syria without going to Congress initially and just done it because if the process that the Russians have manufactured goes nowhere, which is very likely and we're back to debate and possibly the use of force, that is not the context you wanna take into countries like Malaysia or Indonesia. I think that the governments in those countries are within places like the Organization of Islamic Conferences and so forth are quietly extremely worried about what Assad is doing and chemical weapons. But the publics in those countries will not understand, particularly given the muddled message that the US has given on Syria. So that's gonna be a big complicating factor and having worked in the White House, I can tell you, you can go anywhere in the world, but when the White House Press Corps goes with you, the world's issues color the summit and you can't always make the summit about Asia when something in the other part of the world is capturing the White House Press Corps' attention. I don't know what the administration will advance as a theme, one theme I hope they'll advance is Secretary Hagel's theme in his meeting with the Malaysian Defense Minister. When he said, the US doesn't expect our friends in Southeast Asia to make a choice between the US and China. I thought that was a very effective, a well-delivered message, backed by in the case of Secretary Hagel's trip an obvious US commitment to standing by our friends and especially our allies in the region. I thought that was well done and I hope that would be a theme for the president. With APEC and EAS back to back, there may be an opportunity to take advantage of the new Chinese attitude towards TPP and to start breaking down this idea that the region is poised for a clash between RCEP and intraragional agreement and TPP and building some themes there as well. But Syria's gonna make this all very, very complicated. That's a good point. Ambassador Kong, can I turn to you? I mean, I think I certainly have felt over the last two years that Washington has started to view Vietnam as one of the most strategic thinking of the ASEAN countries and really depend on or look forward to your advice and input and you certainly, Vietnam certainly has had to, has taken a careful view and assessment of ASEAN and US-China relations. Could you share some of your thoughts from a Vietnamese perspective? First, thank you, Ernie, for your kind and very generous introduction. It's really an honor for me to be here at CSIS and I think that the topic we are discussing today agree that it's relevant and timely, given much of the focus. In town now, it's on Syria. So I think your conference today on Asian architecture is kind of a re-rebalancing effort and I would like to give high credits for CSIS for this. And back to the question, your question. I think that I just want to start with the, by recalling 2010 when Vietnam was chair, was host of ASEAN here and the fifth EAS that the United States was formally admitted to the EAS mechanism. In fact that Vietnam, together with a few other ASEAN countries was a strong, strong proponent for the joining of the United States in EAS. And why we did so? I think that at least two reasons. The first is that it's a consistent policy or strategy of ASEAN, first to integrate among ASEAN countries, second, reach out to other dialogue partners, especially the major powers including the United States and others. And reason number two for me, I see that with the US rebalancing and you reaffirm that the US is a resident Pacific power and you have the national interest in peace, stability and development in the region. So by inviting the US to join EAS, we welcome and much expect for US contribution of peace, security, stability, development in the region. Let me just explore with the panel and then I'll leave it open to whoever wants to bite on this if anyone does. I think the case has been made a little bit by all of you and certainly by Kurt that economic integration is a sort of a key factor for, it's a key factor in security. And you sort of, I think the, and what I'm hearing is you have to lead with economic engagement to have a solid foundation in Asia anyway for security. Would you agree with that? And what do you think about sort of the, I think Mike, you referenced sort of the, we do have a couple of disconnects where our geostrategic footprint or our scope, the way we think about Asia includes India and all of ASEAN and all of all the EAS members, 18 countries, but APEC is a little different footprint. It excludes India, three of the ASEAN countries and it does include Mexico, Canada and some of the Latin America countries. Maybe I'd ask you to start. How should we, how should the president be thinking about this and how should we think about it? Well, I've been of the view for some time that the architecture in Asia is going to remain eclectic and diverse because the regime types, the levels of development, the threat perception are also diverse and I'm a realist and I think that the institutions have to reflect, will always reflect the underlying power dynamics or values and those are diverse in Asia. They're dynamic, they're changing, but they're diverse. So I think personally it's a mistake to try to rationalize the multilateral energy in Asia into