Singapore's Foreign Policy: Coping with Vulnerability (Politics in Asia Series)

Singapore’s Foreign Policy

This book assesses the profound influence on Singapore’s foreign policy of its government’s perception of the island-state’s innate vulnerability. In the years following its traumatic separation from Malaysia, Singapore has established itself as the leading economy in South-East Asia. Its economic strength has carried it through the East Asian economic crisis at the end of the 1990s, as well as providing the resources for a modern defence capability. Singapore’s economic and military strength and its bilateral and multilateral diplomatic achievements have ensured its international status. Yet, despite an assured place within the international community, Singapore’s foreign policy has continued to be influenced by a deep-seated sense of vulnerability. That vulnerability arises from a limited physical scale, a confined geopolitical location and a prevailing ethnic-Chinese identity, which troubles close neighbours. Singapore’s political leaders, from the first Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, onwards have never allowed themselves to take the sovereign status or the political future of the island-state for granted. That abiding concern underlies its conduct of foreign policy. Michael Leifer is Director of the Asia Research Centre at the London School of Economics and Political Science. His previous publications include ASEAN and the Security of South-East Asia and Dictionary of the Modern Politics of South-East Asia.

Politics in Asia series Edited by Michael Leifer London School of Economics and Political Science ASEAN and the Security of South-East Asia Michael Leifer China’s Policy towards Territorial Disputes The Case of the South China Sea Islands Chi-kin Lo India and Southeast Asia Indian Perceptions and Policies Mohammed Ayoob Gorbachev and Southeast Asia Leszek Buszynski Indonesian Politics under Suharto Order, Development and Pressure for Change Michael R.J. Vatikiotis The State and Ethnic Politics in Southeast Asia David Brown The Politics of Nation Building and Citizenship in Singapore Michael Hill and Lian Kwen Fee Politics in Indonesia Democracy, Islam and the Ideology of Tolerance Douglas E. Ramage Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore Beng-Huat Chua The Challenge of Democracy in Nepal Louise Brown

Japan’s Asia Policy Wolf Mendl The International Politics of the Asia-Pacific, 1945–1995 Michael Yahuda Political Change in Southeast Asia Trimming the Banyan Tree Michael R.J. Vatikiotis Hong Kong China’s Challenge Michael Yahuda Korea versus Korea A Case of Contested Legitimacy B.K. Gills Taiwan and Chinese Nationalism National Identity and Status in International Society Christopher Hughes Managing Political Change in Singapore The Elected Presidency Kevin Y.L. Tan and Lam Peng Er Islam in Malaysian Foreign Policy Shanti Nair Political Change in Thailand Democracy and Participation Kevin Hewison The Politics of NGOs in South-East Asia Participation and Protest in the Philippines Gerard Clarke

Malaysian Politics under Mahathir R.S. Milne and Diane K. Mauzy Indonesia and China The Politics of a Troubled Relationship Rizal Sukma Arming the Two Koreas State, Capital and Military Power Taik-young Hamm Engaging China The Management of an Emerging Power Edited by Alastair Iain Johnston and Robert S. Ross

Philippine Politics and Society in the Twentieth Century Colonial Legacies, PostColonial Trajectories Eva-Lotta E. Hedman and John T. Sidel Constructing a Security Community in Southeast Asia ASEAN and the Problem of Regional Order Amitav Acharya

Singapore’s Foreign Policy Coping with vulnerability

Michael Leifer

First published 2000 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2001. © 2000 Michael Leifer All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Leifer, Michael. Singapore’s foreign policy: coping with vulnerability / Michael Leifer. p. cm. – (Politics in Asia) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Singapore–Foreign relations. I. Title. II. Politics in Asia series. DS610.7 .L44 2000 327.5957–dc21 99-088864 ISBN ISBN ISBN ISBN

0-415-23352-6 (hbk) 0-415-23353-4 (pbk) 0-203-12951-2 Master e-book ISBN 0-203-17687-1 (Glassbook Format)

For my grandchildren: Rose and Robert Eben and Zoe Freddie, Hattie and James

I thought our people should understand how vulnerable Singapore was and is, the dangers that beset us and how we nearly did not make it. Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story (Singapore: Times Editions, 1998)

Contents

Preface Introduction

xiii 1

1 Singapore: the foreign policy of an exceptional state

10

2 The battle for sovereignty

43

3 Accommodating and transcending regional locale

68

4 Singapore and the powers

98

5 Driving and suffering the region?

131

Conclusion: coping with vulnerability

157

Notes Index

163 173

Preface

As a young academic, who developed a professional interest in South-East Asia while teaching at the University of Adelaide, Singapore was my first port of call in that region. At the time, the island enjoyed only self-governing status with foreign affairs and defence the responsibility of the British colonial power. Singapore’s entry into the Federation of Malaysia followed soon after my first visit and then, within less than two years, an unanticipated independence was acquired. The Singapore story has been told in many forms, including the autobiographical version of the road to independence in August 1965 by Lee Kuan Yew, the island-state’s first Prime Minister. This volume takes up the foreign policy dimension of the Singapore story from that historic juncture. Singapore inspires admiration and respect primarily because of its economic and social accomplishments but its diplomatic role has not been the subject of the same attention. This volume is not intended as a tribute to Singapore, although it may appear to read as such. It represents an attempt to explore and explain Singapore’s conduct of foreign policy with reference to the same realist outlook that has characterised the approach to economic development and urban planning. The term ‘vulnerability’ in the title has been chosen because it expresses a condition experienced in Singapore on the morrow of a traumatic separation from Malaysia and a move to international status that has remained an abiding factor in the minds of those responsible for foreign policy. That factor has persisted as an underlying premise despite the remarkable changes in Singapore’s material condition and defence capability that have taken place since independence. Because Singapore’s circumstances are unique, it does not necessarily follow that there are clear lessons to be learned by other states from its conduct of foreign

xiv

Preface

relations. Nonetheless, that conduct is of sufficient intrinsic interest to be worth recounting for its own sake. This volume has been lurking in the mind of the author for many years as he has returned continually to an ever changing island-state. Many Singaporeans have been of considerable assistance in this endeavour, whether knowingly or not, so it would be invidious to single out specific individuals for gratitude. Moreover, a number of those whom I might wish to single out would almost certainly not wish to be identified. I would, however, like to express my appreciation for the assistance that I have received as well as for academic hospitality provided at various times by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies in Singapore.

Michael Leifer London November 1999

Introduction

Most member states of the United Nations take their independent existence for granted; at least, most of the time. Despite the complex security problems addressed by the world body with mixed success, it is the great exception rather than the rule for its member states to be confronted continually by the prospect of political extinction. On the surface, the island-Republic of Singapore, located at the southern tip of peninsular Malaysia, would seem to fall within this general rule and not to be compared, for example, with Kuwait, whose sovereign status has been under threat from Iraq. By contrast, the sovereign status of Singapore has not been questioned or been placed in any doubt since its independence in August 1965 and its uncontested entry into the United Nations in the following month. The government of Singapore, however, has never taken the island-state’s sovereign status for granted; a supposition which has been registered in a practice of foreign policy predicated on countering an innate vulnerability. That vulnerability is a function of a minuscule scale, a predominantly ethnicChinese identity associated with a traditional entrepôt role and also a location wedged between the sea and airspace of two larger neighbours with which Singapore has never been politically at ease. Underlying structural tensions with those neighbours is a deep-seated concern in Singapore that they have never fully come to terms with its separate sovereignty Singapore is limited in size, with an area of some 648 square kilometres which can be crossed by military aircraft in 3 minutes. It is also limited in population to 3.2 million citizens and permanent residents of mixed ethnicity. Another 600,000 temporary residents on the island are foreign nationals, the bulk of whom are construction workers and maids. Of Singapore’s nationals, approximately just over three-quarters are ethnic-Chinese, while the remainder are primarily Malay (14 per cent) and of South Asian origin (8 per cent). The perpetuation of racial divisions beyond the work-place led Prime

2 Introduction Minister Goh Chok Tong to maintain in May 1999 that Singapore was still a fragile society and not yet a nation.1 Indeed, in August 1999, the government backed away from holding a popular election for president – an elective office under the constitution – for fear that their preferred Indian candidate would lose to any credible Chinese opponent. A combination of limited scale and a potential domestic fragility, together with a confined geographic location, has served to generate worst-case thinking in foreign policy, even though that location has also been a source of Singapore’s material good fortune. Singapore, with a remarkable natural harbour, occupies a prized location at the junction of communications between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world’s busiest port in terms of tonnage. Its acclaimed international airport at Changi is linked to 151 cities in 51 countries by 65 airlines, while flagcarrier Singapore Airlines and its subsidiary, Silk Air, serve 92 cities in 42 countries. It was Singapore’s location and harbour which attracted its founding British pro-consul, Thomas Stamford Raffles, in 1819. Location and harbour served as the basis for the island’s economic transformation from fishing shelter to regional entrepôt under British colonial rule. An astounding economic performance since independence has transformed a traditional entrepôt role into a modern globalised version, but without removing an underlying antipathy on the part of neighbouring states. Those predominantly Malay-Muslim states still harbour the stereotype that an ethnic-Chinese Singapore exists in a parasitic economic relationship with its regional locale. A perceived triumphalism over its achievements on the part of Singapore’s leaders has served to sustain such a stereotype and mutual mistrust. Despite an abiding sense of vulnerability, no open threat or act of force has been directed at Singapore’s territory since independence, when the island was separated constitutionally from the Federation of Malaysia. It had joined the newly created Malaysia in September 1963 after more than four years of self-government, following nearly a century and a half of colonial rule interrupted by a brutal Japanese occupation during the Pacific War. From January 1963, neighbouring Indonesia had engaged in a form of coercive diplomacy, described as Confrontation, intended to challenge and deny Malaysia’s international legitimacy. Indonesia was responsible for limited acts of terror and intimidation within Singapore but did not assert any claim to the island’s territory. Confrontation was ended within a year of Singapore’s independence, leading on to diplomatic relations with Jakarta in 1967 and also to a maritime boundary agreement in 1973. A corresponding maritime boundary agreement with Malaysia was not concluded until 1995. Since

Introduction 3 independence, no claims have been pressed to any of the territory of the Republic, with the exception of Malaysia’s assertion of title in 1979 to the tiny offshore island of Pedra Branca (Pulau Batu Puteh) whose Horsburgh Lighthouse commands the eastern channel of the Singapore Strait. Both governments have since agreed to submit that dispute to the International Court of Justice. Singapore’s assured international status is demonstrated by its conduct of diplomatic relations with all of its regional neighbours in South-East Asia and with all Asia-Pacific and European powers. It enjoys diplomatic relations with 158 states, although limited human resources have restricted full overseas missions to only thirty-seven states and international organisations. Despite that restriction, Singapore is engaged also in three important intra-regional networks of multilateral diplomacy; namely, the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). It is engaged also in a transregional dialogue between Asia and Europe, the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM), with a fifth with Latin America in gestation. Its government was responsible for taking the initiative in establishing the ARF and in the dialogues with Europe and Latin America. Singapore also looks forward for the first time to assuming in 2001 a non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. On the surface, despite its limited size, prevailing ethnic identity and confined location, Singapore would seem to be an eminently secure state, especially when one takes into account its remarkable economic accomplishments since independence, which have given the island-state an international reputation for excellence. Those economic accomplishments, particularly in the management of national finances, have enabled the islandstate to cope much better than any of its neighbours with the impact of acute economic adversity which struck South-East Asia with contagious effect from mid-1997. Such economic success has given Singapore the resources for building a modern defence capability beyond the capacity of its close neighbours. A constant defence budget of around 5 per cent of GDP has permitted the procurement of the most modern equipment. For example, Singapore’s fighter aircraft can strike up to 1,000 miles from their runways, while air-borne radar provides 20 minutes’ early warning as opposed to under a minute scrambling time with only ground-based facilities. In August 1965, at least in the absence of a protecting British military presence, Singapore could have been readily

4 Introduction overwhelmed by an external predator. That prospect no longer obtains given the deterrent capability currently deployed.2 Despite its economic and diplomatic accomplishments as well as its defence capability, Singapore is a state whose foreign policy is rooted in a culture of siege and insecurity which dates from the traumatic experience of an unanticipated separation from Malaysia in August 1965. That culture has been sustained, in part, because the government of Singapore has been drawn continuously from the People’s Action Party (PAP) that first assumed office in June 1959. Separation from Malaysia has been represented consistently by the ruling PAP as an eviction: an interpretation that has become part of national folklore. Singapore’s founding moment occurred against a background of Sino-Malay racial tension within Malaysia and an intense suspicion and antipathy between the political leaders of the federal government and those of its erstwhile island constituent that have never been truly put to rest. It occurred also in the context of a continuing campaign of Confrontation by Indonesia. A resolution between Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur was effected in August 1966 without Singapore’s participation. Indeed, that resolution took place against the background of a seeming collusion based on a declared shared ethnic-Malay identity defined by implication with reference to the majority ethnic-Chinese state. Singapore is, of course, the only one of its kind after the People’s Republic of China, if one excepts the ambiguous international status of Taiwan. Separation from Malaysia occurred also against the background of a longstanding conventional wisdom about the non-viability of an independent and primarily urban Singapore that had lacked a natural hinterland since an earlier imposed separation by Britain from peninsular Malaya in 1946. That nonviability was exemplified, above all, by the island’s dependence on Malaysia’s state of Johor for drinking water, which had been a critical factor in Britain’s surrender of Singapore to invading Japanese forces in February 1942. In addition, a lack of self-sufficiency in food supply has increased exponentially over the years with successful industrial growth and trade dependency. The acute sense of vulnerability experienced on separation served to justify a stateled philosophy of ‘survival’ that has never been fully relinquished, partly because of a concern that political turbulence within close neighbours could generate acts of adventurism at Singapore’s expense. Such turbulence within Indonesia during the early 1960s was an important source of Confrontation of Malaysia. An apprehension of adventurism at Singapore’s expense has been sustained over time in respect of both close neighbours, Indonesia and

Introduction 5 Malaysia, despite a growing economic interdependence with each, and even bilateral and multilateral security cooperation. That apprehension was renewed against the background of regional economic adversity from mid1997 which served to precipitate political change in Indonesia and a challenge to the established political order in Malaysia, leading in both cases to a downturn in relations with Singapore. A concurrent antagonism with Indonesia and Malaysia has been the prime political fear of Singapore’s governments. At issue for Singapore in such circumstances has been more than a matter of the disability of limited size. A confined, albeit prized, geopolitical position at the southern tip of peninsular Malaysia has meant that access by sea and by air requires passage through Indonesian and Malaysian sea and airspace. Indeed, both civil and military air passage has been denied on occasions by Malaysia. Moreover, Singapore’s ethnic-Chinese majority of migrant origins, combined with a modernised entrepôt role in and beyond the regional economy, has projected an alien identity within a predominantly MalayMuslim locale. Singapore’s undoubted accomplishments have been regarded with mixed feelings within that locale, where ethnic-Chinese have long been objects of enmity and suspicion. Indeed, concurrent with political change in Indonesia in May 1998, the Chinese community there experienced pogroms marked by destruction of property, rape and loss of life. In the circumstances, where Singapore may be represented as a cork afloat in a potentially raging sea, nothing is taken for granted in international relations. Indeed, the pronouncements of government spokesmen, at times punctuated with references to Niccolò Machiavelli and Thomas Hobbes, fit well into the less than fashionable realist paradigm of International Relations. As early as October 1966, founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew asserted that ‘in the last resort it is power which decides what happens and, therefore, it behoves us to ensure that we always have overwhelming power on our side’.3 Such an outlook is predicated on the conviction that, without access to countervailing power, the biggest bully on the block will do as he pleases. Such reasoning, underpinned by a belief in the tenets of Social Darwinism, has shaped the culture of Singapore’s foreign policy. The practice of its policy may be described in general terms as a paradoxical combination of nonalignment and balance of power, with an emphasis on the latter. That paradox may be explained as an attempt to reconcile an avoidance of engagement in the quarrels of major states with persisting efforts to secure access to benign external countervailing power in the national interest. Balance of power has

6 Introduction not been crudely interpreted and applied, however. In Singapore’s case, its practice has accommodated liberal internationalism in economics and an engagement in multilateral security dialogue with the object of taking the island-state as far as possible out of the play of purely local political forces. Moreover, the practice of foreign policy has been compatible with a strong commitment to the cardinal rule of international society: namely, the sanctity of national sovereignty no matter how small and insignificant the state. To that end, Singapore’s representatives at the United Nations have strenuously upheld the principles of the world body. Indeed, as recently as September 1999, its representative reminded delegates of Singapore’s initial position on Indonesia’s annexation of East Timor in 1975. It was pointed out that, as a small country, Singapore felt strongly that UN principles against the use of force should be respected, and that it had every interest in upholding the integrity of boundaries and the rule of international law. The management of foreign policy has correspondingly never been a complex process. At the outset, it was dominated by three outstanding figures; they shaped its architecture, which has remained virtually unchanged ever since. Founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, Foreign Minister Sinnathamby Rajaratnam and Defence Minister Goh Keng Swee set the parameters for policy on the basis of a shared view of the predicament of the minuscule state. And to an extent they were joined by the first Deputy Prime Minister Toh Chin Chye.4 This triumvirate plus one set the course and tone of foreign policy in its initial assertive phase in which no doubt was left of the ferocious determination to protect an unanticipated independence. These three luminaries dominated cabinet discussions which tended to validate decisions taken informally elsewhere. The foreign policy and diplomatic establishment of the Republic initially comprised reliable political partners and friends and gifted amateurs, supported by a mere handful of officials. A career foreign service was not inaugurated until 1974. Even then, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was primarily a source of information, logistics and protocol and not of advice on policy-making. Moreover, some heads of mission were provided with separate briefs by Lee Kuan Yew with Rajaratnam’s acquiescence. The policy role of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, albeit subordinate to the cabinet, only evolved during the early 1980s under a vigorous permanent secretary and the coming of age of a generation of new recruits into a professional service able and willing to challenge the conventional wisdom of their political masters.

Introduction 7 At independence, Sinnathamby Rajaratnam was given his head as Foreign Minister within parameters set with his senior colleagues, especially Lee Kuan Yew. He was a colourful, intellectually minded figure, who displayed a heroic disposition as he battled for the interests of Singapore against the intimidating heavyweights of the so-called Non-Aligned Movement. When he gave up office in 1980, the pattern of Singapore’s foreign policy had been well set. His three successors, Suppiah Dhanabalan (1980–8), Wong Kan Seng (1988– 94) and the present incumbent, Professor S. Jayakumar (1994–), have had little to do by way of radical innovation, although foreign policy has become more pro-active during the past two decades. They have continued to implement Lee Kuan Yew’s and Rajaratnam’s design, although during Wong Kan Seng’s tenure a major diplomatic initiative was undertaken by Singapore which bore fruit in an unprecedented structure of multilateral security dialogue in the Asia-Pacific. With generational change in political leadership, the foreign policy process has changed up to a point, with a wider basis of ministerial participation. The Foreign Ministry has come to assume a more conventional professional role in placing policy papers setting out options before a full cabinet which has not devolved into committees with functional responsibilities. The degree of latitude enjoyed by the officials of that ministry and its minister will depend on the issues involved, with, for example, limited reference to the cabinet required in the realm of regional cooperation. In the critical cases of bilateral relations with Malaysia and Indonesia, however, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will play a supporting role to the engagement not only of the Prime Minister but also of the Senior Minister, which was the office that Lee Kuan Yew assumed from November 1990 when he was succeeded by Goh Chok Tong. Foreign policy requires at times a speed of response which cannot always await a full cabinet, which means that communication between the Foreign Minister and the Prime Minister, and, importantly, the Senior Minister, as well as the two Deputy Prime Ministers, has been a critical dimension of foreign policy-making. Despite relinquishing the highest political office, Lee Kuan Yew has been the effective presiding figure in foreign policy, albeit less conspicuously so since becoming Senior Minister. He has left his mark on its practice partly through imposing his own experience of political impermanence, exemplified by the four national anthems sung in Singapore within a space of less than twenty-three years. He has also left his mark through combining cerebral and outspoken combative qualities. The cerebral qualities have

8 Introduction brought him an international standing, but their combination with the combative has not necessarily always served Singapore well. A willingness to speak his mind publicly has, at times, given offence regionally and beyond, leaving the Foreign Ministry with an unpalatable damage-limitation role. Lee Kuan Yew and his founding-father colleagues have also left their mark in establishing an authoritarian and disciplined political order which has attracted criticism among the major liberal democracies, and even some regional states. That legacy has been a mixed blessing in the conduct of foreign policy. Beyond the need to justify abroad Singapore’s version of socalled Asian values, the members of the foreign policy establishment have been free from many of the domestic constraints that are characteristic of Western parliamentary democracies. Although foreign policy has not enjoyed an active domestic dimension, a Parliamentary Committee for Defence and Foreign Affairs has been in existence since 1987, but without intruding unduly into the work of either ministry. Moreover, that committee, like all other ‘Government Parliamentary Committees’, comprises only members of the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) and is not serviced by the parliamentary staff. After adjusting to the shock of an unanticipated independence, and taking into account the idiosyncratic qualities of Lee Kuan Yew, foreign policy has been handled much like that of most modern states, with a premium placed on rationality. Diplomacy is employed to manage relations with a variety of governments for economic and security advantage as well as for reasons of general international standing. However, considerable diplomatic resources and energy have been devoted to trying to set agendas in a multilateral context as a way of mitigating a vulnerability arising from geopolitical circumstances. With that vulnerability in mind, Singapore’s foreign policy is not like that of most other states in the way in which the issue of sovereignty bulks consistently large in national sensibilities and considerations; above all, in dealings with Malaysia which sponsored the Republic’s entry into the United Nations. Matching a fear that its size and confined geopolitical circumstances might encourage attempts to impose a conditional sovereignty on its external relations has been a countervailing diplomatic pugnacity and assertiveness which has also been displayed at the expense of the USA, for example. Those qualities have been registered in order to put beyond doubt any implied questioning of Singapore’s international status and right to determine its own destiny. It is often quipped that even paranoids have enemies. In Singapore’s case and experience, those who have the responsibility for

Introduction 9 formulating its foreign policy have been guided by an abiding belief that the independence of the island-state cannot be taken for granted, and that external predators may be poised to exploit an innate vulnerability. Indeed, Lee Kuan Yew justified the publication of the first volume of his memoirs in that vein in pointing out: ‘I thought our people should understand how vulnerable Singapore was and is, the dangers that beset us, and how we nearly did not make it.’5 Not all of Singapore’s foreign policy follows from that dismal maxim but it has shaped its practice with a notable consistency in the decades since independence. That fearful tenet has also served a domestic function in the interest of political education and order. It has been held with a steely tenacity by the founding fathers and a second generation of political leaders, and is justified by recurrent strains in relations with close neighbours which have been beset by structural tensions from the outset. If Singapore is an exceptional state in terms of its economic performance, it is also such a state in the way in which the spectre of worst-case disasters arising from an innate vulnerability hovers perpetually over the island in the perception of its political leaders. The experience of Kuwait, for example, has been paraded before the citizens of the island-state as a fate which could befall them if appropriate vigilance was not displayed. With that example in mind, the foreign policy of Singapore is very much about coping with a vulnerability that has been an abiding concern and theme since an unanticipated independence some thirty-five years ago. To that end, Singapore’s foreign policy has been informed greatly by the precepts of the balance of power; the eternal goal of such a policy is to deny a hegemonic position on the part of states judged likely to harm the interests of the Republic. Shortly after independence, Lee Kuan Yew, the Republic’s first Prime Minister and pre-eminent founding-father, informed a meeting of civil servants that ‘we are in the heart of that [Malay/Indonesian] archipelago which makes our position one of supreme strategic importance and, at the same time, one of grave perils for ourselves if we overplay our hand’.6 This volume is an attempt to explain how Singapore has played its hand over the decades since independence.

1

Singapore The foreign policy of an exceptional state

An exceptional state The island-Republic of Singapore is the smallest state within South-East Asia and, indeed, within a wider East Asia. It also lacks natural resources, except for the human variety in limited numbers, and a harbour in an ideal location for servicing regional trade. And yet, in 1999, for the third year running, the Swiss-based World Economic Forum ranked Singapore first among over fifty leading economies (ahead of Hong Kong and the USA) in its Annual Global Competitiveness Report.1 In its material accomplishments and attendant external recognition, Singapore is exceptional not only within its regional locale but also globally among so-called small states. The point has been well made that ‘Economic success is the main reason for Singapore’s high status and disproportionate influence in international affairs.’2 A size of some 648 square kilometres, a citizen and permanent resident population combined of around 3.2 million together with a confined geographic situation at the southern tip of peninsular Malaysia provide, on their own, misleading indicators of the remarkable achievements and international standing which have been attained in the years since an unanticipated independence in August 1965. For that reason, in addressing its foreign policy, Singapore is not to be located readily within broad generalisations about the category of small and micro-states to be found in an ill-defined academic literature.3 Singapore shares some common features with some states in that loose category; notably, an innate vulnerability arising from geopolitical circumstances which was registered at independence as the

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 11 leitmotif of foreign policy. That underlying vulnerability has persisted, but its economic and environmental achievements, and also its regional diplomatic role, place it in a virtual category of its own so that Singapore is best represented as sui generis, irrespective of its size. Correspondingly, given its notable accomplishments, it is also not easy to locate Singapore comfortably within the overlapping category of ‘weak states’ which has succeeded ‘small states’ as a more pertinent label in academic literature. It merits noting also that, among post-colonial states, small or otherwise, Singapore is free of xenophobic hang– overs; its government has not made a fetish of expunging the colonial record and legacy. On the contrary, recognition has been accorded to Sir Stamford Raffles, the ‘imperialist’ founder of the city-state, for his enterprise and vision, while the British legacy is valued for having bequeathed high standards of professionalism and probity in public life. In that vein, Britain has not been attacked for its colonial past but has been derided for a national decline attributed partly to an indulgence in provision for social welfare held up as a negative model by the local media. Despite a diminishing entrepôt role and the lack of an industrial base, it has been justly pointed out that Singapore was a thriving metropolis well before independence and that its post-economic development ‘began from a strong foundation and with very substantial advantages’.4 That strong foundation has served as the basis for an astounding government-led economic transformation after independence that has far transcended the island’s condition and role during the colonial era.5 At the close of the twentieth century, without any burdensome foreign debt and with foreign currency reserves of around US$90 billion and with an annual per capita GDP of over US$25,000, Singapore is the most advanced member of the regional Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) which it joined on its formation in August 1967. That position has been reflected also in an infant mortality rate of 3.8 per thousand live births, an average life expectancy of 77 years and a literacy rate of 92 per cent. A testament to Singapore’s economic transformation and attendant international standing was the decision to locate the secretariat of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) on the island in 1992, and to hold the inaugural ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) there in 1996. Despite such recognition, Singapore’s achievement has rested on a vulnerable base of economic interdependence which was its experience when a colonial entrepôt. Although it has transcended its original economic role, it is no less trade dependent in its modern version which registers a global ambit.

12 The foreign policy of an exceptional state For example, in company with a number of other regional states, Singapore shared in the dramatic reversal of economic fortunes in train from mid-1997, albeit without experiencing the same acute adversity and political turbulence experienced by close neighbours. Singapore’s ability to cope with the regional economic storm better than most, as well as to return to growth, has been a function of an authoritarian interventionist system of governance and financial regulation justified with reference to its underlying vulnerability. That accomplishment has pointed up the paradox of the island-state’s condition whereby vulnerability has been managed and mitigated by promoting economic interdependence beyond the regional locale but without it ever being fully overcome. As former Prime Minister and currently Senior Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, explained in January 1996 to an Indian audience: We had decided soon after independence to link Singapore up with the advanced countries and make ourselves a hub or nodal point for the expansion and extension of their activities. To attract such capital and human resources, Singapore set out to promote conditions and facilities better than those found elsewhere in the region. A consciousness of an innate vulnerability has promoted a culture of competitiveness through which Singapore has excelled.6 That pairing of vulnerability with excellence serves to register the basis of Singapore’s exceptionalism and its distinctiveness. In assessing the exceptional nature of Singapore’s international position, Hong Kong might be identified as a regional comparator of a kind, but only as a major centre of economic activity which has enjoyed a unique linkage with the Chinese mainland. For long a colony without conventional international status, and since July 1997 a special administrative region of China, Hong Kong has been an international actor in a limited sense only through its qualified membership of some economic organisations. An additional comparison between Singapore and Hong Kong is valid up to a point in one particular respect, in that the overwhelming majority of the island-state’s population is ethnic-Chinese with links to a dynamic economic network of overseas Chinese and to China itself. Unlike Hong Kong, however, Singapore is not located on China’s periphery but in the maritime heart of South-East Asia where ethnic-Chinese are well in the minority and also regarded with resentment and suspicion

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 13 because of their cultural identity and economic prominence. Such resentment was made manifest with the onset of regional economic adversity from mid1997 and found violent expression in neighbouring Indonesia. Singapore’s ability to play a regional diplomatic role has derived, in important part, from a consistent registration of a political identity quite separate from that of China, and also Taiwan, and in seeking to integrate the island-state diplomatically within its geographic locale. Accordingly, Singapore and Hong Kong are hardly appropriate comparators. Hong Kong was returned to Chinese jurisdiction in July 1997, while Singapore has continued to assert and define its distinct independence partly with negative reference to the People’s Republic. A comparison of a kind might be attempted also between Singapore and some of the small oil-rich Gulf sultanates, such as Bahrain and Kuwait, with which the island-state shares the experience of both wealth and vulnerability but not that of natural resources. Indeed, in the case of Kuwait, a sense of shared vulnerability was openly articulated with Iraq’s invasion in August 1990. Neither Bahrain nor Kuwait have matched Singapore, however, in scale and range of economic achievements and in active diplomatic role; nor have they registered the same sophistication and proficiency in their educational and defence establishments. Correspondingly, within South-East Asia the energy-rich Sultanate of Brunei also shares Singapore’s sense of vulnerability from its own experience of regional predators. It is grossly underdeveloped, however, by Singapore’s standards of economic accomplishment and public administration, and hardly a regional comparator. In searching for a historical comparator in order to put modern Singapore into perspective, it is renaissance Venice which comes readily to mind as both a great maritime trading centre and as the locus of great business enterprise. Indeed, the Director of Singapore’s Scientific Centre pointed out a decade and a half after independence: ‘Just as Venice served as the dynamic centre for Europe during the Renaissance, so will Singapore serve as the city of the future in Southeast Asia.’7 The city-state of Venice, of course, did not suffer from the same geopolitical constriction which has been visited by nature and circumstances on Singapore, and which has been reinforced by evolving state practice as registered in the latest United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Moreover, if Singapore is like fourteenth-century Venice in aspiration, expressed from 1972 in the concept of a ‘Global City’, it is certainly not like Venice in cultural pursuits and attainment.

14 The foreign policy of an exceptional state Singapore is primarily about the business of business with its denizens more interested and accomplished in the art of karaoke than in the arts per se. Indeed, it is worth heeding the comment made in 1976 by the head of the Department of Philosophy in the University of Singapore that the concept of a global city had a pretentious ring, and that Singapore was not a centre from which new frontiers of knowledge would emanate. It was founded to be a trading centre ‘which is what it remains to this day’.8 More to the point, Singapore in pre-colonial times was never the Venice of South-East Asia but a refuge for fishermen and pirates. It only became a great oriental bazaar from the early nineteenth century through the intervention and imagination of Britain’s pro-consul, Sir Stamford Raffles, whose achievement and memory is notably honoured and not besmirched within the island-state. Moreover, Singapore was set over time within a wider peninsular Malayan colonial structure from which it was only detached in 1946, partly in Britain’s strategic interest, after its occupation by Japan during the Pacific War. Nonetheless, the example of Venice, and not any contemporary city-state, has been employed by Singapore’s spokesmen to point to an ideal model for emulation. Like so many contemporary small and micro-states which make up a large proportion of the United Nations’ membership, Singapore is the product of liberation from colonial rule. Its route to independence, however, has also been exceptional, in keeping with its achievement. After decolonisation in the form of a period of self-government short of full independence from June 1959 until September 1963, the island became a constituent part of the new Federation of Malaysia together with peninsular Malaya and two British colonies in northern Borneo. Indeed, independence in island form was neither actively sought nor anticipated until shortly before its second separation in August 1965 against a background of rising racial tensions and economic impasse. Sovereignty was transferred from Malaysia dramatically and abruptly but also peacefully. Nonetheless, separation was a traumatic political experience, giving rise to the conventional wisdom that Singapore had been literally ‘cast out’ of Malaysia and that independence had been imposed on the island against the conventional experience of state succession.9 The official representation of that founding moment has served to define a national predicament and a national watchword of vulnerability.10 In that respect, Singapore does have much in common with a number of other small and micro-states, although such states do not necessarily share Singapore’s clear-

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 15 cut sense of external threat; in its case, primarily from Malaysia.11 Singapore has been exceptional, however, in the way in which its government has been able to cope with and mitigate that condition, including displaying an ability to go to war, albeit without being able to overcome fully an innate vulnerability present at its creation as an independent state. The founding moment of the Republic of Singapore was so unlike that of virtually all other post-colonial small and micro-states that it would be an intellectual contrivance to try to fit its experience within that of the global set which makes up much of the United Nations’ membership. Indeed, within South-East Asia, where a separatist disposition has been endemic, albeit frustrated, since the onset of decolonisation, Singapore stands out as the exception and not the rule in its acquisition of independence by means other than a classical act of separatism. Nonetheless, that experience, as constructed into a national memory of being cast adrift to fend for itself against all expectations and in the face of all economic logic and strategic rationale, has left an enduring legacy which shapes the culture and the rhetoric of foreign policy. That culture, which is informed by a condition and consciousness of vulnerability, enables Singapore’s government to demand a constant vigilance and social discipline of its population as the price for protecting and upholding a fragile independence. The rhetoric of government registers a belief in the premises of the realist paradigm in International Relations, whereby states are obliged to fend for themselves as best they can in an ungoverned and hostile world. As recently as July 1997, Foreign Minister, Professor S. Jayakumar, informed a meeting of heads of Singapore’s diplomatic missions that ‘The dynamics of international relations bear a striking resemblance to the laws of the jungle: not all creatures are created equal and only the fittest survive.’12 Social Darwinism translated to international life is the declared formula for coping with vulnerability. Singapore stands out among the mixed set of small and micro-states only partly on account of the unique circumstances of its acquisition of independence. Nonetheless, the experience and legacy of the political genesis of Singapore have to be borne in mind perpetually in seeking to understand and to explain the underlying premises and conduct of its foreign policy. Although that genesis is a decreasing part of the shared experience of rising generations of Singaporeans, its legacy has become an integral part of the political culture of those entrusted with responsibility for its foreign relations. That legacy is expressed in the conviction that the future of the island-state

16 The foreign policy of an exceptional state can never be taken for granted and that its margin for error is minimal, which is reflected in the consistent proportion of national resources allocated for defence. In 1999, that defence provision amounted to US$4.2 billion. In the context of an abiding vulnerability, Singapore’s exceptional standing and influence do not arise from its military might, even though its defence resources, designed primarily with deterrence in mind, are considerable for a state of its limited physical scale and population. Nonetheless, the resources allocated for defence serve as a clear indication of the government’s determination to compensate for natural shortcomings employing the societal concept of ‘Total Defence’ drawn from Swedish experience. In 1999, Singapore’s defence budget was three times that of neighbouring Indonesia which has a population of some 210 million and an extensive archipelago to police. The same disparity applied in the case of Malaysia, its other close neighbour, which has a population of 22 million. Singapore’s defence establishment draws on limited human resources. It is modelled on Israeli lines employing only a small cadre of 50,000 professional soldiers complemented by 250,000 national servicemen. National service of two to two and a half years is compulsory for all males at the age of 18, who, after its completion, are obliged to undergo regular reserve training and service, in principle, up to the age of 45. Singapore’s defence establishment operates within tight geopolitical confines, wedged between Malaysian and Indonesian sea and airspace, mitigated operationally by access to extensive training facilities in Australia, Brunei, New Zealand, the USA, Taiwan and Thailand and, most recently, in France and South Africa. A deterrent capability based on modern weapons and sophisticated training as well as a growing competence in manufacturing arms has to be set against a lack of combat experience and minimal involvement in United Nations’ peacekeeping operations. Singapore’s provision for defence discomforts its nearest neighbours, although to a lesser extent in the case of Indonesia which has granted access for training in Sumatra to units of Singapore’s Air Force. Despite the persistence of structural tensions within its close locale, the Republic has never had occasion to project its military power in anger beyond the bounds of its sovereign jurisdiction; nor has its defence establishment been employed as an instrument of threat in seeking to advance national interests. The islandstate’s sophisticated deterrent power is, however, a reflection of the government’s abiding apprehensive political outlook and of the scale and

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 17 quality of resources generated by the country’s resilient economy.13 The significance attached to defence has been highlighted by a statement in the national media that 20 per cent of the island’s land space was being used for training areas, ammunition storage depots, camps and air and naval bases.14 Singapore’s standing and influence, however, comes primarily from its civilian economic accomplishments, underpinned by an educational base with considerable strength in mathematics and sciences judged by the highest international standards. Singapore’s accomplishments are exemplified also by the global reputation of its national airline, its international airport and its maritime port, which register the remarkable way in which a one-time colonial trading centre has been able to adapt its economic role and to transcend its immediate environment. From a thriving commercial entrepôt serving the trade of colonial South-East Asia with its metropolitan powers, Singapore has become the prime regional centre for high-tech manufacturing and telecommunications as well as for financial services, ship repair and port and aircraft facilities; for oil refining and related energy industry provision and as a regional headquarters for an increasing number of multinational companies. Accordingly, it remains an entrepôt in important respects but as an example of skilful adaptation of that role to the revolutionary process of globalisation during the latter part of the twentieth century. Singapore’s accomplishments are also a product of an efficient authoritarian political system which generates strong mixed feelings in the West. That system has been based on continuous rule through general elections by the People’s Action Party (PAP) ever since the island attained self-government in June 1959. It has been associated closely with the Social Darwinist philosophy of its intellectually awesome first Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, who has remained in the cabinet as Senior Minister after relinquishing highest office in November 1990 to his deputy and successor Goh Chok Tong. Singapore’s authoritarianism and form of mandatory democracy, which brooks no opposition from interest groups outside of the Parliament, has provided a politically stable and distinctively non-corrupt context within which economic development has progressed in an astounding way aided by a widespread proficiency in the English language. That authoritarianism has provoked a mixed reception overseas, especially in a post-Cold War USA able to take a principled stand on human rights issues in foreign policy. On balance, however, that authoritarianism has served the

18 The foreign policy of an exceptional state cause of managing foreign policy in that government has not been obliged to defer to competing domestic constituencies. The virtual absence of corruption in Singapore has been an additional important factor attracting the major involvement and confidence of the international business community. Its members admire the aptitude of the ruling PAP in maintaining the requisite social discipline and industrial peace underpinning economic success, as well as the efficiency that has become the hallmark of the Republic. Within its regional environment, a corresponding admiration is mixed with envy and resentment in important part because of the prevailing ethnic-Chinese cultural identity of the island-state and the persistence of the regional middleman role of local Chinese entrenched during the colonial era. That identity has been reinforced from the late 1970s by the government’s policy of encouraging the study and use of Mandarin by the vast majority of the population, albeit in conjunction with that of English. That attempt at reinforcing cultural identity has made managing relations with closest neighbours a matter of continuing difficulty and those with the People’s Republic of China a matter of acute sensitivity. Formal diplomatic ties have never obtained with Taiwan, despite close defence cooperation. Those with Beijing were delayed until a quarter of a century after independence, and only after Indonesia had restored them in 1990, in a considered attempt to assure close neighbours that Singapore was a reliable regional partner and not an agent of Chinese influence. Moreover, Singapore’s government finds it politically imperative to reaffirm a separate identity from China for domestic as well as international reasons. It did so, for example, in the context of general elections in January 1997, when its leaders alleged that an opposition candidate was a Chinese chauvinist who had espoused views in direct violation of the country’s multiracialist ethic. It has also refused to defer to Beijing’s attempts to restrict the manifold contacts maintained with Taiwan, notably rejecting an attempt to make the end of defence cooperation with Taiwan a condition for establishing diplomatic relations. Singapore has also refused to be a party to Chinese attempts to reduce the USA’s military presence in East Asia. On the contrary, in January 1998, Minister of Defence, Dr Tony Tan, announced that US aircraft carriers and other warships would be accorded access to a new Changi naval base when ready for use at the turn of the century as an alternative to off-shore anchorages.15

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 19 A declared philosophy that a price in political freedom is necessarily required in return for good governance and material prosperity has been represented as a communitarian model more suitable for East Asian societies than for those of allegedly less successful liberal democracies of the West represented as beset by self-inflicted social problems.16 That philosophy reflects a deeply held view of the country’s national leadership that in politics and economics, as in life, natural selection is the determining factor and that only the well adapted survive and progress. Indeed, the people of Singapore have been reminded constantly that they should never be complacent about the future of the Republic. In November 1996, Lim Kim San, who was the country’s first Finance Minister and subsequently Defence Minister, celebrated his eightieth birthday. At a banquet given in his honour by the government, he expounded a characteristic view on the part of his founding generation of politicians. He pointed out that the most precious possessions of Singaporeans were independence and the right to decide their own fate: ‘My own generation learnt from painful personal experience. Without security, our independence is in danger. Singaporeans must never, never take their independence for granted.’17 A consciousness of that innate vulnerability has been well summed up in the warning that ‘Overnight, an oasis may become a desert.’ That apprehension had been articulated a decade and a half ago by current Deputy Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong, the elder son of Lee Kuan Yew, who was then a serving officer in the armed forces. The need to be engaged perpetually in promoting countervailing measures to compensate for and overcome that condition has been the driving factor in the making of foreign policy. A substantive feature of that vulnerability, and one directly relevant to the oasis analogy, is the island’s lack of self-sufficiency in potable water supply which has been heavily supplemented by pipe-line from Malaysia’s state of Johor. Indeed, whenever tensions with Malaysia rise above the surface, calls are heard from radical Malay elements across the Strait of Johor for the water supply to Singapore to be cut off. In April 1995, Singapore’s Minister of Trade and Industry, Yeo Cheow Tong, warned that if the people of the island continued to use water at the current rate of increase of 6 per cent, the Republic would run out completely by the year 2001. Despite an assurance in December 1998 by Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad, that the supply of water to Singapore would be continued beyond the expiration of existing agreements, the acute concern about an

