The most useful place to start thinking about Taiwan’s predicament is not the Taiwan Strait. It is Southeast Asia, and how the region evaluates the reliability of external powers. The latest “State of Southeast Asia” survey shows that Japan enjoys high trust across ASEAN. Japan is trusted because it has been materially present and strategically active without being coercive. Most powers in Asia fail at that combination. In Indonesia, trust has softened and the reasons are structural. Jakarta, under Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, is maximizing optionality, refusing to anchor itself to any single partner. Everyone loses relative salience. Meanwhile, Japan’s attention has drifted northward. Taiwan, the constitutional debate, the trilateral with Washington and Seoul. Southeast Asian elites register that drift. They say nothing. They adjust.
Leggi l’articolo integrale su Taipei Times.