one so-called architecture. I don't think the U.S. should be pushing to have India in every, you know, architecture. I don't think we should be pushing to have all 10 ASEAN countries in TPP necessarily. I don't think we have to push to have Canada and Mexico and everything. We're gonna feel our way along and as the economic independence as norms or how we view the role of institutional architecture in Asia emerges will start docking and connecting but I think it's a mistake to expand a huge amount of energy. Even ASEAN centrality which I think is a benefit for U.S. interests and regional stability does not really, it defines the ARF, it defines the EAS, does not define the security order in Asia as a whole. So we have to be nimble enough to be prepared for quite eclectic architecture and dock these things and connect them when it makes sense but not try to artificially push it. Just very briefly I would say Ernie, I think it's clear to those of us who watch the development of the architecture in Asia, I mean we recognize that it really was by focusing on areas where you could find consensus by using American sometimes or frustrated by a consensus based approach. Doesn't get enough done but if you look at the, if you look at what it has achieved, what it's done is it's enabled the building of trust, confidence and also the stabilizing of a lot of these countries over the time, the dealing with problems such that the architecture is now taking on more difficult security issues. So I'd really say that they're sort of mutually reinforcing. If people didn't have a chance, I think Secretary Hagel addressed this quite well in a speech in Kuala Lumpur on this last trip and really looking at how security is an underpinning at the end of the day. The focus really, I think for all of the governments in the region and for China and for the United States is largely economic, social and in those areas. I mean I think it's about keeping a good thing going. And if you look at the architectures in East Asia, or in East Asia, you see that the many, from APEC on economic terms, you are discussing about the RCEP, about the EE, three E's on the security side, you have the ARF, the ADMM plus, the East Asia Summit and so on. So I think that I agree with you that it's dynamic, it's diverse, but it's evolving. So one of the most important tasks for EAS that President Obama is going to attend is to help develop regional norms and frameworks. And I think that the US in this area, the US, as you mentioned, supports the centrality role of ASEAN and we appreciate that and I think that we should, we encourage the US the same, that respect ASEAN's centrality role and also have a, also already active, but much more active role in helping develop the regional norms and frameworks. One of the themes that's evolved in this discussion is, and I think Mike, you might have been referring to it, is as you develop frameworks, even overlapping frameworks that reinforce as Vikram said, sort of a key ante to actually be at the table is deep or very granular relationships with the individual players, with the key countries so that you have a strong foundational bilateral relationship which you can use to sort of empower regional relationships. In that context, Ambassador, I wanted to call on you and then I invite the other two panelists to comment on other countries or on the US-Vietnam relationship but in July we inked the US-Vietnam comprehensive partnership agreement and that created a high level dialogue between the Secretary of State and your foreign minister. How do you see this progressing? Are we at the right level with the US and Vietnam or is it moving at a pace that you're comfortable with and do you have advice from what you've experienced in Vietnam for us or for other countries? So I guess that my question is based on the US-Vietnam comprehensive partnership, do you think we have US-Vietnam relationship is in good shape? Should we have more ambition and do you have any advice based on your experience in crafting that relationship for either the United States or other Asian countries? As you mentioned in July, the President of Vietnam, the United States and had a very productive meeting with President Obama and they announced the formation of a new framework of partnership between the United States and Vietnam. That's the comprehensive partnership. If you look back at the history of relationship between Vietnam and the United States, you see that it was interesting to recall that when President Chung-Tung Sang met with President Obama, he handed, he gave a copy of President Ho Chi-Min's letter to President Henry Truman in 1946 expressing Vietnam's desire for have the full cooperation with the United States. And it took Vietnam and the United States 68 years to realize that when we formed the comprehensive partnership. And in that, we identified for the first time the principles guiding bilateral relations between Vietnam and United States. And we also identified, as I remember, about nine areas of cooperation in the bilateral comprehensive partnership. So I think that's a great achievement and it's a historical milestone. Historic milestone in our bilateral relationships. We should continue building on that basis and our foundation. And I can