20 The foreign policy of an exceptional state assured source of additional water to that drawn from the island’s reservoirs has persisted. It has driven Singapore’s government to press its Malaysian counterpart, so far without success, to enter into a formal agreement to continue its supply beyond 2061 when an accord signed in 1962 lapses. It has also begun to explore complementary sources of water from Indonesia’s Riau Islands as well as actively to pursue desalination alternatives. Water security is thus a critical factor in the vulnerable condition of Singapore, which has been obliged to rely on Malaysia for around 50 per cent of its supply. A recurrent governmental concern is that water may be used as leverage against Singapore.18 For Singapore, the abiding political fact of life is that the country’s margin for error is minimal. In consequence, a political culture of national siege and emergency has been created within which foreign policy decisions are taken. For the most part, however, foreign policy is not a process of crisis. An independent Singapore has never been faced by an imminent external threat in direct military form since the dying days of Indonesia’s ‘Confrontation’ in the mid-1960s. Nonetheless, the prospect of threat emanating from a close external source, and the need to respond expeditiously and effectively, hovers continually over those responsible for defence and foreign policy formulation and execution. Moreover, crisis has been conceived beyond the bounds of conventional military threat. It has been contemplated in terms of all external challenges to the viability of the state and to its sustained achievement. That outlook has been reflected in and upheld by the degree of interchange in senior positions between officials from the Ministries of Defence and Foreign Affairs. In February 1997, citing an example of the dangers that could befall Singapore, a representative of the second generation of politicians echoed a corresponding view to that articulated by Lim Kim San. Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister, Dr Tony Tan, speaking in Davos, pointed out that Singapore should draw a lesson from Switzerland which, despite its strengths and resources, had run into economic and geopolitical problems over the past decade. The significance of his example is that, at the time of independence, Switzerland, as a tightly knit and well organised state, had been identified as one of several models for Singapore to emulate. Dr Tan advised: ‘If we do not want to be left behind, we have to change with the world, adapt and continue to make ourselves relevant.’19 The significance of that remark for Singapore’s position has been pointed up by attempts by the Republic’s

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 21 neighbours to establish competing facilities on the basis of their comparative economic advantage, at least before the impact of regional economic adversity from mid-1997.20 All such attempts have failed to emulate the achievement of Singapore but should its position slip as a result of any falling off in economic efficiency and performance, then it may be expected that the island-state’s influence and ability to stand up for itself will decline accordingly. Such a negative correlation is well understood and anticipated by its government and was reiterated by Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in a speech on 1 May 1997. He pointed out that should Singapore be overtaken and made irrelevant ‘our influence and international standing will go down’.21 That lesson has been applied by Lee Hsien Loong, in his concurrent capacity as head of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), in promoting greater deregulation in the financial services sector in order to ensure a continual competitiveness. Such a competitive cutting edge, even in times of economic adversity, has been upheld by standards of efficiency, infrastructure maintenance and public probity not matched, so far, elsewhere in Singapore’s region. As indicated above, Singapore operates a system of mandatory democracy whereby regular elections have sustained one party in government whose dominance has not been tempered by the checks and balances of civil society. Indeed, civil society in the Western liberal-democratic sense has been actively discouraged. In January 1997, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong claimed that the overwhelming electoral victory of the ruling PAP had demonstrated that Singapore’s voters had rejected Western-style liberal democracy. The island’s racial mix means that Singapore is not free of entanglements linking its domestic politics to its foreign policy, especially in relations with its putative parent Malaysia and, to a lesser extent, with Indonesia. One example of a controversial nature was the reaction in Malaysia in the late 1980s to a ministerial explanation that restrictions had been placed on the role of ethnicMalay citizens in Singapore’s armed forces because of their suspect loyalty. Such factors notwithstanding, the firm authority and weight of government within Singapore have meant that domestic political considerations have not impinged on policy in the same way as in some other post-colonial states and certainly not in the way that they can do in Western parliamentary democracies. Parliamentary debates on the budget estimates for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have been primarily occasions for informing the assembled

22 The foreign policy of an exceptional state members and their constituents of the priorities and achievements of government and not for any troublesome questioning of policy. For Singapore, the practice of foreign policy is beset by communal factors which bear on regional relationships, but it has not been constrained by the domestic political process as such. Indeed, in the past, serving members of Parliament have been able to assume diplomatic posts overseas without reference to or complaints from their constituencies.22 The degree of governmental freedom of action from domestic constraints permits flexibility in policy formulation and also scope for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to play an influential part in that process, although decisions are the prerogative of the cabinet. And in this forum, authority is concentrated in a limited number of members, including, above all, Lee Kuan Yew. An overriding factor in the making of foreign policy has been the cerebral authority and custodial role of Lee Kuan Yew as Prime Minister and, since November 1990, as Senior Minister in the cabinet led by his former deputy, Goh Chok Tong. Lee, now in his mid-70s, enjoys a unique personal domestic authority and a notable international standing which has long informed the foreign policy of the island-state.23 That Singapore was chosen in January 1971 as the venue for the first full meeting of heads of government of the Commonwealth to be held outside of London was as much a testament to his personal standing as to the progress of the island-state in the short period since its independence. That standing and authority, projected and perceived beyond Singapore, are based on the force of his personality, the extent of his experience, the power of his intellect, the compelling logic of his arguments which have been articulated in all major world capitals. Those arguments have been necessarily buttressed by the tangible accomplishments which have been identified with the material achievements of Singapore over more than three decades during which his leadership role has been continuously pre-eminent. Indeed, without such achievements, the many vocal pronouncements of Lee Kuan Yew would have long lost credence and authority. A demonstration of his singular standing is the way in which he has been able to conduct a personal diplomacy with senior political figures in both Beijing and Taipei without necessarily incurring the public displeasure of either government. Indeed, in April 1993, Singapore served as the venue for the first ostensibly unofficial cross-straits talks between them. Singapore’s position between Beijing and Taipei has become more problematic with President Lee Teng Hui’s ascendance and assertion of a separate political

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 23 identity, and even sovereign status, for Taiwan, which is unacceptable in Beijing and also regarded as foolhardy in Singapore. However, in March 1996, when China engaged in acts of military intimidation in the Taiwan Strait in order to influence the outcome of presidential elections in the alleged renegade province, Lee Kuan Yew was the only regional leader confident enough to make a public diplomatic intervention urging caution and patience on China’s part.24 Whatever affinity with Chinese culture Lee Kuan Yew may have rediscovered with advancing years, it has not affected his judgement about the priority of Singapore’s interests, especially in avoiding becoming caught up in the entrenched quarrel between Beijing and Taipei and also in repudiating the use of force in resolving conflicts. It has to be said, however, that Mr Lee’s views projected well beyond Singapore have been, at times, a mixed blessing for the island-state. Cleverness of the kind associated with Lee Kuan Yew is not always welcome, however grudgingly respected beyond Singapore. And within some parts of South-East Asia, his obiter dicta have been deeply resented, especially when interpreted as disparaging of the condition and practices of neighbouring states. Such a tendency on his part has not been completely discarded with advancing years. Comments earlier in his career about the shortcomings of socalled ‘less intense cultures’ have been succeeded, for example, by harsh critiques of the merits of liberal democracy which have been found offensive by some regional partners as well as in the USA and Europe. Relations with Malaysia, in particular, have been tested by some of his less well-considered remarks in the decades after the experience of separation. For example, as recently as March 1997, a relentless attempt by Mr Lee to pursue a libel case against a political opponent, who had left Singapore for the nearby town of Johor Bahru in Malaysia claiming to be in fear of his life, backfired politically. Mr Lee caused offence and political commotion because of the content of a sworn affidavit in which he had sought to discredit his opponent’s motives, by asserting that Johor was ‘notorious for shootings, muggings and carjackings’. And also that ‘It does not make sense for a person who claims to be fearful for his life to go to a place like Johor.’ In the event, he was obliged to retract his statement publicly and make an unreserved apology which was grudgingly accepted by Malaysia’s government. However, in subsequently seeking leave from a Singapore court to strike out the offending remarks from his affidavit, he seemed to compound matters by indulging in self-vindication about the crime rate in Johor Bahru which made the working

24 The foreign policy of an exceptional state lives of officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who have always been conscious of the critical importance of the bilateral relationship with Malaysia, even more difficult That stormy episode with Malaysia, involving Singapore’s Senior Minister, exposed a structural tension in the bilateral relationship which had been displayed a decade earlier with the first visit to the island-state by an Israeli President. That controversial episode had revived allegations of Singapore’s disdain and arrogance towards its regional neighbours. In late March 1997, in the wake of the short-lived political storm over Lee Kuan Yew’s remarks about Johor Bahru, Malaysia’s government announced a temporary freezing of official ties with Singapore. Its Foreign Minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, warned that the damage caused would take time to heal because the episode had ‘deeply hurt’ Malaysians of all sections of society. Centrally at issue has been a quality of hubris associated with Singapore, and embodied in Lee Kuan Yew’s periodic comments, giving rise to a disposition in some regional capitals to cut the island-state down to size, especially in its economic role. That disposition has been strengthened by Singapore’s ability to escape more readily from the impact of the economic adversity which afflicted Indonesia and Malaysia among other regional states from July 1997. Irrespective of the offensive nature of any of Lee Kuan Yew’s remarks, the hypersensitivity towards them on the part of Singapore’s closest neighbours derives from a view that the island is little more than a comprador equivalent of their own local Chinese communities, who can be intimidated and exploited at will. An understanding of that outlook probably encourages plain-speaking on Lee Kuan Yew’s part. For example, commenting on Singapore’s contribution to international peacekeeping in East Timor in September 1999, Lee Kuan Yew explained: ‘If we don’t go, our neighbours will think we are “scaredies” and therefore, that we can be trampled on.’25 Singapore’s exceptionalism has been registered beyond the mixed impact and role of Lee Kuan Yew. Despite its limited human resources, Singapore has proven itself, at times, to be a considerable diplomatic asset to its regional partners within the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN). The island-state’s diplomatic influence has grown progressively from the early 1970s when its political leaders first began to take ASEAN seriously as a practical vehicle for accommodating and reconciling national and regional interests within a framework of multilateral dialogue. Before then, the Association had been regarded with mixed feelings as a weak instrument for

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 25 economic cooperation and as a likely vehicle for Indonesian hegemony and even for collusion at Singapore’s expense between Indonesia and Malaysia.26 Within a multilateral context, however, it may be possible for minor powers with demonstrable material and intellectual achievement to exercise a disproportionate influence based on a willingness to shoulder more than their fair share of diplomatic burdens. Such was the case, for example, over the Cambodian conflict during the 1980s, when Singapore played the leading role at the United Nations on behalf of its regional partners within ASEAN in mobilising voting support in the General Assembly against Vietnam. Before then, Singapore had consciously avoided that public arena in preference to using the United Nations as a locus for diplomatic networking. With the end of the Cold War and the Cambodian conflict, Singapore has also played a prominent part outside of the United Nations in promoting the establishment, in July 1993, of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF); a novel multilateral security dialogue now extending from the Indian subcontinent to north America which was set up to cope with regional uncertainties. That embryonic structure of ‘cooperative security’ is based partly on a model pioneered by ASEAN whereby tensions are addressed by trying to improve the overall climate of regional relations rather than through direct attention to problem-solving and to defence cooperation. The ARF includes all the major Asia-Pacific powers which serves a long-standing general interest of Singapore’s foreign policy. An ideal objective has been to encourage a regional pattern of multilateral power engagement capable of neutralising potentially hostile forces, especially those geographically most proximate to the Republic, through the medium of institutional cooperation. Such an objective has been at the very heart of Singapore’s foreign policy from independence and has not changed over time.27 Within the ARF, ASEAN has been able to assume a central diplomatic role, at least in assuming responsibility for chairing its annual working sessions and co-chairing all of its inter-sessional meetings. That role has attracted the support of those of its members concerned lest the more limited purely SouthEast Asian enterprise loses its political identity, becoming subordinate to, and even merged with, the more extensive Asia-Pacific venture. Accordingly, Singapore has been most active diplomatically in promoting ASEAN’s role as the so-called ‘prime driving force’ within the ARF. In that kind of endeavour, it has attracted a measure of appreciation from its regional partners as well as realising the benefits of a regional policy which neatly fit its exclusive national

26 The foreign policy of an exceptional state interests. It is in this respect, that the comment of one Singapore ambassador that ‘work is power’ makes good diplomatic sense. At issue in a practice of unequal diplomatic burden-sharing has been a determination to entrench recognition and ready acceptance of a sovereignty about which there is a hypersensitivity within Singapore. That hypersensi tivity is part of the searing legacy of a founding moment reinforced by unchanging geopolitical circumstances. If Singapore’s foreign policy has been driven by the imperative of coping with vulnerability, the primary guide to that end has been drawn from the concept of the balance of power. The classical objective of a balance of power policy has been to deny potential or actual adversaries from establishing a position of regional dominance and so being able to dictate unacceptable terms to a vulnerable state. Such an objective fits Singapore’s national priorities but, for the Republic, balance of power as a policy is not about forging military alliances along the lines of historical European practice. It is directed to finding and employing a variety of ways of compensating for and reshaping to advantage a regional distribution of power which registers the island-state’s vulnerability. It naturally includes defence cooperation but does not exclude liberal internationalism in economic policy or engaging in multilateral forms of cooperative security arrangements which lack a military dimension. Above all, the multiple involvement within the regional locale of important extra-regional states has been encouraged as a practical way of coping with vulnerability and complementing a national defence capability. Such involvement has not been encouraged on an equidistant basis, however. Since Britain’s military withdrawal in the 1970s, and despite clashing with Washington over political values, the USA has long been the preferred primary source of external countervailing power to which Singapore has sought and accorded access in its own security interests. The reasoning underlying such a policy is quite simple: the USA does not have any territorial ambitions in Pacific Asia but holds economic and strategic interests which complement those of Singapore. Accordingly, for Singapore, balance of power is a policy which discriminates in favour of a benign hegemon as opposed to one which guards against any potential hegemonic state. Balance of power is the underlying premise of foreign policy but, as already indicated, the concept is neither crudely interpreted nor applied in an archrealist sense. In the interest of an ideal balance, or, more accurately, a distribution of power which will counter an innate vulnerability, Singapore’s government has been quite eclectic about the mixture of means it is prepared

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 27 to employ to address the problem of vulnerability which is a constant preoccupation. Some of the idiom of its foreign policy has been drawn from the lexicon of the realist paradigm in International Relations, but its practice is more complex and sophisticated, arising from Singapore’s economic as well as geopolitical circumstances, and its experience of regional and international cooperation. Singapore’s exceptionalism in economic performance is a material factor in its balance of power practice. It has served as a strong basis for attracting the interest of major industrialised states in its continued existence. The source and the legacy of vulnerability Singapore did not have any experience of an independent international existence before 9 August 1965 when it was separated from the Federation of Malaysia. As indicated above, the island had achieved self-governing status only in June 1959. In September 1963, instead of proceeding to a separate independence, it became a constituent part of a new Federation of Malaysia including the already independent Federation of Malaya and two former British colonies in northern Borneo. Merger, as that union was widely described, was about dealing with a heady mixture of race and politics. Singapore’s demographic pattern and politics was a combustible factor in that mixture. Its population was a function of its colonial experience; threequarters of its people were of ethnic-Chinese migrant origin. A majority of these had been educated in the Chinese medium which was reflected in their strong cultural identity and overseas nationalism. The remainder comprised migrants and descendants of migrants from the Indian sub-continent, many of them Hindu-Tamil who numbered around 8 per cent of the population. In addition, some 14 per cent were Malay-Muslims with close family links to Malaya across the Strait of Johor. Moreover, a good number of Singapore’s English-educated non-Malay political elite had correspondingly close links to the Peninsula. Their presence in Singapore was a function of the educational opportunity available and of attendant career prospects in the most developed part of Britain’s colonial empire in South-East Asia. At independence, only two members of the first PAP cabinet had been born in Singapore. For the English-educated leaders of Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party, political union within Malaysia meant a reunion and not a merger with an alien political entity. The manifesto of the PAP at its formation in Singapore

28 The foreign policy of an exceptional state in 1954 had been quite explicit as to its pan-Malayan political ambit. Moreover, merger was also deemed to be an economic and political imperative. Indeed, in March 1957, Lee Kuan Yew had warned the island’s colonial legislature that in the context of twentieth-century South-East Asian politics ‘island- nations are political jokes’.28 Singapore, which had always lacked natural resources other than its harbour and human capital, had begun to face a growing regional challenge to its traditional entrepôt role and required the greater economic space and interdependence that merger could provide. Wartime depredation and its declining economic circumstances had also provided a fertile context within which agents of the Malayan Communist Party, in insurrection from June 1948, could foment public disorder through influence over trade unions and ethnic-Chinese high-school children. Indeed, the reputation of Singapore as a centre of local Chinese-communist agitation against the background of the emergence of a revolutionary People’s Republic of China in 1949 had caused the Malay-dominated administration in Kuala Lumpur to regard the island as a problem for political quarantine rather than as an opportunity for family reunion. For the PAP, however, merger was envisaged as restoring an economic hinterland and creating a larger market for alternative economic activity, including a job-creating industrialisation, which would in turn change the political context of the island. Its prevailing Chinese identity with its cultural chauvinism and communist overtones was also a fundamental impediment to a viable independence for Singapore in its geopolitical setting.29 In the event, and ironically in the light of subsequent events, the fear that Singapore might emulate the political experience of Cuba, where Fidel Castro had come to power in the same year as Lee Kuan Yew, caused a change of political heart in Kuala Lumpur. That fear led to a willingness to accept a shelved British decolonising scheme for amalgamating Malaya and Singapore and also Britain’s possessions in northern Borneo. The scheme was intended to ensure that the demographic balance in the Peninsula would not be shifted unduly in favour of the ethnic-Chinese which would have been the case if only Malaya and Singapore were united. Within the Malay Peninsula, the Malays were then a bare majority of the population, while the Chinese comprised around a third with migrants of Indian sub-continental origin making up most of the remainder. The addition of Singapore alone, with its preponderant Chinese population, had been rejected, but a wider union,

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 29 including the northern Borneo territories where the racial mix was presumed likely to sustain the demographic balance in the Malay interest, proved to be acceptable politically. Such crude and also incorrect racial arithmetic provided a fragile foundation on which to establish a new political union, driven as it was in Kuala Lumpur by a negative concern to overcome political infection from Singapore and not from any political vision. The Federation of Malaysia was not established as a union of equals. Malaya served as its political core and its Malay-dominated government based in Kuala Lumpur continued to enjoy its previous centrality as well as responsibility for internal security, foreign relations and defence. Singapore entered the federal union as another constituent state. It was allocated special powers in education and employment, however, which were conceded in return for a less than proportionate representation in the federal legislature and without a place for its ruling party in the federal government. There were also distinct differences in citizenship across either side of the causeway, which pointed up the degree of political separateness and the restricted role envisaged for the island within the federal structure. Symbolically significant also in a converse way in terms of differentiation was Singapore’s retention of the office of Prime Minister, whereas all other heads of state government in both Malaya and Malaysia held the standard subordinate title of Chief Minister. Singapore’s presumption and exceptionalism in that respect, and a propensity to conduct its own foreign relations and also to criticise openly the shortcomings of Malaysia’s foreign policy while being one of its constituent states, added cumulatively to mounting racial tensions over political format which tested the cohesion of the new Federation to breaking point.30 Indeed, in an act of political theatre, on 31 August 1963, Singapore had declared a de facto independence unilaterally without reference either to Britain or to Malaya in advance of the date of the formal establishment of Malaysia that had been set for 16 September that year. The federal powers were said to be held in trust temporarily until Malaysia came into being. That unconstitutional arrogation of authority was an act of protest at the postponement of the original date for its formation. It had been delayed from 31 August in order to allow publication of a United Nations mission report on the determination of opinion in northern Borneo as a way of satisfying Indonesian and Philippine objections to the advent of the new Federation. Such political impertinence was not appreciated in Kuala Lumpur. Indeed, Prime Minister Tunku Abdul

30 The foreign policy of an exceptional state Rahman, in his statement to Malaysia’s Parliament at the time of the separation of Singapore, made critical reference to the inclination on the part of some countries to look on the Prime Minister of Singapore as an equal to the head of government of the Federation. The concept and advent of Malaysia were highly controversial and the legitimacy of the Federation was opposed by Indonesia with support from the Philippines even before its formation. Despite the degree of political cooperation required in the face of external adversity, the relationship between Singapore and the federal government of Malaysia was beset by a structural tension from the very outset which ultimately led to the constitutional break in August 1965 while Indonesia’s menacing campaign of Confrontation was still in progress. It proved impossible, for example, to come to terms on a fair distribution of economic resources and also on arrangements for a common market which had served as the prime rationale within Singapore in persuading its voters of the merits of merger. Even more problematic was an agreement on political arrangements within the new Federation. Its Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, had made quite clear his view of Singapore’s limited position within the new Federation when he remarked recurrently that the island should occupy the place of New York in contrast to that of Kuala Lumpur, represented as the Washington of Malaysia in a clear separation of economic and political roles. The implication was that Singapore’s Prime Minister should confine himself to the role of mayor of the island-city. Lee Kuan Yew and his colleagues refused to accept such political selfabnegation, particularly after a display of double standards by the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO): the dominant party in Malaya’s ruling inter-communal coalition government. Its leader, Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, had intervened on behalf of UMNO candidates in elections in Singapore in September 1963 held within days of merger, albeit without success. For its part, the PAP sought actively to share power at the political centre of Malaysia on the declared grounds that the country could only progress on the basis of racial equality and meritocracy which it purported to exemplify. Such a stance was interpreted in Kuala Lumpur as a direct challenge to the political birthright and dominance of the indigenous Malays for which the extended Federation had been intended to provide. Such a challenge was confirmed when the PAP engaged in a ‘token’ participation in mainland Malayan elections in April 1964, despite prior assurances to the contrary by Lee Kuan Yew. In the event, the attendant rise in racial tensions

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 31 came to pose an unanticipated threat to national security and provided the circumstances in which the political break took place. The conventional wisdom that independence was imposed on Singapore totally against its will requires reconsideration more than three decades after the event. Constitutional separation arose from a realisation on the part of political leaders on both sides of the causeway that they had reached a parting of the ways. That judgement had been informed by the recognition that the political circumstances of communist challenge within Singapore, which had driven the case for merger, no longer applied. The political hold of the Malayan Communist Party on Singapore’s trade unions had been broken, while the People’s Action Party had restored a comfortable parliamentary majority after a period of precarious government brought about by communist-inspired defections from its ranks by the breakaway Barisan Sosialis party. If, in the circumstances, the government in Kuala Lumpur was no longer prepared to tolerate the political assertiveness of the PAP and was deeply concerned about the attendant rise in racial feelings, that in Singapore had become deeply frustrated in its economic purpose in failing to make any progress over a common market as well as with its political subordination within the Federation. Indeed, it had sought to mobilise countervailing support from within the north Borneo states, which pushed relations with the federal government to breaking point.31 The key to separation was a fundamental incompatibility over the distribution of political power and a failure to reach an accord on economic cooperation which prompted Tunku Abdul Rahman to raise publicly the prospect of ‘constitutional rearrangements’ as early as December 1964. There is an alternative view about the road to independence; namely, that separation was not totally foisted on Singapore but that it had its source also within the PAP leadership, especially on the part of its Finance Minister, Dr Goh Keng Swee, who had also become convinced, by December 1964, that remaining in Malaysia would retard Singapore’s economic development.32 The notion of separation may have originated with Tunku Abdul Rahman, who reached a personal decision in July 1965 during a period of convalescence from shingles in the London Clinic. There was, however, a prior process of initiative and negotiation over separation involving Goh Keng Swee in consultation with Lee Kuan Yew and the Tunku’s close colleagues, as opposed to a simple diktat from Kuala Lumpur.33

32 The foreign policy of an exceptional state Irrespective of the source of initiative for separation, it does not seem to have been planned with any forethought either as a Machiavellian design by Singapore’s leaders from before the onset of merger, or as a concerted action during the height of political antagonism with Kuala Lumpur. Moreover, there was a total absence of any advance planning for coping with independence. Separation came as a great shock and also to an extent, paradoxically, as a relief to the majority ethnic-Chinese of Singapore fearful of Malay dominance. The sense of shock was shared also within its government and the personal loss experienced was registered, above all, in an emotional television interview given on 9 August 1965 by Lee Kuan Yew, who was unable to control his tears and who recorded his distraught condition and ‘moment of anguish’ for posterity.34 Coping with vulnerability Singapore’s predicament on the morrow of independence represented a political nightmare. At issue was how to come to terms, psychologically as well as materially, with a situation that had been represented before the advent of Malaysia as both unviable and unacceptable. The problem was how to cope with a worst-case circumstance that Singapore’s leaders, in the main, had not been prepared to contemplate. Above all, there was the related critical problem of Singapore having to go it economically on its own. Although the island-state still enjoyed the protecting presence of a British military establishment, which ensured its sovereign condition and which also generated revenue and employment, its own resources were limited and its prospects seemed meagre in the circumstances. Foreign relations were not completely alien, however. Singapore had attracted foreign consular representation well before self-government in 1959, while, subsequently, its administration had enjoyed a prerogative role in foreign trade as well as consultative links with Britain in matters of foreign relations and defence. In addition, both during the period of self-government and then while a constituent part of Malaysia, senior members of the island’s government had either been involved in negotiations across the causeway or had been a party to international canvassing on behalf of the new Federation and also Singapore’s preferred position within it. It was at this juncture that the reputation of Lee Kuan Yew and his close familiarity with international figures, such as Britain’s Prime Minister Harold Wilson and his counterparts

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 33 in Australia and New Zealand, served as an important diplomatic asset when he became the first Prime Minister of the new Republic. Nonetheless, the organised conduct of foreign relations had to be arranged virtually from scratch on an ad hoc basis. Formal responsibility for the conduct of foreign relations was put in the hands of Sinnathamby Rajaratnam, born in Sri Lanka (Ceylon) and raised in peninsular Malaya. He had set out to study law in London and had been confined there by the Second World War, returning to Singapore and to journalism after the end of hostilities. Rajaratnam had been Minister of Culture (i.e. information) from the time of self-government and had an aptitude for conceptual thinking and colourful rhetoric about foreign relations as well as registering the multiracial identity of what was, in the main, an ethnic-Chinese city-state. He was also deemed to be personally acceptable in Kuala Lumpur and had been a member of Malaysia’s delegation to the United Nations General Assembly in 1963.35 In practice, there were two other dominant and formative influences on foreign policy; namely, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, who had been trained as a lawyer in Cambridge, and also Defence Minister Goh Keng Swee, an economist of considerable ability with a doctorate from the London School of Economics. The intellectual credentials of the latter two leaders were formidable. This triumvirate (with input from Deputy Prime Minister Dr Toh Chin Chye, a university teacher of physiology) set the priorities and tone for foreign policy; above all, the need to defend national sovereignty in every single respect against any attempt to diminish it, especially on the part of Singapore’s most immediate neighbouring states. Because of a steely insistence on full respect for its new-found national sovereign status, the government of Singapore did not necessarily endear itself to its closest neighbours and, at times, served to confirm its alien image. Indeed, at times there seemed to be a clear contradiction between a declared initial intent of being friends with all, and especially close neighbours, and a prickliness in the way in which those relations were handled in practice. Indeed, some observers were led to conclude that the government was engaged on a perverse course of action by entrenching feelings of mistrust harboured by its closest neighbours perceived as the most immediate threat to the island-state’s security. Indeed, the initial imagery of a ‘poisoned shrimp’ defence policy, intended to register the island’s indigestible qualities to any likely predator, revealed a gratuitous pugnacity in foreign relations. The

34 The foreign policy of an exceptional state eventual choice of the State of Israel as initial defence partner and source of military training, while eminently sensible in instrumental terms, also did not endear Singapore to close neighbours as the Palestinian issue had a resonance in their domestic politics. Such pugnacity in its very early years pushed relations with Indonesia close to the point of diplomatic rupture some two years after the end of Confrontation. The hanging, in October 1968, of two of its marines who had been tried and convicted for acts of terrorist murder against civilians during the course of Confrontation provoked mob violence at the expense of Singapore’s diplomatic mission in Jakarta. The very fact that both President Suharto of Indonesia and Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman of Malaysia had interceded with pleas for clemency seemed to make hanging a matter of national imperative for Singapore’s leaders, who believed that the Republic could not be seen to bow to public displays of external pressure. After a decent interval and much political fence-mending, Singapore proved able to demonstrate a greater accommodation to the regional locale, although establishing relationships on a good working basis required a major personal commitment by Lee Kuan Yew and took time to fashion. Indeed, the relationship with Malaysia has invariably been problematic and subject to volatility. In time also, the government of Singapore came to terms with its regional locale through its membership of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), which provided it with access to a multilateral structure of dialogue, participation in which helped to confirm its legitimate place within a regional locale. If the issue of managing close regional relationships proved initially to be difficult, Singapore set out to transcend those relations to considerable material and political advantage from very early on. A distinctive feature of Singapore’s foreign policy has been the way in which an appealing ideal rhetoric, beginning with that of a declaratory nonalignment, has been combined with a single-minded and sometimes inconsistent pragmatism serving national interest. Even while espousing such a rhetoric on independence designed to secure international acceptance, Singapore began to reach out beyond South-East Asia to multinational economic enterprise and solicited its intervening manufacturing role in the cause of export-led growth at a time when most post-colonial states were unwilling to adopt such a course on doctrinaire grounds.36 Ideal goals of foreign policy were articulated in an attempt to ensure the international

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 35 acceptability of the island-state, especially among Afro-Asian countries, but more practically, foreign policy was conducted, as already indicated, with reference to eternal principles exemplified in the theory and practice of the balance of power which seemed fitted to Singapore’s geopolitical circumstances and predicament. To this end, for example, Singapore found no difficulty in reconciling a declaratory non-alignment with a cooperative and lucrative relationship with both the USA and the government of South Vietnam during the late 1960s. To those circumstances and predicament were added convictions about the eternal nature of international relations, about which it was possible for a future Deputy Prime Minister to claim, some two decades after independence, that ‘The world of states shares many characteristics of the world of beasts.’ Despite a view of the world identified with the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes, balance of power in the form of a policy capable of mobilising and managing a coalition of like-minded states in defence cooperation against the rise of a potentially dominant rival or set of rivals has never been within the competence of a government of Singapore. Moreover, such a policy in blatant form, if at all practical, would have aroused an angry reaction from among Singapore’s neighbours from the outset. As suggested above, balance of power for Singapore has never been expressed in such crude terms. It has, however, been an underlying disposition in the formulation of policy with the objective of buttressing the vulnerability of the island-state through encouraging external countervailing interests to develop a stake in the island’s survival and well-being. The initial approach to multinational enterprise should be understood as being as much a part of a policy of engaging countervailing power in Singapore’s interest as that embarked on subsequently of encouraging the sustained regional deployment of a US military presence both during and after the end of the Cold War. The basic priority of foreign policy has been to try to prevent the prospect of either a local dominance (foreshadowed by the experience of Indonesia’s Confrontation) or an adverse change in the overall regional distribution of power through seeking to engage as much external countervailing influence as appropriate and possible to Singapore’s advantage. In a major policy statement at the University of Singapore in October 1966, Lee Kuan Yew maintained that the Republic’s foreign policy had to be one which would encourage the world’s major powers to help the island-state, or at least to see that its situation did not worsen. To that ideal end, it was said to be necessary for Singapore to offer the world a continuing interest in the type of society it

36 The foreign policy of an exceptional state projected.37 Such an ambition was, of course, easier to assert than to realise. But the consistent goal has been to take the fortunes and the future of the island-state as much as possible out of the full play of solely regional forces, against which Singapore is at a decided disadvantage. The concern underlying such an objective was articulated in the national Parliament in December 1965 by Yusof bin Ishak, the Republic’s first indigenous head of state. He pointed out: ‘So many of our neighbours and we ourselves would not have a separate existence if purely Asian forces were to settle the shape of decolonized Asia.’ He added, ‘We must never be isolated and left friendless in Southeast Asia in a Singapore encircled by a hostile sea of communal obscurantist forces’, which was the environmental perception held by its senior leaders.38 The vehicle of the global city In the early articulation of balance of power considerations, it is possible to identify the germ of the idea enunciated subsequently by Foreign Minister Rajaratnam, in a seminal speech made in February 1972. In that speech, he explained Singapore’s degree of economic success since independence in terms of an ability to transform itself into a so-called ‘Global City’, depicted as the child of a modern technology which had enabled the problem of a lack of a natural hinterland to be overcome. He explained: ‘We draw sustenance not only from the region but also from the international economic system to which we as a Global City belong and which will be the final arbiter of whether we prosper or decline.’39 This was certainly a far more sophisticated exposition of the concept of the balance of power than that associated with eighteenthcentury Europe. Some twenty-five years later, in August 1997, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong identified the challenges facing the island-state arising from regional economic adversity and global competition. Apart from pursuing sound fiscal policies, the declared solution was ‘to gather talent and make Singapore a cosmopolitan city’. He spelled out his vision of Singapore as a hub for business, talent, knowledge and information, with global networks linking the world’s three economic growth engines of Asia, Europe and the Americas. At the centre of this vision was a conspicuously elitist immigration policy, designed to compensate for national limitations, which constituted a revised

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 37 version of the global city concept.40 That vision has been reiterated on subsequent national days. The message has been that it is no longer good enough for Singapore just to be the best in the region but that it must strive to become one of the best economies in the world. In a subsequent speech Goh pointed out: ‘Singapore is a special place and to survive in the future, we will need a special solution. Our solution is to make it an oasis of talent ...’41 To that end, Singapore has set out to attract up to ten world-class academic institutions to collaborate at postgraduate level across the disciplines with its own educational establishments. That initiative has been taken in order that Singapore will become the hub of choice for talent, research and development, innovation and knowledge-driven industries’.42 Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong’s recent statements set against earlier ones by Lee Kuan Yew and Rajaratnam indicate the remarkable degree of continuity in foreign policy since independence both in terms of diagnosis and prescription, with change distinguished only by the degree of innovation and adaptability to the forces of globalisation. Continuity has obtained also in terms of the priority of relations with Malaysia and Indonesia, which have always been handled at the highest political level. Both neighbouring states are at the same time regional partners and potential adversaries. Of immediate concern in foreign policy at independence, as already indicated, was the relationship with Malaysia which the first Foreign Minister, with parents and a brother across the causeway, found difficult to conceive of as a foreign country. An important element within Malaysia’s political establishment had objected vigorously to Singapore assuming an independent existence within a part of the traditional Malay domain. That objection gave rise to fears that the island-state might be subject to an attempt to re-incorporate it forcibly within the Federation. In the event, the government in Kuala Lumpur kept to the terms of the Separation Agreement in sponsoring the new state’s membership of the United Nations. A stormy start in relations across the causeway was succeeded by a recurrent contention but set within a framework of economic interdependence. Malaysia has long been Singapore’s principal trading partner as well as its principal political sparring partner. Indonesia was initially more problematic as a neighbour because it was still engaged in the practice of Confrontation and unwilling to recognise Singapore’s independence, despite its separation from Malaysia. Within a year of Singapore’s independence, Indonesia gave up Confrontation because

38 The foreign policy of an exceptional state of a fundamental internal political change and came to terms with Malaysia through a secret negotiation to which Singapore was significantly not a party. The rhetoric of reconciliation expressed in an appeal to a common Malay blood-brotherhood in Kuala Lumpur was also profoundly disturbing to a Singapore conscious of its dominant ethnic-Chinese identity. It generated fears of collusion among its most immediate neighbours not only directed against its interests but also its very existence. Such fears have never been completely erased and constitute the worst-case scenario of foreign policy and defence planners. At the time, that rhetoric revived memories of an ill-fated scheme for a so-called Malay Confederation of Maphilindo (an acronym made up of the first parts of Malaya, Philippines and Indonesia) that had been proposed by Indonesia during 1963 in an ostensible attempt to resolve the problem of Confrontation. Fears of such collusion have contributed to a continuity in Singapore’s foreign policy outlook. Such fears revived, for example, in November 1971, soon after independence. Singapore reacted with nervousness to a joint attempt by Indonesia and Malaysia to challenge the customary legal regime in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore, which accommodated the right of freedom of navigation, and to replace it with the more restrictive regime of innocent passage. At issue was a concern that the free flow of trade on which Singapore depended for its very survival might be placed in jeopardy. In the event, that challenge, which had its source in Indonesia’s claim to archipelagic status for its extensive islands, was overcome within the framework of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. Singapore’s ambassador to the world body, Professor Tommy Koh, would become its concluding chairman in another demonstration of the Republic’s international standing. Over time, a notable change occurred in the pattern of the triangular relationship with Malaysia and Indonesia, to Singapore’s advantage – at least until the advent of regional economic adversity from mid-1997. In many respects, at least up to the resignation of President Suharto in May 1998, Singapore had been able to forge and sustain a far better relationship with Jakarta than had Kuala Lumpur, especially since Dr Mahathir Mohamad became Prime Minister of Malaysia in 1981 and began to ruffle feathers in Jakarta. However, the spectre of collusion reappeared ominously in August 1991, for example, when Malaysia and Indonesia conducted joint military exercises in southern Johor which culminated, coincidentally or not, with the island-state’s celebration of the twenty-sixth anniversary of its independence.

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 39 Those exercises were construed as a gratuitous show of strength intended to intimidate. The strong diplomatic reaction in Singapore was almost certainly influenced by impending general elections at the end of August but it was driven also by an underlying sense of vulnerability. That sense of vulnerability, expressed as an encirclement complex identified on independence, has not been overcome with the passage of time.43 Reinforcing that vulnerability at the end of the twentieth century was a deterioration of relations with Indonesia attendant on the interimsuccession to President Suharto in May 1998 of Vice-President Habibie. His fitness for that subordinate office had been questioned publicly by Lee Kuan Yew generating tensions with Jakarta because of the personal slight involved. Moreover, the political turmoil in Malaysia from September 1998 arising from the dismissal, arrest, trial and conviction of former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, on charges of corruption and sexual misconduct, against a background of economic adversity, also complicated relations between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore which have been at odds on a range of material issues. The tyranny of geography means that Singapore cannot escape a locale in which problematic relations with close neighbours are permanent facts of political life. Getting the balance right Singapore has sought to cope with the vulnerability of its regional position by invoking wider international interests and forces in its support. Attention to its regional locale has not been neglected, however. Although membership of ASEAN was not valued as a diplomatic asset in its early years, Lee Kuan Yew, through personal encounter, came to realise the political significance which Indonesia, its most important member, placed on the regional role of the association, and how that stake might be used to Singapore’s advantage. Indeed, Indonesia’s stake in ASEAN, at least during the Suharto era, meant that the association’s viability was a hostage to Singapore’s political good fortune. ASEAN was not established to promote regional political integration on the basis of the European model but in order to facilitate intra-regional reconciliation post-Confrontation based on a common respect for national sovereignty. A concern with such respect has been at the very core of Singapore’s foreign policy, which meant that its government also developed a strong stake in the association’s cohesion and viability based on a commitment to international norms governing inter-state relations. It was Singapore’s

40 The foreign policy of an exceptional state encouragement, based on its own positive experience of ASEAN, which persuaded a correspondingly vulnerable Brunei to join the association in January 1984 on its independence from Britain. Singapore has sought wherever possible to employ the diplomatic vehicle of ASEAN to uphold the principle of the sanctity of national sovereignty, most notably over Cambodia. Indeed, Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 provided Singapore with the opportunity to entrench that principle at the centre of the association’s set of cardinal norms. Singapore was not a direct party to the ultimate settlement of the conflict as an international problem, which became the prerogative responsibility of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. Nonetheless, its diplomatic influence on the issue within the world body was all-pervasive, and the terms of the ultimate accord reflected the Republic’s basic priority that international society should not allow one state to invade another and to change its government at will through an act of force. The experience and confidence gained during the course of the Cambodian conflict enabled Singapore to employ its diplomatic influence in circumstances that permitted an approximation to its ideal foreign policy goal. For Singapore, that ideal has been a balance or, more accurately, a distribution of power which would deny undue dominance to a potential regional hegemon through engaging external states in a pattern of relationships that would secure that objective and also hold them in check against one another. That ideal was expressed imaginatively, albeit over-ambitiously, by Sinnathamby Rajaratnam in 1976. He claimed that ‘When there is a multiplicity of suns, the gravitational pull of each is not only weakened but also by a judicious use of the pulls and counter-pulls of gravitational forces, the minor planets have a greater freedom of navigation.’44 At issue is whether the imagery of a socalled judicious use of pulls and counter-pulls constitutes more than a rationalisation of a given pattern of power. The ability of a small state, even of Singapore’s exceptional kind, to manage such a pattern to advantage may seem highly doubtful. Nonetheless, the rhetoric was undoubtedly indicative of an outlook which has continuously informed its practice of foreign policy. With the end of the Cold War, Singapore has played a central role in promoting a unique and historically unprecedented structure of institutionalised multilateral dialogue within Asia-Pacific. The ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), which was set up in July 1993, partly as the fruit of Singapore’s diplomatic endeavours, matches, at least in form, the ideal

The foreign policy of an exceptional state 41 distribution of power seen as best underpinning the Republic’s sovereign status. Correspondingly, through the person of Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, it has taken the successful initiative of promoting a novel embryonic structure of Asian– European cooperation in the Asia Europe Meeting (ASEM) at heads of government level beginning in Bangkok in March 1996. The underlying purpose was to give institutional content to a set of enmeshing multilateral relationships also congenial to the independence and security of Singapore. It merits noting that nearly a quarter of a century before, Lee Kuan Yew had publicly advocated that Europe assume a share of regional responsibilities.45 In that respect, Singapore’s foreign policy has been distinguished by a striking continuity in initiatives for multilateral engagement in order to compensate for an inherent and immutable vulnerability. Continuity in change Since attaining independence over three and a half decades ago, Singapore has been transformed physically almost out of all recognition through its economic and environmental achievements. Its level of development and reputation for excellence have bred a sense of national confidence which expresses itself, at times, in a quality of hubris which has been less than palatable to its neighbours. And in the West it has attracted a mixed and grudging respect because of a resentment of an authoritarianism opposed to civil society that, in a post-Cold War world, is deemed to be unnecessary in a modern materially advanced state. Singapore arouses feelings of admiration but also feelings of envy and resentment, above all within its regional locale where its very success has been represented as having been at the expense of its close neighbours. This mixed standing is not always well understood and kept sight of within Singapore where triumphalism can cloud judgement, even though the innate vulnerability of the island-state remains the constant preoccupation of those responsible for its defence and foreign policy. In that respect, little has changed in over thirty years. A minuscule Singapore is still wedged within a confined sea and airspace, access to which is controlled by neighbours which are not fully trusted and whose political circumstances are beyond control. The need to assert sovereign status is still strongly felt and is matched by a reluctance to appear to make concessions to other states under any kind of duress for fear of creating an unwholesome

42 The foreign policy of an exceptional state precedent. Accordingly, balance of power thinking still underlies the calculations of those responsible for foreign relations, even if expressed also in ideas about cooperative regional and international economic and security enterprise. For Singapore, the problems of foreign policy have become far more complex with changes in the international global economic and political order since the end of the Cold War. Its dominant expression of globalisation, however double-edged, has matched Singapore’s priorities in a determination virtually from the outset to take and keep the Republic, as far as possible, out of the play of solely regional forces. That determination has run as a continuous seam through the entire course of Singapore’s limited international experience.

