This book undertakes an in-depth examination of the dynamics of commitment in U.S.-Southeast Asia strategy. Drawing on cases including the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam and Washington’s pivot to Asia amid China’s growing regional role, it constructs an original balance of commitment model to explain continuity and change in U.S.-Southeast Asia policy. Balance of commitment goes beyond balance of power approaches to explains how translating Southeast Asia’s importance in U.S. thinking into actual commitments has proven challenging for policymakers as it requires simultaneously calibrating adjustments to power shifts, threat perceptions and resource extraction. The book applies the balance of commitment approach to several practical case studies, based on hundreds of conversations with policymakers and experts in the United States and Southeast Asia, personal experiences across nearly two decades and primary and secondary source material across a half-century. The findings suggest that the challenges of U.S. commitment to the region are rooted not simply in differences between administrations or divergences in outlook between Washington and regional capitals, but tough balancing acts for U.S. policymakers in domestic politics and wider foreign policy. As such, shaping U.S. strategy in Southeast Asia and calibrating and sustaining commitment requires not just appreciating Southeast Asia’s significance, but committing to the region in ways that manage structural aspects of U.S. thinking, capabilities and resourcing.

Since the sudden disappearance of the Soviet Union, many scholars have argued that the balance of power theory is losing its relevance. This text examines this viewpoint, as well as looking at systematic factors that may hinder or favour the return of balance of power politics.

Bridging the perceived gap between Southeast Asia's historical and contemporary situations, Donald McCloud focuses on continuities in the region's internal dynamics as well as its relationship to the greater global environment. The author challenges widely held views that diversity and fragmentation are the hallmarks of the region, identifying instead the commonalities that have bound the countries of Southeast Asia together through at least two millennia and have provided the basis for a unique regional dynamic. It has only been since World War II that Southeast Asians, long influenced by the global environment, have defined and developed their own institutions, social structures, and communities. Turning away from inadequate and unadaptable Western institutions, they have begun to create structures more in tune with their own historical experiences. Particularly in the political sphere, many of these new structures seemed to be straightforward military dictatorships. However, time has shown them to be more complex, and many unique organizational practices have developed that may presage more open political systems—if not democracies by strict Western definitions. With the expansion of regional cooperation through ASEAN and strong economic growth, confidence among Southeast Asian states has grown as well. The growing references to an "Asian way" of life have given verbal expression to a surge in neotraditional values and behavior that have always been part of the fabric of Asian life but that in the past were frowned upon as "nonwestern." This text traces the evolution of Southeast Asia and focuses for the first time on the neotraditional bases for contemporary, independent development of the region.

Southeast Asia, although not garnering the headlines of ten to twenty years ago, is important in global politics. Vietnam's domination of Indochina, for example, has polarized the region, given the Soviet Union new regional access, and magnified the military threat to Thailand. Insurgency movements supported by the radical Left or Right continue to plague governments. The Strait of Malacca, the major sea-lane through Southeast Asia, provides primary access for the U.S. Pacific fleet to the Indian Ocean and the Middle East and is Japan's oil lifeline. U.S. commercial and military interests remain strong in the Philippines and are expanding in Indonesia, the world's fifth largest country (with a population approaching 170 million people), whereas Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore are sources for investment, raw materials, and potential markets. Thailand, once closely allied with the United States, has again renewed those ties in the face of Vietnam's expansion. This comprehensive, up-to-date textbook analyzes Southeast Asia in the context of regional and global political systems, both traditional and contemporary. After looking at the traditional patterns of interstate relations in the region, Professor McCloud shows that Southeast Asia has been and continues to be dependent on the global system. However, he also identifies a "neotraditional current" in contemporary Southeast Asian politics, as elements of traditional beliefs and values reassert themselves in policy and practice, redefine the patterns of interstate behavior in the region, and set the limits to dependence on the global system. The book is intended as a primary text for courses on the history or politics of Asia or Southeast Asia, regional development and integration, and the role of Southeast Asia in world politics. It will also be useful in survey courses in Asian studies, comparative politics, and Third World development.

At the end of the Cold War, the United States emerged as the world's most powerful state, and then used that power to initiate wars against smaller countries in the Middle East and South Asia. According to balance-of-power theory--the bedrock of realism in international relations--other states should have joined together militarily to counterbalance the United States' rising power. Yet they did not. Nor have they united to oppose Chinese aggression in the South China Sea or Russian offensives along its western border. This does not mean balance-of-power politics is dead, argues renowned international relations scholar T. V. Paul; instead it has taken a different form. Rather than employ familiar strategies such as active military alliances and arms buildups, leading powers have engaged in "soft balancing," which seeks to restrain threatening powers through the use of international institutions, informal alignments, and economic sanctions. Paul places the evolution of balancing behavior in historical perspective, from the post-Napoleonic era to today's globalized world. This book offers an illuminating examination of how subtler forms of balance-of-power politics can help states achieve their goals against aggressive powers without wars or arms races.

Douglas Pike, an eminent authority on Southeast Asia and particularly on Vietnam, wrote: “Dr. Nguyen Anh Tuan is a highly respected economist and political thinker. Even perhaps for our purpose here, he is a man of great breadth of view, a philosopher in the true meaning of the word...” In America Coming to Terms, Dr. Nguyen Anh Tuan addresses himself to the central issue of the Vietnam War. This ambitious study seeks to place the U.S. involvement in Vietnam into the broader context of American and world history. The legacy of the Vietnam War remains a critical topic, particularly with the war in Iraq generating the specter of conflicting partisan politics in a deeply divided country. America’s involvement in Vietnam was misunderstood at the time and is still misrepresented now. As the Iraq War often invites comparisons with the Vietnam War, a full understanding of the U.S. experience in Vietnam is essential. More importantly, lessons learned from Vietnam can be applied to Iraq at present as well as to any U.S. conflict in the future. America Coming to Terms will help the American public to better understand the real legacy of the Vietnam War. It will provide Americans – liberal as well as conservative, Democrat as well as Republican – with substantive reasons to be united and to be proud of America. Most importantly, it will meaningfully impact the writing of American history for future generations and change for the better the world’s perception of the American people and of America. Steven Hayward, a most distinguished scholar wrote: “Revisionist historians two or three generations from now are likely to begin making the argument that the United States won the ultimate victory in the Vietnam War, and that it should be seen as the turning point in the Cold War...” In America Coming to Terms, Dr. Tuan set the record straight that – notwithstanding a number of mistakes that were committed – not only America won the Cold War but, ultimately, also won the Vietnam War.

This book studies the activities undertaken by the ASEAN states and reflects the inspiration and support of many individuals. The ASEAN phenomenon is about the successful consultative process, the accommodation, that these states used in managing tensions and dealing with external environments.

The foreign policy of the People's Republic of China has been dominated in recent decades by the problems of dealing with the other major powers in East Asia. Although many ideological, political, and economic aims have shaped particular Chinese policies, Peking's dominant concern has been national security. Since the late 1960s, its leaders have viewed the Soviet Union as the primary threat to China and have pursued a distinctive, Maoist, balance-of-power strategy against it. China's post-Mao leaders continue to give priority to strategic considerations and the problems of relations with the other major powers. It cannot be assumed, however, that they will simply continue past policies. The recent changes both within China and in the broad pattern of international relations in East Asia have created a new situation. In this study, A. Doak Barnett analyzes in detail China's bilateral relations with the Soviet Union, Japan, and the United States. He also examines the changing nature of the four-power relationship in East Asia. On this basis, he discusses possible future trends in Chinese policy and the prospects for achieving a more stable regional equilibrium.