see and believe that US and Vietnam relations in the years to come, we further developed in that direction. And it's very interesting to let you know that there is question, even asked by a very senior US administration here that is Vietnam really just thinking about the visit itself, but not much about the deliverables. My answer is that just look, let the facts. And after the visit, we see quite a few other developments, positive developments, and we see more, more positive developments. The President himself, the President of Vietnam himself called me several times for the follow-ups. So we are really committed to what we have agreed with the United States and what the two presidents have agreed with one another and we are serious about commitments. On the defense side, Ernie, I think the comprehensive partnership reinforces what we've begun on the defense side. It's only in 2011 that we first signed a memorandum of understanding on defense cooperation between the United States and Vietnam. We have five focus areas and I think Ambassador Quang has been an incredibly strategic and thoughtful partner and we have made, we're really moving towards transformation of this relationship. And also I think things like Vietnam's leadership role in really the establishment of the ADMM plus is sort of a testament to the fact that working with Vietnam has been just very productive in terms of how countries in the region are working together. You wanna follow? Just on the defense side, first thank you Vikram and Singh for reminding us about our initiative to launch the ADM plus. The inaugural meeting was in Vietnam in 2010. First it was 10 years, three years. Once in every three years now it's decided because of the productivity of the ADM plus mechanism now we decided that would be once in every two years. And so for me as a career diplomat I strongly support the defense diplomacy. I'd rather see, you know, defense military men from different countries in the region sitting, talking diplomacy with one another than engaging in diplomacy rather than they are engaging in battlefields. So I strongly support the ADM plus and I think that we should continue on that. Let me turn to Mike to comment on this. You do a lot of work on alliances because the US-Japan alliance is a rock in our engagement in Asia. How do you see alliances within the discussion of architecture and can we use the ADM plus and joint exercises to actually strengthen alliances? I mean, are they mutually reinforcing or do they sort of diminish and compete? For most of American foreign policy history in Asia after the war, alliances and multilateralism were viewed as mutually exclusive and James Baker wrote a famous piece in foreign affairs around 1991 where he described the hub and spokes of American bilateral alliances and he was trying to suppress the enthusiasm about a lot of it from Mahathir but the enthusiasm about multilateralism which had been seen as a Soviet ploy to break up our alliances. That's just not the case anymore. I think anybody who looks at alliances sees the multilateral architecture, especially ADM plus as reinforcing, mutually reinforcing. And when Secretary Hagel goes to Japan and Korea at the end of the month, I hope that in the joint statement we're gonna do with Japan and with Korea, he emphasizes this that for the US-Japan alliance and the US-Korea alliance, ADM plus is great. And these alliances bring into ADM plus levels of interoperability and logistical support that make them a lot more effective. So we're way past where we were two decades ago on this question and I think it's win-win. Great, that's terrific. I'm gonna open up the floor because we've got a lot of talent out in this audience and I'd love to engage you with your questions. Let's start here. Thank you, Ernie. We've been talking a lot about goals. I'm Ellen Frost from the East West Center of National Defense University. We've been talking a lot about goals and I want to raise the thorny subject of obstacles. Vikram Singh, to what extent do budget cuts, sequestration, restrictions on travel, congressional polarization, et cetera, hamper the specific projects and goals that you and Kurt have laid out? And Ambassador Kwong, there's the combination of those obstacles plus Syria seriously hamper in Vietnam and perhaps elsewhere in ASEAN, the appreciation of the U.S. security commitment or have our domestic troubles seriously undermined our security credibility in the region. Thank you. If I could just start, I think, look, the challenges of sequestration, budget challenges, what we're facing, it's really forced us to take a hard look at everything. What we've, and as you know, the secretary did that through a strategic choices management review. We have a quadrennial defense review coming up and it would be very nice to actually have a clear picture of where we were going and it would be very nice to have budget impasses not be the norm but be the exception and be able to really think strategically about how we move forward. But where we are, what we do know is we're able to meet the commitments that we've decided to meet. And I think Secretary Hagel was able to deliver a very clear, very confident message to counterparts across Asia that what we've established as the