Amid ASEAN's Inaction, the Block's Members Look to External Partners for Security

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations' (ASEAN) inactivity on core issues at its most recent summit will diminish ASEAN's importance and slowly compel its members to align with China or the United States. On Sept. 5-7, Indonesia hosted the 43rd ASEAN summit and related meetings, which brought together leaders of the bloc's 10 countries (except Myanmar, whose military leaders are suspended from meetings). Heads of state from India, Japan, South Korea, Australia and Canada and high-level officials from the United States, China and Russia also attended. Despite this prominent gathering of world leaders, the bloc made little progress in resolving its primary issues, including the ongoing civil war in Myanmar; instead of taking steps to enforce peace or Myanmar's adherence to the 2021 five-point consensus peace plan, ASEAN stripped Myanmar of its right to chair the bloc in 2026. Meanwhile, none of the meetings' joint statements mentioned territorial disputes in...