2

The battle for sovereignty

Between September and October 1961, Lee Kuan Yew, as Prime Minister of a self-governing Singapore, gave a series of radio talks in which he pressed the case for the island’s integration into the projected Federation of Malaysia. Those talks were published subsequently under the title of The Battle for Merger.1 A combative idiom was characteristic of Mr Lee’s pugilistic political style that was displayed both in contention with his communistinspired political opponents within Singapore and in negotiations with his prospective federal partners across the causeway linking the island to the Malayan mainland. The seeds of a separate Singapore were sown in the course of that latter encounter, in which Lee and his colleagues defined the role of the island in terms of a political identity that proved to be objectionable and unacceptable to the ruling Malay political elite in Kuala Lumpur. After separation, those differences of political identity have continued to trouble the bilateral relationship, which remains the most problematic foreign policy issue faced by Singapore. An unanticipated independence on the part of Singapore was addressed by Lee Kuan Yew and his political partners in the same combative mode as the so-called battle for merger. Although it was necessary to register the sovereignty of the new state on both a regional and global basis, independence was defined, above all, with reference to Malaysia of which Singapore had been a constituent part and with which the independent island would be obliged to march in perpetuity. Conscious also of the alienating potential regionally of the conspicuously Chinese cultural identity of the new Republic, an attempt was made to register symbols of statehood acceptable within its Malay locale. To that end, while English, Chinese, Malay and Tamil continued to enjoy equal status as official languages, Malay was confirmed as the

44 The battle for sovereignty national language. The words of the national anthem, ‘Majullah Singapura’, were in the Malay idiom, as were military commands on official occasions. The design of the national flag acknowledged Islamic symbolism, while the first indigenous head of state, Yusof bin Ishak, who succeeded the former British colonial governor, was also a Malay. As a consequence, the style of foreign policy, with Malaysia much in mind, was a paradoxical combination of symbolic accommodation and pugnacity. The foreign policy of Singapore begins with Malaysia because of the strong symbiosis of geography and history across the Strait of Johor. It then takes in Indonesia, also because of geopolitical realities which had been reinforced by the foreboding experience of Confrontation and the collusive dimension to its conclusion. The fluctuating triangular relationship between Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia lies at the heart of Singapore’s foreign policy and the problem of its management has not changed fundamentally over the decades since independence. Indeed, that relationship assumed new troubling forms following the impact of regional economic adversity on Indonesia and Malaysia from mid-1997. Singapore’s leaders had good reason to be fearful of both states at the outset but the island-state was fortunate to enjoy an interposing and countervailing British military presence while within and initially outside Malaysia.2 The longer-term problem of foreign policy would be how to cope unaided with those two neighbouring states of very different cultural and political identities in command of Singapore’s close environment for good or ill. The circumstances and the early troubling experience of an unanticipated independence were responsible for generating a determination on the part of the political leaders of the vulnerable Republic to transcend, as far as was possible, that confining and menacing environment. Underlying and underpinning foreign policy from the outset was also a practice of social engineering designed to strengthen the state through countering the rootlessness of those migrant cultures which distinguished Singapore. Indeed, the seeds of so-called Asian values, which became controversial after the end of the Cold War, were sown in Singapore from independence in an attempt to promote a tight social organisation partly as a defence against pressures from larger neighbours. As Lee Kuan Yew pointed out to school principals in August 1966: ‘The reflexes of group thinking must be built to ensure the survival of the community, not the survival of the individual; this means a reorientation of emphasis and a reshuffling of values.’3

The battle for sovereignty 45 Singapore became independent on 9 August 1965. In a series of press conferences and press interviews shortly afterwards, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew indicated the general tenor of the island-state’s foreign policy, which was a determination to survive. Practical policy was summed up simply as one of being friends with and trading with all, including controversially then the Soviet Union, China and Indonesia, but without prejudicing Malaysia’s interests. In a reference to water supply, he pointed out that ‘we need them to survive’. A formal statement on foreign policy had to wait for several months, however, when the new state’s Parliament, which had been elected in September 1963 shortly after the advent of Malaysia, convened in mid-December that year. Separation had been an executive matter without any opportunity for a national debate. When Parliament eventually convened, the recently appointed Foreign Minister, Sinnathamby Rajaratnam, made a major foreign policy statement over two days. In one respect, its content was unexceptionable in rehearsing conventional wisdoms about ‘the jungle of international politics’ and of the dangers of formulating foreign policy ‘on the basis of permanent enemies’. There was also a clear attempt to communicate a tone of moderation and reasonableness in how Singapore would approach the conduct of foreign policy with strong assurances that, in the pursuit of its interests, the Republic would be a good neighbour. To that end, Rajaratnam felt the need to state the obvious: ‘The primary task of our foreign policy will always be to safeguard our independence from external threats’; but with the added provision, ‘We shall try to do this by establishing friendly relations with all countries, particularly those nearest to us’ as well as by ensuring that ‘our foreign and our defence policy do not increase tensions and fears among our neighbours’. Accordingly, an assurance was given that the strategic site of Singapore would not become ‘the pawn of any outside power’.4 The speech was addressed to a mixture of audiences, including the leftwing opposition Barisan Sosialis, which had challenged the validity of Singapore’s independence. The prime targets, however, were the governments and media of Malaysia and Indonesia within whose sea and airspace the island-state was locked. In the case of Malaysia, the message was conveyed in subtle form, through a somewhat coded quasi-academic discourse on the distinction between words and deeds in foreign policy, and how Singapore would pay far more attention to the latter than the former, albeit preferring that professions of friendship were matched by deeds. The speech

46 The battle for sovereignty only alluded to the acrimony which had distinguished the prelude to the postindependence relationship with Malaysia. Moreover, Rajaratnam pointed out in respect of the category of friendship within which Singapore’s closest neighbour was ostensibly located: ‘We shall not take wild and angry postures if from time to time in their foreign policy of words they say something which is not pleasing to us, so long as their foreign policy of deeds remains correct and reassuring.’5 The speech sought also to register the non-aligned credentials of the Republic, despite the presence on the island of British military bases with a South-East Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO) connection which had been a part of Indonesia’s justification for Confrontation. The retention of those bases, until alternative effective ways could be found of ensuring national defence, was justified in terms of protecting a militarily weak Singapore ‘in the eventuality of a major conflict with more powerful neighbours’. In a pointed reference to Indonesia, however, Rajaratnam explained that as a sovereign and independent state ‘We can take steps to make it clear to those who genuinely fear that the base is an imperialist base for aggression against them that their fears are unfounded.’6 As well as identifying ten countries, in addition to Malaysia, within which diplomatic missions would be initially established (Australia, Burma, Cambodia, India, Japan, New Zealand, Thailand, Egypt, the USA and the United Kingdom), Rajaratnam concluded his statement by paying more explicit attention to relations with the Federation from which Singapore had been recently separated. He noted that there was something unreal and odd about lumping Singapore’s dealings with Malaysia under the heading of foreign relations, pointing out that, like many Singaporeans, he had close family living across the causeway: So one cannot talk of a foreign policy towards Malaysia in the same sense as one would in regard to other countries. It must be a foreign policy of a special kind, a foreign policy towards a country which, though constitutionally foreign, is essentially one with us and which, when logic and sanity reassert themselves, must once again become one. It must be a foreign policy based on the realisation that Singapore and Malaysia are really two arms of one politically organic whole, each of which has, through a constitutional proclamation, been declared separate and independent.

The battle for sovereignty 47 He concluded, in evident contradiction, by saying that ‘we in Singapore have to accept the fact that we and Malaysia are two sovereign states compelled to move, by different routes, towards the ultimate destiny of one people and one country’.7 Some thirty-five years later, and in the light of recurrent tensions across the Strait of Johor, it would take a leap backward in the imagination to understand the basis of the confusion in Rajaratnam’s remarks. In his statement to Malaysia’s Parliament on 9 August 1965, Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman had announced that Singapore would be separated from Malaysia ‘for ever’. Within Singapore, however, separation did not seem to be accepted fully as a permanent fact of political life, as Foreign Minister Rajaratnam’s Parliamentary statement had indicated. It may be that expectations were entertained that negotiations on economic and defence cooperation would demonstrate the interdependence and indivisibility of the two entities and thus set in train a process of reunification. In retrospect, and in the light of the experiences of the separate development of Singapore and Malaysia as well as recurrent outbreaks of tension between them, such expectations would seem to have been mere flights of political fancy. Nonetheless, they were undoubtedly entertained in Singapore. Indeed, Lee Kuan Yew had speculated publicly about an eventual reunification during press conferences immediately after separation. Three years later, a member of the Political Science Department at the University of Singapore, who became a PAP Member of Parliament in the 1970s, still entertained such expectations.8 Rajaratnam’s speech makes strange reading some thirty-five years after the event. Its singularity does not arise from the greater part of its content, which was neither path-breaking nor truly profound, but from the language employed to address the relationship with Malaysia which was said to call for a foreign policy of a special kind. Moreover, a reading of this speech would not give an uninformed observer any inkling of the bitterness and rancour which had led to the political break in the previous August. It also would not have given any indication of the matching tone of the early post-independence relationship, which had been special only in the degree of ill-feeling and personal animus displayed on either side of the causeway. It was that rancorous climate that, in addition to an unanticipated separation, distinguished the context of Singapore’s early and formative experience as an independent state. It is for this reason, as well as for those of geographic

48 The battle for sovereignty propinquity and economic linkage, that the relationship with Malaysia has always been such a central fixating factor in the foreign policy of Singapore. It is for this reason also that it is intended to begin the study of Singapore’s foreign policy by highlighting the early relationship with Malaysia. Over time, that relationship has remained the most critical and sensitive for the island-state, despite the establishment of considerable working economic links and even security ties. Although the degree of economic interdependence has increased substantially over the decades, with Singapore becoming the largest investor in the Federation as well as its main trading partner, the government of the Republic has never been able to establish a comfortable working relationship with its counterpart in Kuala Lumpur. One of the reasons for this failing has been the persistently held view in Malaysia that Singapore’s predominant Chinese community have been encouraged to look with disdain on the Malay majority across the causeway for their congenital lack of enterprise and industriousness. Whatever the public rhetoric about a special relationship so as to keep alive the idea of reunification, the practice of foreign policy was another matter as Singapore set about protecting its interests with a vengeance, which invariably brought its government into contention with that in Kuala Lumpur. For example, import quotas were imposed on an extensive range of Malaysian products concurrently with independence, thus sparking of a minor tariff war. The net effect was to sustain those vituperative exchanges that had distinguished relations between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur before separation, with diplomatic protests flying between respective foreign ministries and an early, albeit temporary, withdrawal of respective heads of diplomatic missions. Such intemperate conduct was partly a function of the lack of an experienced professional foreign service which might have exercised a moderating function. Those senior officers of Singaporean origin in Malaysia’s foreign service all elected to remain in their federal posts after separation.9 A separate career service was not set up on independence but had to wait until 1972. The judgement was made that a separate professional establishment was a luxury that Singapore could not initially afford. Instead, a small shifting cadre of civil servants were detached from their home departments with senior overseas positions occupied by established figures from the professions and politics, often as a result of personal links going back

The battle for sovereignty 49 to their schooldays, with the political triumvirate in effective charge of foreign policy. During the first year of independence, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs operated on a virtual shoe-string with only five home-based officials and six missions operating overseas in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Thailand and Cambodia. By 1970, the home-base establishment had been increased to only twenty-six officials with additional overseas missions in the USA, India, Indonesia and the Philippines. A permanent mission to the United Nations had been established in 1968 but an embassy in the Soviet Union had to wait until 1971. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was concerned strictly with its formal remit. Foreign economic policy, including attention to inward investment and trade promotion, was the shared responsibility of the Ministries of Finance and the Department of Trade with key roles allocated to the Economic Development Board and to the Trade Development Board ‘to build and maintain foreign confidence in the citystate’.10 Given the high priority accorded to investment and trade, and the way in which foreign policy was the prerogative of an inner political circle, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was not then an attractive career choice, although a limited number of high-flyers who had entered it through the elite administrative section of the public service indicated its potential early on. Their rise through the ranks took time, however. For example, in 1977, vacancies for heads of mission were declared for London, Paris, Bonn, Brussels and Moscow on the grounds that there was a dearth of suitably qualified candidates. The first permanent secretary of the ministry was Abu Bakar Pawanchee, a Malay seconded from the Finance Ministry who had served as a trade representative within the British Embassy in Jakarta. He initially doubled as Permanent Representative to the United Nations. Ko Teck Kin, a wealthy ethnic-Chinese businessman, who had represented Singapore in the Malaysian Senate, was appointed High Commissioner in Kuala Lumpur. In that early phase, the embryonic foreign service may be described, in the main, as a collection of information gatherers and messenger boys, including some able amateurs, whose prime job was to do the bidding of the troika of concerned ministers, led by Lee Kuan Yew. He invariably put his personal mark on policy, especially towards Malaysia, which has not been erased over the decades since independence.

50 The battle for sovereignty The post-independence relationship between Singapore and Malaysia had all the qualities of a messy divorce in which both partners sought to assert their independence of the other but without necessarily finding it easy to accept their new-found status. At least, that was the perception in Singapore of the attitude displayed in Kuala Lumpur. This perception has, in fact, been sustained over time, especially when tensions have arisen across the causeway over claims in Kuala Lumpur that Singapore had not taken Malaysia’s ‘feelings’ sufficiently into account in its conduct of foreign policy and even in the management of its domestic affairs. The employment of the term ‘feelings’ in the discourse of foreign policy served to invoke an idiom alien to Singapore’s realist lexicon that aggravated the problem of communication. A determination by Singapore’s political leaders to overcome any slide into a conditional sovereignty in undue deference to the interests of Malaysia, however represented, gave an early edge to a natural assertiveness on Singapore’s part. That assertiveness served to entrench a structural tension in the relationship and to make any talk of future reunification quite academic. The strongly expressed Malaysian objections to the state visit to Singapore in November 1986 by Israel’s President, Chaim Herzog, some twenty years after separation, revived underlying concerns that Singapore’s sovereignty was still not fully respected and generated a corresponding assertive response. Whatever the rhetoric about the relationship with Malaysia, an underlying concern has persisted in Singapore that, in Kuala Lumpur, its sovereign status is not treated with the same respect as that of other regional neighbours. That lack of respect is more likely to occur with a less than assured leadership in Kuala Lumpur driven by domestic political considerations. The terms of separation between Singapore and Malaysia were contained within an agreement concluded on 7 August 1965 that took effect two days later. The agreement set out the mutual obligations of the two states in a measured way, including formal provision for joint defence and against any unilateralism in foreign policy as well as for economic cooperation. Underlying the constitutional niceties was a deep well of suspicion and mistrust, which was the legacy of both the negotiations for and the actual experience of merger. That suspicion and bitterness had been aggravated by personal antagonisms in which the assertive demeanour of Lee Kuan Yew bulked large in the perceptions of Malay and also, importantly, those of Chinese political leaders in Kuala Lumpur. His personal role has been an important abiding factor in the problems of the chequered relationship because of a recurrent tendency on his part in heated argument to be openly

The battle for sovereignty 51 disparaging of Malaysia’s society and government. That tendency has never been kept totally under control over the years, so that his continued prominence in Singapore’s politics has been a mixed blessing in the bilateral relationship. The fact that Lee Kuan Yew stepped down as Prime Minister in November 1990 in favour of his deputy Goh Chok Tong has never been accepted in Kuala Lumpur as a transfer of effective power. In his role in the cabinet as Senior Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, second in formal rank to the Prime Minister, is regarded still as the controlling influence in the affairs of the Republic, for good or ill.11 Moreover, the prospect of his elder son, Deputy Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong, succeeding to highest office as indicated publicly by Goh Chok Tong in August 1999, serves to reinforce a stereoptypical view of Singapore held in Kuala Lumpur. During the negotiations for merger, Lee Kuan Yew had been faced with a communist-inspired opposition with roots among Singapore’s Chineseeducated community. In that context, he had made a strong point of standing up aggressively for the island’s interests, which suited his temperament. After the advent of the wider Federation, he sustained that confrontational stance as well as prescribing and justifying an ideology of multiracialism and meritocracy which was construed in Kuala Lumpur as a coded attack on the political birthright and entitlement of the indigenous Malays. The fact that he did so from an island dominated by ethnic-Chinese, which was deemed to be part of an historical Malay territorial domain alienated by colonial intervention and migrant settlement, added to the ill-feelings towards him. Such feelings were readily revived three decades later in June 1996 when Lee Kuan Yew, after an address to the Foreign Correspondents’ Association of Singapore, speculated publicly in the same vein on the prospect of and preconditions for Singapore rejoining Malaysia. His remark that reunification could only take place if Malaysia were to uphold the same principles of multiracialism and meritocracy as practised in Singapore were found offensive in Kuala Lumpur, especially when they were echoed by Lee’s cabinet colleagues. Lee Kuan Yew may have been holding out the prospect of reunion with Malaysia as an electoral gambit, in order to concentrate the minds of Singapore’s predominantly non-Malay voters with elections due in the near future. North of the causeway, however, his remark was construed as a demonstration of an enduring political incorrigibility. Such incorrigibility was further reconfirmed in Kuala Lumpur with the publication in September 1998 of the first volume of his memoirs that took Singapore’s

52 The battle for sovereignty story up to August 1965; it dealt controversially with the island’s period within Malaysia, including the events leading up to separation.12 Malaysia had been invented to contain a perceived ethnic-Chinese communist threat posed from Singapore. Its advent not only served that purpose but also had the effect of consolidating PAP rule within the island. That rule came to be viewed as an even more insidious ethnic-Chinese threat which Lee Kuan Yew personified. In the period just prior to separation, there had been recurrent calls from within the politically dominant United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) for the arrest of Lee and his close associates. In reaction in Singapore, there had even been plans for the People’s Action Party to set up a government in exile in Cambodia, because of the special relationship established with its head of state, Prince Norodom Sihanouk.13 The suggestion has been made that it was the prospect of repressive action which ultimately persuaded Lee Kuan Yew of the necessity of separation and that, ‘It was this fear (reinforced by the knowledge that Malaysian troops had been put on alert in Johor) which clouded the post-separation relations between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, especially in the military sphere.’14 After separation, the Secretary-General of UMNO, Syed Ja’afar Albar, perhaps the most vitriolic of Singapore’s critics, had resigned office in protest at the island being permitted to go its own political way. Moreover, in the light of the rationale which had been employed within Singapore in support of the imperative of merger, there was an expectation in some quarters in Kuala Lumpur that the newly independent state, after a salutary period of acute economic difficulty, would seek to return to the Malaysian fold virtually on bended knee.15 Correspondingly, within Singapore, despite the formal terms of the Separation Agreement, there was a barely concealed fear that ultraconservative Malay political forces in Malaysia would either come to power or become unduly influential within UMNO, in each case posing a threat to the new-found independence and distinctive social values of Singapore. An additional factor which served to aggravate Singapore’s fears was the presence in the island of a significant Malay minority of around 14 per cent. For the Malays of Singapore, separation required a major adjustment because they had been detached from a political context within which they felt a sense of privileged status, even if it had limited practical import. Singapore had acknowledged the special position of the Malays as the indigenous people in its constitution but had not been willing to countenance substantial affirmative action on their behalf, even while a part of Malaysia. After separation, a

The battle for sovereignty 53 perceived sense of relative deprivation and disadvantage prompted a natural disposition on the part of Singapore’s Malays to covet the more favourable position of co-religionists across the causeway and, indeed, to look across that causeway for a political lead. Accordingly, an undoubted apprehen sion obtained within Singapore that attempts might be made in Kuala Lumpur to assert a protective role on behalf of Singapore’s minority Malay community, particularly in the light of a political intervention by UMNO figures which preceded, and almost certainly provoked, violent racial conflict within the island in July 1964.16 Such an apprehension served to reinforce the sense of vulnerability which accompanied the advent of independence, which in turn added to an acute defensiveness and assertiveness in outlook within the Republic directed, in particular, towards Malaysia. A fear that Malaysia was seeking to establish a controlling military presence on the island was raised in February 1996. Malaysian troops who were occupying barracks in Singapore under the terms of the Separation Agreement were ordered to remain in their accommodation and not to make way for a Singapore battalion returning from active duty in Sabah in northern Borneo. The Malaysian troops had been deployed in Singapore at the time of separation to cope with any renewal of inter-communal violence. In the event, the matter of their accommodation was resolved through making temporary arrangements in Singapore using British troops’ quarters but not without considerable public acrimony. The Malaysian government’s insistence on sticking to the letter of the Separation Agreement over its right of access to bases in Singapore for the defence of the Federation reinforced the underlying sense of vulnerability which has served as the basic premise of foreign policy. In a sympathetic comment, The Times of London noted that ‘Singapore’s fear, to put it bluntly, was that the manoeuvre over these troops could have been the first step in a plot to overpower the island state.’17 Irrespective of the degree of its genuine concern, there can be no doubt that Singapore’s government also found it convenient to exploit the issue for domestic and international advantage, and especially in attracting the sympathetic and protecting attention of Britain’s Labour administration with which the ruling PAP then enjoyed a special relationship. Such a practice brought about a short-term advantage but had the effect of entrenching mistrust across the causeway. It also failed to resolve the problem of ensuring full respect for Singapore’s sovereign status by governments in Kuala Lumpur.

54 The battle for sovereignty Separation from Malaysia had come about despite Indonesia’s prosecution of Confrontation which was sustained and even reinforced in its rhetorical dimension. For Singapore, wedged within the maritime- and airspace of both Malaysia and Indonesia, independence was a precarious condition mitigated by a British military presence which could not necessarily be relied upon for more than a limited period. Indeed, the very act of separation, which was undertaken without any consultation with Britain as the effective protecting power, precipitated debate in London about the costs and merits of an expensive military deployment East of Suez. Foreign policy at independence, of course, was not just about adjusting to an unanticipated relationship between Singapore and Malaysia. It was necessary also to secure widespread recognition and to register sovereignty on a global basis, in part to make the point to Malaysia, in particular, that it should not make the mistake of regarding the new Republic as a subordinate political entity. In that respect, it was also important to retain a continuing security commitment from Britain which had obtained for the whole Federation under the terms of the Anglo-Malaysian Defence Agreement and which had provided well for Malaysia’s protection in the face of Indonesia’s Confrontation. Nonetheless, managing the relationship with Malaysia (in effect, the Malay Peninsula), which had never been regarded as organically separate between 1946 and 1963, was of paramount consideration. Despite the distinct constitutional identities of the two states, they were still bound together in 1965 in a myriad of ways which required sustained cooperation as well as disentanglement, above all, for example, in securing Singapore’s continuing access to vital supplementary supplies of potable water. Agreements on such access reaching well into the twenty-first century had been reached in 1961 and 1962, before Singapore had become a constituent part of Malaysia. Separation did not invalidate those agreements but it certainly generated concerns about their long-term observance. As a foreign policy problem for Singapore, managing relations with Malaysia has involved trying to strike a balance between insisting on Kuala Lumpur’s acknowledgement of its sovereign status and taking sufficient account of political sensibilities to the north of the causeway linking the two states with economic interdependence and security in mind. Singapore’s government has been less than effective in consistently maintaining such a balance, driven to an extent by interposing domestic priorities. Moreover, a quality of hubris expressed, at times, in a disdainful view of Malaysia arising from superior economic accomplishment has been viewed with resentment in

The battle for sovereignty 55 Kuala Lumpur and treated as evidence of a racist-based triumphalism. Recurrent expressions of such disparaging regard have generated political fury in Kuala Lumpur at the expense of good bilateral relations. Indeed, a measure of political insensitivity has been a recurrent feature of Singapore’s stormy relationship with Malaysia, despite an important countervailing practice of substantial cooperation, especially in economic matters, which has been of mutual benefit. One form of that cooperation has been the construction of a second physical communications link between the two states. A bridge joining northwest Singapore with southeastern Johor was opened at the beginning of 1998, though this was marred by contention over toll charges. The Separation Agreement took full formal account of Singapore’s assumption of independent sovereign status. Recognition was taken of the close defence and economic links between the two states with provision made for their future entry into a treaty to cater for the former category of cooperation. It also bound both states to honour water supply and sharing agreements concluded in 1961 and 1962. In addition, Singapore committed itself not only to afford Malaysia the right to maintain bases and other facilities in the island used by its forces but also to permit its government to make such use of those bases and facilities as it might consider necessary for the purpose of external defence. As the contentious example cited above demonstrated, conflicting interpretations of that part of the agreement shortly after Singapore’s independence were to cause difficulties in the relationship. It proved impossible to conclude a defence treaty and also to sustain in existence the Joint (Combined) Defence Council provided for in the Separation Agreement. Singapore failed conspicuously in an attempt to trade a defence treaty for an agreement on economic cooperation to compensate for the loss of common market access anticipated but never realised during merger. In the event, the two states had to be satisfied with a revised application of the AngloMalaysian Defence Agreement which took account of Singapore’s independence. That revised agreement proved to be short-lived as Britain began to reconsider its overseas defence commitments in the light of the end of Confrontation and the impact of its own economic adversity in the late 1960s. Malaysia and Singapore had undertaken not to enter into any treaty or agreement with a foreign country which might be detrimental to the independence and defence of the territory of the other party. Such a constraining mutual commitment was understandable given the continuation of Indonesia’s policy of Confrontation which had reached new heights of

56 The battle for sovereignty hostile rhetoric soon after Singapore’s independence. Interpretation of that mutual undertaking also caused early difficulties arising from initiatives by both states in pursuit of their separate interests. For Singapore, with its acute sense of vulnerability created by an unanticipated independence, it was imperative from the outset to register and defend sovereignty from any seeming derogation. For this reason, a culture of embattlement informed the international outlook of the small group of political leaders who were responsible for the conduct of foreign policy. An idiom of survival, with attendant assertive prescriptions, was transmitted to the body politic at large to become the dominant theme of public life.18 It served a domestic function in seeking to demonstrate that the PAP government had not lost its political will despite the trauma of separation. The mobilisation of Singapore’s public through such an ideology was deemed to be necessary in the light of the radical change of political circumstances and also because of the conviction, prior to merger, that Singapore could not have a viable future on its own. The idiom of survival had an important foreign policy dimension, communicating beyond the island’s shores, and especially across the causeway, that independence would be vigorously defended and would not be an ephemeral experience. Such an ideology had been made more necessary by the initial image of political feebleness conveyed by Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, who had been reduced to uncontrollable tears at a televised press conference that he gave in Singapore immediately after the public announcement of separation.19 How to survive Singapore’s independence from Malaysia took place against a background of formal pledges of mutual cooperation. Indeed, Malaysia sponsored Singapore’s application for membership of the United Nations (together with Britain, the Ivory Coast and Jordan) which did not meet with any opposition within the world body. An initial prospect of a Soviet objection on the grounds of Singapore’s retention of British military bases had been overcome because of Moscow’s apparent concern that the Chinese-supported Malayan Communist Party could become the beneficiary of their removal. Singapore was admitted into the United Nations on 21 September 1965 as its 117th member, and into the Commonwealth a month later. Mutual mistrust, however, was so deep-rooted that the commitment between Singapore and

The battle for sovereignty 57 Malaysia to cooperate proved to be exceedingly difficult to fulfil and, in a number of cases, impossible to arrange, leading to active competition in economic matters. As indicated above, Singapore virtually began its independent existence by imposing licensing and quota arrangements on the entry of Malaysian products which provoked an immediate retaliation; a short-lived tariff war ensued before the status quo was restored in the mutual interest. Although the modified framework of defence cooperation under the terms of the Anglo-Malaysian Defence Agreement demanded consultation given the continuation of Indonesia’s Confrontation, such consultation did not extend to a number of important matters of foreign policy with adverse consequences for bilateral relations. At issue initially and symbolically in dealing with Malaysia was Singapore’s relationship with Indonesia. This became an early matter of contention with Kuala Lumpur which sought to hold the island-state to the letter of the Separation Agreement. Indonesia had not relented in its diplomacy of Confrontation but signalled the prospect of recognition to Singapore, at first, to exploit the tensions across the causeway and, later on, to help manage its own domestic political problems. For Singapore, which was keen to restore an important barter trade with Indonesia, it seemed possible to distinguish and differentiate the exercise of its sovereignty in that limiting case from the security of Malaysia. Lee Kuan Yew’s initial open offer to trade with all parties and a subsequent attempt to re-establish barter trade with Indonesia represented an attempt to cope with adverse economic circumstances which had been aggravated by a failure to reach an agreement on trade matters with Malaysia. The initiative provoked an emergency cabinet meeting and a hostile response in Kuala Lumpur, including a threat to break off relations which Singapore was loath to do. That particular episode occurred shortly after a temporary recall of respective heads of diplomatic missions precipitated by ill-considered obiter dicta by Lee Kuan Yew, including pejorative references to Malaysian political leaders and society. Writing as a young academic in the late 1960s, Singapore’s current ambassador to Washington pointed out that: ‘Singapore’s hard pushing style in politics, so offensive to the Alliance government throughout 1963–65 is still the major alienating factor in the post-separation relations between the two countries.’20 Singapore’s sovereign right to conduct its foreign relations became an issue again in April 1966. At the time, Malaysian representatives were engaged in

58 The battle for sovereignty clandestine negotiations with those of Indonesia’s Armed Forces to bring Confrontation to an end. Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, reacted with fury, however, to Singapore’s expression of welcome to the revelation by Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Adam Malik, that he had been instructed by President Sukarno to step up the recognition of the island-state ‘in intensifying Confrontation’. This episode occurred shortly after Singapore had withdrawn from the Joint Defence Council set up under the Separation Agreement in frustration at Malaysia’s insistence on vetoing a resumption of barter trade with Indonesia. The malaise in the relationship was reinforced by the judgement in Singapore that Malaysia was employing double standards in the constraints imposed on the exercise of the Republic’s sovereignty. In the event, Singapore was obliged to defer to Malaysia’s objections Although still a formal target of Indonesia’s aggressive policy, Singapore was never made a party to the negotiations between Malaysia and Indonesia which brought Confrontation to a close in mid-1966. Moreover, their successful conclusion of that episode occurred against the background of a rhetorical shared Malay blood-brotherhood whose racial connotation was deeply disturbing within a predominantly ethnic-Chinese Singapore. Indeed, very shortly after separation, Lee Kuan Yew had pointed out that: ‘Our longterm survival demands that there’s no government in Malaysia that goes with Indonesia. Life would be very difficult if I found myself between Malaysia and Indonesia.’21 In that context, Singapore was also not an original party to negotiations when Indonesia and Malaysia began to explore creating a new vehicle for regional cooperation intended to institutionalise their political reconciliation. That exploration bore fruit as the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) whose founding members were Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Singapore joined ASEAN as a founding member in August 1967 but its government had exhibited an early suspicion of the attempt to promote multilateral regional cooperation because of a fear that it might lead to the subjugation of smaller partners by the larger ones, possibly in collusion. It is notable that Singapore did not enter into negotiations for entry until as late as May 1967, and then only after Lee Kuan Yew had been informed privately in the previous month by Britain Defence Minister, Dennis Healey, of his government’s intention to withdraw its military presence from East of Suez by the mid-1970s. Singapore’s initial suspicions of ASEAN were sustained in the early 1970s by pressure within the Association to endorse a Malaysian

The battle for sovereignty 59 proposal for neutralising South-East Asia subject to the guarantees of the major powers. That proposal was endorsed, in principle, by ASEAN’s governments in November 1971 but, in practice, as an Indonesian-inspired alternative scheme for a so-called regional Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) within which resident states only would assume prime responsibility for managing regional order. In Singapore, even the revised alternative proposal, that only paid lipservice to neutralisation, was seen to carry the danger of the island being exposed to a locally imposed distribution of power. Singapore’s approach to regional order was the exact opposite. As a Foreign Ministry spokesman pointed out not long after: ‘Rather than keeping out all outsiders, therefore, it would be better for as many interested powers as possible to come in and develop a stake in the region thereby ensuring that no single great power gets into a dominant position.’22 Singapore’s Foreign Minister signed the Kuala Lumpur Declaration with strong official reservations but in the conviction that the Zone of Peace idea would not have serious practical application because ASEAN was hardly likely to become a manger of regional order. In the case of Indonesia, which posed a different kind of threat to that of Malaysia, Singapore displayed an evident ambivalence. Indonesia was a giant of a state compared to the island. Indeed, its population was increasing every year by around the same number as the total population of Singapore. Singapore was resented by Indonesia’s political establishment for its ethnicChinese identity and for its regional entrepôt role, viewed as parasitic in encouraging a barter trade regarded as smuggling in Jakarta, and which denied important tax revenue to its government. Singapore had also to live down the role of the island serving as a support-base for rebellion in Sumatra during the mid-1950s and the related charge that it was an agent for British influence after formal decolonisation. Lee Kuan Yew had made an effort to overcome that perception with a visit to Jakarta in January 1960 during which he had supported Indonesia’s claim to the western half of the island of New Guinea (now Irian Jaya). One fruit of that visit had been the establishment of a trade office in August 1961 within the British Embassy. The prospect and advent of Malaysia, however, had led to a reversion in relations with old suspicions revived. Singapore was keen to secure Indonesia’s recognition as a way of defusing the kind of threat posed during ‘Confrontation’ when acts of terror had been conducted by armed infiltrators and also in order to revive the lucrative barter

60 The battle for sovereignty trade. Singapore could not act independently towards Indonesia, however, without alarming Malaysia which had its own separate agenda for dealing with its adversary in ‘Confrontation’ that did not include a role for the islandstate. Indeed, the circumstances of the clandestine negotiations of the end of hostilities effectively cut out Singapore. It could only strike postures towards Indonesia. A separate relationship could only evolve as a consequence of rapprochement across the Malacca Strait from which Singapore was excluded as a principal party which, in turn, served to reinforce the Republic’s sense of vulnerability and embattlement. The rhetoric of survival expressed in an assertive diplomacy was compelling in the circumstances but its efficacy was perhaps questionable given the critical role of Malaysia in the declared indivisibility of security relations with the new island-state. Singapore, in particular, through the person of Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, was pugnacious in the extreme in asserting sovereignty, but to the government in Kuala Lumpur such assertiveness was seen to be articulated in a gratuitously offensive manner. Indeed, the nature of dealings across the causeway totally belied the kind of textbook formulations about maintaining good relations in foreign policy which were articulated by Foreign Minister Rajaratnam. To a degree, therefore, the rhetoric of survival was somewhat self-defeating. It served an important purpose in mobilising domestic support for Singapore’s government but was less functional in foreign policy. The same may be said to be the case in early combative dealings with Indonesia, however justified by the compelling logic of not appearing to bend the knee to a more powerful neighbour for fear of displaying a weakness that would be exploited in the future. It became clear from very early on that close economic cooperation with Malaysia was out of the question and that Singapore would have to go its own separate way in seeking development through export-oriented foreign direct investment. In registering sovereignty, however, Singapore enjoyed countervailing external support. For example, it attracted the ready backing of alliance partners in London, Canberra and Wellington which were sympathetic to the modern meritocratic image of Singapore projected by Lee Kuan Yew, whose intellectual and political qualities were much admired in the white Commonwealth. Those qualities stood in contrast to the picture of an obscurantist and feudal Muslim Malaysia which Lee Kuan Yew had managed to convey persuasively during overseas visits from well before separation, and which had been responsible for fuelling a sense of resentment in Kuala

The battle for sovereignty 61 Lumpur. The British, Australian and New Zealand governments all had military forces in the region in response to Indonesia’s Confrontation but for Singapore their utility went beyond that mission as sources of countervailing power against additional threat from Malaysia. In his memoirs, Lee Kuan Yew has claimed that after separation, ‘The Tunku and Razak thought they could station troops in Singapore, squat on us and if necessary close the causeway and cut off our water supply.’ 23 To Commonwealth and also US diplomatic support was added the tolerance of the non-aligned community of states which were prepared to countenance Singapore’s accommodation of a British military presence without objecting to its entry either into the United Nations or the NonAligned Movement. Neither did the Soviet Union raise objections to Singapore’s membership of the United Nations, which had been a prospect of some concern giving rise to the effort at an opening to Afro-Asian states. The People’s Republic of China, excluded from the United Nations, was not a direct factor in the diplomacy of recognition for membership in international organisations. However, Singapore did not go out of its way to alienate Beijing by entering into diplomatic relations with Taiwan. It began with and has held continuously to a one-China policy, albeit taking advantage of important informal economic and defence dealings with Taiwan. It also voiced support for Beijing’s admission to the UN from the outset and in time voted for its government to assume the China seat when the issue of representation was resolved within the General Assembly of the United Nations in October 1971. The government in Beijing indicated its approval of Singapore’s initially expressed willingness to deal and trade with all countries, regardless of ideology, although critical of its support for US policy in Vietnam. Beijing would have been pleased, however, by Singapore’s efforts, while within Malaysia, to keep open its branch of the Bank of China whose continuing presence in the island was only assured by the act of separation. That said, Singapore insisted that the bank be staffed by local citizens not regarded as security risks and that it should not be directed by a representative from Beijing who might be seen as an unofficial ambassador.24 Such provision for continuing the activities of the bank, however prudent in Singapore, did not endear the island-state to Kuala Lumpur, which had entered into consular relations with Taipei. An ambivalence in the defining relationship with Malaysia, and also with Indonesia, was matched in other aspects of foreign policy. For example,

62 The battle for sovereignty Singapore placed considerable importance on securing overwhelming international recognition at a time when the General Assembly of the United Nations was being increasingly dominated by the beneficiaries of decolonisation. An Afro-Asian political collegial ity of a kind obtained, despite the abortive attempt in mid-1965 to reconvene the historic 1955 Bandung Conference in Algiers. The institutionally separate Non-Aligned Movement had only come into being formally in 1961 but its ranks were increasing steadily. Singapore sought international acceptance from this quarter in order to be able to call on its diplomatic support. To that end, its government found it expedient to adopt a strident anti-American stance with Lee Kuan Yew revealing details at the end of August 1965 of an attempt in 1960 by the CIA to suborn a local member of the security service with financial inducements. He also gave public assurances that the USA would be denied access to Singapore’s bases ‘under all circumstances’ as a way of making the British tenure of those bases more acceptable.25 In the light of such a display of anti-American rhetoric, it is ironic to note that, at the turn of the century, Singapore entered into an agreement with the USA whereby its aircraft carriers would enjoy access to berths at an enlarged Changi naval base. Singapore’s somewhat crude attempt to demonstrate acceptable political credentials on independence had been prompted partly by the tardiness with which a number of African states came to recognise Singapore’s sovereignty.26 Moreover, Pakistan had denied Singapore early recognition, as did the Philippines, because of alignment with Indonesia over Confrontation. In its opening to the non-aligned states, Singapore was sailing under false colours. Indeed, over the years an undisguised open contempt has been displayed for governments seen to live in a political day-dream marked by anti-colonial rhetoric, while failing conspicuously to provide for the material welfare of their citizens. At the time, however, Singapore’s government felt obliged to reach out well beyond its immediate regional locale in order to demonstrate universal confirmation of its independent status. It was probably for that reason that Lee Kuan Yew went out of his way to identify the future of Singapore with that of Norodom Sihanouk’s Cambodia. That proclivity to reach out beyond regional locale was to be displayed in a contrary way once the United Nations had accepted Singapore’s right to exist. Its current ambassador to Washington pointed out in 1969: ‘As Singapore’s independence became widely recognised and accepted and as her government made fresh calculations of her international assets, Singapore’s anti-Western

The battle for sovereignty 63 attitude mellowed considerably.’27 Indeed, a visit to the island by William Bundy, the USA’s Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs, in March 1966, paved the way for an agreement whereby servicemen from Vietnam would use facilities in Singapore for rest and recreation. By October 1967, Lee Kuan Yew was in the USA offering public support for America’s war aims in Vietnam but significantly not any token military contribution of the kind provided by Thailand and the Philippines, by then regional partners within ASEAN. On independence, Singapore was faced with interrelated problems of security and economic well-being. They were closely connected in a special sense in so far as the British military presence contributed significantly to employment and gross domestic product. The prospect of its progressive withdrawal became a practical issue soon after separation which, in effect, had served to precipitate its discussion in Whitehall where Singapore had ceased to be regarded as a strategic asset. For Singapore’s political leaders, such a view pointed to the imperative of access to countervailing power in the Republic’s vulnerable geopolitical circumstances. Indeed, without a British military presence based in Singapore during the period of the island’s membership of Malaysia, the contention with Kuala Lumpur might have ended up with a very different political outcome. That presence, which provided a guarantee of continued independence, could not be taken for granted, especially in Britain’s deteriorating economic circumstances leading to devaluation in November 1967. Early intimations of retreat had been signalled with the publication of Britain’s Defence Estimates in February 1966, which declared the intention of maintaining a military presence in South-East Asia but with a reduced force level. A public announcement of Britain’s ultimate military withdrawal was made in July 1967. Its timetable was accelerated to the turn of the decade by a further announcement in January 1968. In the event, Lee Kuan Yew engaged in a personal intervention in London which was successful in securing a delay in final withdrawal until the end of 1971, based on the shrewd calculation that general elections in Britain might bring a change of government and policy. That calculation proved to be correct when the Conservative Party was returned to office committed to sustaining an East of Suez policy but without the ‘blank cheque’ security guarantee of the Anglo-Malaysian Defence Agreement. The alternative Five Power Defence Arrangements, which came into force in November 1971, by contrast

64 The battle for sovereignty consisted of a consultative arrangement among defence partners, with a much reduced standing force which did not survive the mid-1970s, and were therefore less than ideal from Singapore’s point of view. Although second best, the Five Power Defence Arrangements were nonetheless regarded from the outset as an important contribution to Singapore’s security because of the continuing involvement of Britain, Australia and New Zealand. They provided a framework for multilateral security cooperation which would offer a measure of protection against collusive activities by Malaysia and Indonesia, especially as, at that juncture, ASEAN was still regarded with mixed feelings, while the idea of neutralisation was viewed with apprehension. The Five Power Defence Arrangements were intended primarily to serve as a vehicle for confidence-building between Malaysia and Singapore. However marginal their benefits to that end, they have stood the test of time. They remain an asset of a kind for Singapore to the extent that they provide an institutionalised external security involvement in regional locale in keeping with the island-state’s balance of power perspective.28 At issue in the light of developments which led on to the withdrawal of Britain’s protecting military presence were complementary or even alternative ways of providing for security so that foreign policy could not be dictated from ‘near abroad’. By then, the USA had been drawn deeply into its fateful military engagement in Vietnam. As indicated above, whatever the mixed feelings in Singapore about the merits of that undertaking, there was an underlying approval for a US military role as a basis for upholding the independence of regional states. More directly relevant was the concern that a US withdrawal would lead to a Communist victory in Vietnam and provide fresh encouragement to local communist parties elsewhere in South-East Asia. The defence dimension of foreign policy in the wake of independence symbolised the dilemma arising from Singapore’s geopolitical circumstances. The new state began its independent existence with a deepseated and well-founded mistrust of its nearest neighbours. Whatever the rhetoric about establishing friendly relations, in particular, with those countries nearest to the Republic, the prime threat was perceived as likely to arise from those close neighbours. Singapore’s choice of Israel as its covert defence partner served to symbolise that fear in the light of the cultural identity of Malaysia and Indonesia. It also registered the alien regional identity of Singapore through an analogy with an embattled Israel standing alone in the

The battle for sovereignty 65 Middle East against its adversary Muslim neighbours. However provocative the choice of Israel as a source of defence and youth training, it demonstrated both the limited choices available as well as the signal which was intended to be conveyed about the determination of the PAP government not to permit its independence to be compromised. In October 1969, Lee Kuan Yew explained to the Socialist International that the reason why Singapore had opted for Israel was that: ‘In our situation, we think it might be necessary not only to train every boy but also every girl to be a disciplined and effective digit in defence of their own country.’29 Singapore had almost certainly decided on Israel as its most suitable defence partner on the basis of comparing the special circumstances of both states. The decision was justified, however, by a reluctance on the part of nonaligned states, such as India and Egypt, which Singapore had sought to cultivate, to offend Malaysia by becoming involved in the Republic’s military development. The first Defence Minister, Dr Goh Keng Swee, had direct knowledge of Israel, which he had visited in 1959, and also knew its ambassador to Thailand who was invited to Singapore to discuss defence cooperation. That visit led on to Israel sending military advisers to Singapore and to the Republic adopting Israel’s model of national service for its armed forces in the light of the small size of the population. Israel’s astounding victory against the Arab states in the Six-Day War in June 1967 served to vindicate the choice of defence partner. It did not endear Singapore to its closest neighbours, however, and the relationship with Israel was modified when survival became less of an imperative. Indeed, although Singapore entered into diplomatic relations with Israel in 1969, which set up a mission on the island, a corresponding mission has never been established in Tel Aviv. Singapore’s accreditation to Israel of an ambassador based in Paris occurred only in 1996. An honorary consul was appointed in 1999. Singapore made pragmatic diplomatic adjustments in the direction of Arab states in response to the oil crisis of 1973, in order to protect the flow to its refineries. Moreover, after a terrorist attack on an offshore-island oil refinery in 1974, by a combined Japanese Red Army and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine force, Deputy Prime Minister Goh Keng Swee bade a contrived public farewell to the country’s military advisers. The Israeli defence connection has been reduced over the years as Singapore’s economic success has made the world its market for military cooperation. That connection has never been relinquished, however, and remains an asset valued

66 The battle for sovereignty by Singapore’s government because of a continuing identification with Israel’s predicament and an admiration for its military professionalism. In the event, Singapore sought to accommodate dual approaches to security. A heavy provision for self-defence of the most modern and sophisticated kind facilitated by a remarkable economic development has been matched by a deep engagement in multilateral regional cooperation to mutual advantage. That latter approach took time to evolve, however, because of an initial lack of confidence in such a modality which was construed initially as a constraint on Singapore’s initiative and independence. The circumstances of Singapore’s acquisition of independence and its early experience of dealing with its two closest neighbours made Singapore’s accommodation to its regional locale a slow, ponderous process. In the event, the adjustment was made with a vengeance over time, as Singapore assumed a leading diplomatic role in promoting the collective interests of its regional partners within ASEAN. Despite that achievement, the underlying dilemma of how to deal with regional partners who are also potential adversaries has remained a persistent factor in the conduct of the Republic’s regional relations. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, and given Singapore’s modern defence capability, sovereignty is no longer as immediately at issue as it once was. In a fundamental sense, however, the island state’s geopolitical circumstances have not changed in the more than three and a half decades since an unanticipated independence. For that reason, the need to assert sovereignty continually, both in practice and in principle, beyond the regional locale has remained a central feature of the Republic’s foreign policy. In that respect, Singapore’s voting record at the United Nations has demonstrated a consistent stand on the principle of non-interference, exemplified in the case of the Western (Spanish) Sahara and Grenada when invasions respectively by Morocco in 1975 and by the USA in 1983, both friendly states, were publicly condemned. Such a stand, which was registered up to a point also in the case of Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor in 1975, served to strengthen the credibility of Singapore’s position in upholding the cardinal principle of international society that is a matter of continual critical self-interest. Singapore adopted the same stand on behalf of ASEAN in defending the right of the exiled murderous Khmer Rouge, in company with other Khmer resistance groups, to hold the Cambodian seat in the United Nations from 1979 in the face of challenge from the incumbent government in Phnom Penh which owed its place to Vietnamese military intervention. For Singapore, the

The battle for sovereignty 67 principle of non-interference is seen as a shield for sovereignty. Singapore’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, during the interventions into Western Sahara and Grenada, in expatiating on the theme of whether a country could afford a moral foreign policy, has pointed out ‘that the national interest of Singapore required that I put principle ahead of friendship’.30 A corresponding stand was taken subsequently in 1990 in response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, with parallels drawn to the vulnerable circumstances of both states. Constancy in geopolitical circumstances in the context of a deepseated historical memory makes the defence of sovereignty in all of its dimensions an abiding imperative in Singapore’s foreign policy.