rebalance, what we feel we need to do to be at the table and to be invested in the region are all things we're going to be able to do no matter how things play out on the budget front. So we feel very comfortable. It's not, fortunately for us, this investing in the region is more about time, energy, exercises, doing things together. It is not involving vast, vast investments that would be really jeopardized. So it's tough, it's a tough time but we're not worried about being able to make the rebalance real. And for me, first, you have to acknowledge that there is a concern about the sustainability of the US rebalancing in the region, even the fact now, Syria, Middle East, and so on. But if you look in the longer term, I think that I agree with what Vikram Singh just mentioned, that the rebalancing is there to stay. Why? It's not because of Assad or because weak countries in the region are good enough to persuade the US to remain in the US. But it is the interest of the United States to remain engaged and committed to the region, the most dynamic region in the world now. And by that, I think that now, that's the first, the second look at the facts. I think that the Secretary Kerry just been to mission to the region, Secretary Hager just been there and we expect the US president will be in the region again. So we think that the US rebalancing is there and we are comfortable with that. And I just want to quote our president, Junten-Sang, when he was here at CSAS on July 25th, that we, in which he said, unquote, we welcome President Obama's commitment to enhance cooperation in Asia Pacific for peace stability and cooperation. And the United States, we were sent as a center pillar of this policy and supports our sensitivity in the original architecture. The US also voices support for peace stability, security and maritime security and safety in the eastern sea. Apart from TPP, so we accelerate, we Vietnam, we accelerate cooperation with the US at various forums including, you know, our satellite mechanisms, the LMI, the East Asia Summit and AIPEC and so on. We believe we've been interested in it and it's real. You didn't ask me, but can I? We did a study, as you know, Ellen at CSIS, Ernie helped us a lot at the request of the Congress, NDOD, on the forced posture strategy in Asia. Drawing from that research, I think the pivot is about Asia broadly and from, I would argue from the security perspective, the integrity of the first island chain that runs from Japan through the Philippines, the East and South China Sea is really the front line of where we want stability and reassurance and if necessary, deterrence. So in that sense it's unified, but the Southeast Asian and North Asian views of sequestration and the implications are very different. In Southeast Asia, it's mostly about what the, you know, the jargon is shaping the environment, about peacetime, engagement, building capacity, helping shore up states that are vulnerable, building cooperation and the Pentagon is getting, I think, an A plus for that and this happens to be Vikram's part of Asia. So I'm not just saying this to be nice to him, but Secretary Hagel's really been putting his money into his mouth is that, you know, exercise budgets in the middle of a sequestration are actually going up for that part of the world. The heavy lift in a way though is in North Asia where we're not just talking about so-called shaping or peacetime engagement and confidence building, these are militaries and governments, Korea and Japan, that care a lot about our capability to do the kinetic part, the war fighting part of our forward presence and commitments and their sequestration, I think, quietly has people quite nervous because if you're talking about the difference between 10 aircraft carriers and seven aircraft carriers or whether or not we can maintain, you know, ground forces on the Korean Peninsula, that's a very, very big deal. No one knows where all this is going. So there's nothing really to react to, but it's a different issue between Southeast Asia and Northeast Asia. And I think we're doing very well in Southeast Asia. I think Northeast Asia is gonna be challenging. The gentleman here. Hello. Susumu Awanohara from Medley Advisors. You've talked a lot about the framework and process, but I thought we were gonna hear about issues. And my question is, I mean, how does, how do these institutions that you talk about help tackle issues, say, like the South China Sea issues? Do they, are the countries all agreed that these institutions will take up these issues or are some countries against multilateral approach to these issues? That's a great question. And Ambassador, maybe you could start us off. Yes. I agree with you, that's a great question. So not only talking about the process and the objectives and goals, but about the issues. So I think that the, especially the AES forthcoming years, we should, the AES members countries should address the current challenges of the day. And in that sense, I mean that there are traditional security issues such as the proliferation issues, the territorial disputes, and also the non-traditional security issues such as the natural disaster, climate change, environmental degradation, food security, and world security. I think the U.S. should