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Establishing maritime guardrails in the Indo-Pacific: Mutual cooperation
Southeast Asian states can explore new international sea-lane alternatives to avoid certain routes that are prone to conflict and marine ecosystem disruptions, or routes with navigational accident potentials.
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Brotherhood of the sea: Indonesian Navy sailors look on as a Royal Australian Navy warship passes during a joint exercise in the Java Sea, on Oct. 29, 2021. The joint training, named Exercise New Horizon 2021, lasted until Nov. 3, 2021. (Courtesy of /Information Center, Indonesian Navy Eastern Fleet Command)
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eflected in the increase of world trade volume by sea, the Sea Lanes of Trade (SLOT) in the Pacific and Indian Ocean have become more crowded in recent decades, along with the increasing pace of economic growth in Asia.
Besides the density of the SLOT at the sea surface, undersea cables are also increasingly being laid on the seabed as the backbone of world communications.
However, the SLOT is facing disturbance from traditional and non-traditional threats, ranging from misperceptions between countries and transnational organized crimes, to pollution and environmental degradation. Transnational organized crimes have harnessed technological advances, resulting in the growing trend of various criminal acts with crime patterns that law enforcers find it more difficult to detect.
These growing challenges should give an impetus to regional cooperation to establish maritime guardrails or mechanisms to secure the region from various threats, as their transnational character requires joint awareness among countries and regional organizations.
However, balancing political ends and economic imperatives is an art form. It requires a measurable scheme and mechanism to be tailored to each country's national interests and regional organizations' interests.
Dealing with multifaceted threats at sea requires cooperation between Southeast Asian states at various levels. This cooperation requires trust as its foundation. Southeast Asian states could enact several maritime security cooperation programs as a concrete effort for trust building.
First, it is important to open effective communication channels. Currently, interstate maritime security cooperation already has existing lines of communication that can be further improved, while interregional maritime security cooperation still needs to be built together.
