The United States has just signed an agreement that will give it a stake in the Strait of Malacca, the world’s most important natural waterway. Meanwhile, Indonesia has just found a partner to protect it from China.
On April 13, Indonesia and the United States signed major defense partnerships The Pentagon said the agreement would “serve as a guiding framework for advancing bilateral defense cooperation.” The agreement has “three fundamental pillars” – capacity building, training and business cooperation.
Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world and the largest archipelagic country in the world. Also considering a letter of intent to facilitate U.S. entryFly into its airspace for emergency operations and standard transit, depending on the circumstances.
Details of the April agreement were scant, and the real test will, of course, be how both sides move “from paper to practice.” However, because of China, the United States and Indonesia all have reasons to solidify their relationship into a lasting military partnership.
“Indonesia needs friends, in fact we all need friends,” James Holmes, JC Wylie chair of maritime strategy at the U.S. Naval War College, told me this month. “Mutual access helps us jointly fight back against Chinese aggression.”
We start from the Strait of Malacca. The waterway borders Malaysia to the north and the Indonesian island of Sumatra to the south, controlling the shortest route from East Asia to the Indian Ocean. As such, it is part of the busiest transit corridor between Asia’s economic powerhouses (China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan) and Europe and Africa.
through choke point An estimated 23.2 million barrels of oil flow dailyaccounting for approximately 29% of global maritime oil transportation volume. Last year, more than 102,500 ships passed through the strait. The strait is of vital importance to China. Nearly two-thirds of the country’s maritime tradeApproximately 80% of oil imports are transported via waterways.
Indonesia has traditionally adopted a non-aligned stance, but has particularly close relations with China. Therefore, the defense partnership is clearly tilted in favor of the United States. Beijing cannot be happy now, but the Chinese have only themselves to blame for alienating Jakarta.
First, Beijing persists in its baseless claims to the Natuna Islands, which were apparently part of Indonesia until 2015. However, China has not recognized Indonesia’s rights to the exclusive economic zone of the South China Sea Islands in accordance with the requirements of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Beijing insists it has rights without recognized legal backingtraditional fishing grounds” in Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone.
China claims sovereignty over most of the South China Sea with a ten-dash line. There, Beijing hired gray area What it calls “a strategy of periodic incursions into Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone”blue hull“Fishing boats organized into maritime militia, China Coast Guard said”white hull“.
Jakarta has been slow to acknowledge China’s designs on its 17,508 islands. Holmes told me that in 2012, during a speech he gave at an institute in Paris, an Indonesian diplomat, “with a silly smile on his face,” expressed no concern about China’s hostile behavior toward the Philippines at Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea.
“Look at the map,” the maritime scholar told the diplomat, referring to China’s southward push through that disputed body of water. “It was clear, even then, that Beijing would expand southward. And it did.”
To counter China’s southward expansionism and protect its waters from Chinese encroachment, Indonesia maintains what appears to be a three-pronged strategy. First, Jakarta, while not formally relinquishing its claims, has tried to appease Beijing by using ambiguous and loose language in its official dealings with China. For example, in November 2024, President Prabowo Subianto Formal written expression of willingness to jointly develop the North Natuna SeaThis is the first time Jakarta has made such an important concession.
Second, Indonesia used force to keep Chinese ships out of the country. For example, Indonesia has repeatedly Seize and destroy invading fishing boatsincluding from China.
Third, Jakarta has been developing military ties with Australia, Japan, India and France. Now it’s with one of the most powerful countries on earth, the United States
Last month’s deal also furthered Washington’s goals. If the United States has had any consistent foreign policy in its 250 years, it has been to defend the global commons. Now, the United States has a foothold at a critical choke point. China, seeking maritime dominance, is the biggest loser.
Gordon Chang yes”Plan Red: China’s Plan to Destroy the United States” and”China is about to collapse.“
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