strengthen cooperation and current response to those challenges. And in this regard, I understand that there's discussions on the way that, and there will be a convening of the inaugural Asia Pacific Leaders Mararia Alliance to be co-chaired by the prime ministers of Australia and Vietnam on the sidelines of the eighth year, yes. And we also support Australia's proposal on the establishment of an AES connectivity forum to support the implementation of the Bali Declaration on connectivity. And we also welcome the BUNAIS proposal for the AES declaration on food security. On the maritime security and safety issues, I think that the AES should continue to cooperate on the search and rescue, combating piracy, boosting maritime connectivity, and protecting the oceans biodiversity and sustainable management of seafood resources. In view of the issues you mentioned about the East China Sea or South China Sea, which we call the Eastern Sea, the AES should further uphold its role in promoting dialogue, cooperation, and confidence building, and to work to ensure to ensure peace, stability, maritime security and safety and freedom of navigation. Exercise of self-restraint non-user force, peaceful settlement of the disputes on the basis of respect of international law, including the Unclosed 1892, and to support efforts by ASEAN and China in the effective implementation of the DOC and towards an early conclusion of the COC on the cell in the South China Sea. Let me thank you, Ambassador, and let me follow up and see if I can pull Victor or Vikram and Mike into this. Isn't it, I mean, isn't one of the broad objectives of this architecture, the EAS in particular, and ADMM and sort of if you're thinking about strategic trust building, isn't the sort of the goal addressing issues like the East Sea and the Senkakus and Dius and the South China Sea, isn't the goal to try to get everybody to the table, get everybody to ante up or have equity, and then play, make the rules together and then play by those rules? I mean, that's not gonna happen overnight, but isn't that sort of why we're in from a security point of view? Over the long haul. The problem is that some of the key players, in particular China, don't think these forms should be making rules. And we did, actually it's before you came, Ernie, but you know about this, we did a survey here at CSIS of elites across the Asian region about how they saw the role of these institutions. And there were, everyone agreed with East Asia Community Building, but there were clear divisions on the question of whether these institutions should make rules. Particularly if the rules go beyond the border. And I don't think that's been resolved at all. The survey also showed when we asked the hypothetical question 10 years from now, not today, but 10 years from now, if this architecture building continues, what institutions would you turn to or should your government turn to if there's a crisis and we had a bunch of crises, pandemics, security crisis proliferation, nobody chose EAS, ARF, nobody chose them. I don't think anyone in the region views these yet, or even in the next five to 10 years as being collective security, crisis management institutions. That doesn't mean they don't have value, but it gives you some perspective. We're doing the survey again this year, by the way, and should have the results out January timeframe. It's interesting to see if there's change. So we have to be realistic about the expectations. I worked on ARF when I was in the White House and it was like watching paint dry. And it was so, sorry Ambassador, but as you know, it was not very exciting. ARF is exciting now, not because it's the Treaty of Versailles and we're coming up with collective conclusions to problems, but because there's a real competition for influence. And that's actually a good thing in an ironic way because I think ARF has the ability to impose what I would call a kind of influence cost. So if China pushes too hard, what will happen is within the ARF there will be more support and there is more support. This year more than last for supporting a code of conduct and having some basic, very, very basic rules that you don't use coercion, that China should talk to, that ASEAN centrality matters. So it does have a dampening effect on friction that's very positive, but that's precisely because there's a competition for influence. If Beijing and Washington and other countries didn't care what ASEAN thought, we wouldn't care. We would do what we did in the late 90s with the financial crisis. We learned a big lesson when you don't listen to what ASEAN thinks. And now the Chinese are learning that lesson. So in terms of imposing a kind of cost because we both want influence, it's actually quite healthy, I think, but it's not a problem-solving institution. I think one very quick side comment that's a supporting comment. What we know these institutions can do is really increase interaction. And so on the defense side, for example, the diplomatic piece of this, some of these tensions are very much bilateral, some are very much multilateral, and they're going to probably be resolved in a variety of different ways. And at some point, the regional architecture might play a big role, it might not. And a lot