3

Accommodating and transcending regional locale

Singapore’s government set about conducting its foreign relations in a robust way registered by the credo of ‘survival’. The ability to sustain a viable independent existence depended, above all, on assuring the economic future of the new Republic. It had become clear that such a goal could not be achieved through pursuing the rationale for merger. Singapore, as a regional entrepôt in decline, had sought economic salvation through a common market with a Malayan hinterland. That prospect had been denied while within the new Federation. Post-independence negotiations with Malaysia on economic cooperation confirmed the impasse. Moreover, it has been suggested that, ‘To Lee and the PAP leaders, Malaysia was not only guilty of a calculated policy of holding off cooperation but also blocking their attempts to find alternative solutions to the island’s economic problems.’1 An alternative economic course became imperative. After a limited and abortive experiment with import substitution, Singapore opened its doors wide to multinational enterprises looking for manufacturing bases and export platforms with favourable comparative cost advantages. To that extent, Singapore went against the grain of conventional post-colonial and some Western intellectual opinion that multinational enterprise was a form of economic exploitation without real advantage to the host state. In that respect, it also stood out regionally, at least for a time, as an irritating exception.2 Lee Kuan Yew pointed out in 1978 in a speech to the Orlando Chamber of Commerce: ‘We have never suffered from any inhibitions in borrowing capital, know-how, managers, engineers and marketing capabilities.’

Regional locale 69 In the event, its foreign economic policy was decisive in giving the Republic an early lead in export-oriented industrialisation. That successful experience served as a case-study for disproving a fashionable neo-Marxist dependency theory that conceived of defending sovereignty through total self-reliance, irrespective of economic and human costs. Singapore engaged in its battle for sovereignty through economic interdependence with a key role assumed initially by US electronics firms. They were attracted by financial inducements offered to so-called pioneer companies, firm and stable government and restrictive industrial relations as well as a low-cost location in the Jurong industrial estate in the west of the island. It was this virtual multinational foreign economic policy that enabled Singapore to overcome its immediate vicissitudes, especially those brought on soon after separation by Britain’s need to reduce and then to remove its military presence because of its own dire economic circumstances. That withdrawal did not take place overnight and was accompanied by a good measure of economic compensation. The process of adjustment was daunting, however, because of the level of employment (16 per cent) provided by the British bases as well as the proportion of wealth (14 per cent) which they contributed to gross national product. And yet, within only a short space of time, the Republic began to display rapid economic growth. It began also to transform its traditional entrepôt role into a modern form through providing a new range of technical and financial services for its regional environment and beyond. In the process, the island-state began to reinvent itself as an entrepôt through expanding its economic role within maritime South-East Asia. By the turn of the decade after independence, Singapore was set on a path to the astounding economic achievement that has become its distinctive feature. That achievement gave a greater confidence to the practice of foreign policy, which began to shed the intense prickliness that had been displayed at the outset. Singapore’s leaders talked less about the analogy of a poisoned shrimp that had been intended to convey its toxic indigestible qualities to close neighbours in the event of an invasion and more about the virtues of regional cooperation. A tension has persisted, however, between Singapore’s reconstituted regional economic role and its regional diplomacy. It has been pointed out that ‘much of Singapore’s foreign policy is designed to allay the fears of neighbouring countries but that is difficult because much of Singapore’s well-being directly depends on its economic hegemony in SouthEast Asia’.3 Whether the tag of economic hegemon is justified, Singapore’s

70 Regional locale material attainment tends to be regarded among closest neighbours as having been realised at their expense. Singapore’s relations with closest neighbours had begun very badly. Open antagonism with Malaysia was an abiding feature of their early years, with the Federation beset by racial antagonisms which culminated in great violence in May 1969. That Sino-Malay confrontation, which broke out in Kuala Lumpur in the wake of an adverse electoral outcome for UMNO, spilled over briefly into Singapore and pointed up the volatile way in which the two societies were connected. The episode also served as a salutary lesson for both sides and, for a time, had the effect of helping to contain bilateral tensions. For example, a joint initiative was taken to discontinue circulating each state’s newspapers north and south of the causeway. Singapore also discontinued a provocative section entitled ‘How Others See Us’ in The Mirror, a government weekly. The riots and their spill-over revived fears in Singapore of becoming engulfed by racial conflict from Malaysia, which might draw in Indonesia in a worstcase variation of the way in which Confrontation had been brought to a close.4 By that juncture, the process of disentangling common institutions was well in train but negotiations to that end did not ease the bilateral relationship. Symptomatic of the structural tension embedded in it was the way in which a minor incident on Singapore’s side of the causeway led to the postponement of an official visit by Lee Kuan Yew to Kuala Lumpur arranged for August 1970, which would have marked his first official call since separation. By then, Tun Abdul Razak, the Deputy Prime Minister, was close to assuming Malaysia’s highest office in succession to Tunku Abdul Rahman, who had lost the confidence of the Malay political establishment. Singapore had speedily transferred Maurice Baker, a long-standing school friend of Razak’s and by profession a university teacher of English, from his post as High Commissioner in New Delhi to that in Kuala Lumpur. Baker had also been at school with Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore, and they had been students in Britain at the same time, so Baker was able to arrange an official visit for his Prime Minister to Kuala Lumpur. That visit fell victim to the undue zeal of immigration officers in Singapore, which was then passing through a puritanical phase in social policy. Long hair worn by males had been marked out as a sign of a decadence that was deemed incompatible with the Republic’s disciplined social order. In June 1970, three Malay youths seeking to enter Singapore were detained and had their long locks shorn against their will. That incident was quickly taken up by Malaysia’s media and also by UMNO’s youth wing, always keen to display

Regional locale 71 its nationalist credentials against Singapore. Lee Kuan Yew’s visit had to be postponed because of the furore aroused by the hair-cutting incident. It was to be nearly two years before it could be rearranged. The episode demonstrated Singapore’s difficulties in managing a relationship beset by a deep-seated structural tension that has persisted over the decades. Moreover, attitudes towards Singapore in Kuala Lumpur continued to harden. Demonstrations of survival mentality on the island were construed as sharp practice north of the causeway. For example, Singapore’s attempt to expropriate the goodwill attached to the internationally known initials of the joint Malaysia-Singapore Airline (MSA) prior to its division into separate national carriers marred the delayed official visit to Kuala Lumpur by Lee Kuan Yew in March 1972. Lee was welcomed under sufferance and certainly without any warmth. Moreover, strong suspicions had been aroused by the acquisition of modern equipment by Singapore’s Israeli-trained armed forces. Such procurement was interpreted as preparation for a possible pre-emptive strike to seize the sources of Singapore’s supplementary water supply in Johor. As Prime Minister, Tun Razak visited Singapore in 1973, with Lee Kuan Yew returning to Kuala Lumpur in 1975, but the relationship remained correct and hardly cordial. A marked improvement had to await the premature death of Tun Razak and the succession of Dato Hussain Onn as Prime Minister. Reciprocal visits by national leaders in 1976 prompted an editorial judgement in Singapore about the continuation of ‘the pecial relationship’ between the two states.5 However exaggerated that view, close cooperation across the causeway between intelligence communities had been indicated in a crackdown during 1976 against so-called leftists in government circles in Malaysia close to the late Tun Razak. Beyond such cooperation, foreign policy towards Malaysia was very much a personal matter between political leaders, with the officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs concerned primarily with messagecarrying and damage limitation. A declared policy of good neighbourliness had to contend with the disposition on Singapore’s part to fear Malaysia but paradoxically not to take it seriously as a state. Indeed, the stereotype of Malaysia as a state beset by feudal and obscurantist religious considerations was deeply resented in Kuala Lumpur, especially when communicated abroad by Singapore’s leaders. Singapore’s relationship with Indonesia did not carry quite the same kind of historical legacy of rancour as that with Malaysia, but it was problematic nonetheless given the size, population, close proximity and power potential of Singapore’s southern neighbour compounded by the experience of

72 Regional locale Confrontation. Under the rule of President Sukarno, Singapore had been viewed from Jakarta with resentment as a centre of parasitic overseas Chinese enterprise and as a colonial bastion as well as a base of support for regional rebellion. With the advent of the New Order established by General Suharto in 1966, that open enmity had given way to a grudging tolerance expressed in the establishment of diplomatic relations soon after ties had been established with Malaysia. For minuscule Singapore, Indonesia was a potentially more fearsome prospect than Malaysia. It had been threatening as a broken state but the prospect of a strong Indonesia was worrying in a different sense. Its government had appeared to have forged a special post-Confrontation relationship with its Malaysian counterpart and, with the destruction of its once formidable Communist Party, had come to enjoy the favourable regard of the USA and Japan. A practical but cautious accommodation characterised the early relationship with Jakarta. That caution was based on a pessimistic interpretation of Indonesia’s regional policy goals as indicated in the negotiations that had preceded the advent of ASEAN in Bangkok in August 1967. It was Indonesia, to Singapore’s concern, that had formulated the terms of reference for the regional mission of the Association in the preamble to its founding declaration. Indonesia had been able to incorporate a prerogative residentstate responsibility for regional security. It had also been responsible for including a repudiation of all foreign military bases in South-East Asia. That political stance stood in direct lineal descent from the outlook of the ultranationalist Sukarno administration, which had been responsible for embarking on Confrontation. Indeed, the terms of the Bangkok Declaration bore a disconcertingly close resemblance to a series of joint statements issued by Indonesia, the Philippines and Malaya during 1963, in the course of the diplomacy over the controversial advent of Malaysia, when the government in Kuala Lumpur had appeared willing to appease Indonesia’s hegemonic pretensions. For that reason, Singapore had joined ASEAN with strong private reservations and had committed itself to the terms of the founding declaration with political tongue in cheek. While Singapore could not afford to isolate itself regionally by rejecting membership, its expectations of ASEAN were limited, including those entertained of economic cooperation. The underlying concern was harboured that the Association might be used and abused to serve as a vehicle for asserting Indonesia’s regional dominance with Malaysia’s complicity.

Regional locale 73 That concern was reinforced by the way in which Indonesia and Malaysia cooperated during 1971 in an attempt to challenge the customary legal regime of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore which was an economic life-line for the island-state. The grounds employed for that challenge were safety of navigation and threats to the marine environment arising from the increasing size of Japanese bulk oil-carriers in passage from the Gulf. The governments in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur had earlier extended the breadth of their respective territorial seas from 3 to 12 nautical miles and had reached an agreement on defining the medium line in the Strait of Malacca whose maritime narrows were less than 24 miles. This delimitation, which, in principle, removed the quality of high seas from the Strait, served as the legal basis for seeking the establishment of a more restrictive regime of innocent passage. Singapore was a coastal state only in the Singapore Strait that, connected to the Malacca Strait, provided the main maritime communications link between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Singapore’s territorial sea was limited to 3 miles only, because of the confined maritime space that it shared with both Malaysia and Indonesia. Because of the logistical symbiosis between the Straits of Malacca and of Singapore, however, the Republic could not be excluded by its neighbours from any collective attempt to challenge their customary legal regime, which its government vigorously resisted. In the event, Singapore became a party to an agreement whereby the three coastal states asserted a shared exclusive responsibility for safety of navigation within the maritime narrows. However, it stood out against the pressures of its close neighbours by only ‘taking note’ of their challenge to the customary legal regime of the interconnected straits, and in insisting, with their endorsement, that the matters of safety of navigation and of the ‘internationalisation of the straits’ were two separate issues. The importance that Singapore placed on these matters had been indicated by the presence of Defence Minister Dr Goh Keng Swee and Acting Foreign Minister E.M. Barker, at ministerial consultations with Indonesia held in Singapore in October 1971 as well as that of the Minister of Communications, Yong Nyuk Lin. At issue was a determination by Singapore’s government to deny its suspect close neighbours the right to restrict maritime or other access to the islandstate with the attendant prospect of a stranglehold being exerted on its vulnerable economic life-line. It had been alerted by its UN mission from the late 1960s to the general trend towards a creeping maritime jurisdiction on

74 Regional locale the part of coastal states, including the prospect of an extension of territorial waters to 12 miles, which had proven critical in the case of the Strait of Malacca. In reaction, early representation had been secured on the UN Seabed Committee set up in 1968, which was engaged in preparations for the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea that convened in 1974. Within the UN and with the support of the major maritime powers, Singapore’s representatives pressed successfully for the issue of the legal regime of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore to be taken out of regional context and to be addressed together with that of all other straits used for international navigation. Singapore successfully linked its self-interest in the matter not only with the major maritime powers but also with other ‘geographically disadvantaged states’, which confirmed both the logic and utility of a foreign policy based on access to countervailing influence beyond regional bounds.6 In the event, the United Nations Conference concluded its protracted and complex deliberations in November 1982 with provision in its Convention for a new liberal regime of ‘Transit Passage’, which protected Singapore’s economic and strategic interests. That basis in protection in International Law was confirmed twelve years later when the Convention came into force.7 Singapore was able to defend its maritime life-line without coming into serious conflict with Indonesia. Jakarta’s main maritime objective was to secure international recognition for its unilaterally declared archipelagic status, which could be readily supported without compromising Singapore’s interests. In the event, Indonesia’s joint initiative with Malaysia in respect of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore proved to be a gambit to serve the cause of acquiring archipelagic status. Indeed, the episode caused resentment in Kuala Lumpur at its diplomatic resources having been used to serve Jakarta’s end, especially as the outcome placed a possible impediment to communications between Malaysia’s Peninsula and Bornean wings. It is worth noting that when, in late 1977, Malaysia was initially obstructive over granting rights of passage through its airspace to the supersonic Concorde service to be operated jointly by Singapore Airlines and British Airways, Indonesia proved willing for a time to permit access to Singapore through its airspace. Moreover, Singapore’s strong stand over the legal regime of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore did not prove an obstacle to practical cooperation with Indonesia in maritime matters. A treaty delimiting the territorial sea boundary between the two states in the Singapore Strait was

Regional locale 75 signed in May 1973 on the occasion of Lee Kuan Yew’s first official visit to Indonesia as head of government of an independent republic. In developing its relations with Indonesia, Singapore despatched Lee Khoon Choy, a senior ethnic-Chinese PAP figure, as its second ambassador. He proved to be a considerable success, in part because of his genuine interest in Javanese culture.8 The relationship between the two states was not one of equality of standing, but it was important for Singapore to demonstrate an equality of international status. That issue had been joined in a disruptive way early on in the post-Confrontation relationship when, in October 1968, despite public representations from Jakarta, Singapore went ahead with the execution of two Indonesian marines who had infiltrated the island during the period of Confrontation and had discharged explosive devices causing loss of civilian life. Singapore’s cabinet refused to bow to international pressure to commute the sentences, including a personal act of intercession for clemency by President Suharto supported by Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman. The ostensible reasoning was a refusal to interfere with the Republic’s legal process but the underlying rationale was characteristically Singaporean: namely, that to show weakness in the present would be to invite intimidation in the future and even to encourage the imposition, in Indonesia’s case, of a vassal status. The episode provoked a temporary rupture in relationships with mobs sacking Singapore’s Embassy in Jakarta and the homes of some of its diplomatic staff.9 In the event, calmer counsels prevailed because of Indonesia’s determination not to deviate from its new course in economic policy and foreign relations, which enjoyed the strong support of the USA and Japan and its new-found ASEAN partners. The government in Jakarta had no wish to rekindle images of mob agitation against foreign diplomatic missions, which had been a characteristic feature of President Sukarno’s rule. Relations were restored to near normality within a short space of time, although President Suharto did not forget the seeming insult for which Lee Kuan Yew was obliged to make an appropriate act of contrition with resonance in Javanese culture. It took Singapore’s government nearly five years to put the relationship on a full working footing. It had also offended Indonesia in May 1970 when it sent only a junior minister to an international conference on Cambodia which convened in Jakarta in the wake of the coup in Phnom Penh that drew the country into the ambit of the Vietnam War. That conference marked an attempt to register Indonesia’s return to an active foreign policy but its composition

76 Regional locale favoured Cambodia’s new government led by General Lon Nol, who had led the coup. Singapore’s junior representation was motivated by a concern not to be seen to jump at Jakarta’s diplomatic command and, probably also, by not wishing to be seen as part of an alignment against the position of deposed head of state, Prince Norodom Sihanouk. A number of Singapore’s ministers, including Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, had developed a close working relationship with him. Indeed, at one time Cambodia had been represented as a model for Singapore to emulate in its foreign policy. Although Lee Kuan Yew had met with President Suharto at the NonAligned Conference in Lusaka in September 1970, he had not been able to find an opportunity to explain his government’s position. Amends were made, however, in mid-1972, when Singapore provided advance notice to Jakarta of a visit to the island-state by a Chinese table tennis team. Their presence had been contemplated both as a bridge to China in the light of the role of table tennis in recent Sino-American rapprochement and as a test of national loyalty and identity for the island’s predominantly ethnic-Chinese population. Apparently, the gesture of transparency was appreciated and served the desired goal of confidence-building. A further sign of a thaw in relations was a meeting between Finance Minister Dr Goh Keng Swee and President Suharto in Jakarta in November 1972, by which time Singapore had become the fourth largest investor in Indonesia after the USA, Japan and Hong Kong. It was not until May 1973, however, that Lee Kuan Yew was able to pay a state visit to Jakarta. Indeed, it took almost three years to arrange by Singapore’s ambassador, who was charged specifically with that task, and it was preceded by visits to the island-state by a number of President Suharto’s minions in order to assess Lee Kuan Yew’s power and intentions.10 At issue for Suharto was the question of Singapore’s position on the Strait of Malacca, its defence relationship with Israel and its role as a locus of overseas Chinese economic and cultural activities, as well as the matter of personal humiliation over the hanging of the Indonesian marines. In the event, the visit took place without controversy. It began with a symbolic act of contrition on Lee Kuan Yew’s part. Early in the morning of the first full day, he paid a visit to the Kalibata military heroes cemetery outside the capital where he scattered flower petals on the graves of the two marines, who had been buried there with full military honours. That penance done, Lee Kuan Yew was permitted his first direct and private conversation with President Suharto, which proved to be a political revelation. Suharto ex pounded his views on development and political order and also his ambitions

Regional locale 77 for ASEAN which, as a result, came to be seen by Lee more as a defensive entity, with China much in mind, than an offensive one likely to harm Singapore’s interests. That private meeting, without officials or interpreters present, gave Lee Kuan Yew an insight into the mind-set and strategic priorities of the Indonesian President, and also confidence in the prospect of a much better working relationship with Indonesia. Indeed, within a short space of time, Singapore’s relationship with Indonesia began to assume a better condition than that between Indonesia and Malaysia, which had been represented as of a special kind in the wake of Confrontation. The key to that change was the personal link established between Lee Kuan Yew and Suharto, which also exemplified the locus of authority in Singapore’s foreign policy. There was also a meetings of minds on regional order, with Lee Kuan Yew making a speech identifying the shortcomings of neutralisation for South-East Asia based on great power guarantees, which had been the basis of the rapprochement proposal.11 Instead, he invoked the merits of Indonesia’s doctrine of regional resilience inherent in the ZOPFAN concept, which had fewer practical disadvantages for Singapore. Lee Kuan Yew’s visit to Jakarta proved to be a formative event in Singapore’s foreign policy. Without removing the underlying apprehension with which Singapore contemplated Indonesia, and untoward political change there, an understanding of the priorities of the Suharto government served as a critical reference point for Singapore’s actions. Indeed, during his meeting with President Suharto, Lee Kuan Yew made available privately barter trade figures whose lack of disclosure had a been a source of bilateral tensions. He also gave assurances that Jakarta would be consulted on the development of relations between Singapore and China, which was the case when Singapore began exploratory high-level contacts with Beijing from the mid-1970s. The new phase in the relationship was indicated in a speedy return visit to Singapore by President Suharto in May 1974. By this stage, Singapore and Indonesia had begun to find greater common cause with one another on a number of regional issues than both countries were able to do with Malaysia. Despite their cooperation over the legal regime of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia had differed strongly over the former’s proposal for neutralising South-East Asia based on the guarantees of the major powers, which had been put to the meeting of Non-Aligned heads of governments in Lusaka in September 1970. In the event, in November 1971, ASEAN’s foreign ministers, including Singapore’s, endorsed an Indonesian-

78 Regional locale inspired alternative formula prescribing a regional ‘Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality’ that conceived of managing regional order through the exclusive role of resident states and without any identifiable responsibility for outside powers. Notwithstanding its strong opposition to a balance or distribution of regional power based on a hierarchy of local states, Singapore had gone along with the Indonesian formulation as a lesser evil. The Malaysian proposal was deemed to be suspect because neutralisation was regarded as a flawed concept with which to provide for national security, especially as it would be likely to prejudice the USA’s military role in the region. Indonesia’s alternative was not seen as any better in substance but it was certainly much more vague and impractical. Singapore’s Foreign Minister was prepared to endorse it because it was deemed to possess only a declaratory significance and not an operational utility to the island-state’s strategic disadvantage. Indeed, its declaratory quality and the lack of positive response from the major powers to the prior idea of neutralisation made it possible for Singapore to accommodate Indonesia and so help to consolidate the bilateral relationship without compromising its own security interests. It proved politic also to be able to support Indonesia over an issue on which it differed significantly from Malaysia at a time when Indonesia and Malaysia appeared to be working together against Singapore’s interests over the legal regime in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. Moreover, Singapore did not follow suit when Malaysia established diplomatic relations with China in May 1974, to Indonesia’s evident displeasure. It was made clear to Jakarta that Singapore would only establish such relations after Indonesia had itself restored diplomatic ties with Beijing, which had been suspended in October 1967. The critical reason for the degree of success in Singapore’s relationship with Indonesia from the early 1970s was that Lee Kuan Yew began to see the advantage of deferring to President Suharto in personal terms as long as it was not at the practical expense of Singapore. The meeting between Lee and Suharto in May 1973 marked a turning point not only in relations with Indonesia, with which economic cooperation picked up, but also with ASEAN. Singapore was able to comprehend Indonesia’s strategic stake in ASEAN and, in consequence, began belatedly to appreciate the political advantages of regional cooperation. Such cooperation began to be valued as a vehicle for intra-mural confidence-building and subsequently as one for advancing Singapore’s interests through the medium of collective diplomacy. Previously, regional cooperation had been contemplated primarily in

Regional locale 79 economic terms, which had been very frustrating in the case of ASEAN, whose members were not in a position to open their markets to one another. ASEAN had been regarded initially as an instrument for strengthening domestic economies and as a clearing-house for mutual consultations, but not much more. At the end of 1969, Foreign Minister Rajaratnam had suggested that ASEAN should remain an organisation for promoting economic cooperation and not for resolving the region’s military and security problems.12 That view was reiterated by Lee Kuan Yew in the speech that he delivered in Singapore in April 1972 at the opening of the fifth annual meeting of ASEAN’s foreign ministers.13 Singapore’s attitude to ASEAN began to change as a direct result of a qualitative change in the relationship with Indonesia. Tensions remained between the two disparate states but the constructive dimension was enlarged considerably from that time, with Singapore seeing political advantage in working with Indonesia within the Association. That attitude bore fruit during the course of the decade, when it became necessary for the member states to take stock of their political cooperation in the wake of the disturbing success of revolutionary communism in Indochina during 1975. ASEAN then began to be employed as a protective diplomatic vehicle for registering a retention of collective political nerve and for signalling within and beyond South-East Asia that the Association’s member governments would not suffer the fate of falling dominoes. Additional benefits of intra-ASEAN solidarity accrued, for example, in negotiating economic preferential arrangements with European Community states and in countering an Australian airline policy which discriminated against Singapore. Singapore drew increasing comfort from this protective framework and played an increasingly active role in its support. With a greater sense of political comfort about participation in ASEAN, partly because of a conviction over Indonesia’s stake in the Association, Singapore’s ministers and diplomats began to profit from working within a multilateral structure of relations. Within such a structure of relations, inequalities between states pointed up in bilateral dealings may be softened and reduced somewhat depending on the quality of diplomatic input by the more junior parties. The reasons why Singapore has been able to punch above its weight have been articulated by Ambassador Tommy Koh, a long- standing senior member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He has pointed out that Singapore may be a flyweight nation state in terms of its geography and population, but it carries

80 Regional locale a lot of weight when it mounts the scales of economic, communication, intellectual and diplomatic power.14 By the early 1970s, Singapore had set up a separate professional foreign service and had begun gradually to move away from the model of the gifted amateur in filling diplomatic appointments. Within its foreign service, it set high standards of intellectual proficiency and also of application, so that its members came to be valued by their ASEAN colleagues as the Association began to take on the role of a diplomatic community with a collective interest to advance. To the extent that Singapore was able to reconcile its separate national interests with the Association’s collective goals, then it was able to embed itself in an increasingly acceptable way within its regional locale. In coming to terms with its regional locale, Singapore’s government never lost sight of its imperative interest in preventing its fortunes from becoming subject to the mercy of purely regional forces. It had been with that objective in mind, that, in February 1972, Foreign Minister Rajaratnam had articulated his vision of the Republic as a ‘Global City’ with the world as its hinterland as an alternative to its traditional restricted role as the ‘Change Alley’ of the region. This was an analogy to the narrow lane of market stalls running from Raffles Place to Collyer Quay where, it was said, a visitor could lose a wallet at one end and buy it back at the other. He pointed out: If we view Singapore’s future not as a regional city but as a Global City then the smallness of Singapore, the absence of a hinterland, or raw materials and a large domestic market are not fatal or insurmountable handicaps. It would explain why, since independence, we have been successful economically and, consequently, have ensured political and social stability.15 Rajaratnam was ahead of his time in contemplating the dynamics of ‘globalisation’ through internationalised production, of which Singapore was an early exemplar and willing beneficiary. He concluded by stressing that: ‘The gist of this possibly lengthy discourse is that an independent Singapore survives and will survive because it has established a relationship of interdependence in the rapidly expanding global economic system.’16 In the same way that Singapore had overcome the constraints of its economic circumstances through attracting multinational enterprise, its government was keen to do the same in the dimension of security.

Regional locale 81 Singapore was willing to go along with the prerogative regional outlook of Indonesia in promoting the corporate identity of ASEAN, which provided a measure of collective political defence. To that end, Singapore played a constructive role in cooperation with Indonesia in promoting the idea of an ASEAN summit and establishing a permanent secretariat located in Jakarta, which was endorsed at the first meeting of its heads of government, in Bali, in February 1976, attended by Lee Kuan Yew. Singapore was also strongly in support of a norm-setting Treaty of Amity and Cooperation for the region, which was concluded at that summit. That treaty provided an opportunity to overcome an underlying tension with Indonesia over the concept of a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) about which Singapore had mixed feelings. Its conclusion moved a potential source of conflict over the regional distribution of power to a plane of common interests. A consensus was reached when an initial idea of a regional treaty of non-aggression as means of realising ZOPFAN was succeeded by another whereby international norms intended to regulate intra-ASEAN relations would be registered also in treaty form. Most attractive for Singapore was that the Treaty of Amity would be based, above all, on respect for national sovereignty and drew also on other conventional precepts of best state practice found in the United Nations Charter. The Treaty of Amity served to counter the impression given in 1971 that the Zone of Peace might serve as a device for asserting an Indonesian hegemonic role. A complementary purpose of the Treaty was to secure adherence by the successor revolutionary states of Indochina as a way of building a political bridge based on a commitment to common norms of international conduct. That aim proved to be impossible at that juncture, particularly when a reunited Vietnam exhibited a triumphalist attitude in calling for ASEAN’s replacement by an alternative regional body. Endorsement of the Treaty by all ASEAN governments had a clear security utility, albeit of a limited kind, for a state like Singapore. Their signature did not in itself overcome Singapore’s innate condition of vulnerability but it did place a measure of self-imposed constraint on regional partners, some of which were regarded as potential adversaries. There was a clear irony, from Singapore’s point of view, in the timing of the Treaty, which had been drafted well before its signature in February 1976. The first ASEAN summit had convened shortly after Indonesia had employed armed force to seize the eastern half of the island of Timor, which had been a neglected Portuguese colony. That brutal annexation in December 1975 had been undertaken by the government in Jakarta as an act of strategic denial in

82 Regional locale the face of a left-wing independence movement and against the background of the recent successes of revolutionary communism in Indochina. That rationale was accepted in all ASEAN capitals, with the exception of Singapore, where the use of force across an internationally recognised boundary, even one with a colonial state, could not be endorsed without seeming to sanction an unwholesome precedent with implications for the island-Republic. Indonesia’s annexation of East Timor in December 1975 and then its formal integration in July 1976 remained controversial within the United Nations. The UN never recognised Jakarta’s assumption of sovereignty, which was ultimately relinquished in October 1999. When a resolution condemning Indonesia came before the UN General Assembly in early 1976, every ASEAN government voted against it, with the exception of Singapore which initially abstained. That stance provoked renewed tension with Jakarta whose government had no sympathy with Singapore’s point of principle. In the event, Singapore’s point was not sustained for long. Its abstention soon came to be replaced with a negative supporting vote for Indonesia in common with all of its ASEAN partners. Singapore had signalled its concern, nonetheless, over upholding the cardinal principle of the international society of states. It did so, even if it was not politic to uphold principle for long in the case of East Timor for fear of permanently alienating its large and powerful neighbour with which a practical working relationship had been established. At issue, of course, is whether Singapore’s abstention on a point of principle in the case of East Timor, without any practical bearing on the material matter at hand, served the island-state’s foreign policy interests. Given the fierce anti-communism of Singapore’s government in its domestic policy, and the ideological orientation of the independence movement in East Timor, there was a disposition in Jakarta to interpret Singapore’s stand as less than consistent and even hypocritical. While there was satisfaction in Jakarta when Singapore deemed it appropriate to step into line over East Timor with its regional partners within ASEAN, it was of a grudging quality based on the belief that the Singaporeans had been gratuitously obstinate over a matter of strategic importance to Indonesia and also with security significance for the island-state. For Singapore, however, the view was maintained that in its vulnerable condition it was absolutely necessary to make the point of principle so that no state would be tempted to toy with its independence. Making such a point also had an important domestic political function to the extent that an awareness of the tension in the relationship with Indonesia would remind a rising generation of Singaporeans that the Republic’s independence could not

Regional locale 83 be taken for granted. Overall, Indonesia’s brutal seizure of East Timor and its implications for Singapore had been a salutary reminder of the continuing pressing need to try to take the regional balance or distribution of power out of the exclusive control of regional states. While taking some comfort from the direction in which ASEAN was going, Singapore persisted with its attempts to replicate its condition of ‘Global City’ in security terms. As indicated above, Foreign Minister Rajaratnam had expatiated over-imaginatively on this theme and had been quoted in a selfcongratulatory volume of essays on the record of PAP government published in 1976. He explained: ‘When there is a multiplicity of suns, the gravitational pull of each is not only weakened but also by a judicious use of the pulls and counter-pulls of gravitational forces, the minor planets have a greater freedom of navigation.’17 That statement represented, in a highly ambitious form, Singapore’s ideal of encouraging a balanced engagement of external interests and influences in order to underpin its vulnerable independent position. The ability of a minuscule state, even of Singapore’s political sophistication and economic achievement, to call into being and to manage such a pattern of power would seem highly doubtful. The ‘minor planet’ analogy was a flight of political fancy. Nonetheless, Singapore was able to demonstrate progress in this direction when its ideal pattern of power proved to be in accord with the interests of its regional partners. Such a concordance occurred with ASEAN’s second summit, held in Kuala Lumpur in August 1977 to commemorate the tenth anniversary of its foundation. In many respects, that meeting was a major disappointment because of the failure of the participating governments to make any substantive progress in economic cooperation, which was at the top of their agenda. The meeting was significant, however, for the attendance after the formal summit of Japan’s Prime Minister, Takeo Fukuda, as well as of the Prime Ministers of Australia and New Zealand, Malcolm Fraser and Robert Muldoon. Japan’s government had made a positive judgement of ASEAN’s staying power in the wake of communist success in Indochina, and was keen to build on the economic ties which had been slowly revived after the end of the Pacific War. The presence of the Prime Ministers of Australia and New Zealand served to make the attendance of their Japanese counterpart less conspicuous, although the ASEAN governments looked particularly to Japan for inward investment. Singapore’s Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, played an important part in inspiring that meeting. It marked the beginning of a process to be

84 Regional locale institutionalised at the level of foreign ministers at which ASEAN governments would meet collectively on an annual basis with their ‘dialogue partners’ from industrialised states. The Post-Ministerial Conference (PMC), as it became known, convened in full form in July 1979 in Bali immediately following the annual meeting of ASEAN’s foreign ministers. It was particularly significant for the attention that it gave in support of ASEAN’s strong objection to Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 and to the flow of refugees from Vietnam. Singapore adopted an unprecedented high profile over these issues in which national and regional security were seen to be inextricably joined. Indeed, it was over the issue of Cambodia that Singapore began to register a notable lead and stridency in foreign policy, directed, above all, at Vietnam, whose government was accused of seeking to destabilise the region. When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan at the end of the following year, Singapore immediately joined that issue with the invasion of Cambodia as part of an insidious design being masterminded from Moscow. It has been suggested that it was only after the Cold War that Singapore came out of its diplomatic shell to assert a managerial role in regional politics.18 While such a role was certainly asserted at that juncture, from the late 1970s Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs had already begun to play a vigorous part in promoting and coordinating the diplomacy of the ASEAN states. It may be argued that Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs came into its own over the Cambodian conflict. UN General Assembly resolutions on Cambodia sponsored by ASEAN were effectively handled by Singapore’s mission. Singapore was not only out in front diplomatically within ASEAN over Cambodia but also had a hand in conciliating contending positions on the issue between Indonesia and Thailand over the degree of threat posed by Vietnam compared to China. The Cambodian conflict between December 1978 and October 1991 was a defining period for ASEAN. It was the critical episode over and during which the Association attained and demonstrated the quality of a diplomatic community able to conduct itself, up to a point, as a unitary international actor. Equally significant was the way in which Singapore assumed an increasingly active diplomatic role within the Association in upholding a corporate solidarity in challenging Vietnam’s military occupation of Cambodia and the legitimacy of the government carried into Phnom Penh in the saddlebags of its army.

