East Asia is fast emerging as a new theater for an arms race. With the end of the cold war and the disappearance of the Russian threat, the East Asian Nations are not sure who is their enemy and who will protect them in a future war, The US is reducing its presence overseas and the countries in the region feel rich enough to build their own armed forces.
In March, Indonesia bought a third of the former East German Naval to strengthen its own fleet. Malaysia was shopping for fighter planes at discounted prices, while the western nations and Russia vied with each other to sell their military hardware.
It is believed that the East Asian nation alone made 35% of all major weapon purchases in 1991, at this place of spending this part of the world is likely to become the most heavily armed region by the end of the century.
China’s defense spending has increased by 50% in two years Singapore’s arms budget increased by 23% followed by Malaysia Taiwan and Thailand are showing double digit spurts.
South Korea is alarmed by the N. Korean nuclear build up. Though one of the last communist states, N. Korea is considerably dangerous and poses a real threat with its withdrawal from the NPT three weeks ago refused permission to inspect its nuclear installations. So South Korea has a good reason to beef up, Taiwan too is shopping for arms furiously, to assert its independence from mainland China, It bought 150 F16 jets from US and is seeking an 100 hundred modern jet fighters from France in addition to many Naval vessels it has acquired, Japan has been unsettled by all this. Being the most modem military power in the region, it has military budget larger than that of many western nations. What if this uneasiness gets translated into a military aggressiveness? Japan seeks a strong US presence in the area but the Clinton administration has no inclination to reiterate from its declared aim of slashing overseas military spending. As things stands there is hardly any sign of a let up in the increasing militarization of East Asia.
Article extracted from this publication >> April 16, 1993