of these things will take a long time. But in the meantime, there's things like reducing risk and building confidence. And those things can very much happen through these kinds of structures. So when we do multilateral exercises at sea, and it includes not only all 10 ASEAN countries, but it also pulls in the plus countries in the ADMM, including the United States, China, and others, that does make a real difference because that helps us see how our guys out there that might be sort of in the midst of what could become a conflict, how are they going to behave? How are they going to learn how to behave? And we really welcome this year ADMM in Brunei, the declaration included something new, which was language on taking concrete measures to take steps to avoid disputes escalating at sea and things like that. And I think that will support more practicing and exercising of things that can at least reduce risk. Because I think everyone acknowledges that these are tough problems. So I think I agree with Mike and Vikram about the role of EAS. I agree that it's not a problem solving institution. And EAS has been and we continue to be leaders led forum to address the issues. And the more I agree with Vikram Singh about the increasing of the interactions and it would help to create the environment for countries to solve their own problems. But it's not like a problem solving institution itself. Dr. Hot. Thanks, Marvin, Johns Hopkins, Woodrow Wilson Center. This is sort of a follow on, I think. Peter Lavoie, assistant secretary in this hall just a few days ago, speak. Okay, sorry. Anyway, there was an interesting reference in the course of that conversation about preferences within the region in terms of China and the US valuing assurances that the US is not asking the region to choose. But within the region there was a preference to deal with China and the US separately. And I'm not quite sure the implications of that and it struck me as an interesting, it was an observation, nothing more than that. But I wonder if there would be comments on the panel of whether you see that in the region, whether there's any trend lines, is there any dynamic, any change going on? And what the sort of root of that preference is? Well, I mean, ASEAN wants to be in the, is it the Catbird seat? I actually never knew what a Catbird seat was, but they want to be in the, they want to be the center of this process. And if the US and China reach some grand condominium and start deciding how issues will be resolved, then ASEAN influence will collapse very quickly. But I don't think our friends in Southeast Asia or Japan or Australia or India have to worry too much about a US-China condominium. I think it would be a good idea if we had some understanding from our friends in the region, if the US and China could actually pick some projects to work together on. Ernie and I have said maybe the US and China could do more together on Myanmar, on Burma's development. Not on democracy, we won't agree on that, but on economic development. So, Mary, it's to show that we're not in a zero-sum competition in Southeast Asia. That would be useful, and maybe we'd find some understanding. I don't think a condominium is gonna happen, but that's a bad-case scenario for anybody in Asia who's not the US or China. For countries in the region, first, we don't want to see a confrontation between China and the United States. It's in no interest of any countries in the region to see such a confrontation between China and the US. And I agree with Kurt that we also want to see a good relationship between the US and China, a cooperation between the US and China. And the US and China can cooperate to contribute to peace and stability and development, prosperity in the region is good for all countries in the region. But I agree with you that I don't think that countries in the region want to see a condominium, big powers deciding, the fate of smaller countries. So, very frankly speaking, you don't want to see it. So that's why ASEAN, we uphold to the centrality role of ASEAN in the institution building efforts and in the architecture, the regional architecture. So ASEAN always want to uphold its centrality role. Okay, it's time for one more question. The gentleman here. Gray suit. Hi, I'm Mike Pizer formally of the State Department in US Army Pacific. I'd like to ask about one particular security issue that faces the new architecture in Southeast Asia and that's US military exercises and Mil-Mil contacts. Aside, Mr. Singh referred to RIMPAC in the multilateral exercises. Aside from Cobra Gold and I think the PACPAMs or the Pacific Army Management Seminar, almost all of our relations, military to military in Asia now are bilateral. It's still a spoken wheel, whether it's Yamasakura in Japan or Balakatan or Talisman Gold, Keras Strike. They're all US military to US military. How do you see this developing over time over the next 10 years or so? Are we going to integrate China? Does the EAS need a security component and should our budget for military exercises be repivoted or pivot towards Southeast Asia taking away the enormous amount of money that goes to Japan and Northeast Asia? Will you focus Guardian and Yamasakura in moving that south perhaps to multilateral exercises that will