Regional locale 85 It has been suggested that 1979 was the most active year in foreign policy for Singapore since independence. It was marked additionally by a robust and defiant role at the Non-Aligned Summit in Havana in the face of Cuba’s virtual hijacking of the conference in Vietnam’s interest.19 Singapore’s Foreign Minister, S. Rajaratnam, took on the political heavyweights of the NonAligned Movement with courage and conviction. Singapore’s diplomacy over Cambodia expressed a Cold War conventional wisdom that Vietnam’s invasion and the invasion a year later of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union were part of the same expansionist design.20 The view was articulated that the Soviet Union and its Vietnamese proxy were engaged in an insidious attempt to extend influence in South-East Asia by force of arms signalled earlier by naval deployments from the Pacific into the Indian Ocean. Irrespective of the extent to which Foreign Minister Rajaratnam believed his own rhetoric, it served the foreign policy purpose of Singapore, which found itself in tune with the USA and China in mobilising support against Vietnam’s violation of the cardinal rule of international society. To that extent, the Cambodian conflict provided an opportunity for Singapore to promote a junction of regional and global interests in its own favour while, ironically, trading on a profitable cash-and-carry basis with Vietnam that its representatives denounced with passion in the United Nations. This kind of conduct, in which a spurious distinction was drawn between politics and economics, gave Singapore a reputation for international sharp practice and served to confirm the prejudices of its close neighbours about the trustworthiness of the island-state, despite its diplomatic prowess on their behalf. Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs distinguished itself as a diplomatic dynamo during the course of the Cambodian conflict. The advocacy, lobbying and drafting skills of its officials were employed to great effect within the United Nations against Vietnam and its client government in Phnom Penh. For example, the declaration of the International Conference on Kampuchea held at the UN in 1981 was drafted by Singapore’s delegation. Singapore’s diplomatic success was accomplished through playing on the political sensibilities of states that had been alarmed by the example of a government despatching its army across an internationally recognised boundary to remove an incumbent administration recognised at the United Nations and replacing it with another of its own manufacture. In making a case for that displaced government to retain its seat in the United Nations, Singapore’s

86 Regional locale representatives faced a considerable difficulty over the moral dilemma involved. The displaced government of so-called Democratic Kampuchea had a murderous reputation and was universally reviled. Indeed, the Vietnamese had argued persuasively, after the event, that their invading ‘volunteers’ had performed an international public service in removing the bestial Khmer Rouge regime from power. Their action was compared with that of India in coming to the aid of the people of Bangladesh and Tanzania in coming to the aid of the people of Uganda. Singapore found itself at odds with India, in particular, which recognised the Phnom Penh regime in 1980. In 1983 at Algiers, its representative had acted to thwart Democratic Kampuchea’s assumption of the Cambodian seat in the Non-Aligned Movement, which had been declared vacant in 1979 at Havana. To counter this line of argument, Singapore’s spokesmen successfully pressed the point of view that membership in the United Nations had never been based on the criterion of respect for human rights and that, if it were to be, then the credentials of a good number of members might well be in jeopardy. At issue, it was argued, was respect for the principle of national sovereignty, which was the cardinal rule of the world body. Professor Tommy Koh, Singapore’s Permanent Representative in New York, maintained that: If Democratic Kampuchea were to lose its seat in the United Nations, it would be tantamount to saying that it is permissible for a powerful military state to invade its weaker neighbour, to overthrow its government and to impose a puppet regime on it.21 That view, which was expressed on behalf of ASEAN and very much in Singapore’s interest, was accepted and endorsed through the course of the 1980s with its diplomats in the vanguard of the Association’s successful collective efforts. Singapore also played a key role in helping to fabricate a so-called Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea comprising disparate Khmer factions in a successful attempt to dilute and so overcome the murderous political identity of the Cambodian government in exile. In September 1981, the disparate and contending Khmer factions joined in opposition to the government in Phnom Penh were brought together initially in the island-state. Success in this diplomatic endeavour was realised subsequently at a meeting in Kuala Lumpur in June 1982 when the coalition

Regional locale 87 government was constituted under the formal leadership of Prince Norodom Sihanouk. This government, under his nominal leadership despite the absence of an identifiable locus of administration, served to help keep the Cambodian seat in the UN in the hands of ASEAN’s nominees right up to the end of the conflict. In this exercise, Singapore was in the diplomatic vanguard within ASEAN but its representatives were careful not to seek political credit. The Cambodian conflict also marked a turning point in Singapore’s foreign policy to the extent that its ministers and officials came to appreciate the advantages of working with and through regional partners. For Singapore, the Cambodian conflict provided an opportunity to fuse principle and practice in foreign policy because of the close identification with Vietnam’s act of international delinquency and its own vulnerable condition. In consequence, Singapore’s government acquired the reputation of ‘hardliner’ in its diplomatic stance against Vietnam and also the Soviet Union, which was represented as the patron of its attempt to establish a hegemonic position within Indochina. Underlying Singapore’s militant stance directed at the Soviet Union was a consistent interest in sustaining the countervailing military role of the USA in the region, especially after its ignominious exit from Vietnam in the mid-1970s. In that respect, the Cambodian conflict, which never posed any tangible threat to Singapore and from which it secured economic advantage, was a political gift of a kind. First, the Cambodian conflict provided the opportunity for the Republic to become a full party to a combative diplomatic process with full acceptability from its regional partners with which it was able to attain a notable level of solidarity. In that respect, Singapore had joined the region in its ASEAN dimension with a vengeance and demonstrated enhanced credentials in the process. Second, Singapore’s regional engagement was deepened because its diplomats were obliged to work to moderate tensions among regional partners because of resistance to the way in which the Cambodian conflict had become a factor in a wider global contention in much the same way as the two previous Indochina wars. For Singapore, however, that global contention was seen to work to national advantage because of the way in which the USA was drawn back into regional conflict so denying the establishment of an adverse local balance or distribution of power. It also stimulated a renewal of security cooperation with Malaysia in response to a successful Australian initiative to breathe new life into the flagging Five Power Defence Arrangements. The Cambodian conflict was a diplomatic triumph for ASEAN, but it was also a mixed blessing for the Association. The international standing attained

88 Regional locale during its course concealed the extent to which ASEAN’s diplomatic success was due to its participation in an informal alliance coalition with major powers for which the Association served as a diplomatic proxy. Nonetheless, the need to coordinate and concert policies promoted and reinforced a corporate culture of close consultation and cooperation, which also worked to the decided advantage of its smallest and most vulnerable member, Singapore. The Cambodian conflict increased the stake of the members in the Association because of the way in which its more or less harmonious collective voice appeared to count for much in chancelleries around the world, which worked equally to Singapore’s advantage. It was with this stake and advantage in mind that Singapore played a key role in persuading the Sultanate of Brunei that it should join ASEAN on securing full independence from Britain in January 1984. With Singapore, Brunei shared an apprehension of Indonesia and Malaysia. A popular revolt in the Sultanate in December 1962 had been mounted with Indonesia’s support and had also provided the pretext for Confrontation of Malaysia. For its part, Malaysia had been involved in seeking to destabilise Brunei during the mid1970s, ostensibly from a fear that it would become a contagious source of insecurity in northern Borneo in much the same way as Indonesia’s military establishment had contemplated the deteriorating situation in East Timor. In the wake of its separation from Malaysia, Singapore had developed a close relationship with Brunei, whose former Sultan had opted not to take his British protected state into the new Federation. Lee Kuan Yew went out of his way to establish a close working relationship with the Sultan of Brunei, Sir Omar Ali Saifuddin, which was sustained after he had abdicated in 1967 in favour of his son, the incumbent Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah. Singapore had established an informal diplomatic presence in the protectorate from the 1970s and conspicuously stood aside from the challenge to its international status, which was mounted in the United Nations by Malaysia with Indonesia’s support in the middle of that decade. Singapore was able to avail itself of military training facilities in jungle areas of Brunei, which were unavailable to its forces on its own home island. Brunei had been unusual in resisting British attempts at final decolonisation but had been persuaded that a reversion to sovereignty should take place five years following the signing of a treaty of friendship in January 1979. In the intervening period, ASEAN had flowered as a regional partnership. Singapore was able to persuade the government of the Sultanate that there would be more security at hand within the walls of the Association than outside because of the stake that

Regional locale 89 Indonesia and Malaysia had developed in its cohesion and standing. Brunei’s membership in the multilateral structure, which worked by consensus, was also of signal advantage to Singapore because of the shared sense of vulnerability and common concerns of the two states. Moreover, its officials worked closely with their counterparts in Brunei in helping to develop its fledgling foreign service. Singapore’s role had been critical in the Sultanate joining ASEAN. It was Lee Kuan Yew who, in June 1978, had issued a personal invitation to the Sultan after meeting with President Suharto.22 Encouragement for Brunei’s membership by Singapore was not pressed at the expense of relations with its two immediate neighbours. Its entry into the Association represented only a marginal diplomatic augmentation, especially as the oil-rich state had limited diplomatic resources at its disposal with which to participate effectively in the multilateral enterprise. Nonetheless, Brunei’s membership of ASEAN, strongly encouraged and promoted by Singapore, meant that interests similar to Singapore’s would have to be taken into account in securing the necessary consensus in collective decision-making. During the Cambodian conflict, Singapore had also developed a closer working relationship with Thailand, with which it became closely associated in hardline position. There had been a measure of neglect on Singapore’s part in the years following separation, with Lee Kuan Yew not paying an official visit to Bangkok until 1973. By then, the judgement had been made that Thailand was a critical buffer state against the spread of insurgency from Indochina. During his visit, Lee Kuan Yew reached an agreement for a company of Singapore’s commandos to train in Thailand on an annual basis. With the onset of the Cambodian conflict, a meeting of political minds was registered on the issue of the regional balance or distribution of power and in support of armed opponents of the regime in Phnom Penh. Thailand was regarded as a strategic partner and the coincidence of interests made for a good working relationship, albeit one marred by problems associated with Thai migrant workers in Singapore. In the case of the remaining member of ASEAN, the Philippines, Singapore had mixed feelings as the authoritarian experiment imposed by President Marcos in September 1972 went sour against a background of managerial incompetence and corruption. That incompetence and corruption served to fuel the revival of communist insurgency causing concern and alarm in Singapore whose Prime Minister became embarrassed at the way in which President Marcos sought to represent himself as a Philippines equivalent of Lee Kuan Yew. For the greater part of the institutional evolution of ASEAN

90 Regional locale from the mid-1970s and through the major part of the course of the Cambodian conflict, the Philippines was the sick man of South-East Asia. Its main asset for Singapore was as the locus of a network of US military bases which gave the USA a power-projection capability westwards towards the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. Singapore had every interest in the USA being able to maintain its military deployment in and from the Philippines but had no practical way of persuading President Marcos of the folly of his personalised rule. In the event, Singapore’s leaders were quietly pleased to see the downfall of Marcos in 1986, but harboured mixed feelings about the style of government of his successor, Corazon Aquino, especially her willingness to compromise with the local communists. Nonetheless, Singapore demonstrated solidarity with the Philippines as a regional partner when its government was under threat from a mutinous military. Lee Kuan Yew was, significantly, the first ASEAN head of government to visit Manila after Marcos’ downfall. He also attended the third ASEAN summit in Manila in December 1987, where he accorded due deference to President Suharto, who had insisted that the meeting proceed as planned in a display of intra-ASEAN solidarity, despite the security risks entailed. Singapore, in the person of Lee Kuan Yew, continued to hold misgivings about the Philippines, especially its reversion to a raucous undisciplined democracy. His remarks on this subject offended Corazon Aquino and her successor President Fidel Ramos, and probably contributed to popular ill-feeling towards Singapore exhibited during the mid-1990s when a Filipina maid was found guilty of murder and executed in the island-state. The Cambodian conflict provided a basis for consensus between Singapore and its regional partners during the 1980s. In relations with Indonesia, the matter of Singapore’s diplomatic deviance over East Timor had been overcome without any other issue of substance interposing in the relationship, which had been sweetened by the flow of investment from the island-state, including that to the nearby Indonesian Riau Islands of Batam and Bintam. Military cooperation followed, including access for Singapore’s airforce to training areas in Sumatra. Far more problematic was the relationship with Malaysia, which had been beset by a structural tension from independence. Despite a growing economic interdependence expressed from the end of the 1980s in a growth triangle with Malaysia and Indonesia, incorporating the state of Johor and the Riau Islands, minor irritations continually intruded into the relationship.23 One notable example arose from a unilateral redrawing by

Regional locale 91 Malaysia of its maritime boundaries at the end of the 1970s to incorporate the island of Pedra Branca (Pulau Batu Puteh) in the Singapore Strait, which houses the Horsburgh Lighthouse and which had been subject to administration from Singapore for more than a century. This symptomatic dispute, which has rumbled on unresolved for two decades, was eventually contained by an agreement to refer the matter to the International Court of Justice.24 A more critical but still symptomatic deterioration of relations occurred when Singapore judged it appropriate to give greater visibility to its relationship with Israel by receiving its President, Chaim Herzog, on a first state visit.25 Singapore’s relationship with Israel had begun even before independence, with contacts in the fields of medicine and youth training. With independence, however, the relationship was expanded to encompass a controversial military dimension justified by the innate vulnerability of the island-state. Although highly suspect in Malaysia and Indonesia, the political cost of harbouring Israeli military advisers was deemed acceptable in the interest of providing for the protection of a precarious independence. Their presence became an open secret together with their Mexican nom de guerre. In acting to entertain that presence, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew must have taken into account his earlier admonition, once employed to justify Singapore’s short-lived participation in Malaysia. He had pointed out that: ‘Singapore with its predominantly Chinese population would, if independent on its own, become a South-East Asia’s Israel with every hand turned against it.’26 In the event, the burgeoning relationship between an independent Singapore and Israel did not prove to be an obstacle to a working relationship between the island-state and Malaysia and Indonesia, despite their degrees of support for the Palestinian cause. For its part, Singapore was not obliged to establish a mission in Tel Aviv in return for continuous access to military training, technology and intelligence. A visit to Singapore in May 1979 by Israel’s Foreign Minister, Moshe Dayan, had passed off without arousing contention from nearest neighbours. That experience and the utility of the long-standing relationship made Singapore’s cabinet give serious consideration to Israel’s request for a first ever visit by a head of state. An agreement to that end was reached in December 1984 for a visit in the following May on the condition that Israel’s President would also travel to other countries in South-East Asia. In the event, the occasion was postponed twice by the Israelis for domestic reasons but was reinstated in April 1986 for

92 Regional locale the following November after Suppiah Dhanabalan had made an uncontroversial first visit to Israel by a Singaporean Foreign Minister. In the light of the seeming sturdiness and resilience of intra-ASEAN relations, the worst expectation was that the presence of Israel’s President would be received ‘with cold displeasure in Malaysia’.27 Within Singapore’s Foreign Ministry, there was no apparent forewarning of the political storm that was about to rage when President Herzog’s visit was announced a month in advance by Israel’s Embassy. The visit was marked by acute controversy. It was treated in Malaysia, in particular, as a calculated act designed to give political offence. The problem was, in great part, one of unfortunate timing. Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad had long registered his antipathy towards Israel. From the middle of 1986, he had also begun to represent Zionism and Jewry, employed interchangeably, as an insidious international conspiracy with malicious intent towards Malaysia in response to allegations in the Asian Wall Street Journal of stock market manipulation by his Finance Minister. Whether coincidental or not, those strictures had been articulated concurrently with a rising political challenge to Dr Mahathir’s leadership within the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), which culminated in April 1987 in an unsuccessful bid for power by his rival Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah. According to Lee Kuan Yew, once the initial agreement for Herzog’s visit had been approved, he had not been made aware of its reinstatement until it was reported in the newspapers following the unanticipated press conference by Israel’s Embassy in Singapore. Moreover, it is doubtful whether Singapore’s Foreign Ministry had advised its Malaysian counterpart of the impending visit. S. Rajaratnam, by then Senior Minister, pointed out after the event that it was not ‘the practice between sovereign states either to inform or seek permission from another before inviting foreign guests’.28 Singapore’s High Commissioner to Malaysia certainly only found out about the timing of the reinstated visit from the local press, to his undoubted anger. Dr Mahathir felt an even greater sense of outrage and affront because, according to Lee Kuan Yew, he had construed the visit in the context of his publicly declared position on Israel ‘as a slight or disregard of his views’.29 Dr Mahathir was almost certainly angered also in that context because no mention of the impending visit had been made when he had met with Lee Kuan Yew in Kuala Lumpur in August 1986. Public demonstrations against the visit were mounted in Malaysia, while vitriolic comment appeared in the media. Malaysia’s High Commissioner returned to Kuala Lumpur for the duration of

Regional locale 93 the visit. Indonesia’s ambassador also withdrew from Singapore but without the same domestic furore, while the government of Brunei contented itself with a perfunctory protest. The issue was primarily a bilateral one across the Strait of Johor governed by the coincidental competitive condition of Malaysia’s politics. Indeed, in February 1987, President Suharto paid a cordial visit to Singapore, travelling by road across the causeway from Malaysia, which he had just visited, in a symbolic act of promoting reconciliation. Singapore’s willingness to receive Israel’s President was represented in Malaysia as an ill-timed public flaunting of a politically tainted relationship and as another example of the characteristic hubris with which Prime Minister Lee and his cabinet colleagues conducted the affairs of the island-state. In effect, the so-called Herzog affair was more a sin of omission than one of commission. There had been a failure in the foreign policy process with disastrous consequences for Singapore’s most important bilateral relationship. That failure of consultation and coordination within Singapore was symptomatic of a more deep-seated failing in political sensitivity in the light of the public utterances by Dr Mahathir in the months preceding the controversial visit. However genuine or opportunistic such utterances may have been in the light of a rising challenge to his leadership, they represented warning signs which went either unnoticed or unremarked, or possibly dismissed as of little political account by Lee Kuan Yew himself. In the event, Singapore’s government sought to make a virtue out of necessity by managing the strain in the relationship with Malaysia so as to demonstrate the perpetual vulnerability of the island-state. That vulnerability had been additionally pointed up by evidence in private opinion polls taken by the government of the extent to which Singapore’s Malay minority had been influenced in opposing the Herzog visit by public rhetoric from across the causeway. Malaysian demands at ministerial level for the visit to be reconsidered were construed as an unwarranted attempt to impose a veto on foreign policy as well as subversive of the loyalty of the Republic’s Malay citizens. Accordingly, the episode became a test of respect for national sovereignty. Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew sought to engage in damage limitation publicly after the event and acknowledged the impact of the visit on the self-esteem of Dr Mahathir. He pointed out that if he had been kept better informed, he would have postponed the visit because of his personal relationship with Malaysia’s Prime Minister. He went on to say: ‘So I would not wish to slight him. But once it was announced, we could not without horrendous consequences to ourselves and to our foreign policy cancel it

94 Regional locale because of demonstrations in Malaysia. It is not the way you behave if you want to be taken seriously.’30 The controversial episode had a controversial sequel arising from a public comment in February 1987 by Lee Kuan Yew’s elder son, Lee Hsien Loong, in his capacity as Second Minister of Defence. During a constituency tour, he questioned the loyalty of Malays in justifying why none of their number had been recruited as pilots into Singapore’s airforce. He remarked: ‘If there is a conflict, if the SAF is called to defend the homeland, we don’t want to put any of our soldiers in a difficult position where his emotions for the nation may come into conflict with his emotions for his religion.’31 Apart from the display of prejudice as perceived in Kuala Lumpur, his remarks coincided with rising intra-party contention within UMNO which made imperative a caustic response from Malaysia’s government, setting back the modest improvement in bilateral relations after the furore caused by Herzog’s visit. In Singapore, that reaction served to demonstrate the extent to which the Herzog affair and its sequel were more tests of national sovereignty than just bilateral squabbles. An editorial in The Straits Times in March 1987, in response to Malaysian criticism of Lee Hsien Loong’s remarks about the position of Singapore’s Malays in its armed forces, pointed out: ‘This goes to show that some 22 years after Singapore left Malaysia, not everyone in Malaysia has accepted the Republic as a sovereign state.’32 The intense fragility in the relationship was again demonstrated later in the year by Malaysia’s caustic reaction to an incursion into its coastal waters in the Johor Strait by a small group of Singapore’s national servicemen on a training exercise. Despite that fragility, both governments sought to repair matters through practical cooperation. For example, joint naval exercises were conducted in the South China Sea in April 1987. Malaysia’s Defence Minister, Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen, visited Singapore towards the end of the year and ratified an agreement on exchanging students between the two states’ respective defence colleges. Close cooperation between internal security services is believed to have occurred concurrently with arrests in Malaysia under the Internal Security Act in October 1987. The same month, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew met with Dr Mahathir during the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Vancouver, where they discussed the condition of the bilateral relationship and also the supply and price of water and natural gas from Malaysia to Singapore. These discussions were continued in December 1987 at the third ASEAN summit in Manila. The momentum of their rapprochement was sustained when Dr Mahathir paid a one-day visit to

Regional locale 95 Singapore in January 1988, after which he announced a new agreement on the price of fresh water and one, in principle, on the purchase of natural gas. These agreements were confirmed when Lee Kuan Yew paid a return visit to Kuala Lumpur in June, by which time Dr Mahathir had long seen off his domestic political opponents. Symbolic reconciliation occurred in the following month in the first ever official visit by a King of Malaysia to the island state. The incumbent, coincidentally or not, was the Sultan of Johor, with whom members of Singapore’s government enjoyed close personal relations. Subsequently, when the late Yitzhak Rabin visited Singapore from Indonesia in October 1993, after the conclusion of the Oslo Peace Accords, and also when Lee Kuan Yew, by then Senior Minister, visited Israel in May 1994, there was no hostile governmental reaction from Malaysia.33 Speaking to Singapore journalists in Manila in December 1987, Lee Kuan Yew recalled his conversation with Dr Mahathir in Vancouver in the previous October, in which Malaysia’s Prime Minister had expressed the view that should Singapore be ignorant of Malaysia’s problems and discuss its own problems in isolation of Malaysia’s search for, and implementation of, its own solutions, ‘it might cause problems between us’.34 That implicit indication of sensitivity to Malaysia’s priorities as a critical factor in the conduct of foreign policy was a prescriptive self-admonition that Lee Kuan Yew has honoured only up to a point in obiter dicta about Malaysia and, indeed, about other neighbours and regional partners, including Indonesia, the Philippines and even Vietnam. The structural tension in the relationship with Malaysia, which was to express itself again in an openly contentious vein a decade later, has its roots in more than just the assertive temperament and open style of Singapore’s first Prime Minister. It has its source also in a political culture which is a product of a national consensus on how to cope with vulnerability which corresponds with Lee Kuan Yew’s outlook. In that respect, the priority of being sensitive to close neighbours’ interests has long been in competition with a resolute determination never to give the impression that friendship may be construed as weakness and appeasement. For this reason, irrespective of the degree of intra-ASEAN solidarity displayed over Cambodia and the recognition of the importance of the temper of relations with closest neighbours, an uncompromising spirit lies at the heart of foreign policy formulation in Singapore. That spirit has been exemplified, above all, in the relationship with Malaysia which time and time again has proven to be most troubling for Singapore. It was demonstrated also at the end of the decade by Singapore

96 Regional locale acting unilaterally to offer military facilities to the USA without mediating the matter first through ASEAN. By the end of the 1980s, Singapore, through its economic and diplomatic achievements, appeared well integrated within its regional locale. In the case of Indonesia, for example, defence cooperation had proceeded at a remarkable pace with access granted to the Siabu Air Weapons range in Sumatra, permission for its airforce to train in Indonesia’s airspace as well as the first ever combined army exercise. Singapore was a formal party, with its ASEAN partners, to the negotiations in Paris which brought the Cambodian conflict to a close in October 1991, and also participated in the United Nations peacekeeping exercise which paved the way for free and fair elections in that stricken country. It was evident in Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, however, that the end of the Cambodian conflict had not been brought about through the diplomatic ministrations of ASEAN. Its resolution was indicative of the end of the Cold War with the key factor having been the withdrawal of Soviet support for Vietnam. Without this support, Vietnam proved unable to hold its embattled position within Cambodia against pressure from China, in particular. Vietnam’s effective defeat was mediated by the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with ASEAN in little more than a diplomatic spectator role. The end of the Cambodian conflict as symptomatic of the end of the Cold War indicated the emergence of a new pattern of power and a strategic uncertainty in East Asia. The solidarity within ASEAN, and also between ASEAN and China, had lost a rallying point, while tensions over competing claims to islands in the South China Sea indicated that the prevailing pattern of alignments of the 1980s directed against Vietnam and the Soviet Union could no longer be assumed. When the Soviet Union disintegrated at the end of 1991, within a month of the USA giving notice of its withdrawal from military bases in the Philippines, the strategic architecture of the region had begun to change in a disturbing way. Indeed, it was with such a change in mind that Singapore offered limited compensating facilities to the US navy and airforce, which provoked a hostile reaction from Malaysia, in particular. The point has been well made in connection with that issue, and also differences with Thailand over stern treatment of its illegal migrants, that ‘Both incidents served as reminders to Singapore’s policy-makers that its economic preeminence within ASEAN bestows on it no special diplomatic status within the bloc.’35

Regional locale 97 Singapore’s integration within its regional locale was certainly well established compared to its position at independence. That degree of integration was not taken for granted, however, especially in the light of significant changes in the overall strategic environment and a recurrent rancour with Malaysia. Singapore had developed the most modern and technologically sophisticated defence capability in the region but its government had learned not to take national security for granted. The end of the Cold War and the attendant end of the Cambodian conflict had demonstrated the continuing significance of the major powers. Singapore had long placed considerable importance on the countervailing role of the USA. The prospect of its declining interest in regional security with the end of the Cold War and the disintegration of the Soviet Union served to focus attention on how to promote an alternative convergence of regional and global interests to those which had benefited the island-state during the Cambodian conflict. The following chapter addresses the record of Singapore’s relations with the major power. It is intended as a prelude to the current phase in its foreign policy, from the end of the Cold War, during which efforts have been made to promote a more predictable structure of regional relationships.

4

Singapore and the powers

A balance of power perspective Singapore’s leaders have consistently approached the matter of foreign policy from the conventional realist perspective of a small state obliged to cope with a world that was potentially hostile and without common government. Deputy Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong, in discussing the security options of small states in a speech in October 1984, before he entered political life, suggested that: ‘The world of states shares many characteristics with the world of beasts’ and that ‘goodwill alone is no substitute for astute self-interest’.1 Underlying such formulae has been the considered judgement that security and material well-being depend ultimately on the workings of the balance of power. Singapore’s interpretation of such a concept and practice was spelled out by Lee Hsien Loong in the same speech as follows: This policy depends on the competing interests of several big powers in a region, rather than on linking the nation’s fortunes to one overbearing partner. The big powers can keep one another in check and will prevent any one of them from dominating the entire region, and so allow small states to survive in the interstices between them. It is not a foolproof method, as the equilibrium is a dynamic and possibly unstable one, and may be upset if one power changes course and withdraws. Nor can a small state manipulate the big powers with impunity. The most it can hope to do is to influence their policies in its favour. In Singapore, the concept and practice of balance of power has not been addressed in crude mechanical terms based solely on responding and

Singapore and the powers 99 adjusting to indices of military strength through changing alignments in the promiscuous manner of eighteenth-century Europe. The attitude to the regional balance – or, more accurately, the distribution of power – has consistently been one of discrimination. At issue has not been how to counter each and every potential and actual hegemon but whether or not such a hegemon is likely to be a benign or a malign factor affecting Singapore’s interests. This kind of reasoning, for example, has led all governments of Singapore from shortly after independence to view the USA as a protecting and not a menacing power. Moreover, Singapore’s government has shown a facility for employing a variety of instruments beyond the conventional mechanisms of the balance of power in serving its core interest of protecting the vulnerable sovereign position of the Republic. Among these instruments, for example, has been the sanctity of International Law even if it has meant, at times, taking a position at variance with a close international partner of balance of power significance, such as the USA. At the United Nations, Singapore’s representatives have been consistent in seeking to uphold the principle of respect for national sovereignty and, as indicated above, voted for the General Assembly resolution that criticised America’s invasion of Grenada in 1983. Singapore also criticised the decision of America’s Congress in March 1988 to close the Palestine Liberation Office to the UN on the grounds that such an act was in violation of the Host Country Agreement which had been concluded between the UN and the USA. To the extent that International Law, with all of its shortcomings, is viewed as a supporting pillar of the independence of the Republic, then it serves as an instrument of the balance of power in its traditional function of upholding the independence of all states. Correspondingly, to the same end, Singapore has taken a strong public stand in response to armed external challenges to either independence or prevailing political identity in the case of Cambodia, Afghanistan and Kuwait, all members of the United Nations. It even risked the ire of close regional partner Indonesia in its initial reaction to the invasion and occupation of the Portuguese colony of East Timor in December 1975. However expressed, judgements about the balance of power, defined in terms of underpinning national integrity through a range of countervailing measures, serve as a general guide for Singapore’s conduct of its relations with the more important states of international society.

100 Singapore and the powers The USA Singapore’s relationship with the USA has been judged the most important among the major powers. The USA has long been regarded as a benign presence in the Asia-Pacific region as not only are its interests most in accord with those of Singapore but it is also the state most capable of protecting them because of its global reach. The relationship has been subject to recurrent differences, especially over political values since the end of the Cold War, but those differences have not seriously disturbed bilateral ties, which have come to be valued in Washington because of their strategic utility bearing on American interests in the Gulf as well as in South-East Asia.2 Those ties are valued all the more in Singapore but have been continuously joined with a concern that America’s regional security role could be progressively diminished because of a national preoccupation with domestic priorities. Singapore had become independent just prior to Britain’s decision to give up its military role East of Suez. The stimulus and opportunity for that decision had been prompted, in part, by Singapore’s dramatic exit from Malaysia without any prior consultation with Britain, which had been the principal alliance partner against Indonesia’s Confrontation. The end of Confrontation, less than a year after Singapore’s independence, then changed the strategic context in which Britain’s alliance commitment obtained. Apart from the prospect of damaging economic consequences, Britain’s decision to withdraw its military presence reinforced the sense of vulnerability inherent in the geopolitical circumstances of the new Republic. At issue was how to cope with an exposed situation between close and menacing neighbours who had made an overnight transformation from bitter enemies to so-called bloodbrothers. Britain did not evacuate its position immediately. It phased out its military withdrawal as well as mitigating it with an alternative, albeit consultative, set of defence arrangements. Singapore, however, could no longer place any firm reliance on the protecting role of the former metropolitan power. It was in these circumstances, and also in the context of a rising communist insurgency in South Vietnam with implications beyond Indochina, that Singapore was obliged to consider other security options. One option was, of course, to build up an independent defence capability virtually from scratch, which was undertaken with Israeli assistance. Another was to look to other sources of external countervailing power. That consideration was responsible for a change in Singapore’s relationship with the USA. During Confronta tion

Singapore and the powers 101 and the limited tenure of President Kennedy and into that of President Johnson, Singapore had reason to lack confidence in the regional policy of the USA. Washington had played a decisive role in persuading the Netherlands to relinquish control of the western half of the island of New Guinea to Indonesia. The government in The Hague had refused to transfer that peripheral part of its East Indies to Indonesia on international acknowledgement of its independence in December 1949. The unresolved dispute had not only soured the post-colonial relationship but had also become a source of nationalist ferment, which the late President Sukarno had exploited to his personal political advantage. At issue in Washington had been a concern lest a frustrated irredentism work also to the political advantage of the large Indonesian Communist Party and of the influence in Jakarta of the governments in Moscow and Beijing. In early 1964, after the assassination of President Kennedy, his brother Robert was sent by President Johnson on a diplomatic mission to South-East Asia in an attempt to resolve the problem of Confrontation which seemed to be serving the interests of Indonesia’s Communist Party and its external patrons. The tenor of the mission gave the impression of an act of appeasement on America’s behalf at the expense of Malaysia of which Singapore was then a constituent part. In the event, President Sukarno’s obduracy worked to Malaysia’s advantage, while his continuing acts of coercive diplomacy against the Federation alienated President Johnson, then about to deepen America’s fateful involvement in Vietnam. Irrespective of the view in Singapore about the merits and efficacy of the subsequent military intervention, an American military presence in East Asia came to be welcomed as a countervailing force upholding the regional balance of power and as a positive contribution to mitigating the Republic’s vulnerable position. That point of view has been maintained consistently up to and beyond the end of the Cold War. The initial stage of the relationship with the USA was chequered, however, because of the need to register the international status of the Republic and to justify Britain’s military presence. On independence, and before any intimation of Britain’s reappraisal of strategic priorities, Lee Kuan Yew went out of his way to repudiate any military association with the USA. Moreover, he deemed it politic to reveal publicly an act of political indiscretion by America’s Central Intelligence Agency in Singapore in 1960 during its period of self-government. At the time, Lee Kuan Yew was concerned to demonstrate a declaratory non-alignment in order to ensure full international recognition

102 Singapore and the powers of a new-found independence, bearing in mind the extent to which Indonesia had been able to represent Malaysia, and by association Singapore, as a neocolonialist enterprise among fellow post-colonial states. A measure of its success had been Malaysia’s exclusion from the Non-Aligned Conference in Egypt in 1964 and from invitation to the abortive Afro-Asian Conference in Algeria scheduled for the following year. Lee Kuan Yew’s calculated outburst in displaying opposition to any American military involvement in Singapore was a way of justifying a continuing British military presence without forfeiting the goodwill of the non-aligned states. Correspondingly, in his first statement before the UN General Assembly in September 1965, the Republic’s first Foreign Minister, S. Rajaratnam, reiterated a commitment to non-alignment but sought to reconcile that policy path with retaining British military bases. He explained: ‘The moment we can be assured of effective alternative arrangements which will guarantee our security, that moment foreign bases would have to go.’ In the event, widespread international recognition was accorded without serious difficulty and without the British military presence being an impediment. In the wake of that assurance of recognition of international status and with Britain’s military role not in question, Singapore felt able to adopt a more flexible attitude towards the USA as a potential security partner. The Five Power Defence Arrangements which came into force in November 1971, involving British, Australian and New Zealand as well as Malaysian participation, were welcomed despite the end of an explicit alliance commitment. The defence links with Commonwealth partners, however diminished in utility, had the advantage of tying Singapore and Malaysia into a structure of defence cooperation, which could be used to contain and mitigate bilateral tensions. A closer security association with the USA was contemplated as serving a complementary purpose, but more important in the first two decades of independence than any formal defence link was the continuing regional role of the most powerful state in the world. There is no doubt that of the major powers, it is the USA and its regional policies that have been judged to serve Singapore’s interests best of all in balance of power terms. Such a judgement has been based on the calculation that the USA, despite its hegemonic role in shaping international regimes, would not pose a challenge to Singapore’s core interests. Moreover, its regional presence would ensure that local powers would not be able to control Singapore’s security environment. Despite differences over political values after the end of the Cold War, a general convergence has long obtained with

Singapore and the powers 103 Washington over the nature of regional order, international political economy and also freedom of international navigation. During the Cold War and its Vietnam phase, a vigorous anti-communism, which was reflected in Singapore’s domestic policy, endeared the Republic politically to Washington where Lee Kuan Yew came to be received regularly in the White House and before the Congress. The American connection did not have direct military expression, however. Indeed, Britain’s final military withdrawal within the framework of the Five Power Defence Arrangements did not take place until after the Paris Peace Agreements of January 1973 and the consequent exit of American combat troops from Vietnam. However, Singapore has consistently lent encouragement to a continuing American military role in East Asia with direct reference to the balance of power in a number of respects. The first of these was in public support of its military intervention in Vietnam justified as a way of buying time for the other states of the region, some of which were subject to domestic communist challenge. Whatever the merits of this argument, it was articulated with conviction in Singapore and has not been revised with the advantage of time and the end of the Cold War. Apart from public exhortation, Singapore was also willing to be identified with America’s military enterprise in providing rest and recreational facilities for its servicemen from Vietnam during the late 1960s. Second, after the success of revolutionary communism in Indochina during 1975, Singapore sustained its open support for an American presence offshore in the Philippines, especially as, from the late 1960s, the Soviet Union had begun to demonstrate a menacing naval mobility from its Far Eastern port of Vladivostok into the Indian Ocean. Indeed, it was from the late 1960s that the USA had indicated a declining regional resolve through a statement by President Nixon on the island of Guam in July 1969 that placed the prime responsibility for their conventional defence on regional states. It was with direct reference to the Soviet Union, made acute after Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia, that Singapore engaged in recurrent exhortation in support of an American regional buffer role. Such concern did not preclude a commercial relationship with the Soviet Union and its East European partners, including the provision of repair facilities for merchant vessels, some of which serviced the Soviet Pacific fleet. A willingness to deal to economic advantage with declared adversaries tended to devalue the more alarmist pronouncements of Singapore’s Foreign Ministry, especially during its subsequent diplomatic confrontation with Vietnam.

104 Singapore and the powers The sense of alarm expressed about the Soviet Union became more acute from the late 1970s with Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia. For example, Foreign Minister Dhanabalan pointed out in November 1981 that: ‘In Southeast Asia, the particular challenge engendered by the new balance of power has been the arrival of the Soviet Union as a power in the region through a united communist Vietnam.’3 Singapore was involved diplomatically within ASEAN in mobilising international support against that declared challenge and, in the process, engaged with its close neighbours in a structure of cooperation which mitigated its inherent vulnerability. The USA took the position that ASEAN, on the basis of its regional credentials, should take the lead diplomatically in challenging the legitimacy of the government in Phnom Penh established through Vietnam’s act of force. There were differences between Singapore – on ASEAN’s behalf – and the USA over the diplomatic management of the Cambodian conflict; for example, during an international conference at the United Nations in 1981, because of the USA’s interest in conciliating China as its strategic partner against the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, to Singapore’s satisfaction, the USA became heavily involved in challenging the military fait accompli in Cambodia through economic sanctions against Vietnam and military assistance for the so-called Khmer resistance. Indeed, in 1987 ambassador-at-large Tommy Koh revealed the success that he had enjoyed, while Singapore’s head of mission in Washington, in lobbying successfully for the USA to provide overt aid to the non-communist Cambodian resistance through the good offices of Stephen Solarz, then chair of the House Foreign Affairs sub-committee on Asia and the Pacific.4 America’s mixed involvement in the Cambodian conflict certainly served Singapore’s interests in balance of power terms. Singapore’s approach to the balance of power with reference to the countervailing role of the USA was registered tangibly at the end of the Cold War when Washington announced that it would withdraw from long-held military bases in the Philippines after failing to reach an agreement with the government in Manila on their continued tenure. Speaking in Tokyo in May 1991, Lee Kuan Yew made clear his view that peace and security both in Europe and Asia depended still on a balance of power and that: ‘A US military presence in both regions is very necessary.’ Six months prior to that speech, in November 1990, just before relinquishing the office of Prime Minister and also while visiting Tokyo, he had signed a memorandum of understanding with America’s Vice-President Dan Quayle that offered an enhanced use of

Singapore and the powers 105 facilities in Singapore to America’s military aircraft and naval vessels as a contribution to sustaining its forward military position in South-East Asia. Although not a contribution of great substance that would compensate for the impending loss of bases, repair and training sites in the Philippines, the terms of the memorandum were intended to demonstrate that the USA was still welcome in the region. That accord aroused controversy among some of Singapore’s regional partners within ASEAN. Within a short space of time, however, governments in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta which had expressed irritation over Singapore’s unilateral initiative had followed suit, albeit to a more limited extent. The underlying strategic purpose was the same; namely, to uphold a regional balance of power in which the USA was deemed to be the critical make-weight. Singapore went even further in December 1991 in providing facilities for the USA with the transfer from the Philippines to the island-state of an American naval logistics centre; this time, without arousing regional opposition. And at the end of 1998, Singapore entered into an agreement with the USA whereby its capital ships would be able to berth at the new Changi naval base on its completion after 2000, instead of having to anchor off-shore. Singapore has served as a strong supporting voice for an American military presence in Asia-Pacific with a conspicuous consistency. Indeed, Singapore’s role within ASEAN in promoting the formation of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in July 1993 was contemplated as an additional way of sustaining America’s regional interest and engagement in the changing and uncertain strategic circumstances attendant on the end of the Cold War. Foreign Minister Wong Kan Seng was most explicit in pointing out: ‘I see multilateral security dialogues as another means of helping the US stay engaged in this dynamic and economically important region. It creates a new rationale for a US presence in the post-Cold War Asia-Pacific.’5 Without being a strategic partner in the way that Japan has performed this role for the USA for nearly half a century, Singapore has seen its own interests served in balance of power terms through America’s interposing regional presence, which it has tried to facilitate within its limited means. It has also tried to reconcile support for that presence with encouraging the USA to follow a policy of engaging China as a rising power rather than contend with it over trade and human rights and strategic issues, such as Taiwan. From the early days of independence, Singapore also had its interests served by the willingness of American multinational enterprises to locate their factories and regional headquarters in the Republic. The contribution of such

106 Singapore and the powers multinationals played a decisive part in the industrial transformation of the island-state and in underpinning a new-found independence with economic growth and vitality. Access to American markets has served to complement that contribution. Moreover, recognition of the abiding importance of the USA and its role has been a major factor in Singapore’s government redirecting the flow of its promising students away from traditional centres of learning in Britain and towards the best of American universities, especially for postgraduate training, albeit without giving up the British connection. By and large, Singapore’s governments have found it easier to strike up a better working relationship with Republican administrations in Washington, at least since the departure from office of Lyndon Johnson. The difficulty experienced with Democratic administrations has followed from their tendency to place a greater emphasis on the moral dimension of foreign policy, which has expressed itself importantly in attention to human rights issues. Such a tendency became more pronounced with the end of the Cold War and the attempt in Washington to find a foreign policy doctrine that would serve as an alternative to the defunct one of containing international communism through registering the success of liberal democratic values. An attendant bilateral tension arose from a concern in Singapore that America’s agenda for a new world order, based on the theme of expanding socalled market-democracies, included an unwarranted interventionism touching on its conception and practice of good government and thus on national sovereignty. Although the USA was driven, in great part, by a revulsion at the bloody events in Tienanmen Square in June 1989, Singapore found itself lumped together with far more oppressive regimes on account of its restriction of civil liberties, a political climate that constrained opposition, its often penal control of the foreign press and a conservative legal system that included provision for corporal punishment. During the late 1980s, even before that change in emphasis in American policy, Singapore had deemed it necessary to expel a first secretary from the American Embassy on the grounds that he had exceeded his diplomatic role in actively encouraging a local lawyer to stand as an opposition candidate against the ruling PAP.6 This controversial expulsion, which provoked an American diplomatic retaliation, took place against a background of long-running battles with US-owned newspapers and publications. Some had fallen foul of Singapore’s Printing and Presses Act for refusing to give the government of Singapore the right of full reply to articles

Singapore and the powers 107 critical of the island-state and also for allegedly engaging in its domestic politics. Matters came to a head between Singapore and Washington over restrictions on the foreign press and, above all, the caning in 1994 of Michael Fay, an American teenager at school in Singapore, who had been found guilty of vandalism. Although the corporal punishment for that crime found sympathy with middle America, the liberal establishment, especially through major organs, such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, adopted a strong and sustained hostile attitude to Singapore. Moreover, President Clinton found it politic to intervene publicly in seeking clemency. Such was the concern among Singapore’s leadership at the effect of the episode on the bilateral relationship that the government departed exceptionally from a longstanding policy of not bowing to external pressure. In the event, the sentence of six strokes was reduced by two in an attempt to limit damage, although it is doubtful if American attitudes were changed as a consequence.7 The hostility of the American liberal establishment was reinforced later that year when Christopher Lingle, a visiting American academic at the National University of Singapore, became the subject of a libel action for writing an article in The International Herald Tribune, which was found by the court to have alleged that Singapore’s government had used ‘a compliant judiciary to bankrupt opposition politicians’.8 Singapore was further pilloried as an oppressive regime but was defended vigorously by members of its Foreign Ministry, especially by its one-time Permanent Secretary, Kishore Mahbubani, some of whose related writings have been published in a single volume.9 The clash of political cultures as reflected in such causes célèbres served for a time to change the public tone of a relationship that was otherwise in good working order, especially in defence and defence-related cooperation. For example, Singapore and USA senior officials have worked constructively with each other in co-chairing the Intersessional Meeting on Search and Rescue Co-ordination and Cooperation of the ASEAN Regional Forum. The change in public tone which occurred concurrently was expressed, for a time, in a restriction of high-level access enjoyed by Singapore’s most senior political leaders. For example, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, who was the object of public demonstrations in the USA in July 1995 while receiving an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Williams College, was denied an official White House audience with an American President for several years by contrast with the easy access once enjoyed by Lee Kuan Yew.

108 Singapore and the powers Those irritations have not stood in the way of Singapore’s other more practical associations with the USA. Nor have they served to alter the balance of power role envisaged and encouraged by Singapore for the USA in the uncertain strategic circumstances at the end of the Cold War. Moreover, in the wake of America’s revision of its foreign policy to stress engagement with China and also the advent of economic adversity in East Asia, personal relationships visibly improved. For example, at the meeting of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) heads of government in Vancouver in October 1997, President Clinton conspicuously chose Prime Minister Goh as a golfing partner in a visible display of the improved tone in the relationship underpinned by active defence cooperation. And in September 1998, Prime Minister Goh called on President Clinton at the White House for discussions, in part, on the Asian economic crisis. In September 1997, Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew addressed the annual conference of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, meeting for the first time in Singapore. He pointed out that the USA remained the only superpower in the world ‘in the full multi-dimensional meaning of the term’ and that China could not match the political and economic influence, the military reach or the cultural resonance of the USA around the world. While still advocating the engagement of China, he suggested that prudence dictated ‘that there be a balance of power in the Asia-Pacific Region’, which, he claimed, was reflected in a widely held consensus that the US presence in the region be sustained. With specific reference to the role of the USA, he articulated the long-standing strategic outlook of his government in pointing out that: ‘A military presence does not need to be used to be useful. Its presence makes a difference, and makes for peace and stability in the region. This stability serves the interest of all, including that of China.’10 Singapore’s management of its relationship with the USA has been based continuously on that premise, which bears also on its relationship with China.

