INTRODUCTION

Since the main topic is on the evolving security environment of Southeast Asia, particularly on external security challenges of Southeast Asia, this introduction will include two other problems that are internal security concerns for Southeast Asia. First is the domestic challenges due to the financial crisis (and generally globalization) which put a lot of new pressure on the developing societies of Southeast Asia. They are not only economic in nature but also social, political and even cultural or the values system that have been touched and changed.

The second challenge is the new relations in ASEAN created not only by the expansion of its membership from six to ten Southeast Asian nations, but also by the new challenges of globalization that put a lot more pressure on the relationship. This is due to the expectations of the greater East Asian and Asia-Pacific regions on the regional entity, ASEAN, while the entity could not be advanced or expanded due to the limitations of some of its new members and to the diversity of political systems and economic development among them.

These two internal challenges could be more devastating to Southeast Asia than any external security challenges, because in fact, outside threats directed towards Southeast Asian states are non-existent in the foreseeable future. However, there are developments in the East Asian region that could become sources of instability for the whole region and affect the security of Southeast Asian states indirectly. They are the potential conflicts across the straits between China and Taiwan, and the problem of proliferation of nuclear weapons in the Korean peninsula. Another source is the nuclear stand-off in the sub-continent between India and Pakistan.

In addition, there are new threats and challenges coming to the region (and globally), namely, the problem of global and regional terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). These new asymmetrical threats are non-state in nature but are very damaging because they are distinct from earlier domestic political terrorism. The terrorists form a global network based on a very extreme interpretation of Islam and they have no qualms about killing innocent people anywhere and in big numbers.