engage all of Southeast Asia? I think Mike just mentioned, we've done a study that he led on this. So I think I'll let him start and then Vikram, you can bat clean up on this one if you would. I don't know if this is what you're thinking, Mike, but I'm a little worried in sort of reading the tea leaves that big army and other parts depending on our thinking to continue supporting this very successful engagement in Southeast Asia, they made you less in North Asia where we've historically done so much. I think that would be an enormous mistake for the reason I mentioned earlier because the stakes are higher. I mean there's more, we're talking about war and peace in North Asia in a way we aren't quite in Southeast Asia and I would hope that we don't rob North East Asia to continue a very successful engagement in Southeast Asia. The best pattern would be if we have very high-end bilateral exercises and we should be pushing them on missile defense and other things higher with Japan, Korea, Australia are sort of NATO level high-end militaries in terms of their technical capabilities. We should be multilateralizing those more. We do, the Malabar with Indians now includes Japan in most years. I'm sure the Pentagon wants to do more US, Japan, Korea. They're political issues, but those are on again, off again. And the Marine Corps is definitely gonna be doing more amphibious exercises off of Guam with the countries of Guam Marine Corps, Canada, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand. And then there should be another level where we're really multilateralizing, which gets at all the things Vikram said, confidence building in. Here I think the story's quite good. ADMM Plus has done more military exercises in this year alone than the ARF has done in its entire history. And ADMM Plus came out of nowhere. And it's a real opportunity to do what you're talking about to broadly multilateralize exercises so we can incorporate China, build some rules of the road, but you're gonna have different levels of exercises and we need to maintain the high-end ones for stability. Yeah, absolutely. I think it's a great question, and Mike, thank you also for your answer. I just, let me address something really head-on. We are absolutely rock-solid steadfast in our commitments to our core treaty allies in the region. Japan and Korea are the bedrock of the security architecture that has supported peace and stability that has dealt with what is a very real challenge. For example, from North Korea, and I don't think there should be any doubt that the United States will continue to work extremely well and closely and devote the necessary resources to the posture in those countries, to working together and to the bilateral exercises and things we need to do to make sure that those alliances are strong and capable of dealing with anything they may have to deal with. That said, it is, we are looking at the hub-and-spoke model of old in a very new context, and it is entirely appropriate and necessary that we actually start to focus on doing more with more partners, networking more partners together in support of common interests. And so I think what you will see is a continuation and a commitment to our bilateral engagements and what we do with our allies and closest partners bilaterally. You will see some of those bilateral things sometimes on again, off again and sometimes more systematically, multilateralizing, drawing in more partners. If you think about things like Cobra Gold, they have grown and grown and grown and increased more, and that's because it's something that we and our Thai partners see as a good thing to do. There will be exercises that we choose to keep bilateral. And I think you're gonna see a really significant commitment on our part two more multilateral exercises like those that are hosted by ASEAN. So I think a multilateralization is a foot, and I think it's exactly what we wanna see. We see great value in those. I think Brunei hosted an HADR, MilMed exercise as one of the ADMM exercises. 18 countries, some 3,000 military personnel from 18 countries, including us, including China. Great, we had US officers on the Chinese hospital ship, the Peace Arc, every day of that exercise. I mean, these are opportunities that you really can't overestimate how important it is that these kinds of activities are happening, and it's a very hopeful thing that these kinds of things, these activities are happening in the region. So I think you'll see us doing more multilateral stuff. I do not think it will come at the expense of our core alliances. Well, let me just announce we are going to wrap up the session. I'm gonna ask you all to join me in thanking the speakers in a second. Hang on, but before I do that, I just wanna remind everybody who's watching online, we're gonna break for lunch now. You have 15 minutes to go and get lunch. It's in the back or in the room back here. Our team will show you where that is. Get lunch, we're gonna come back. Keynote speech by Scott Marcel, who's the principal deputy assistant secretary in the East Asia Pacific Division of State, and a great discussion on economic and business issues this afternoon. So please join me in thanking this excellent panel. Thank you. It's a really good discussion.