China 11 China has always loomed large in the calculations of Singapore’s government because of the island’s demographic profile and attendant suspicions among close neighbours. Some three-quarters of the population had comprised ethnic-Chinese of migrant origin long before independence. Moreover, Singapore’s Chinese had sustained a separate strong cultural identity during

Singapore and the powers 109 the colonial period as well as links with their ancestral land through remittances to extended families and through charitable donations by successful businessmen, notably to educational institutions. Within Singapore, community-supported Chinese schools based on a traditional curriculum served to infuse and sustain an extended and, at times, contested national identity. Issues which both united and divided China and Chinese were exported to the colonial diaspora where community organisations mobilised financial support for the prevailing cause, especially opposition to Japan’s invasion and occupation during the 1930s.12 A branch of the Bank of China was set up on the island in 1936 to serve that end. Those links with China were looked on with suspicion by the colonial authorities; in particular after the Pacific War, with the advent of the Communist People’s Republic and its support for regional revolution, including the insurgent Malayan Communist Party which drew primarily on an ethnic-Chinese constituency. Communist insurrection in the jungles of Malaya from mid-1948 was not replicated in urban Singapore but clandestine communist organisation existed within its trade unions with ancillary support from Chinese high school students. The victory of the Chinese Communist Party over the Kuomintang gave great encouragement to the local communist movement, which viewed Singapore and Malaya as a single battleground and which drew political support from among the Chinese community, especially from those educated in the Chinese medium. It was that constituency that the English-educated leaders of the People’s Action Party had sought to attract in their electoral bid for power within a colonial Singapore. That constituency had become of increasing political significance with constitutional change and an expansion of the suffrage. It was an electorate dominated by the Chinese-educated that carried the PAP to office in May 1959 but then an internal struggle for power ensued as a party faction aligned with the communist movement sought to exploit its strength on the ground. The latent internal split came out into the open with the positive response of Singapore’s government to the proposal in May 1961 by Malaya’s Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, for a new and wider federation to include the self-governing island as well as British possessions in northern Borneo.13 The prime object of the Federation of Malaysia was to permit British decolonisation from Singapore in such a way that the local communist movement would be effectively crushed. This was well understood by its leaders who mobilised support against merger but without success. In the

110 Singapore and the powers event, the communist movement was crushed through the use of powers of arrest and the ability of the leadership of the PAP to rally popular support in their contention with the Malaysian government, which culminated in an unanticipated separation in August 1965. After independence, the ruling PAP sustained its concerns about the perils of links between China and Singapore which were seen as a source of continuing political challenge as well as complicating relations with neighbouring states. The label of a third China, after the mainland and Taiwan, was one that a Singapore vulnerable within its confined location could not afford to carry. It was an ironic coincidence that an Australian historian published a book entitled The Third China in the same year that Singapore attained its independence.14 Although Singapore’s first Chief Minister, David Marshall, had been invited to visit China in 1956, the People’s Republic initially ignored the international status of the island-state on independence.15 China posed a dual problem for Singapore from the outset. It had shown itself to be a source of threat as a revolutionary power because of its support for communist insurgency. Indeed, Singapore became an object of vituperation during the Cultural Revolution. Moreover, China’s perceived potential to menace the region was alarming in the light of its scale and population, and a willingness to resort to force to prosecute national and ideological interests. In addition, Singapore had to cope regionally with the recurrent charge that ethnic affinity would make the island, at the very least, an agent of influence for China. A politically embarrassing episode occurred in February 1980 when spectators at a badminton match in Singapore between Indonesian and Chinese teams demonstrated an effusive partisan support for the latter. Singapore has never been in a position to manage and cope with the problem of China on its own. The analogy of the relationship between an elephant and a flea readily comes to mind in the earlier phase of the relationship, as China lumbered about within the international system. Singapore has sought, nonetheless, to engage constructively with China where practical. Indeed, Lee Kuan Yew has recalled giving unsolicited advice to the late Richard Nixon in April 1967 that ‘There was much to be gained from engaging with China.’16 An independent Singapore engaged with China very tentatively, however, and only in economic activity where practical and profitable; for example, in tolerating the opening of Chinese emporia which sold cheap products which helped to keep down the cost of living. Moreover, its government had not been inhibited in prosecuting the local branch of the

Singapore and the powers 111 Bank of China in the late 1960s for its failure to observe banking regulations. In other respects, Singapore kept its political distance from a perceived locus of subversion and also encouraged, as far as it was possible, a different kind of engagement; namely, that of the USA whose countervailing power was judged to be critical for the security of the vulnerable island-state. Bilateral engagement with China by Singapore was only undertaken with a change in the pattern of major-power alignments which marked the onset of the second phase of the Cold War, and with the change of regime within China itself after the death of Mao in September 1976 and the elimination of the Gang of Four. Lee Kuan Yew recognised the opportunities attendant on Deng Xiaoping’s radical revision of China’s political economy as well as the potential challenge likely to be posed should China realise its full economic potential. In so far as Singapore might serve as a model of a kind for China’s economic development, then the prospect of a flourishing and stable regional environment was deemed to be far more likely. The prospect of a growing economic interdependence on China’s part encouraged expectations that it would conduct itself as a good regional citizen because of an interest in a stable regional environment. On independence, however, Singapore needed to differentiate itself from China, which was not difficult in one sense because its government had made a reputation for crushing its internal communist opponents. Indeed, that victory had been lauded as a spectacular triumph. Moreover, the way in which communist influence had been eliminated from the trade union movement was a very important factor in foreign economic policy as the Republic sought to attract inward investment in support of its industrialisation policy. The economic predicament of Singapore on independence posed a dilemma as far as relations with China were concerned, however. Entrepôt trade with China was a tangible asset for the Republic which it could not afford to discard. Indeed, a tussle with the federal government over closing the Singapore branch of the Bank of China, during the closing stages of the island’s incorporation within Malaysia, had been indicative of economic priorities. That branch had been saved from closure by separation which may well have been a factor in China’s measure of political tolerance towards Singapore’s independence, despite the anti-communist record of its government. After 1949, the Bank of China in Singapore became the point of unofficial diplomatic contact with Beijing until a trade office was opened in 1981. At issue in the development of relations with China was the need to separate out economics from politics. In that respect, Singapore’s flag did not follow

112 Singapore and the powers trade. Its government went out of its way to register a distinct political identity, while permitting commercial and trading links on a private basis. In the meantime, economic ties were developed with Taiwan as well as defence cooperation in an attempt to overcome the limitations in military training facilities posed by the scale and population of Singapore island. Singapore never recognised the government in Taipei, however; nor did it, like Malaysia, enter into formal consular relations. Singapore adhered to a one-China policy from the outset but without giving it operational diplomatic expression. The China factor, therefore, was not found to be an obstacle to Singapore entering into regional association within South-East Asia. Moreover, in wider international associations, such as the Commonwealth, Singapore was not suspected of links with any radical alignment. The PAP became a member of the Socialist International of democratic persuasion alongside European and Scandinavian counterparts until it withdrew in May 1976 against a background of criticism of its alleged violation of civil liberties and, in effect, to pre-empt expulsion. There was never any question of Singapore seeking formal diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic before the end of the Cold War, even though support was proffered for the claim by Beijing’s government to represent China in the United Nations. That stand, which became a matter of practical diplomacy in October 1971, did not cause Singapore any political difficulty with its regional partners within ASEAN, who were divided among themselves over the issue. Despite voting for Beijing’s government to represent China in the United Nations, Singapore did not follow Malaysia’s lead when it established diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic in May 1974. Singapore was not moved by the same domestic political imperative as Malaysia and was also highly sensitive to Indonesia’s negative disposition. It was made a matter of policy not to establish diplomatic relations with the government in Beijing until after the government in Jakarta had done so. In addition, at least during the 1970s, there was less than complete confidence within the government of Singapore that the Chinese population of the island would not fall prey to an emotive identification with representatives of the new China, given the experience of political fall-out from the Cultural Revolution. Moreover, there was no pressing practical political reason, at that juncture, for Singapore to establish a diplomatic mission in Beijing. After some preliminary ping-pong diplomacy and contacts through chambers of commerce, Singapore began its direct encounter with China through an act of political reconnaissance conducted in March 1975 by Foreign Minister Rajaratnam whose ethnic-

Singapore and the powers 113 Tamil identity was deemed an asset in the circumstances. Rajaratnam had the advantage of having been given a private dinner in New York in September 1974 by China’s Vice-Foreign Minister, Qiao Guanhua, who issued the initial invitation. He subsequently became Foreign Minister by the time of the visit. That visit took place against a background of a notable improvement in SinoAmerican and Sino-Japanese relations so that Singapore was hardly being politically adventurous in sending its foreign minister to Beijing. By then, China’s media had long softened their recurrent diatribes against ‘the Lee Kuan Yew clique’, which had not harmed the Republic’s relations with its close neighbours who were advised in advance of Rajaratnam’s visit. In Beijing, Rajaratnam was received by the Prime Minister, Zhou Enlai, who expressed the view that he understood Singapore’s foreign policy of delaying diplomatic relations until after Indonesia had re-established them and that his government was prepared to wait until then. The visit provided an opportunity to develop trade relations further and, to that end, a large delegation accompanied the foreign minister. On China’s part, an interest was expressed in purchasing machinery and oil rigs as well as in sending tankers and cargo vessels to Singapore for repair. The extent to which China truly understood Singapore’s position, as expressed in official statements, was qualified by unofficial comments that Singapore was a ‘kinsman’ country, which was not well received by the government of the island-state. Indeed, it was the kind of identity that its government had gone to great pains to repudiate from the very outset. Moreover, Rajaratnam made the point of informing China’s Foreign Minister, Qiao Guanhua, that Singapore would be sending soldiers to Taiwan for training because of limitations of space on the island and, without voicing objections, ‘Mr Qiao immediately indicated that he had taken note of what I had said.’17 Rajaratnam’s reconnaissance paved the way for the first visit to China by Lee Kuan Yew in May 1976 during which he met with a comatose Mao Zedong. Lee made a point of only speaking in English on all official occasions in a conspicuous attempt to refute the charge that Singapore was a third China. Moreover, he returned a gift of a Chinese book on the 1962 Sino-Indian War because of the significant Indian community in Singapore. Lee’s visit took place following dramatic political changes in South-East Asia with the success of revolutionary communism in Indochina. This was not to China’s liking because of a concern that Vietnam might establish a dominant position in that peninsula to the advantage of the Soviet Union, then its principal

114 Singapore and the powers adversary. China had been an ideological missionary state in the first phase of the Cold War. With rapprochement with the USA, expressed in the Shanghai Communiqué of February 1972, its regional interests had found a different focus, registered in rising differences with Vietnam which was perceived as an agent of hostile Soviet influence. Lee Kuan Yew was testing the political water in such circumstances without making any change of substance in his government’s policy. It is almost certain that he would have provided advance notice of his visit to President Suharto. Any concerns in Jakarta about the prospect of Singapore getting too close to Beijing were almost certainly allayed by the inspired revelation in September 1976 that Singapore’s servicemen, including pilots, had been receiving regular military training in Taiwan. Moreover, Lee Kuan Yew also let it be known that, while in Beijing, he had pointed out how China’s support for communist insurgency within South-East Asia was a fundamental obstacle to better relations with regional states. Singapore began a guarded encounter with China at the official level without compromising its attempt to register a regional South-East Asian identity. Trade links were strengthened, notably after Deng Xiaoping had inaugurated his policy of economic modernisation during 1978. Indeed, China acknowledged Singapore as a model of economic development and political economy, at least for its cities, and to that end looked to it as a source of modern technology and for guidance in developing service sectors, such as tourism. Deng visited Singapore in November 1978, driven in important part by a concern to counter the regional influence of the Soviet Union expressed through the perceived agency of Vietnam with which it had recently concluded a Treaty of Friendship with evident security implications. The visit by Deng has been seen as a turning point not only in China’s relations with Singapore but also in the domestic and international priorities of the People’s Republic. It has been suggested that ‘Singapore’s officials knew that he [Deng] had seen China’s economic future in Singapore’ and that ‘Singapore was Deng’s preferred model because it showed that rapid economic growth was not inconsistent with tight central government control.’18 From that juncture, Singapore engaged with China with growing enthusiasm because of the opportunity to pursue major economic advantage as well as to benefit in terms of general security from China’s incentive to do the same as it opened up to the international economy. At the same time, its government continued to differentiate Singapore’s interests from those of the

Singapore and the powers 115 People’s Republic. Speaking in the presence of Deng Xiaoping, at a dinner in his honour in mid-November 1978, Lee Kuan Yew pointed out that Singaporeans were in the midst of ensuring a separate and durable future in South-East Asia which had to be shared equally with Malays, Indians and other nationals. He explained further that: ‘They understand enough of geopolitics to know that their future directly depends on Singapore’s future in South-East Asia, and not on China’s future among the front rank of industrial nations.’19 This pointed differentiation has punctuated the development of relations between Singapore and China on a consistent basis, with audiences in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta in mind as well as those in Beijing. At the time, in the late 1970s, Singapore found common tactical cause with China over the regional balance of power. Singapore had come to share corresponding concerns about the projection of Soviet influence, which came to a head with Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia in the month following Deng’s visit. Its government had already made a point of showing resolve towards Hanoi in October 1977 in refusing its demand for the return of Vietnamese hijackers of a Vietnamese aircraft, who had been dealt with in Singapore’s courts. It was not moved by Vietnam’s cancellation of a visit by a trade delegation as a mark of displeasure. Over Cambodia, Singapore adopted a strident public position, which brought it closer to China in political priorities and alignment and also incurred Vietnam’s strong displeasure for representing it as the main threat to South-East Asia. The island-state was accordingly depicted in Hanoi as being out to please Beijing and faithfully following its policies and as generally being its ‘stooge’ as well as a fifth column in the region because of its ethnic-Chinese identity. Vietnam’s representation of Singapore did not bear any relationship to the practical pursuit of its interests. Singapore was undoubtedly engaged in a united front practice with China, among other states, in order to counter a perceived threat from Vietnam backed by the Soviet Union. At the same time, Singapore was engaged also in trying to make it plain to China where its government’s best interests lay in continuously pressing the point about the political disutility of supporting communist insurgencies. During his second visit to China, in November 1980, at the head of a delegation of forty-two members, Lee Kuan Yew chose not to make a speech at the usual banquet. His hosts had become upset at seeing critical references in a prior draft to the issue of party-to-party support for communist insurgencies, while seeking good government-to-government relations which was declared Chinese policy. It

116 Singapore and the powers was deemed politic for Lee not to make a speech at all rather than be seen to have modified it as a result of succumbing to pressure from his hosts in Beijing. On his return to Singapore, Lee announced that China’s government wanted to disengage from any involvement in such insurgencies but was embarrassed shortly after when the Voice of the Malayan Revolution, a clandestine radio station broadcasting from Yunnan, registered open criticism of Singapore. In the following August, when Premier Zhao Ziyang visited Singapore, he was told in no uncertain terms by Lee Kuan Yew that China would have to make up its mind about political priorities in South-East Asia. It could not expect to enjoy friendly relations with the majority of countries of the region and, at the same time, reserve the right to intervene in their affairs through support for insurgent movements. The issue of support for communist insurgencies did not stem the process of international collaboration between Singapore and China. Singapore’s Finance Minister, Hon Sui Sen, signed a trade agreement with Deng Xiaoping in December 1979 which paved the way for an acceleration in trade and economic cooperation. Singapore’s government-linked trading company, Intraco, played an important coordinating and supervisory role in shifting the balance of economic activity from traditional entrepôt flows to the export of manufactured and processed goods as well as investment. In June 1980, another agreement was concluded which provided for the establishment of trade offices in respective capitals. These were opened during 1981 and did not arouse any indications of concern by regional partners, even when Singapore’s office began to function as if it were a fully fledged diplomatic representation. China’s office in Singapore took over handling visa applications, which before then had been dealt with in Hong Kong by the China Travel Service and also, after May 1974, by China’s embassy in Kuala Lumpur. Singapore’s relationship with China developed progressively on a pragmatic basis. Singapore was attracted by economic opportunity, which came to be expressed in a multitude of contacts and a growing number of contracts, with Lee Kuan Yew paying his third visit in September 1985.20 One striking indication of Singapore’s deepening involvement in China’s economic modernisation was the appointment in May 1985 of former Deputy Prime Minister, Dr Goh Keng Swee, as an adviser on the development of special economic zones and tourism. Singapore’s growing stake in the economic development of China was expressed more than just symbolically

Singapore and the powers 117 in an agreement in 1993 to participate in building an entire satellite township and industrial park in Suzhou in the vicinity of Shanghai, which has attracted considerable capital outlay from Singapore, albeit with mixed returns. Pragmatism was expressed also on both sides in the tolerance shown by the government in Beijing at the intensity of Singapore’s relations with Taiwan where Lee Kuan Yew has travelled regularly on holiday, at least until President Lee Teng Hui began to assert the separate sovereign status of the offshore island. He received the late President Chiang Ching Kuo in public in Singapore apparently without any hint of admonition from Beijing where he has continued to be received as a special friend. Lee Teng Hui made his first overseas visit there after assuming high office in March 1989, again without Singapore incurring displeasure in Beijing. Indeed, in April 1989, a man accused of murder in Taiwan was extradited there from China via Singapore’s Changi Airport. For some time, Lee Kuan Yew was seen in the role of interlocutor between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan. This was borne out by the choice of the island as the venue for the first ‘official’ cross-straits talks in April 1993. That role has diminished during the tenure of President Lee Teng Hui but not from any loss of credentials on the part of Lee Kuan Yew. The problem has arisen from the political disposition of Lee Teng Hui, who has come to be regarded with derision in Beijing and annoyance in Singapore where his initiatives to raise Taiwan’s international profile and status have been regarded as unnecessarily provocative and a source of regional tension. Singapore’s long-standing association with Taiwan has not been an obstacle to developing relations with the People’s Republic. Indeed, the government in Beijing withdrew its objection to Singapore continuing to use Taiwan for military training as a condition for the establishment of diplomatic relations which occurred in October 1990, after ties had been resumed with Jakarta in the previous August and after Lee Kuan Yew’s fifth and final visit as Prime Minister. In addition to economic opportunity, Singapore’s government has been motivated by considerations of the balance of power in its dealings with China. Although China’s potential for regional hegemony was well understood against a background of its Communist Party’s interference in the domestic politics of South-East Asian states, the considered judgement before the end of the Cold War was that the prime external threat to regional order was posed by the Soviet Union aided in its expansionist goals by Vietnam. To cope with that prospect, Singapore saw utility in political cooperation with China,

118 Singapore and the powers especially if it could be located within the context of ASEAN’s regional interests following the invasion of Cambodia. That informal alliance practice worked to Singapore’s advantage in that Vietnam ultimately found itself without any alternative but to withdraw its troops from Cambodia as part of an imperative accommodation with China. That development, which was an expression of the end of the Cold War and the collapse of Soviet power, also demonstrated the extent to which Singapore’s foreign policy planners had been working on false premises, at least at the declaratory level. The disintegration of the Soviet Union and the attendant impact on American strategic priorities meant that China began to enjoy a novel strategic latitude, even if limitations in its military capability would deny opportunities to take full advantage of it. By this juncture, Singapore’s government had embarked on a revision of national language and cultural policies which stressed communal differences rather than highlighting multiculturalism, which had been its hallmark on attaining self-government and the policy sustained with independence. Concern about the solidarity of the island’s Chinese majority and concurrent doubts about the loyalty and social contribution of the Malay and Tamil minorities would appear to have influenced the decision to try to weld Singapore’s Chinese into a more unified entity. In order to achieve that aim, which involved trying to break down long-standing barriers of Chinese dialect, the government launched recurrent campaigns to encourage ethnicChinese to speak Mandarin. In addition, they were encouraged to draw moral sustenance from the eternal virtues of Confucian ethics. Such invocation of ‘cultural ballast’ was justified in terms of warding off the adverse social effects of economic development in its Western-liberal expressions as well as an asset for the local Chinese in securing access to the vast market of the People’s Republic. Lee Kuan Yew, for his part, did not have any inhibitions in September 1984 in reminding his ethnic-Chinese compatriots that they were part of an ancient civilisation with an unbroken history of over 5,000 years. That civilisation was represented as ‘a deep and strong psychic force’ that would give confidence to a people in facing up to and in overcoming great changes and challenges.21 He was also willing to accept the office of honorary chairman of the founding conference of the International Confucian Association which convened in Beijing in October 1994. On the other hand, Lee Kuan Yew was without inhibition in expressing shock, horror and sadness at the massacre in Tienamen Square in June 1989, while Singapore’s

Singapore and the powers 119 government offered passports with right of abode to 25,000 Hong Kong families in advance of their migration. Moreover, when Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong visited Beijing in May 1995, he was vocal on the issue of freedom of navigation in the wake of China’s seizure of Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands. The net effect of Singapore seeking to find operational expression for attachment to ‘cultural ballast’ was to widen the communal gap within the island and to register a more distinct Chinese identity, which had long been opposed in Singapore as a matter of principle. In that respect, a domestic issue had become a foreign policy problem to the extent that such registration did not help Singapore in embedding itself politically within its close regional environment where it has long been regarded with envy and suspicion. A problem of reconciling different levels of aspiration and practice has arisen. Therefore, in coping with the China factor, Singapore’s leaders have found the need from time to time to make the point publicly that the island-state is different in every respect from the People’s Republic to which it is not in any way beholden. Such a point was made theatrically in the course of a general election campaign in January 1997 when members of the PAP, led by Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, found it politic to denounce Tan Liang Hong, an opposition candidate, as a Chinese chauvinist. In this circumstance, domestic and foreign policy priorities coincided to enable the registration of a distinct and distinctive national identity which, while comprising a notable Chinese dimension, enabled a repudiation of any affinity to and loyalty towards the ancestral homeland in the form of the People’s Republic. At other times, however, a notable degree of divergence has appeared with domestic priorities expressed in terms of Chinese language and culture without any countervailing message of political comfort either to Singapore’s minority races or to its close neighbours.22 Such ambivalence has a potential for misleading Chinese governments which, on convenient occasions such as the return of Hong Kong in July 1997, have played up the notion of a patriotic diaspora. Indeed, Lee Kuan Yew’s opposition to Governor Chris Patten’s plan for democratisation in Hong Kong and his participation in congresses of overseas Chinese as well as holding high office in an International Confucian Association served to add to that confusion. It was almost certainly to counter any impression of any undue dependence on China that Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, not known as a fluent-Chinese speaker, has encouraged a countervailing economic interest in

120 Singapore and the powers India with a corresponding search for opportunities expressed in investment. His initiative at the ASEAN summit in Bangkok in December 1995 to make India a dialogue partner of the Association drew decisive support from Indonesia’s President Suharto, whose government had long held an apprehensive view of China’s regional intentions. For Singapore, China casts an additional shadow to that which causes foreboding within other states of South-East Asia. Singapore is the only other ethnic-Chinese majority state in the world, if one discounts Taiwan on account of its disputed international status. That identity is a critical constituent of the vulnerable condition of the island-Republic, which can never be overcome. The government of Singapore has reinforced that identity in external perception because of its language and cultural policies and also by a disposition to articulate so-called Asian values, which are seen to be drawn primarily from Chinese tradition. Singapore’s foreign policy is obliged to address the China factor on a continuous basis from an apprehension of both a strong China and also one that might dissolve into anarchy. There is a much greater fear of the latter scenario, with a prospect of a flow of refugees and regional turmoil. It has been judged better to try to live with a prospective strong and stable China, which develops a stake in regional cooperation. In that context, the opportunity for Singapore to offer China an alternative model of political economy has been available, not because of any special foresight on independence but because of a fortuitous coincidence of interests attendant on Singapore’s remarkable economic achievement and the recognition by Deng Xiaoping that a prosperous and strong China could not be built on the basis of Maoist doctrines. Whether or not it was Lee Kuan Yew who showed Deng the way for China to develop economically without political turmoil is neither here nor there. The fact of the matter is that Singapore has been a beneficiary of China’s change of course in economic association, which has given it a vantage point from which to assume a limited interlocutor role in prescribing the best course of action for dealing with a rising China which is beyond any conventional practice of containment in Cold War terms. However, when China engaged in acts of military intimidation in the Taiwan Strait in the run-up to the first direct presidential elections on the island in March 1996, it was Lee Kuan Yew who took the lead within the region in publicly urging caution on Beijing in its own interests.23 Singapore’s support for the ARF and ASEM has been governed also by a policy of encouraging China to appreciate and come to terms with the

Singapore and the powers 121 practical stake which it has acquired in regional cooperation and stability. That said, Singapore’s government has not been inhibited in speaking out against China when its interests seem likely to be jeopardised. For example, Lee Kuan Yew has voiced open frustration at the failings of China’s central authorities to give adequate attention to the Singapore Industrial Park in Suzhou, near Shanghai, which, under an agreement in January 1994, had been intended to cater for a township of 600,000 inhabitants. In June 1999, he announced that Singapore would finish only one sector of the project and leave the rest to China because the Suzhou authorities had set up a rival industrial park nearby based on Singapore’s ideas and had also solicited the interest of the same investors.24 That salutary episode served to revise expectations in Singapore about the correlation between culture and economic opportunity. In the case of the Suzhou project, the impediment to fruitful economic cooperation had been a culture of corruption at the local level that had not been overcome by a common culture in the traditional sense. In its guarded relationship with China, Singapore has been driven by economic advantage and by geopolitical and cultural concerns. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, China is no longer considered an imminent subversive threat; nor is it regarded as an external adversary with an interest in threatening Singapore’s independence. Nonetheless, as a rising power with irredentist goals within maritime South-East Asia, China is a source of suspicion and apprehension. That suspicion and apprehension touch Singapore because of the island-state’s prevailing ethnic identity and susceptibility to emotive associations, which makes management of the relationship with Beijing a sensitive matter of the highest priority. Singapore is hardly in a position to manage the relationship between China and SouthEast Asia. It is obliged to use whatever influence it can muster in the cause of a policy of engagement deemed to serve the island-state’s interests better than any other policy option. The Soviet Union/Russia The disintegration of the Soviet Union in December 1991 has meant that Russia, its principal successor state, although still a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, has been diminished considerably as a factor in the strategic calculations of Singapore’s policy-makers. Apart from a residual trading association, a late membership of APEC and a low-profile

122 Singapore and the powers participation in the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), Russia does not take up a great deal of the attention of Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That situation represents a radical change of strategic outlook, especially from that of a period of some two decades after independence, when the Soviet Union was represented as a waxing power and as a permanent fixture actively engaged in competing with its global rivals in South-East Asia. Such was the considered view of the Republic’s Foreign Minister, S. Dhanabalan, in November 1981. In bemoaning the apparent decline in America’s regional power, he asserted that ‘The Soviet Union will not disappear ....’25 The Soviet Union had been a factor in Singapore’s calculations even before independence when, in September 1962, Lee Kuan Yew had briefly visited Moscow to solicit its government’s support for the Malaysia project, albeit without success. After independence, Singapore entertained an initial concern about Moscow’s likely response to its application for membership of the United Nations. That membership was achieved without open objection, Singapore then set out to cultivate trade relations expressed in a formal agreement in March 1966. Diplomatic relations were established in June 1968, with the Soviet Union tolerant of Singapore’s international alignments in the wake of its own loss of position in Indonesia. The development of trade ties had been encouraged with the end of Confrontation and extended by 1972 to the provision of ship repair facilities for Soviet merchant vessels. In the late 1960s, however, Soviet naval vessels had begun to sail through the Singapore Strait en route to the Indian Ocean. Indeed, the sighting of one such vessel during the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference held in Singapore in January 1971 caused a diplomatic flurry. So did the appearance of a Soviet destroyer in Singapore’s roads in the following July. Lee Kuan Yew registered an uncharacteristic ambivalence over the use of Singapore’s facilities by Soviet naval vessels, appearing to indicate approval in March 1971 but unequivocally opposing it by the end of 1972. Trade ties were sustained, however, but never amounted to much because of the limited offerings of the defective Soviet economy.26 Despite the measure of economic association, the relationship between Singapore and Moscow became increasingly cool as the island’s government identified the Soviet Union as the prime external threat to regional order. The virtually concurrent announcement of the Nixon Doctrine and Brezhnev’s proposal for a collective security system in Asia provoked alarm in Singapore as an indication of a Soviet initiative to fill the vacuum likely to arise from

Singapore and the powers 123 America’s seeming strategic retreat. In the mid-1970s, Lee Kuan Yew made an abortive call for measures to counter its growing influence, including a proposal for a joint American, European and Australian naval force with Japanese participation. The relationship deteriorated markedly from the late 1970s, after Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia, which was represented as part of a grand Soviet design for Indochina, and then Moscow’s military deployment to former American naval and air bases in Cam Ranh Bay and Danang.27 In August 1980, a planned visit to Moscow by Lee Kuan Yew, where he had not been for nearly a decade, was cancelled at short notice on spurious grounds, following on the Republic’s boycott of the Olympic Games in the Soviet capital over the issue of Afghanistan. The depiction of the Soviet Union as a political demon in Singapore’s media and government statements makes curious reading with the benefit of hindsight. Even accounting for the nuclear military capability of the Soviet Union and its patronage of Vietnam, the representation of its regional threat seemed exaggerated at the time. Such exaggeration has been explained partly in terms of the predominant ethnic-Chinese domestic constituency in Singapore. The nature of Sino-Soviet rivalry and the Soviet attempt to depict Singapore as a vehicle for China’s interests is said to have disposed the Republic to diplomatic confrontation.28 However valid that explanation, an additional consideration was probably the persisting interest in attracting America’s perpetual involvement in regional security through dramatising the malign intent of its principal global rival. That consideration has become of academic interest in the wake of the Cold War and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, but those dramatic events revived anxiety on Singapore’s part over the regional role of the USA because of the disappearance of the Soviet threat. As far as Singapore is concerned, Russia is far away without any interest in or capability to project power within the island-state’s regional locale either in challenge to or in support of a favoured balance or distribution of power. That said, it was Singapore which pressed successfully for Russia’s participation in the founding foreign ministers’ meeting of the ASEAN Regional Forum in July 1993. Its government is not ready to write Russia off as a potential AsiaPacific power, or to assume that there is any point in denying it a place and a voice within a cooperative structure of multilateral regional relations. Indeed, to the extent that Russia, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, is regarded as of minimal significance in the regional strategic balance, then

124 Singapore and the powers Singapore has been keen to sustain its involvement in multilateral security dialogue. Japan By contrast with the Soviet Union/Russia, Japan has been a far more consistent factor in Singapore’s regional calculations. Governmental attitudes have been far more ambivalent, however, about Japan’s regional role, without any immediate pressing concern about the country’s military relevance to the balance of power. Part of that ambivalence arises because Singapore was invaded and occupied by Japanese forces in the early phase of the Pacific War. That brutal occupation of three and a half years has left a far more bitter legacy than nearly a century and a half of British colonial rule. The predominantly Chinese population of the island were treated as hostile because of their conspicuous support for nationalist resistance to Japan’s invasion and occupation of China proper. They were also subjected to massacres whose memory has been kept alive more than half a century after Japan’s defeat. This murderous experience has informed Singaporean attitudes to Japan, especially as articulated by its first Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, who lived through the harrowing occupation.29 On the other hand, Japan has been held up within Singapore as an economic development model to be emulated. Its national work ethic and team spirit have been represented as ideal for Singaporeans to copy; until Japan became afflicted by recession during the 1990s at least. Well before the notion of ‘Asian values’ became a matter of international discourse and closely identified with the social order of the island-state, Singapore was strongly attracted to Japan’s pattern of industrial organisation, despite the harsh experience of the occupation. Although Singapore has predicated its foreign policy on the premises of the balance of power, Japan has never been contemplated or encouraged as an independent factor in that regional process because it continues to be viewed in terms of war-time experience and thus in terms of threat. Singapore conducts its foreign policy towards Japan with an underlying suspicion based on a conviction that the Japanese, however peace-loving and democratic since their defeat in the Pacific War, are quite capable of reverting to their former aggressive military selves. For that reason, Singapore has only been willing to contemplate and encourage a regional security role for Japan within a constraining framework maintained by the USA. Indeed, when the prospect

Singapore and the powers 125 arose of Japan playing a modest role in United Nations’ peacekeeping in Cambodia after the Paris settlement of October 1991, Lee Kuan Yew voiced his public concern. He indulged in an extravagant and ill-founded imagery in claiming that to permit Japan to engage in peacekeeping would be like giving chocolate liqueur to an alcoholic. The strong underlying sense of reserve towards Japan and the Japanese in Singapore has not interfered with a pragmatic economic relationship with Tokyo. Indeed, by the time that Singapore had become independent in 1965, Japan had overcome a good many of its post-war disabilities. It was well on the way to becoming an economic power of the first rank and had long returned to South-East Asia through a series of reparations agreements which served to help regenerate its industrial capacity. Its enterprise had begun to develop a multinational character and Singapore proved to be an early site for locating manufacturing for export on the basis of advantageous comparative cost. Indeed, to that end, diplomatic relations were established soon after independence in December 1965, although it took the Republic until June 1968 to find a suitable ambassador to send to Tokyo. Japan did not bulk large in the initial foreign policy of the Republic, which was concerned with the imagery of non-alignment, while preserving its British connections for economic and security reasons. That orientation began to change with changes in British policy signalled first in July 1967, while the visit to Singapore by Japan’s Prime Minister, Eisaku Sato, the following September, was the first by a foreign head of government since independence. Japan eventually settled its ‘blood debt’ to Singapore with loans and grants to the value of US$25 million in 1969. By that juncture, if Japan was ruled out as any kind of security partner for a mixture of reasons, the burgeoning economic link begun by attracting Japanese direct investment was envisaged as a way of underpinning the island’s security.30 Moreover, the diplomatic intervention of Japan from the early 1970s in support of freedom of navigation through the Straits of Malacca and Singapore had been much welcomed. Political association with Japan came to be valued in the wake of the policy statement by President Nixon on the island of Guam in July 1969 which placed the onus for their conventional defence on the states of Asia. In a speech in Tokyo in May 1973, Lee Kuan Yew had toyed with the controversial idea of a Japanese naval contribution to a regional task force within a defence structure dominated by the USA as a way of countering a growing Soviet presence in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.31 Underlying this abortive

126 Singapore and the powers proposal was a concern about the military staying power of the USA and how to employ the Japanese connection to sustain its regional engagement, especially in the wake of the Vietnam War and America’s military withdrawal from mainland South-East Asia in both Thailand and Indochina. In the event, Lee Kuan Yew had to be content with what the Japanese, under Takeo Fukuda in the late 1970s, described as their comprehensive security policy. Indeed, Lee Kuan Yew pointed out in October 1979 that ‘Japan’s investment and transfer of technology to ASEAN countries and the promotion of two-way trade are Japan’s best contributions to the security and stability of the region.’32 By that juncture, through Singapore’s initiative, Japan had become integrated in an exclusive policy network with ASEAN governments. Initially, Prime Minister Takeo Miki had expressed an interest in attending the first ASEAN summit on the island of Bali in February 1976 but his overture was rebuffed. However, an opportunity was found for his successor Takeo Fukuda to attend after the intra-ASEAN phase of the second summit in Kuala Lumpur in August 1977, albeit made less conspicuous by the presence also of the Australian and New Zealand Prime Ministers. That initial prime ministerial participation led on to ASEAN’s practice of inviting the foreign ministers of so-called dialogue partners to a post-ministerial meeting after the annual meetings of its own foreign ministers. Indeed, it was Japan, through its Foreign Minister, Taro Nakayama, which suggested in July 1991 at such a meeting that the ASEAN-Post Ministerial Conference become an institutionalised regional structure for multilateral security dialogue. When Singapore assumed the role of chair of ASEAN’s Standing Committee in the following year, it was able to draw on strong Japanese support in its successful diplomatic efforts to build a constituency for such a multilateral security dialogue which took concrete form as the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). Because of the degree of congruence in Japan’s regional security policy with Singapore’s expectations of its regional role, there have not been substantive differences of perspective between the two governments over time. Indeed, it is notable that, in May 1991, Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu chose Singapore as the venue for the first explicit apology to the peoples of Asia by a Japanese head of government for his country’s conduct during the Pacific War. With conspicuous consistency, Japan has refrained from contemplating security in military terms beyond the ambit of its home islands. It has, however, continued to provide extensive forward deployment facilities for the American armed forces which suits Singapore’s interests. In the wake

Singapore and the powers 127 of the Cold War, the evident convergence in the regional policies of Singapore and Japan, above all in encouragement for the retention of an American military presence, has been sustained. Such convergence had not always been demonstrated on some other regional issues during its course. For example, there were times when Singapore and Japan had been at odds over the degree of consideration to be given to Vietnam’s interests following its occupation of Cambodia. Singapore’s hard line was not always well appreciated in Tokyo where the view had been taken initially that it would not only drive Hanoi deeper into Moscow’s arms and so reinforce regional polarisation but would also harm Japan’s prospects of reaching an accommodation with the Soviet Union over the occupied Northern Islands. Post-Cold War, the two governments have demonstrated a shared stake in perpetuating America’s use of military facilities in Japan. To that end, the visit by President Clinton to Tokyo in April 1996 was welcomed in Singapore together with the accompanying Joint Statement on Security with Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto. A measure of tension arose, however, in the following year, with the announcement of revised guidelines for the Mutual Security Treaty with the USA. The suggestion within Japan that such guidelines could apply within a geographic ambit which included Taiwan generated regional controversy involving the government in Beijing. Singapore was foremost in voicing disapproval of such an interpretation of the revised guidelines which were deemed to be destabilising regionally and which also revived memories of war-time occupation. That matter was clarified in due course, however, to the advantage of the tone of the relationship between Singapore and Tokyo, which has been remarkably stable and consistent over time. Nonetheless, the issue pointed up a consistent priority on Singapore’s part; namely, that Japan should not become a disturbing factor in the triangular relationship with China and the USA whose stability is regarded as critical to the island-state’s security. Other powers Britain, which played an important interposing military role on independence, ceased to be regarded as an independent factor in Singapore’s calculations of the regional balance from its military withdrawal from East of Suez. Important diplomatic links have been maintained, however, given its permanent place on the UN Security Council, and vestigial attachments of a personal kind.

128 Singapore and the powers Britain’s continued, albeit limited, participation within the Five Power Defence Arrangements has been valued, however, together with that of Australia and New Zealand, particularly when the latter deployed the only foreign land forces in the island during the mid-1970s. Beyond the major powers, Singapore’s most important regional security relationship has developed with Australia, despite a chequered beginning. Initial diplomatic support from Australia gave way to sourness in the relationship, based partly on personal differences between leaders post-Vietnam during the early 1970s and the perceived reluctance of Australia to take the Five Power Defence Arrangements seriously, despite its major responsibilities for the integrated air defence system. At the end of the decade, a notable difference between the states arose over the abortive attempt by Quantas, Australia’s national airline, to protect its market share at the expense of Singapore’s national carrier. Australia, despite its attraction as an educational centre for students from Singapore, tended to be represented as a country to visit for a holiday but not to be taken seriously because of a cultural hedonism alien to Singapore’s declared national ethic. That perception changed gradually from the early 1980s as Australia took a renewed interest in the Five Power Defence Arrangements but coincided also with differences over managing the relationship with Vietnam following its invasion of Cambodia. The relationship has flowered, however, with the end of the Cold War and the strong commitment of the Labour government of Paul Keating to close cooperation with Asia. Corresponding diplomatic cooperation was registered in promoting the advent of the ASEAN Regional Forum as well as in defence cooperation with Canberra making available land force training facilities in Queensland and corresponding airforce training facilities in Western Australia. The nature of the relationship was sustained after the LiberalNational coalition, led by John Howard, assumed office in March 1996. At Singapore’s initiative, the two countries entered into a formal ‘New Partnership’ in that year. That accord is of particular value to Singapore because of the professional competence in training and advice of Australia’s armed forces and diplomatic service set within a common strategic perspective. In addition, Australia’s sustained strategic relationship with the USA, which was reaffirmed in an agreement in June 1995, is regarded as an important asset in the partnership, albeit at one remove. Australia is not an alliance partner in the sense that its limited but proficient military capability would be deployed to defend Singapore. At issue in the relationship is Australia’s deep interest in regional stability, which serves Singapore well.

Singapore and the powers 129 The partnership has been institutionalised through a joint ministerial committee that met for the first biennial occasion in Canberra in October 1996 with three ministers participating from each side. Singapore was conspicuously silent among those ASEAN states which found it politic to criticise Australia for its leading role in the UN-sanctioned multilateral force that was deployed in East Timor from September 1999. If Singapore’s relationship with Australia has a tangible security dimension, that with an integrating Europe and a diplomatically distant India has been cultivated in the general interest of deepening the benign involvement of external powers. To that end, Singapore took the initiative through Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong to promote the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) which convened at heads of government level in Bangkok in March 1996 and then again in London in April 1998.33 This initiative, that was intended to fill a gap in a network of inter-regional relationships as well as to counter a unipolar America, was mediated by Singapore through ASEAN which served the purpose of regional partnership. Correspondingly, the opening to India had an economic dimension with investment opportunities sought in its modern electronics sector, but Singapore was also instrumental in promoting India as a dialogue partner of ASEAN in 1995, and in supporting its membership of the ASEAN Regional Forum a year later. Neither of these two initiatives have had great impact in ameliorating Singapore’s condition of vulnerability in its immediate locale, but they represent a consistent practice of policy with balance of power in its most general sense in mind. In that vein, Singapore has taken the initiative to promote a corresponding structure of dialogue between Asia and Latin-America. Conclusion In the post-Cold War era, Singapore’s approach to the major powers is not a mystery. It comprises a publicly proclaimed set of policies with a balance or distribution of power in mind intended to contribute to regional stability and to the assured independence of the island-state. In this ideal balance or distribution of power, Russia enjoys a minimal role. Japan is contemplated in a supporting role only, although its relationship with China is regarded as critical for regional stability. China remains highly problematic to the extent that there is no guarantee that its participation in economic interdependence and multilateral security dialogue will curb its irredentist assertiveness,

130 Singapore and the powers particularly with a rising nationalism. Singapore’s leaders see no practical alternative to a policy of engagement as the best way of encouraging Beijing in the habit of good regional citizenship. Given the fallibility of such a policy, Singapore places greatest reliance on the regional role of the USA as the countervailing and stabilising factor on account of its awesome deterrent capability, but again without any certainty in its staying power. That said, although now a defence partner, Singapore enjoys only limited influence in a Washington driven primarily by domestic considerations. There is no sense, therefore, in which Singapore can be described as a major manager of the regional balance, which continues to be subject to vagaries beyond its control. The island-state’s relationships with the major powers have been driven nonetheless by a sustained interest in upholding that balance in its overall favour. So far, the regional pattern shaped by the interactions of the major powers has coincided with Singapore’s general priorities but, characteristically, that regional pattern, like national independence, has never been taken for granted.

5

Driving and suffering the region?

