The Vietnam War was not a uniquely American experience to write songs about. The three-verse, Russian-language song No Sleep for Me in Hanoi features a Soviet military personnel who finds himself unable to sleep at night. Filled with nostalgia, he recalls his snow-bound hometown by the Volga, as Hanoi’s Red River flows on in the distance. This cultural memento came from Russia’s first sustained engagement with Southeast Asia.
Almost half a century later, a revived Russia is seeking to expand ties with the region. While the ASEAN-Russia dialogs began in 1996, Moscow’s comprehensive and significant diplomacy in the region took off only after President Vladimir Putin announced Russia’s new Turn to the East policy in 2010. Crafted amid falling oil prices and Western economic sanctions, the policy initially aimed at taking advantage of China’s meteoric economic growth. The imperative for diversification after China’s economy slowed down meant Russia also needed to make inroads further south.
The question that arises, however, is whether Russia is truly serious in engaging countries in Southeast Asia. Its participation in ASEAN-led forums like the East Asia Summit and the ASEAN Regional Forum have been unimpressive. Trade mainly involves natural resources, energy technology and arms sales, and in 2016 only reached slightly over US$13 billion. On the South China Sea, an issue that divides Southeast Asia, Russia takes a neutral position as if careful not to offend its two most important partners in Asia, China and Vietnam.
Moreover, the type of leaders Russia is courting in the region is causing some disquiet. As our first Spotlight article from the Nikkei Asian Review details, Russia is throwing its weight behind less-than-progressive, if democratically elected, leaders like Cambodia’s Premier Hun Sen and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. In doing so, Moscow is taking a page out of Beijing’s playbook in Southeast Asia. Regional leaders of this mold respond well to Russia’s maneuvers as it represents an opportunity to break out of Western pressure without having to turn completely towards China.
Nevertheless, questions remain about the ambiguous nature of ASEAN-Russia relations. Our second Spotlight report – very topical and relevant albeit a year old — by a New Zealand-based professor studying Russian foreign policy toward the region, outlines the potential and the limits of bilateral relations. By virtue of its size and military might, Russia sees itself as a natural and perennial great power in world politics. Southeast Asians agree with this Russian self-image up to a point. However, Russia’s greatest attraction for people in Southeast Asia is its soft power.
Because ASEAN and Russia have no meaningful economic ties, they can have no long-term political engagement. Trade patterns between ASEAN countries and Russia clearly show that Russia offers little in goods and services, apart from arms and energy, that ASEAN countries can sustainably rely on. Likewise, for most of Russia’s eurocentric elites, Southeast Asia is too much on the periphery in their grand scheme of world politics. This is weak support on which to build a durable engagement.