The push to multilateralism Singapore’s government was certainly aware that the diplomatic prowess displayed during the Cambodian conflict had exaggerated the intrinsic strength of ASEAN. The Association had played a critical part in keeping an international spotlight on Vietnam’s armed delinquency and had demonstrated the quality of a diplomatic community in the process. In the event, the negotiations leading to the Paris settlement of October 1991 had involved ASEAN in a nominal role only; the primary responsibility having been assumed by the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. Senior officials from Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs had identified in advance the diminishing significance of the Cambodian conflict for the regional balance of power. By the end of the 1980s, they had ceased to invest the same diplomatic resources into pressing ASEAN’s position. In an address to an ASEAN Ministerial Meeting in June 1987, Lee Kuan Yew had forecast an eventual Cambodian settlement through negotiations, which were not long in coming. Although ASEAN was regarded as an important vehicle for collective diplomacy and confidence-building, it was hardly sufficient for countering the vulnerability of the island-state. Moreover, within a short time, ASEAN was to become beset by a collective paralysis concurrent with regional economic adversity and its enlargement to coincide with geographic SouthEast Asia. For Singapore, the time had come to look beyond an ASEAN that could no longer command an international alignment relevant to the islandstate’s interests. That much was to be demonstrated after the end of the Cold

132 Driving and suffering the region? War; for example, over competing claims to islands in the South China Sea that registered an end to the strategic partnership between ASEAN and China that had obtained over Cambodia. Moreover, ASEAN claimants were unable to agree on a common position on jurisdiction. It was in that context that Singapore had acted without consulting its regional partners in reaching an agreement with the USA in providing access and support facilities for its navy and airforce. That display of unilateralism had demonstrated an unwillingness to permit those partners the right to exercise a veto where the security of the island-state was concerned as well as an abiding balance of power perspective. Singapore had acted in the knowledge that its strategic environment was in flux and that, with the end of the Cold War, the era of America’s crusade in East Asia had come to an end. Assured access to modest military facilities in Singapore, which helped America’s forward deployment at the time of the Gulf War, provided a measure of compensation for the loss of bases in the Philippines and served as a way of sustaining its security role in the region. It was deemed well worth incurring the initial displeasure of ASEAN partners to achieve success in such a venture. While Singapore sought to cope with a changing regional security environment by strengthening its defence ties with the USA, a novel diplomatic opening for ASEAN was identified and pursued. Singapore had long been sceptical of ASEAN’s declaratory security doctrine of a regional Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality within which order would be upheld exclusively by resident states. Such a distribution of power was suspect because of the danger of a local hegemony as presaged by Indonesia’s abortive Confrontation. Singapore had long favoured the alternative of a multiple balance involving the engagement of extra-regional states, which could hold the ring against any local adventurism. With the end of the Cold War and a concern about the utility of ASEAN, Singapore’s government explored the opportunity for extending geographically the Association’s model of regional security as a way of serving the island-state’s particular interests. The goal was to promote an extended structure of multilateral security dialogue within Pacific Asia with the prime purpose of engaging the USA in a way additional and complementary to its Cold War bilateral relationships. Ideally, such a structure, incorporating all the major Asia-Pacific powers, would help to ease the transition from one strategic environment to another. Singapore’s initiative in seeking to complement the bilateral bases of regional security bore fruit in the form of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), which was inaugurated at a meeting of ASEAN and other Asia-Pacific foreign

Driving and suffering the region? 133 ministers in the island-state in July 1993. That initiative was supported by a number of friendly governments, including those of Australia and Japan. Singapore’s contribution arose from using the medium of multilateralism to diplomatic advantage. At issue was a shared concern about the regional staying power of the USA in the wake of the Cold War and then the disintegration of the Soviet Union, despite the access agreements concluded with Washington. A characteristic worst-case thinking generated the view that the Republic would experience strategic exposure in the event of America’s retreat from East Asia. In addition, it was judged that the regional environment would become unsettled to Singapore’s disadvantage as a result of an attendant increase in rivalry between China and Japan, in particular. For some time, Japan had been pressing for a multilateral security dialogue in Asia-Pacific beyond ASEAN, comprising its membership and its ‘dialogue partners’ who shared an interest in upholding the regional status quo. Such a view was in keeping with a long-standing Singaporean position that had been enunciated by Lee Kuan Yew in a National Day address in 1980. He had remarked that: ‘ASEAN’s interests lie in working together with America and Japan to ensure a stable arrangement of independent states in Southeast Asia, both communist and non-communist.’1 The USA had resisted any initiatives for multilateralism through a fear that such developments might prejudice the viability of long-standing and well-tested bilateral alliances of Cold War vintage. That resistance began to disappear by the end of the Bush administration, while multilateralism was welcomed by the succeeding Clinton administration which took office in January 1993. From Singapore’s perspective, the prime object of the exercise was to engage the USA in multilateral dialogue as a way of helping to sustain its interest in the security of the Asia-Pacific registered through a forward military presence. Singapore threw its diplomatic weight into the attempt to draw the USA into a new regional multilateralism in an attempt to allay a pressing concern as to whether the USA would continue its key security role beyond the year 2000 as indicated on numerous occasions by Lee Kuan Yew. This priority was identified in general terms by Foreign Minister Wong Kan Seng in a statement in Singapore’s Parliament in March 1991 during a debate on the estimates for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He explained that: ‘Over the long term, the security of Southeast Asia and the Asia Pacific can be best served by having an engagement of all powers large and small, of necessity, in overlapping and multiple security and political frameworks.’2

134 Driving and suffering the region? A limited insight into the foreign policy process to the more specific end of the ASEAN Regional Forum was provided by Wong Kan Seng after it had convened in July 1994 for its first working session. He drew attention to the ‘delicate stage-setting required’ as a preliminary to establishing the ARF as a grouping of non-like-minded states. For example, preliminary to its formation, the foreign ministers of China and the Soviet Union and Russia successively were invited as guests to the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting in Kuala Lumpur in 1991 and again to the corresponding meeting in Manila in 1992 at which Vietnam and Laos adhered to the Association’s Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, which gave them observer, and candidate member, status. Wong Kan Seng also observed that: ‘If we didn’t set the stage for all these events to take place, get the time right and seize the opportunity presented, the ARF would not have been formed.’3 In its stage-setting activities, Singapore was presented with two specific opportunities where automatic assumption of the chairman’s role provided a tangible diplomatic advantage. The first of these occurred when the Fourth ASEAN Summit convened in Singapore in January 1992. It did so against the background of the end of the Cold War and the settlement of the Cambodian conflict and also the notice given by the USA in November 1991 that it would quit Subic naval base which was followed closely in the next month by the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Although seemingly only a change of policy form, ASEAN’s heads of government agreed to move towards ‘a higher plane of political and economic cooperation to secure regional peace and security’ and additionally, for the first time, to ‘seek avenues to engage member states in new areas of cooperation in security matters’. Their declaration signalled the way forward in suggesting, inter alia, that ‘ASEAN could use established fora to promote external dialogues on enhancing security in the region’, and that: ‘To enhance this effort, ASEAN should intensify its external dialogues in political and security matters by using the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conferences (PMC).’4 Singapore’s Foreign Ministry had been active in pressing for this development in ‘Cooperative Security’, which marked an exception to conventional balance of power practice in that it could bring together in dialogue potential adversaries as well as defence and political partners. An additional significance in the outcome of the summit was the general acknowledgement by ASEAN’s governments of the long-standing Singaporean refrain that it was impossible to exclude major powers from their

Driving and suffering the region? 135 region. In the post-Cold War strategic environment, despite a continuing declaratory commitment to the Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) formula, it had become necessary to try to establish a geographically wider mechanism for regional security beyond the narrow framework of ASEAN. A consensus to this end converged with Singapore’s strategic perspective and served, in effect, as a rationale for collective initiative to sustain the active engagement of the USA. The initiative represented an attempt to uphold the regional distribution of power through political means. With America’s enthusiastic support for ASEAN’s Singapore-driven initiative, diplomatic attention turned to securing the engagement additionally of China in the interest of inducting the People’s Republic into the canons of good regional citizenship. Singapore’s opportunity to promote this kind of security cooperation came after ASEAN’s Ministerial Meeting in July 1992 when, again coincidentally, it was the Republic’s turn to assume the chair of ASEAN’s Standing Committee. This office gave Singapore the responsibility for acting as host state for the following year’s Ministerial Meeting and also secretariat and agenda-setting obligations in the run-up to the occasion. Together with the mandate from the 1992 summit, this diplomatic window of opportunity was exploited to full advantage in securing cooperation from ASEAN partners and the governments of the Association’s dialogue partners to convene the first ever combined meeting of their most senior foreign ministry officials. The initial suggestion pursued had been that a meeting of such senior officials from ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference states should be held before the annual meeting of ASEAN’s foreign ministers in July 1993. Singapore then canvassed a more radical proposition to include senior officials from Vietnam, Laos and Russia but not China. Intense lobbying followed, particularly of the USA whose State Department was persuaded of the need to establish a security analogue to Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), which had been set up in 1989. In this diplomatic process, Singapore engaged in close cooperation with Australia whose government, then headed by Paul Keating, had become increasingly influential in Jakarta. President Suharto’s approval of a wider initiative in the interest of addressing the regional roles of both the USA and China proved to be a key factor in forging an ASEAN consensus over diluting its declaratory security doctrine. The seminal meeting of senior officials took place in Singapore in May 1993, chaired by Peter Chan, Permanent Secretary of its Ministry of Foreign

136 Driving and suffering the region? Affairs. That meeting reviewed the post-Cold War political and economic landscape in the Asia-Pacific region and reached agreement on a formulation that was in perfect accord with Singapore’s regional security priorities. The officials agreed that: ‘The continuing presence of the United States, as well as stable relationships among the USA, Japan and China, and other states of the region would contribute to regional stability.’5 This formulation registered the practical terms of reference of the ASEAN Regional Forum, which was inaugurated in the following July at a meeting of foreign ministers in Singapore during the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting. Its first working session convened in Bangkok in July 1994.6 The significance for Singapore of the seminal meeting in May 1993 was that it established an ambit for security cooperation that included ASEAN and also extended well beyond the geographic confines of South-East Asia. The net effect was to drive a coach and horses through the concept of ZOPFAN, which ASEAN had pioneered as an exclusive South-East Asian approach to regional security without any role for the major Asia-Pacific powers. Although ZOPFAN was mentioned in passing in the Chairman’s statement at the end of the meeting of senior officials, and while the utility of ASEAN’s Treaty of Amity and Cooperation was acknowledged, a new cooperative security architecture was being planned, which had the potential to supersede ASEAN in its remit. To that extent, and without challenging the institutional existence of ASEAN that gave its name to the new security dialogue, Singapore’s interest in promoting the greatest possible multilateral engagement of major powers had been realised, albeit in an experimental form. Within the ARF, Singapore pressed for the prerogative diplomatic centrality of ASEAN whose foreign ministers have acted continuously as chairmen for its annual working sessions beginning in Bangkok in 1994 and as co-chairmen in all of its inter-sessional activities. Moreover, in August 1995, when the ARF’s second working session was convened in Bandar Seri Begawan under Brunei’s chairmanship, a seminal Concept Paper was drafted in final form in Singapore’s Foreign Ministry, albeit put forward under the name of the host government. That paper defined the terms of reference of the ARF and also set out its graduated approach to regional security. Within that Concept Paper, ASEAN’s role within the ARF was represented as ‘the prime driving force’. That formulation secured endorsement in successive chairmen’s statements but lost the word ‘prime’ in 1999. In this way,

Driving and suffering the region? 137 Singapore was able, up to a point, to demonstrate its diplomatic utility to its ASEAN partners, while enjoying their support for a wider geographic structure of security cooperation that fitted the multilateral ideal of its successive foreign ministers. It is worth noting, however, that in March 1993, Singapore’s Defence Minister, Yeo Ning Hong, while welcoming multilateral security cooperation then in gestation, had pointed out that it was an ‘add on’ and not a replacement for tried and tested arrangements such as Five Power Defence.7 Within ASEAN, Singapore was able to count on support for greater multilateralism, in particular, from Indonesia that had been the source of the initiative for the ZOPFAN formula in 1971. For example, at the fifth meeting of ASEAN’s heads of government in Bangkok in December 1995, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong secured the support of President Suharto in a successful attempt to have India recognised as a ‘dialogue partner’ of the Association. Singapore’s relations with India had developed through economic association as the island-state began to deploy investment offshore for much the same reasons as multinationals had located there during the late 1960s. Apart from sweetening the investment climate in India by helping to extend the country’s diplomatic profile and standing, Singapore was moved also by its multilateralist logic. This had worked with Indonesia when it was argued that India’s regional involvement could serve as a counter to the influence of China, which had also been pressing for dialogue partner status with ASEAN. India, together with Myanmar (Burma), then became a member of the ARF at its annual working session in Jakarta in 1996. Singapore had been also involved in pioneering a highly controversial diplomatic opening to Myanmar, which is regarded as a pariah state in the West because of its military government’s gross violations of human rights. Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong had visited Yangon in March 1994 in a demonstration of support for ASEAN’s policy of so-called ‘constructive engagement’ that had been conceived with countering China’s influence, as well as economic advantage, in mind. The push to multilateralism was sustained through another initiative by Singapore; this time, to promote a structured dialogue between the states of East Asia and the European Union. The opportunity for that initiative was presented by the concern of the Commission of the European Union that it might be cut out of the dynamic economic developments in Asia because of

138 Driving and suffering the region? the advent and direction of APEC, which had begun to meet at summit level from 1993. In July 1994, the European Commission had expressed that concern in a document entitled ‘Towards a New Asia Strategy’8 that was endorsed by the Council of Ministers later in the year. That document was noted by Singapore’s delegation in Brussels and an imaginative initiative followed from Goh Chok Tong in October 1994 during a speech in Paris. That initiative was speedily endorsed by ASEAN at its annual ministerial meeting held in Brunei at the end of the following July and was then agreed with its European Union dialogue partner. An additional consideration, which was important in securing the support of China and Malaysia, in particular, was an interest in countering the post-Cold War unipolarity of the USA registered at the APEC summit in 1993. Singapore’s initiative paved the way for the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) at heads of government level, which convened first in Bangkok in March 1996 on a biennial basis. ASEM was another form of multilateralism through which ASEAN conceded that its ambit was inadequate for addressing the problems of the post-Cold War era. And once again, Singapore’s initiative had served partners’ interests beyond its own. For example, the ASEM proposal carried Malaysia’s support in addition because the composition of the Asia side of the dialogue corresponded to the membership envisaged by Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad for his abortive scheme for an East Asian Economic Caucus (EAEC). That proposal had been less than sympathetically received by his ASEAN partners on its launch in 1991. Moreover, Singapore found common cause with both Malaysia and Indonesia in supporting the controversial entry of Myanmar into ASEAN in 1997, in part because of a shared resentment of the attempt by Western states to impose rules for membership and so intrude into matters of sovereignty and collective prerogative. Singapore’s multilateralist drive had also borne fruit earlier, despite American prevarication because of the Michael Fay case, when it was chosen as the venue for the inaugural ministerial meeting of the newly formed World Trade Organisation (WTO). It had been the site for some time of the APEC Secretariat and such international recognition, together with its programme of outward investment within and beyond South-East Asia, seemed to suggest that it had been increasingly successful in taking the fortunes of the island states out of the vagaries of the close regional locale. As indicated above, such

Driving and suffering the region? 139 a goal had been pursued also in post-Cold War defence cooperation with the United States. Underlying Singapore’s regional policy was an attempt to demonstrate in practical terms that ‘Size is not Destiny.’9 The intellectual protagonist of that thesis has been Ambassador-at-Large Tommy Koh. He has argued that size is an imperfect criterion for assessing a state’s ranking and in Singapore’s case that factors such as size of trade, foreign reserves, per capita income as well as degree of use of sea and airports serve as more valid indicators in a borderless globalised world where assessing the power of a state is a complex matter. He has noted also the burgeoning empowerment of multilateral institutions within which the influence of a member country is partly determined by its importance in the world and partly by the ability of its delegation. This assessment has given rise to the conclusion that: ‘In such a forum, it is not unusual for the delegation of a small country to out-perform those of much larger countries. Multilateral diplomacy is a field in which a small country such as Singapore can shine.’10 Ambassador Koh’s argument, which underlies the evolution and direction of Singapore’s foreign policy, is unexceptionable in terms of the remarkable diplomatic performance of the island-state on top of its economic achievements. That argument is flawed, however, because Singapore’s vulnerability is not only a function of its minuscule size but also of a confined location wedged between politically unpredictable neighbours, which have always been uncomfortable with the island-state’s prevailing ethnic-Chinese identity and its associated economic role. Limited size together with a confined location and prevailing ethnic-Chinese identity do not necessarily in themselves add up to destiny but they are facts of geopolitical life which cannot be wished away. They can only be mitigated and not erased through multilateral diplomacy, however skilful and successful. In Singapore’s case, its attempt to drive the region in a multilateral direction proved to be very successful, in part because the moment was seized in the Shakespearean sense of there being a tide in the affairs of men which taken at its flood leads on to fortune. That moment coincided with an extensive period of remarkable regional economic growth that had served to facilitate political cooperation and to mitigate bilateral tensions. That period of remarkable economic growth came to an unanticipated end from the middle of 1997. The impact of contagious regional economic adversity had the effect of reducing the efficacy of Singapore’s multilateralist

140 Driving and suffering the region? policy, albeit without any direct threat being posed to the security of the islandstate. Nonetheless, Singapore’s security environment was impaired and its innate vulnerability was more conspicuously exposed, especially as close-athand regional relationships began to deteriorate and require more managerial attention. The regional economic crisis also had the effect of diminishing the international standing and the confidence-building role of ASEAN. The move to multilateralism driven by Singapore had the effect of ameliorating the climate of regional security but had not served to transform its condition in any fundamental sense. Moreover, all that diplomatic effort on Singapore’s part counted for little when adverse economic circumstances caused a souring in key bilateral relationships. Suffering the region At the end of the Cold War, Singapore had seized the moment in promoting multilateral initiatives that had widened the ambit of its active diplomatic network beyond the confines of South-East Asia. Correspondingly, it had begun to engage in state-led outward investment to China, India and Vietnam in particular, in order to exploit comparative cost advantages which would compensate for the decreasingly competitive position of the island-state.11 The model for what Lee Kuan Yew has described as ‘growing an external wing’ arose from experience in investment in Indonesia’s Riau Islands which, in December 1994, were joined with the Malaysian state of Johor in a so-called ‘Growth Triangle’.12 In effect, Singapore acted as the hub that interacted economically with the two other poles without any substantive trilateralism. Apart from the economic advantage anticipated from such a formal trilateral economic arrangement, there was also the expectation that such an institutionalised economic interdependence would help to defuse recurrent political tensions with both neighbours. Such tensions have been most acute in the case of Malaysia despite the degree of economic interdependence.13 As reported by Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong in August 1998, Malaysia is Singapore’s second-largest trading partner, while Singapore is Malaysia’s third-largest. Some S$10 billion of Singapore capital has been invested there, spread over 1,000 companies, while its bank exposure constitutes another S$21 billion. Such linkage has never been a guarantee, or indeed an effective cushion, against a deterioration in

Driving and suffering the region? 141 bilateral relations, particularly as economic cooperation can go hand in hand with a belief on Malaysia’s part that Singapore is out to put it at a disadvantage. Such was the view articulated in Kuala Lumpur after the onset of regional economic adversity from mid-1997, when higher interest rates in Singapore, governed by market conditions, attracted capital funds from Malaysia. One reaction was a withdrawal of official recognition of trading in Malaysian shares listed in a secondary market in Singapore, known as the Central Limit Order Book (CLOB). The effect has been to cause considerable financial embarrassment to Singapore’s business community and exasperation to its government. One purpose of Malaysia’s development policy has been to improve the country’s competitive position with direct reference to Singapore, especially its communication facilities. Indeed, for years, Malaysia had smarted in adverse comparison with Singapore’s economic accomplishments. And just when it seemed as if Malaysia was beginning to become a serious competitor, it was struck down by economic adversity that its Prime Minister represented as the work of unscrupulous foreign speculators. The regional economic circumstances precipitated by Thailand’s decision to float the Baht in July 1997 set the context in which Singapore experienced a deterioration in its closest bilateral relationships. Indeed, it is striking just how Singapore’s experience of those relationships at the end of the century bore a resemblance to its experience of them on independence in 1965. One notable element of continuity bearing on its foreign relations has been the continuing role in government of Lee Kuan Yew as Senior Minister. Despite the measure of success of Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong in dealing with Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta, Lee Kuan Yew is still regarded as having the last word on important matters of state, especially in relations with Malaysia and Indonesia. Moreover, his at-times less than discreet public obiter dicta have been seized on with fury in both capitals at the expense of bilateral relations. Examples of such hypersensitivity have been much more frequent in the case of Malaysia, where Lee and his cabinet colleagues have never been able to establish close working relationships sufficiently resilient to cushion any ill-judged remarks. Such a relationship certainly existed with Indonesia up to May 1998 based on a personal rapport between former President Suharto and Lee Kuan Yew. Whatever the degree of resentment at Singapore’s role as the regional locus of overseas Chinese enterprise, Indonesia’s sense of national self-confidence was sufficiently well developed as the country progressed economically for a relaxed attitude to be displayed towards any perceived

142 Driving and suffering the region? transgressions. However, because of the highly personalised nature of Suharto’s rule, close relationships by Singapore’s leaders were not established beyond the former President, which made for a serious problem in the event of an unanticipated political succession. For example, in September 1997, Singapore’s government banned a forum on Indonesia organised by the local Foreign Correspondents’ Association which opposition leader Megawati Sukarnoputri had been invited to address. That invitation was reinstated after President Suharto’s political downfall by the government-funded Institute for Defence and Strategic Studies. A magnanimous understanding of Singapore’s predicament was indicated then by Megawati, who was chosen as Indonesia’s Vice-President in October 1999. The same institute, headed by Ambassadorat-Large S.R. Nathan, also took the fortuitous initiative to extend a corresponding invitation to opposition luminary, Abdurrahman Wahid, who was chosen as President of Indonesia. A hypersensitivity to ill-judged remarks has not been exclusive to Malaysia. It was displayed in the case of Indonesia in early 1998 when Lee Kuan Yew indicated his misgivings over the suitability of Dr B.J. Habibie, then Minister of State for Research and Technology, for the office of Indonesia’s Vice-President. In the event, he was elected Vice-President in March 1998. In the following May, he succeeded President Suharto when the latter was obliged to resign against a background of acute economic crisis. Apart from an organised demonstration outside Singapore’s Embassy in Jakarta, an unforgiving President Habibie treated Singapore, at times, as a less than friendly state, despite its offer of material support for an IMF rescue package for Indonesia. Such a deterioration of relations, driven by Indonesia’s acute economic distress and political instability, brought a deep-seated resentment against Singapore to the surface with complaints that the island had become a refuge for ill-gotten capital flight on the part of ethnic-Chinese. For example, Adi Sasono, Indonesia’s Cooperatives Minister in interimPresident Habibie’s government, complained of Singapore’s lack of interest in helping him develop a so-called ‘people’s economy’ based on a nation-wide network of cooperatives. He linked this view to a warning to nations which had ‘joined in the grand party’ of the Suharto era and ‘robbed the country’s money’ that times had changed. It was made only too evident that Singapore was on the list of such countries.14 For its part, Singapore did not respond officially to such taunts and ill-concealed threats. Unlike the People’s Republic of China, it did not register any expressions of concern about the ill-treatment of

Driving and suffering the region? 143 Indonesia’s Chinese citizens for obvious reasons, although it has been apprehensive about the potential scale of refugee flow, which would confirm the view of Singapore as a state primarily for Chinese. Its government has been obliged to engage in political damage limitation with Jakarta to the best of its ability. Although it has not been in any fear of Indonesia’s armed forces, which have been tied down in internal security duties since the fall of Suharto, it has remained deeply apprehensive of the outcome of political change in Jakarta, which lies beyond any influence from the island-state. The relationship with Indonesia at the end of the century deteriorated against the background of regional economic adversity but without acute diplomatic confrontation. As indicated above, personal factors have been relevant to that deterioration. Interim-President Habibie has harboured resentments that have been articulated in an inconsequential manner. For example, in February 1999, during a meeting in Jakarta with Taiwanese journalists, he sought to divert attention from Indonesia’s notorious illtreatment of its ethnic-Chinese community by claiming that discrimination in Singapore was worse. It was described as a country of ‘real racists’ where Malays could never be military officers. It was left to Indonesia’s Minister of Education, Professor Juwono Sudarsono, then visiting Singapore, to engage in political damage limitation. Apart from suggesting that President Habibie had been misinformed about the level of Malay representation in Singapore’s armed services, he said that President Habibie may have made the comment because he ‘probably still feels the stinging rebuke from Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew when it was indicated he was the likely running mate for President Suharto’.15 Such a view was confirmed by a presidential aide who revealed that Dr Habibie craved respect which had not been forthcoming from Singapore and Lee Kuan Yew.16 In the event, the episode proved to be a trivial matter, but it was an indication of the ambivalence towards Singapore on the part of Indonesia’s leaders. In July 1999, President Habibie, after having experienced an electoral reverse in his bid to hold on to high office, gave an interview to The Straits Times in which he was emollient towards Singapore and asked for his regards to be passed on to Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and all Singaporeans.17 A few days later, Singapore’s President, Ong Teng Cheong, presented the Republic’s highest military award to General Wiranto, then Commander of Indonesia’s Armed Forces, in a political bridge-building gesture towards the man seen then as a likely ‘king-maker’ in the contest for the presidency in

144 Driving and suffering the region? Jakarta. Fortunately for Singapore, by the time that Abdurrahman Wahid had become President of Indonesia in October 1999, his host at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies in Singapore, S.R. Nathan, had become President of the island-Republic, thus providing an important personal link between the two states. The management of relations with Indonesia has served to point up the importance as well as the fallibility of personal relationships, given the limited resources at Singapore’s disposal. Good personal relations between political leaders take time to cultivate and can serve to mitigate bilateral difficulties but are not likely to transform relationships, except where underlying interests are in harmony. For example, when Indonesia was hit by economic adversity from the latter part of 1997, Prime Minister Goh visited President Suharto in Jakarta on three occasions but failed to persuade him to act in a sufficiently resolute way in cooperation with the IMF so as to restore investor confidence. As he pointed out after the event: ‘We have a vested interest in Indonesia’s ... growth and stability.... We have more than S$4 billion of investments in Indonesia .... Our banks have another S$4 billion in loans to Indonesia.’ He also pointed out that ‘we are only three million people. Just a little red dot on the map. Where is the capacity to help 211 million people?’18 The term ‘red dot’ had been employed in a derisory way by interim-President Habibie to illustrate the vulnerability of the island-state. He had pointed out in a press interview: ‘Look at that map. All the green is Indonesia. And that red dot is Singapore.’19 Although Singapore and Indonesia were not confronted with unresolved bilateral issues, the island-state was not in any position on its own to make a real difference to Indonesia’s predicament. A pledge of US$5 billion towards an IMF rescue package plus the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s participation in joint intervention to support the Rupiah–Dollar exchange rate constituted a marginal contribution in the light of the scale of Indonesia’s economic difficulties. An attempt to introduce a trade guarantee scheme foundered because Jakarta quibbled at the safeguards required. Underlying an undoubted tension in the relationship was an Indonesian resentment that a dot of a country of Chinese businessmen and traders long regarded as parasitical on its neighbours and to which capital in-flight as well as wealthy businessmen and their families had repaired should be in a position to contribute to the economic rescue of the stricken and shamed archipelago. Moreover, Indonesia had suffered international embarrassment because of violent, including sexual, attacks, on its ethnic-Chinese citizens but resented the kind

Driving and suffering the region? 145 of attention given to such episodes in Singapore as well as the somewhat condescending advice coming from across the Singapore Strait on how Indonesia should restore stability and investor confidence. The problem for Singapore is one of relative helplessness in managing a relationship into which so many material and diplomatic resources had been poured. Singapore’s interest is self-evident given the scale, population and proximity of Indonesia. For Indonesia, however, Singapore has never enjoyed a corresponding importance, despite long-standing economic and even security cooperation. It could be treated when convenient, with some impunity, as a ‘whipping boy’ for domestic and even international political purposes, as President Habibie’s loose remarks to Taiwanese journalists confirmed. In Singapore, such comment has caused consternation without provoking an official reaction. Reaction was left to Malay members of Parliament, who raised the suspicion that President Habibie’s remarks were aimed at ‘undermining the stability of a multiracial Singapore’, an implied reference to the impact of the flow of ethnic-Chinese from Indonesia on the local property market.20 Although President Habibie’s remarks did not jeopardise working bilateral ties, they served to reinforce a sense of vulnerability in Singapore borne of helplessness in the particular circumstances of Indonesia. The fall of Suharto in a context of economic distress had been succeeded by a raucous political pluralism that exposed deepseated national divisions but also a shared animus towards ethnic-Chinese, which was partly a legacy of the Suharto era. Singapore’s concern had long been the prospect of that animus being extended destructively across the Singapore Strait, despite ties of partnership forged within ASEAN. The fact that President Habibie’s remarks came within a month of Singapore and Indonesia concluding a twenty-two-year agreement on the supply of natural gas was an indication of the way in which the bilateral relationship could become a hostage to the economic and political fortunes of the archipelago state with Singapore as a virtually helpless bystander. In the event, the unanticipated accession of Abdurrahman Wahid as President of Indonesia in October 1999 led to a tangible improvement in the climate of bilateral relations, especially as a competitive edge had been removed from Indonesian politics. Moreover, the new government in Jakarta set its priority on economic development, while the appointment of an ethnicChinese, Kwik Kian Gie, as Co-ordinating Minister for Economics, Finance and Industry, sent a positive signal across the Singapore Strait. Abdurrahman

146 Driving and suffering the region? Wahid paid a brief working visit to Singapore in November 1999, some two weeks after assuming office, during which he registered a new tone in the bilateral relationship. He even raised the prospect of Lee Kuan Yew joining an international advisory team on Indonesia. Despite the warm welcome given to Abdurrahman Wahid in Singapore, its leaders were conscious of his uncertain health and that he was the head of a politically diverse coalition government. In that respect, the pattern of politics in Jakarta retained the potential for radical transformation in the event of further succession. Singapore’s experience of dealing with Indonesia during the interim rule of President Habibie pointed to the way in which political change beyond the control of the island-state could menace its interests. In the case of Malaysia, an even more acute deterioration of relations occurred in the late 1990s, driven by economic circumstances and aggravated by corresponding factors to those that had brought relations to a low point over the controversial visit to Singapore by Israel’s President Chaim Herzog more than a decade previously. A minor tension had arisen before the onset of regional economic adversity in June 1996 after Lee Kuan Yew had raised the prospect of Singapore rejoining Malaysia while answering questions after an address to the local Foreign Correspondents’ Association. When other ministers returned to the theme and reiterated Lee Kuan Yew’s qualification that such a reunion could only occur when Malaysia became a multiracial society with meritocracy as its guiding principle, a public row ensued. At issue was resentment in Kuala Lumpur at a seemingly crude attempt to play on the fears of the majority ethnic-Chinese in advance of general elections in Singapore by disparaging Malaysia, if only by implication. The episode was yet another example for Singapore of the likely clash between domestic and external priorities.21 That passing tiff was succeeded by an episode of even stronger discord which was precipitated early in 1997 when Lee Kuan Yew sought to discredit the claim of a political opponent, Tang Liang Hong, that he had been obliged to flee from Singapore to Johor out of fear for his life. As indicated above, Lee had described Johor as ‘notorious for shootings, muggings and car-jackings’ in an attempt to dispute the credibility of his claim. Moreover, although he made an unreserved apology for his remarks, Singapore’s press was concurrently full of stories which appeared to corroborate Lee’s initial offensive comment. In accepting that apology, Malaysia’s Foreign Minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, said that restoring the previous level of relationship

Driving and suffering the region? 147 would take time. In the event, the relationship deteriorated further as matters fell beyond the control of Singapore’s Foreign Ministry when economic crisis in Malaysia coincided with an unsuccessful political challenge to Dr Mahathir by his deputy, Anwar Ibrahim. The problem in the relationship owed much to Malaysia’s change of circumstances relative to those of Singapore. Singapore had long been a reference point for Malaysia’s economic advance. During the 1980s and into the early 1990s, its progress had been so astounding that it had come to be contemplated as a serious rival to the island state. That relative position had been set back in the wake of an economic adversity that had hit Malaysia far harder than Singapore, while Singapore had showed itself to be more adept and resilient in coping with it so reviving an underlying resentment in Kuala Lumpur. It was in this context that a number of issues of great substance for Singapore came to interpose in an even more controversial way in the bilateral relationship. For Singapore, vulnerability and sovereignty were linked together inextricably to the extent that the ability to cope with the former served to demonstrate the reality of the latter. In the case of Malaysia, vulnerability was pointed up in a dependence on the supply of drinking water. Indeed, half of the island-state’s daily drinking water requirements came by pipeline from Johor under agreements which were not due to terminate until 2061. Nonetheless, the issue of water supply has been a matter of continuous sensitivity, especially as, whenever difficulties have arisen in the bilateral relationship, there have always been extreme voices in Malaysia calling for that supply to be cut off. It is for this reason that Singapore’s authorities have sought additional agreements on water supply beyond the terminal date of existing ones, as well as to explore alternative access with Indonesia. The net effect has been to point up the vulnerability of the island-state in a way which increases the sense of leverage of the government in Kuala Lumpur. Indeed, when Malaysia was struck by economic adversity, an abortive attempt was made by Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong to offer substantial economic assistance in return for a new water agreement. Indeed, so concerned was Goh at repairing the relationship that he met with Dr Mahathir on five separate occasions between January and April 1998. Among the issues outstanding between the two states have been jurisdiction over the island of Pedra Branca, the re-development of Malayan Railway land in Singapore, the timing of the withdrawal of pension funds by Malaysians who had worked in Singapore as well as financial cooperation,

148 Driving and suffering the region? including the CLOB shares, and water supply. For a time there was a prospect that Malaysia would enter into a new agreement on water supply in return for financial support from Singapore. In the event, an offer from Japan made Singapore’s gesture somewhat redundant. It is almost certain, however, that the very thought of being bailed out through the island-state’s patrimony had been galling in Kuala Lumpur. In February 1999, Malaysia’s Finance Minister, Daim Zainuddin, explained his government’s refusal of Singapore’s loan offer specifically because it was tied to the question of water supply, maintaining that Malaysia was not prepared to borrow on a non-commercial basis.22 The fact of the matter was that Malaysia’s government was not then strong enough in its domestic position to make a fresh commitment on water supply in return for Singapore’s patrimony. The issue of the dismissal and arrest of former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim in September 1998 did not impinge directly on relations with Singapore. Indeed, the government of Singapore had long viewed Anwar with deep suspicion because of his Islamic provenance and associations and has taken meticulous care not to be drawn into the affair, which became more sordid as Anwar was convicted on charges of corruption and then tried again on a charge of sodomy. However, as political rivalry between Dr Mahathir and Anwar intensified from the middle of 1998, ostensibly over economic policy, relations with Singapore worsened correspondingly and not coincidentally as old issues re-surfaced. From Malaysia’s perspective, Singapore represented a soft target against which to play the nationalist card. It is in the context both of Singapore’s registration of vulnerability over its access to water supply and the power struggle in Malaysia that the related issue of sovereignty became joined with some acrimony. For Singapore, sovereignty and its prerogatives have always been jealously guarded, especially against Malaysia. Although Malaysia had sponsored the Republic’s application to join the United Nations, its behaviour towards the island-state has given rise to the view in Singapore that in Kuala Lumpur the sovereignty of the island-state is deemed to be less than complete. Indeed, its conduct in such matters as the visit by Israel’s President Herzog in November 1986 provided reason to believe that respect for Singapore’s sovereignty was conditional on the kind of subservient deference to the government in Kuala Lumpur that has come to be expected from its federal state units. The issue of Singapore’s relationship with Israel arose again in July 1999 when Abdullah Fadzil, Malaysia Deputy Defence Minister, voiced his government’s

Driving and suffering the region? 149 misgiving about Singapore’s purchase of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles from the Jewish state. He made the point that the Republic should be more sensitive towards Malaysia’s feelings when it involved cooperation with Israel, while conspicuously omitting any reference to Singapore’s burgeoning defence cooperation with Sweden.23 The issue of sovereignty rose again from 1998 in a substantive sense over the location of Malaysia’s Customs, Immigration and Quarantine post at the terminal point in Singapore of the railway line from the Federation. Indeed, while the contentious episode was hardly a casus belli, it demonstrated how deeply embedded was the structural tension between the two states and, in Singapore’s case, how it touched sensitively on the subject of sovereignty. The rail service to and from Singapore is operated by Malayan Railway, which owns the 40-kilometre track-corridor and also 200 hectares of land around Tanjong Pagar station in the south of the island under a 999-year lease bequeathed by the British colonial power. For over thirty years, passengers to Malaysia would complete immigration and other formalities at Tanjong Pagar and then travel through Singapore before reaching Malaysian territory after the train had crossed the causeway linking the two states. A logical sequence was registered by passengers clearing Singapore immigration first before moving along the platform to clear Malaysian immigration. This convenient practice was not in strict accord with Malaysian law indicated by the stamp on passengers’ passports boarding at Tanjong Pagar. This stated that the Malaysian Immigration Control Post was at Johor Baru on the northern side of the causeway. Singapore’s government had informed its Malaysian counterpart in November 1989 of its intention to relocate its own Customs, Immigration and Quarantine facilities to the Woodlands Train Checkpoint in construction at the north of the island close to the causeway. This planned relocation did not challenge the status of Malayan Railway land. Singapore’s rationale for such a move was to address drugs smuggling and illegal immigration more effectively. In April 1992, Malaysia’s Prime Minister appeared to concede Singapore’s point, and even indicated that it would be more convenient for both countries to share the same checkpoint at Woodlands. In response, Singapore expressed a willingness to include facilities for Malaysia’s customs and immigration at Woodlands, even though this provision would continue an exceptional practice of locating such facilities on foreign soil. In September 1993, Malaysia communicated an official intention to locate their own

150 Driving and suffering the region? Customs, Immigration and Quarantine Post within Singapore’s post at Woodlands. In June 1997, however, Malaysia had a change of heart and indicated that it had decided to retain its facilities at Tanjong Pagar but without providing any reason in official communications. In return, in April 1998, Singapore informed Malaysia that their Customs and Immigration post could not remain in Tanjong Pagar once Singapore had removed its own facilities to Woodlands on 1 August that year. Moreover, Singapore also informed Malaysia that from that date, it should relocate its post to within its own territory, which is normal state practice, even though Malaysia had by then showed a softening of position over co-location at Woodlands. The issue of sovereignty arose in July 1998, when Malaysia claimed a legal right for their Customs, Immigration and Quarantine facilities to remain at Tanjong Pagar which Singapore rejected. Singapore did offer provision for interim arrangements for Malaysia, however, first at Tanjong Pagar, even though its own facilities would be at Woodlands, and subsequently on the platform at Woodlands before ultimate relocation to Johor Baru. Later in the month, Malaysia revised its position on the nature of interim arrangements at Woodlands and also insisted on retaining facilities at Tanjong Pagar if colocation within Singapore’s building at Woodlands was not on offer, which was the declared view of Prime Minister Dr Mahathir. Malaysia’s stand over their Customs, Immigration and Quarantine Post was less than consistent and not backed by written legal argument. Underlying that equivocation was almost certainly a concern that if their facilities were relocated to home soil, their financial bargaining position over any redevelopment of Malayan Railway land in downtown Singapore would be weakened. That concern obtained despite the fact that provision for such redevelopment had already been covered by an unpublished Points of Agreement (POA) with a 60–40 return in Malaysia’s favour signed in November 1990 between Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and Malaysia’s Finance Minister Daim Zainuddin. That Points of Agreement has remained unratified by the government in Kuala Lumpur. Whether or not there was any additional interest in Kuala Lumpur in effecting a derogation from Singapore’s sovereignty, it was certainly the official interpretation within Singapore. Foreign Minister Professor S. Jayakumar indicated as much in Parliament in January 1999 when he pointed out that Malaysia’s claim to a legal right to retain its facilities at Tanjong Pagar railway station had to be settled because it involved Singapore’s sovereignty.24

Driving and suffering the region? 151 At issue between the two states was a package of issues, but once Malaysia had asserted a legal right to retain its Customs, Immigration and Quarantine facilities at Tanjong Pagar, the matter of sovereignty was made a separate priority. Malaysia’s acknowledgement of the Republic’s undisputed sovereignty was made a condition tied to the resolution of other outstanding issues, such as Singapore’s use of Malaysian airspace, the repatriation of Central Provident Fund sums accumulated by Malaysians working in Singapore and a new agreement on water supply. Indeed, in September 1998, Malaysia had refused permission for Singapore’s airforce to use its air space without authorisation on a case-by-case basis. On the Malaysian side, there did not seem to be a full comprehension of the importance attached by Singapore to an acknowledgement of its sovereignty. For example, Foreign Minister Hamid Albar ruled out piecemeal negotiations over Tanjong Pagar and insisted that it should be settled as part of a package of issues: a view which attracted support from within the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO). The degree of misunderstanding between the two states was exemplified by an editorial in the Malay language Berita Harian published in Kuala Lumpur.25 That editorial claimed that Singapore had shown itself to be incapable of appreciating the views and sincerity of Malaysia in wanting to seek a solution through negotiation and not confrontation via the mass media. More significantly, it pointed out that the railway station in Singapore belonged to Malaysia and that Customs, Immigration and Quarantine checks, which had been operating there since the time of the British, were ‘just a procedure’. A meeting in Hanoi in December 1998 between Prime Minister Goh and Dr Mahathir during the ASEAN summit appeared to calm political passions, but not for long as interpretations were at odds over whether or not there had been an oral agreement that all controversial bilateral issues would be treated as a single package. Such an interpretation was repudiated by Singapore’s Foreign Minister, Professor S. Jayakumar, speaking in the Parliament in January 1999. He insisted that only after Malaysia had acknowledged the Republic’s undisputed sovereignty could other outstanding bilateral issues be tackled as a package. The matter hung fire without any Malaysian response to Singapore’s insistence that it should submit legal arguments to back its claim. At the end of the month, however, Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir, met privately at the World Economic Forum in Davos. After the event, Dr Mahathir, who described the

152 Driving and suffering the region? meeting as one between old friends, said that he was confident that the socalled problems between the two countries would be resolved to their mutual benefit. That meeting was indicative of the nature of foreign policy-making in both countries, and the extent to which Lee Kuan Yew was still regarded as the critical voice of authority within the island-state. Indeed, that is one reason why the first volume of his memoirs, published in September 1998, which dealt, in part, with the events leading up to separation, were received with such resentment in Kuala Lumpur, serving to aggravate the adverse condition of the relationship. From Singapore’s point of view, the issue of acknowledgement of sovereignty was paramount and was not resolved at the time by Dr Mahathir’s emollient words. It went to the heart of an innate vulnerability set in stark relief by the circumstances of separation and an underlying belief that Malaysia was not prepared to take Singapore’s concerns seriously. When UMNO International Bureau Secretary, Mustapha Yaakub, posed the question: ‘Is the CIQ issue so big that they are accusing us of not respecting Singapore’s sovereignty?’, he was exemplifying the cognitive gap between the two governments. Indeed, there was a belief that Malaysia was deliberately toying with the issue of Singapore’s sovereignty because of the domestic political resonance it generated in the Peninsula. In addition, a suspicion was aroused that Malaysia was being obdurate in order to secure a greater financial return from the redevelopment of the Malayan Railway land. One reason why Malaysia was indifferent to Singapore’s political sensibilities was that the island-state has long been regarded as an enclave of overseas-Chinese sharp practice. In the case of the facilities at Tanjong Pagar there was a concern on the part of Malaysia that, by insisting on respect for sovereignty, Singapore was positioning itself to undermine a legal title to land that was quite separate from that of sovereignty. Irrespective of the underlying motivation, the government of Singapore was presented with a foreign policy dilemma. Stable relations with a neighbour as close as Malaysia, with which economic and security interests were joined inextricably, were an imperative matter. The matter of enforcing sovereign rights could have been demonstrated by removing physically Malaysia’s Customs, Immigration and Quarantine officers from Singapore’s soil. But such an action would only raise political tempers, possibly to the dangerous point of a mobilisation of forces on both sides of the causeway. The alternative for Singapore was to suffer the minor symbolic derogation of Malaysian officers going through the motions of clearing passengers for

Driving and suffering the region? 153 immigration at Tanjong Pagar in an illogical sequence before they had been cleared by their Singaporean equivalents at Woodlands, while still insisting on an express acknowledgement of sovereignty. In the event, in February 1999, a letter from Malaysia’s Foreign Minister, Hamid Albar, to Professor Jayakumar met Singapore’s concerns over sovereignty and paved the way for renewed negotiations over a package of outstanding issues, including water supply.26 Hamid Albar paid his first official visit to Singapore in July 1999 after taking over his Foreign Ministry portfolio in the previous February. He and his Singaporean counterpart reaffirmed the importance of maintaining good relations. However, in answer to a journalist’s question as to whether both sides were finding a solution to their differences, after two rounds of meetings between senior officials, Hamid Albar responded: ‘Let me put it this way, we are not getting further.’27 The acrimonious episode had been a function, in part, of Malaysia’s domestic circumstances but did not bring either side to the point of direct confrontation. Within Singapore, however, it served to reconfirm a belief that the government in Malaysia could not be fully trusted to keep its word and honour explicit agreements, and that the relationship will always be a troubled one and never informed by genuine friendship. Such beliefs have served to sustain an acute sense of vulnerability which, it is judged, needs to be addressed from strength so as to avoid communicating signals that may be misunderstood.28 In turn, such a siege mentality breeds a countervailing mistrust from across the causeway which serves to sustain a caustic relationship, despite a number of important interests in common. In the case of Singapore, the episode served to justify an anticipated heavy investment in developing water desalination plants, with three planned to be in operation by 2001, in an attempt to reduce and even eliminate dependence on Malaysia for such a critical resource. Full circle In order to cope with its geopolitical predicament of location, Singapore has sought to cultivate regional ties beyond its immediate locale. Within ASEAN, it enjoys good working relations with Thailand, for example, and a special relationship with Brunei. But these ties do not provide countervailing influences of substance capable of controlling the effects of political turmoil

154 Driving and suffering the region? in either Indonesia and Malaysia which could impinge adversely on Singapore’s security. Moreover, the enlargement and much greater diversity of ASEAN following from the membership of Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia makes it decreasingly likely that an earlier homogeneity of political outlook can be sustained within the Association. Such an outlook, reflected in the management of a corporate consensus over Cambodia during the 1980s, made ASEAN of direct relevance to Singapore’s sense of security. With the decline in such a consensus, the utility of ASEAN for Singapore has diminished. For example, ASEAN demonstrated a diminished cohesion in response to the coup in Cambodia in July 1997, which caused a delay of some fifteen months in its entry to the Association. Singapore attracted only mixed support for its Foreign Minister’s view that ASEAN could not ignore or condone the use of force to change an established government because it could also pose a threat to regional stability.29 ASEAN has never been a political community based on common values but it has become even less of one with enlargement and, therefore, of diminishing utility to Singapore’s needs. Moreover, the different positions taken by Singapore, on the one hand, and Malaysia and post-Suharto Indonesia, on the other, over the controversial issue of Cambodia’s membership of the Association were symptomatic of that diminishing utility. All that Singapore’s Foreign Ministry was to attempt by way of remedial initiative, when it held the ASEAN chair during 1998/9, was to try to return the Association to a procedural consultative consistency that had gone astray with economic adversity and enlargement. It proved unable to inject a sense of focus and direction that was seen to be demonstrably lacking over the issue of East Timor during 1999. In the case of the ARF, although that security dialogue has fared relatively better than ASEAN in the tone of its multilateral deliberations, it also cannot provide Singapore with the buffering that it requires in the face of acrimonious rhetoric across both the Johor and the Singapore Straits. Of late, a conscious attempt has been made to cultivate better relations with Australia, which were less than warm during the first two decades of Singapore’s independence. A greater commitment to Asia on the part of both Liberal and Labour governments in Canberra, as well as burgeoning defence cooperation, has introduced genuine warmth into the relationship but, again, without serving any practical countervailing function except in the most extreme circumstances. Moreover, that relationship became a political

Driving and suffering the region? 155 embarrassment, for a time, in the light of the vocal criticism in both Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur of Australia’s leading military role in the UN-sanctioned multilateral force deployed to East Timor from September 1999. Most practical from Singapore’s point of view would be the assurance that, in the event of irrational conduct by less than strong governments in either Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur, Washington would send a clear diplomatic warning that Singapore should cease to be treated as a soft target. For that reason, it is likely that any contracts for water desalination plants will be awarded to American firms. In the absence or failure of such an initiative, the worst-case alternative would be for Singapore to move from deterrence to forward defence. Indeed, such a prospect has been identified with some perspicacity by one author who has pointed to ‘the impetus for (Singapore) developing military capabilities which go beyond providing merely for the deterrence of invasion, giving Singapore the capability to mount a pre-emptive invasion of southern peninsular Malaysia’.30 Such a policy would have its obvious security dilemma dangers should Malaysia purchase land-to-land missiles, putting the island-state at strategic risk and so obliging Singapore to contemplate a matching capability that could reach Kuala Lumpur. Such an option would not seem to obtain in any practical sense for Indonesia. Moreover, in the case of both Malaysia and Indonesia, rhetoric rather than malicious deeds would seem to have informed the climate of bilateral relations. Nonetheless, at the end of the twentieth century, the climate of relations within Singapore’s close locale had been returned, in some respects, to the dire circumstances attendant on the island-state’s independence from Malaysia.31 There is, of course, a fundamental difference between Singapore’s condition in August 1965 and that obtaining at the end of the century. Singapore has enjoyed exceptional economic development and has managed better than most in addressing acute regional economic adversity. Such development has enabled the island-state to cope with vulnerability in a way unanticipated at independence, especially in self-provision for defence. Moreover, its ability to profit from the positive impact of globalisation has given important governmental and non-governmental interests a stake in its continued existence as a thriving modern entrepôt. To that extent, foreign policy is partly a matter of ensuring that calm reason prevails over strong passions provoked by loose rhetoric in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur driven by their domestic circumstances.

156 Driving and suffering the region? Matters have come full circle for Singapore but with a difference. An initial experience of an acute vulnerability was succeeded by economic and then diplomatic accomplishments with most likely adversaries transformed into working regional partners. Indeed, with the end of the Cold War, Singapore was able to exploit its diplomatic experience and prowess to drive the region in the direction of unprecedented multilateral security dialogue. That postCold War cooperative interlude in South-East Asia was then succeeded by a dramatic reversal of economic fortunes with significant political effects. In Indonesia, economic turmoil paved the way for an incomplete transfer of power and political turbulence, bringing to a head a succession crisis already in train. Political succession to President Suharto took seventeen months to complete. In the contrasting case of Malaysia, economic turmoil prompted political leadership to resist political change so delaying a transfer of power in a succession dispute also already in train. In both cases, however, Singapore served as a soft target for political fall-out. The difference from 1965, of course, has been in the circumstances in which a more robust and resilient Singapore has been able to cope with a vulnerability, which has been mitigated as a consequence. The context and premises of foreign policy have not changed beyond recognition, however, but the ability to cope with vulnerability has much improved. Singapore has enjoyed practical success in its regional diplomatic role based, in important part, on its remarkable economic attainment of global note. Its multilateral initiatives have served to accommodate the interests of regional partners with its own strategic perspective. To that extent, balance of power has been pursued partly through political means; notably, in the promotion of the ASEAN Regional Forum as well as in more conventional form through giving military access to the USA. In such endeavours, Singapore has demonstrated that it enjoys a very different international standing to that inherited on independence. Singapore is very much about continuous innovation, which has been the key to its astounding success.32 That innovation has been unable to overcome critical enduring factors, exemplified by persistently troubled relationships with close neighbours. Singapore’s attempts to drive its region have been successful up to a point. They have not served to transform its security environment that displays a disconcerting continuity.

Conclusion Coping with vulnerability

The condition of Singapore at the beginning of the twenty-first century stands in marked contrast to that which obtained on the morrow of independence in 1965. A new state without a hinterland has succeeded in making a hinterland of the global economy with conspicuous success. Moreover, the way in which the regionally contagious economic adversity was addressed at the end of the last century demonstrated an underlying resilience based on a system of governance respected for its efficiency and probity. Singapore has superseded its past as a colonial entrepôt to give new and modern meaning to the concept of entrepôt in an age of globalisation. An underlying continuity of geopolitical circumstance and outlook has gone hand in hand with that change, however. It is notable, for example, that the economic adversity, which required popular belt-tightening at the end of the 1990s, was not permitted to become a constraint on defence expenditure based on a constant percentage of gross national product. While a necessary austerity obliged regional neighbours to neglect their defence establishments, Singapore sustained a programme of arms procurements, including the purchase of four submarines from Sweden, and defence training. Minister of Defence, Dr Tony Tan, remarked in March 1998 that Singapore had to continue its long-term investment in defence, even during regional economic turmoil, if it wanted to avoid paying the price of being caught unprepared. That indication of priorities pointed to a basic continuity in governmental perceptions of Singapore’s strategic circumstances. In crudest geopolitical terms, those circumstances of size and location have not changed for a minuscule island without any defence in depth. Moreover, towards the end of the 1990s, relations with its most immediate neighbours were returned to a problematic state because of domestic circumstances in both Indonesia and Malaysia, which were well

158 Conclusion beyond Singapore’s influence. The management of relations with those neighbours has been a perpetual core consideration of Singapore’s foreign policy. For a quarter of a century, relations with Indonesia were conducted on a relatively stable basis because of an understanding reached between former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and former President Suharto. President Suharto’s effective depoliticisation of his country meant that an underlying suspicion and resentment of Singapore in Jakarta was rarely translated into open bilateral tensions. With his political downfall in May 1998, the condition of bilateral relations became vulnerable to Indonesia’s new-found competitive politics, while interim-President Habibie made no secret of his personal grudge against Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew for publicly casting doubt on his credentials for vice-presidential office. Fortunately for Singapore, at least in the short run, Dr Habibie failed in his bid to retain the presidency. His successor, Abdurrahman Wahid, has acknowledged Singapore’s potential role in his country’s economic recovery and has held out the hand of friendship. As long as he remains the President of Indonesia, Singapore can expect a similar quality of relationship to that which obtained under former President Suharto. In the case of Malaysia, a structural tension in bilateral relations has been the normal condition but has been aggravated either when it has suited Prime Minister Dr Mahathir for domestic political purposes, or when statements emanating from Singapore or issues between the two governments have entered the domestic domain. That underlying circumstance is not expected to change with a change in Malaysia’s leadership. The country’s domestic domain is set in its mind against Singapore, as demonstrated when Singapore’s national team was booed at the Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur in September 1997. That said, neither Indonesian or Malaysia have been in a position to threaten Singapore in military terms either because of limits to capability or because of the likely damage to self-interest that would occur. That judgement assumes, of course, that rational calculations prevail in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur. Such rationality is not taken for granted in Singapore, which helps to explain Dr Tan’s remarks cited above. Singapore’s leaders display a notable ambivalence as they seek to build viable relationships with close neighbours whose unpredictable politics require that the island-state never lowers its guard. Indonesia’s more recent tribulations, in particular, have extended beyond the bilateral relationship with Singapore to touch on the viability and utility

Conclusion 159 of ASEAN, once regarded as a valuable forum for mediating and mitigating regional tensions. Under the stable authoritarian rule of President Suharto, Indonesia provided a locus of leadership for ASEAN, albeit exercised in a low-key and acceptable way. With acute economic adversity and political turbulence, Indonesia’s capacity for regional leadership was diminished and so, correspondingly, was the international standing of ASEAN. ASEAN has been much affected also by the aggregation of the adverse economic circumstances of its key states and by the problems of managing consensus attendant on its enlargement of membership to coincide with geographic South-East Asia. In consequence, a framework of multilateral dialogue set up to serve the cause of managing regional tensions and which evolved into a diplomatic community has been weakened considerably, to Singapore’s disadvantage. Singapore’s government has not been addicted to multilateralism in foreign policy for its own sake. It has promoted its prime interests through bilateral arrangements in defence and economic cooperation. Nonetheless, ASEAN has been very much at the centre of its foreign policy practice, permitting a collective diplomacy which has served the interests of the Republic well. ASEAN demonstrated its utility over the Cambodian conflict, albeit in exceptional circumstances, and served as a vehicle for successful initiatives leading to the ARF and to ASEM, for example. Through ASEAN, Singapore sought to embed itself regionally as a political partner of governments that exhibited mixed feelings towards it. That facility for political solidarity has been weakened through the institutional failings of an enlarged Association and its lack of a common focus post-Cambodia, without any substantive compensation for Singapore, so far, from the advent of the ASEAN Regional Forum. The ARF has not progressed beyond a minimal confidence-building role, although it still serves Singapore’s interests through providing an institutional locus for dialogue among the major Asia-Pacific powers, especially the USA and China. Set against the failings of ASEAN and the limitations of the ARF, Singapore’s policy-makers can take some comfort from the absence of acute conflicts within South-East Asia since the end of the Cold War. There is, of course, the exception of the potential inherent in that over the islands in the South China Sea, where it is not a claimant state. Moreover, as long as sources of energy in commercial quantities are not discovered beneath the sea-bed, the contention over the Spratly Islands, in particular, should not get out of hand. In addition, although within a wider East Asia, the issues of Taiwan and the

160 Conclusion Korean Peninsula continue to display a potential for armed confrontation, the strategic environment has remained relatively stable, in part, because of the degree of Sino-American accommodation. In Singapore, it is believed that China would not have had the temerity to seize Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands had the USA not withdrawn previously from its military bases in the Philippines. Correspondingly, the display of resolve by the Clinton administration in March 1996 in deploying two carrier groups to the vicinity of Taiwan in response to China’s attempt to influence the outcome of presidential elections through armed intimidation was quietly welcomed as a demonstration of the viability of a regional balance of power predicated on an American military presence. Singapore has contributed to that balance, or, more accurately, distribution of power by providing facilities for America’s airforce and navy. And, in the case of China, a policy of engagement has been advocated as the most practical way of giving the People’s Republic a stake in regional stability. It is well understood in Singapore that the island-state is primarily a spectator to the evolving pattern of power in the Asia-Pacific, which is why the American military connection is highly valued. The more local distribution of power has been served up to a point by the Five Power Defence Arrangements in collaboration with Malaysia, Britain, Australia and New Zealand. These arrangements have suffered from ups and downs in the relationship across the causeway, but have been sustained by the growing interest of Australia in playing a role, in the interest of regional stability. They are valued in Singapore because of the Australian connection in particular, and because of the additional indirect link to the USA with which Australia is in an alliance relationship. They also provide a channel of communication between Singaporean and Malaysian defence counterparts. The Five Power Defence Arrangements do not provide a security guarantee for Singapore. They are regarded as a vehicle for confidence-building of a limited kind, and also as a barometer of the state of relations with Malaysia, with which Singapore has experienced the most turbulent exchanges. For example, Five Power joint exercises were called off in September 1998, when Malaysia withdrew at short notice citing economic difficulties, but were then resumed in April 1999. They are valued most of all, however, because they continue to draw in countries in addition to Malaysia with which Singapore has enjoyed long-standing good relationships. With the devastating impact of regional economic adversity at the end of the twentieth century, Singapore’s scope for initiative within collective diplomatic frameworks involving its regional partners has been considerably

Conclusion 161 reduced, although Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong has promoted the idea of an Asia-Latin American forum to match ASEM. In the case of ASEAN, expectations have been downgraded to await a possible restoration of regional economic vibrancy. In that context, Singapore’s main initiative at the turn of the new millennium has been in the realm of foreign economic policy where government-directed initiatives towards liberalisation in banking and financial services have been intended to improve the international competitive economic edge of the Republic. At issue is the judgement that it is necessary to prepare for an anticipated regional return to economic crisis by tapping the potential of global markets. In addition, Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has set its sights, for the first time, on a non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council in the year 2001. Beyond such minimal initiative, Singapore displays continuity in the influence on foreign policy of Senior Minister, Lee Yuan Yew. His political perspective, including the conviction that Singapore cannot take its independence for granted and that continual adaptation is required for survival, is part of the conventional wisdom of the successor generation of political leaders. As noted above, Lee Kuan Yew has combined a razor-sharp intellect and a remarkable experience with a disposition for speaking his mind on political matters which has not always helped in managing relations with Singapore’s closest neighbours, Malaysia and Indonesia. Indeed, some of his obiter dicta have served to point up the persisting vulnerability of the Republic through the hostile reactions of those governments. Vulnerability is not necessarily the same as insecurity, however. Singapore conducts its foreign policy on the basis of an underlying vulnerability but the island-state does not enter the twenty-first century in a condition of insecurity because of its considerable economic strengths. Those strengths enable a corresponding defence capability, which fulfils a deterrent function. Nonetheless, the goals of foreign policy remain governed by the same concerns that were evident at independence; namely, that size and location should not add up to destiny and that every effort should be made to keep the fortunes of the Republic out of the play of solely regional forces that cannot be fully trusted. In that respect, although Singapore’s foreign policy has not come full circle completely in its environmental circumstances, the bases of its practice have remained remarkably constant. That practice has been predicated on the premises of the balance of power, albeit without conceiving of its application in a crudely mechanical way. In addition to securing access to the countervailing military strength of the USA and developing its own

162 Conclusion deterrent capability, Singapore has participated in multilateral security dialogue and multilateral economic cooperation. It has done so as a way of engaging the interest of extra-regional states in its environment and in its continued independence. Balance of power has also been expressed in adaptive Social Darwinist terms in the need to attract foreign talent as a way of remaining globally competitive and exceptional. Lee Kuan Yew pointed out in August 1999 in respect of such potential skilled migrants: ‘If we don’t welcome them, make them stay, we will be out of the race because conditions have changed .... So if we just stay in our little pond, we will perish.’ In one obvious sense, Singapore has no alternative but to stay in its little pond. That has been its geopolitical fate ever since August 1965 and is the source of its abiding vulnerability. It is also the source of an extraordinary political morbidity about addressing the viability of the island-state. In seeking to cope with an innate vulnerability, there are no illusions about the task involved, despite an innovative culture that has been responsible for an extraordinary achievement. Indeed, Singapore copes with vulnerability by trying to be extraordinary in the way in which its achievements are projected and perceived well beyond its little pond. In the process, nothing is taken for granted and nothing is guaranteed. Lee Kuan Yew gave voice to the sombre philosophy underlying foreign policy in a statement of October 1981, which still applies. He pointed out then that: ‘In an imperfect world, we have to search for the best accommodation possible. And no accommodation is permanent. If it lasts long enough for progress to be made until the next set of arrangements can be put in place, let us be grateful for it.’ This epigraphic statement encapsulates the essence of Singapore’s practice of foreign policy.

Notes

Introduction 1 See The Straits Times, 6 May 1999. 2 For Singapore’s current defence capability, see The Military Balance 1999–2000, Oxford: Oxford University Press for the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, 1999, pp. 203–4. 3 Lee Kuan Yew, ‘We Want to be Ourselves’, speech delivered at a seminar on international relations at the University of Singapore, Ministry of Culture, Singapore, 9 October 1966. 4 Biographical portraits of Goh, Rajaratnam and Toh may be found in Lam Peng Er and Kevin Tan (eds) Lee’s Lieutenants: Singapore’s Old Guard, St Leonards, New South Wales: Allen and Unwin, 1999. 5 Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore: Times Editions, 1998, p. 8. 6 Lee Kuan Yew to senior civil servants, 30 September 1965, reproduced in Mark Hong (ed.) MFA Reader, vol. 1, Singapore: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, August 1988. 1 Singapore: the foreign policy of an exceptional state 1 International Herald Tribune, 14 July 1999. 2 Linda Y.C. Lim, ‘The Foreign Policy of Singapore’, in David Wurfel and Bruce Burton (eds) The Political Economy of Foreign Policy in Southeast Asia, London: Macmillan, 1991, p. 130. 3 The utility of ‘small’ as a criterion for analysing Singapore’s foreign policy has been addressed by Alan Chong in ‘Analysing Singapore’s Foreign Policy in the 1990s and Beyond: Limitations of the Small State Approach’, Asian Journal of Political Science, 6(1), 1998. 4 W.G. Huff, The Economic Growth of Singapore, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994, p. 1.

164 Notes 5 For an account of Singapore’s economic transformation, see Philippe Regnier, Singapore: City-State in South-East Asia, London: Hurst, 1987. 6 Lee Kuan Yew, ‘Survival through Remaining Relevant’, Speeches 96: A Bimonthly Selection of Ministerial Speeches (Jan.–Feb.), 20(1), Singapore: Ministry of Information and the Arts, 1996, p. 14. 7 Quoted in Koh Tai Ann, ‘The Singapore Experience. Cultural Development in the Global Village’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1980, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1980, p. 302. 8 Ho Wing Meng, ‘Singapore and the Concept of a Global City’, in Wee Teong Boo (ed.) The Future of Singapore – The Global City, Singapore: University Educational Press, 1976, pp. 108–9. 9 Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore: Times Editions, 1998, p. 14. 10 Chan Heng Chee, Singapore: The Politics of Survival 1965–1967, Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1970, registers well that predicament and watchword. 11 See Tim Huxley, ‘Singapore and Malaysia: A Precarious Balance’, The Pacific Review, 4(3), 1991. 12 Professor S. Jayakumar, ‘Keeping Sight of the Basics in our Foreign Policy’, Speeches 97: A Bimonthly Selection of Ministerial Speeches (July– Aug.), Singapore: Ministry of Information and the Arts, 1997, p. 50. 13 See Tim Huxley and David Boey, ‘Singapore’s Army-boosting Capabilities’, Jane’s Intelligence Review, April 1996, and also former Defence Minister, Yeo Ning Hong, ‘Air Power – A Singapore Geopolitical Perspective’, in Newspoint, Ministry of Defence, Singapore, April 1994. 14 The Straits Times, 13 August 1999. 15 The Straits Times, 16 January 1998. 16 For a discussion of that model in Singaporean context, see Beng-Huat Chua, Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore, London and New York: Routledge, 1995. 17 The Straits Times, 29 November 1996. 18 See Alan Dupont, The Environment and Security in Pacific Asia, Adelphi Papers no. 319, London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1998, pp. 67–9. 19 The Straits Times, 5 February 1997. 20 See Murray Hiebert, ‘Chasing the Lion’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 27 February 1997. 21 The Straits Times, 2 May 1997. 22 See the observations by Ambassador Lee Khoon Choy, Diplomacy of a Tiny State, Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co., 1993, p. 13. 23 Less than flattering biographies which touch on Lee Kuan Yew’s foreign policy role are: T.S.G. George, Lee Kuan Yew’s Singapore, Singapore: Eastern Universities Press, 1984 and James Minchin, No Man is an Island, Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1986. 24 The Straits Times, 4 March 1996. 25 The Straits Times, 19 September 1999.

Notes 165 26 See Chan Heng Chee, ‘Singapore’s Foreign Policy 1965–1968’, Journal of Southeast Asian History, 10(1), March 1968, pp. 188–9. 27 The theme of a multilateral underpinning for Singapore from the very outset has been well identified and expounded in Kawin Wilairat, Singapore’s Foreign Policy, Field Report no. 10, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1975, which examines the first ten years of foreign policy experience. See also Bilveer Singh, Singapore: Foreign Policy Imperatives of a Small State, Singapore: Heinemann Asia, 1988, and Dick Wilson, The Future of Singapore, London: Oxford University Press, 1972. 28 Singapore Legislative Assembly Debates, 2(20), 5 March 1957, p. 1471. 29 Note the arguments rehearsed in Raj Vasil, Asianising Singapore, Singapore: Heinemann Asia, 1995, Chapter 2. 30 See Peter Boyce, ‘Policy without Authority: Singapore’s External Affairs Power’, Journal of Southeast Asian History 6(2), September 1965. 31 A balanced account of separation close to the event is Nancy Fletcher, The Separation of Singapore from Malaysia, Data Paper no.73, South-east Asia Program, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, July 1969. 32 See James Minchin, No Man is an Island, op. cit. p. 144 and Alex Josey, Lee Kuan Yew: The Crucial Years, Singapore: Times Books International, 1980, p. 285, for confirmation of the role of Dr Goh and, more recently, Kwok Kian-Woon, ‘The Social Architect: Goh Keng Swee’, in Lam Peng Er and Kevin Y.L. Tan (eds) Lee’s Lieutenants: Singapore’s Old Guard, St Leonards, New South Wales: Allen and Unwin, 1999, pp. 55–8. 33 See interview with Dr Goh Keng Swee (Finance Minister at the time of separation) in Melanie Chew, Leaders of Singapore, Singapore: Resource Press, 1996, pp. 132– 3 and p. 147. 34 See Dennis Bloodworth, Chinese Looking Glass, London: Secker and Warburg, 1967, p. 257. 35 For a vignette of Rajaratnam as ‘the world’s first instant Foreign Minister’, see Dennis Bloodworth, An Eye for the Dragon, Singapore: Times Books International, 1987, pp. 102–3. 36 See Hafiz Mirza, Multinationals and the Growth of the Singapore Economy, London and Sydney: Croom Helm, 1986. Former Deputy Prime Minister Goh Keng Swee has explained how Singapore began to industrialise virtually from scratch initially through attracting overseas arms of a burgeoning electronics industry based mainly in the USA as well as oil companies attracted by exploration prospects in a politically stable Indonesia (fourth Dr K.T. Li Lecture, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 13 October 1993). 37 Lee Kuan Yew, We Want to be Ourselves, Singapore: Ministry of Culture, 1966, p. 9. 38 Parliamentary Debates, Singapore, 8 December 1965, vol. 24, cols 5–14. 39 This speech has been reprinted in Chan Heng Chee and Obaid ul Haq (eds) S. Rajaratnam: The Prophetic and the Political, Singapore: Graham Brash and New York: St Martin’s Press, 1987, pp. 223–31. 40 Goh Chok Tong, ‘Global City, Best Home’, Prime Minister’s National Day Rally Speech, 1997, Singapore: Ministry of Information and the Arts, p. 28.

166 Notes 41 The Straits Times, 16 October 1997. 42 Deputy Prime Minister Tony Tan quoted in The International Herald Tribune, 15 February 1999. 43 See Chan Heng Chee, Singapore: The Politics of Survival, op. cit., p. 11. 44 In a speech delivered in Bangkok in June 1976, reprinted in Chan and Obaid (eds) S. Rajaratnam: The Prophetic and the Political, op. cit., p. 294. 45 See Wilairat, Singapore's Foreign Policy, op. cit., pp. 53–4. 2 The battle for sovereignty 1 Lee Kuan Yew, The Battle for Merger, Singapore: Government Printing Office, 1961. 2 The sympathetic disposition of the Labour administration in Britain has been indicated in Harold Wilson, The Labour Government 1964–70, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1974, pp. 176–7. 3 Lee Kuan Yew, New Bearings in Our Education System, Singapore: Ministry of Culture, 29 August 1966, p. 9. 4 Chan Heng Chee and Obaid ul Haq (eds) S. Rajaratnam: The Prophetic and the Political, Singapore: Graham Brash and New York: St Martin’s Press, 1987, p. 283. 5 Ibid. p. 281. 6 Ibid. p. 286. 7 Ibid. pp. 289–90. 8 See Lau Teik Soon, ‘Malaysia–Singapore Relations: Crisis of Adjustment 1965– 1968’, Journal of Southeast Asian History, 10(1), March 1969. 9 Peter Boyce, ‘Singapore as a Sovereign State’, Australian Outlook, 19(3), December 1965. 10 Hafiz Mizra, Multinationals and the Growth of the Singapore Economy, London and Sydney: Croom Helm, 1986, p. 36. 11 A measure of verification of that view is to be found in an interview with Goh Chok Tong in Raj Vasil, Governing Singapore, Singapore: Mandarin, 1992, pp. 294–7. 12 See Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore: Times Editions, 1998. 13 See Ang Hwee Suan (ed.) Dialogues with S. Rajaratnam, Singapore: Shin Min Daily News (Singapore) Ltd, 1991, p. 211. 14 Chin Kin Wah, The Defence of Malaysia and Singapore, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983, p. 104. 15 In his memoirs, Lee Kuan Yew has recorded that Ghazalie Shafie, a future Foreign Minister and Permanent Secretary of Malaysia’s Foreign Ministry at the time of separation, had prophesied that ‘after a few years out on a limb, Singapore would be in severe straits and would come crawling back, this time on Malaysia’s terms’. Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore Story, op. cit., p. 663. 16 See Michael Leifer, ‘Communal Violence in Singapore’, Asian Survey, October 1964. 17 The Times, 22 February 1966.

Notes 167 18 See Chan Heng Chee, Singapore: The Politics of Survival 1965–1967, Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1970. 19 Note the comment by former Deputy Prime Minister Toh Chin Chye in Melanie Chew, Leaders of Singapore, Singapore: Resource Press, 1996, p. 98. 20 See Chan Heng Chee, Singapore: The Politics of Survival, op. cit., p. 33. 21 The Observer, 15 August 1965. 22 Goh Kian Chee, ‘Regional Perspectives for Singapore’, quoted in Kawin Wilairat, Singapore’s Foreign Policy, Field Report no. 10, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1975, p. 97. 23 Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story, op. cit., p. 663. 24 See Dick Wilson, The Future of Singapore, London: Oxford University Press, 1972, p. 58. 25 See Peter Boyce, ‘Singapore as a Sovereign Power’, Australian Outlook, 19(3), December 1965. 26 Chan Heng Chee, ‘Singapore’s Foreign Policy 1965–1968’, Journal of Southeast Asian History, 10(1), March 1968, p. 182. 27 Ibid. p. 183. 28 For a scholarly account of the advent and evolution of the Five Power Defence Arrangements, see Chin Kin Wah, The Defence of Malaysia and Singapore, op. cit., and ‘The Five Power Defence Arrangements: Twenty Years After’, The Pacific Review, 4(3), 1991. 29 Lee Knan Yew, ‘Socialism – The Realities of Life’, Speech to Council Meeting of the Socialist International, Zurich, Singapore: Ministry of Culture, 1967, p. 3. 30 Tommy Koh, The Quest for World Order (ed. by Amitav Acharya), Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1998, p. 5. 3 Accommodating and transcending regional locale 1 See Chan Heng Chee, Singapore: The Politics of Survival, Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1970, p. 36. 2 For an account of how Singapore opened up to multinational enterprise, see Hafiz Mirza, Multinationals and the Growth of the Singapore Economy, London and Sydney: Croom Helm, 1986. 3 Ibid. p. 41. 4 See Dick Wilson, The Future of Singapore, London: Oxford University Press, 1972, p. 37. 5 The Straits Times, 8 December 1976. 6 See S. Jayakumar, ‘Singapore at the United Nations: Some Aspects’, in Charles Ngo and T.B.B. Menon (eds) Singapore – A Decade of Independence, Singapore: Alumni International, 1975, p. 122. 7 For a discussion of the initial diplomacy over the regime of passage in the joined straits, see Michael Leifer, Malacca, Singapore and Indonesia: International Straits of the World, vol. 2, Alphen aan den Rijn: Sijthoff and Noordhoff, 1978. 8 See Lee Khoon Choy, Indonesia: Between Myth and Reality, London: Nile and Mackenzie, 1977.

168 Notes 9 For an account of this episode, see Dennis Bloodworth, An Eye for the Dragon, Singapore: Times Books International, 1987, pp. 252–3. 10 For an account of the planning of that visit and its background, see Lee Khoon Choy, Diplomacy of a Tiny State, Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co., 1993. 11 The Straits Times, 28 May 1973. 12 The Mirror, Singapore, 29 December 1969. 13 The Mirror, Singapore, 24 April 1972. 14 Tommy Koh, ‘Size is not Destiny’, in Arun Mahizhnan and Lee Tsao Yuan (eds) Singapore: Re-Engineering Success, Singapore: Oxford University Press for the Institute of Policy Studies, 1998, Chapter 18. 15 See Chan Heng Chee and Obaid ul Haq (eds) S. Rajaratnam: The Prophetic and the Political, Singapore: Graham Brash and New York: St Martin’s Press, 1987, p. 227. 16 Ibid. p. 230. 17 Quoted in Lee Khoon Choy, ‘Foreign Policy’, in C.V. Devan Nair (ed.) Socialism that Works – The Singapore Way, Singapore: Federal Publications, 1976, p. 110. 18 See, for example, Jean-Louis Margolin, ‘Singapore: New Regional Influence, New World Outlook’, Contemporary Southeast Asia, 20(3), December 1998. 19 Lim Joo Jock, ‘Singapore: Bold Internal Decisions, Emphatic External Outlook’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1980, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1980, p. 285. 20 See From Phnom Penh to Kabul, Singapore: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1980. 21 A discussion of both Singapore’s and ASEAN’s position may be found in Michael Leifer, ‘The International Representation of Kampuchea’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1982, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1982. 22 See Timothy Ong Teck Mong, ‘Modern Brunei – Some Important Issues’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1983, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1983, p. 82. 23 See R.S. Milne, ‘Singapore’s Growth Triangle’, The Round Table, 327, 1993. 24 See R. Haller-Trost, ‘Historical Legal Claims: A Study of Disputed Sovereignty over Pulau Batu Puteh (Pedra Branca)’, Maritime Briefing 1(1), International Boundaries Research Unit, University of Durham, Durham, 1993. 25 For an account of the controversy stirred by that visit, see Michael Leifer, ‘Israel’s President in Singapore: Political Catalysis and Transnational Politics’, The Pacific Review, 1(4), 1988. 26 The Guardian, London, 11 September 1962. 27 Letter by Sinnathamby Rajaratnam, Senior Minister and former Foreign Minister, in The Straits Times, 17 December 1986. 28 Ibid. 29 In an address at the National University of Singapore on 12 December 1986 reproduced in The Straits Times, 15 December 1986. 30 Lee Kuan Yew, op. cit. 31 The Straits Times, 23 February 1987. 32 The Straits Times, 31 March 1987. 33 See Michael Leifer, The Peace Dividend: Israel’s Changing Relationship with South-East Asia, London: Institute of Jewish Affairs, 1994. 34 Singapore Bulletin, Singapore: Ministry of Information, January 1988.

Notes 169 35 Garry Rodan, ‘Singapore: Continuity in Change as the New Guard’s Agenda Becomes Clear’, in Southeast Asian Affairs, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1990, pp. 311–12. 4 Singapore and the powers 1 See The Straits Times, 6 November 1984. 2 For an authoritative American statement of the security relationship with Singapore, see The United States Security Strategy for the East Asia-Pacific Region, Washington, DC: Department of Defense, November 1998, p. 40. 3 Speech given at the National University of Singapore, 27 November 1981, in Issues Facing Singapore in the 1980s: Talks by Ministers at the National University of Singapore, 1981–2, Singapore: Ministry of Culture. 4 See Tommy Koh, The Quest for World Order (ed. by Amitav Acharya), Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1998, p. 189. 5 International Herald Tribune, 19 July 1993. 6 For an account of that expulsion from the point of view of the lawyer in question, now in political exile, see Francis T. Seow, To Catch a Tartar: A Dissident in Lee Kuan Yew’s Prison, New Haven, CT: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies, 1994. 7 For a Singaporean account of the episode, see Asad Latif, The Flogging of Singapore: The Michael Fay Affair, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur: Times Books International, 1994. 8 See ‘The Smoke over Parts of Asia Obscures Some Profound Concerns’, International Herald Tribune, 7 October 1994. Lingle’s account of that episode and its sequel may be found in Christopher Lingle, Singapore’s Authoritarian Capitalism, Barcelona: Edicions Sirocco, S.L., and Fairfax, VA: The Locke Institute, 1996. 9 Kishore Mahbubani, Can Asians Think?, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur: Times Books International, 1998. See also Bilahari Kausikan, ‘Governance that Works’, Journal of Democracy, 8(2), April 1997. 10 Speech by Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew at the International Institute for Strategic Studies Conference, Shangri-La Hotel, Singapore, 12 September 1997, reported in The Straits Times, 13 September 1997. 11 In writing this section, I have benefited, in particular, from reading Yuen Foong Khong, ‘Singapore: A Time for Economic and Political Engagement’, in Alastair Iain Johnson and Robert S. Ross (eds) Engaging China: The Management of an Emerging Power, London and New York: Routledge, 1999, Chapter 5. 12 An excellent survey of the experiences of the so-called overseas Chinese is to be found in Lynn Pan, Sons of the Yellow Emperor, London: Martin Secker and Warburg, 1990. See also Victor Purcell, The Chinese in Southeast Asia, London: Oxford University Press, 1965 and Wang Gungwu, Community and Nation: Essays on Southeast Asia and the Chinese, Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong: Heinemann Educational Books (Asia) Ltd, 1981. 13 See Dennis Bloodworth, The Tiger and the Trojan Horse, Singapore: Times Books International, 1986.

170 Notes 14 C.P. Fitzgerald, The Third China: The Chinese Communities in Southeast Asia, Melbourne: Angus and Robertson, 1965. 15 See David Marshall, Letters from Mao’s China, Singapore: Singapore Heritage Society, 1996. 16 Lee Kuan Yew, ‘How the US Should Engage Asia in the Post-Cold War Period’, acceptance speech on being given the Architect of the New Century Award by the Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom in November 1999, reprinted in The Straits Times, 13 November 1996. 17 For a personal account of that visit, see Ang Hwee Suan (ed.) Dialogues with S. Rajaratnam, Singapore: Shin Min Daily News (Singapore) Ltd, 1991, pp. 106–17. See also The Straits Times, 18 March 1975. 18 See Yuen Foong Khong, ‘Singapore: A Time for Economic and Political Engagement’, in Johnson and Ross (eds) Engaging China, op. cit. 19 See Speeches: A Collection of Ministerial Speeches, Singapore: Ministry of Information, vol. 2, no. 6, December 1978. 20 Singapore’s relationship with China during the mid-1980s is addressed in Chin Kin Wah, ‘A New Phase in Singapore’s Relationship with China’, in Joyce K. Kallgren et al. (eds) ASEAN and China: An Evolving Relationship, Berkeley: University of California, Institute of East Asian Studies, 1988. 21 Quoted in ibid. p. 277. 22 See Raj Vasil, Asianising Singapore, Singapore: Heinemann Asia, 1995, pp. 133–4. 23 The Straits Times, 4 March 1996. 24 The Straits Times, 10 June 1999. 25 In a speech at the National University of Singapore on 11 November 1981, reprinted in Mark Hong (ed.) Essential Singapore Speeches, Singapore: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1994. 26 For an assessment of Soviet policy in Singapore’s region in the period leading up to disintegration, see Leszek Buszynski, Gorbachev and Southeast Asia, London and New York: Routledge, 1992. 27 An account of early Soviet–Singapore relations may be found in Charles B. McLane, Soviet–Asian Relations, London: Central Asian Research Centre, 1973. 28 See Suppiah Dhanabalan, The Straits Times, 12 January 1980. 29 See Bilveer Singh, The Soviet Union in Singapore’s Foreign Policy, Singapore: Institute for Strategic and International Studies, 1990, pp. 8–9. 30 A personal bitterness towards the Japanese is not concealed by Lee Kuan Yew in his memoirs in which he points to their persistent refusal to acknowledge their brutal conduct towards civilians during the Pacific War. He remarks that: ‘When they refuse to admit them to their neighbours, people cannot but fear that it is possible for them to repeat those horrors.’ Lee Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore: Times Editions, 1998, p. 83. 31 See Lee Lai To, ‘South and East Asia’, in Peter S. Chen (ed.) Singapore: Development Policies and Trends, Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1983, pp. 340–1. 32 The Straits Times, 12 May 1973. 33 Business Times, 23 October 1979.

Notes 171 34 For background discussion, see Hanns Maull, Gerald Segat and Jusuf Wanandi (eds) Europe and the Asia Pacific, London and New York: Routledge, 1998. 5 Driving and suffering the region? 1 Quoted in Lim Joo Jock, ‘Singapore in 1980: Management of Foreign Relations and Industrial Progress’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1981, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1981, p. 280. 2 Singapore Parliamentary Reports, vol. 57, col. 791. 3 The Straits Times, 20 November 1994. 4‘Singapore Declaration of 1992’, ASEAN Heads of Government Meeting, Singapore, 27–8 January 1992. 5 Chairman’s Statement, ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conferences, Senior Officials Meeting, Singapore, 20–1 May 1993, p. 2. 6 See Michael Leifer, The ASEAN Regional Forum: Extending ASEAN’s Model of Regional Security, Adelphi Papers no. 302, London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1996. 7 The Straits Times, 12 March 1993. 8 Commission of the European Communities, ‘Towards a New Asia Strategy’, Brussels, 13 July 1994. 9 That is the title of a chapter by Ambassador-At-Large Tommy Koh in a volume which has sought to celebrate Singapore’s ability to re-engineer (sic) its success at the turn of the century; see Arun Mahizhnan and Lee Tsao Yuan (eds) Singapore: Re-Engineering Success, Singapore: The Institute of Policy Studies, 1998, Chapter 18. 10 Ibid. p. 178. 11 See Wong Pah Kam and Ng Chee Yuen, ‘Singapore’s International Strategy for the 1990s’, Southeast Asian Affairs 1991, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1991. 12 See Karen Peachey, Martin Peachey and Carl Grundy-Warr, The Riau Islands and Economic Cooperation in the Singapore–Indonesian Border Zone, Boundary and Territory Briefing, vol. 2, no. 3, International Boundaries Research Unit, Durham University, Durham, 1998, p. 45. 13 See Tim Huxley, ‘Singapore and Malaysia: A Precarious Balance’, The Pacific Review, 4(3), 1991. 14 Interview in The Straits Times, 13 February 1999. 15 The Straits Times, 11 February 1999. 16 Umar Juoro quoted in The Straits Times, 14 February 1999. 17 The Straits Times, 14 July 1999. 18 The Straits Times, 23 August 1998. 19 The Asian Wall Street Journal, 4 August 1998. 20 The Straits Times, 11 February 1999.

172 Notes 21 See Shamira Bhanu Abdul Azeez, The Singapore–Malaysia ‘Remerger’ Debate of 1996, Centre for South-East Asian Studies and Institute of Pacific Asia Studies, University of Hull, Hull, 1998. 22 The Straits Times, 9 February 1999. 23 The Straits Times, 9 July 1999. 24 The Straits Times, 21 January 1999. 25 Berita Harian, 23 January 1999. 26 The Straits Times, 21 February 1999. 27 The Straits Times, 13 July 1999. 28 See Tim Huxley and Susan Willet, Arming East Asia, Adelphi Papers no. 329, London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1999, p. 22. 29 The Straits Times, 25 July 1997. 30 Tim Huxley, ‘Singapore and Malaysia: A Precarious Balance’, The Pacific Review, op. cit. 31 See Derek da Cunha, ‘Asian Crisis Sharpens Siege Mentality’, The Sunday Times, Singapore, 18 October 1998. 32 See Arun Mahizhnan and Lee Tsao Yuan (eds) Singapore: Re-Engineering Success, op. cit.

Index

Afghanistan 84, 85, 99, 123 Albar, Hamid 151, 151 Albar, Syed Ja’afar 52 Algeria 102 Anglo-Malaysian Defence Agreement 54, 55, 57, 63 Anwar Ibrahim 39, 147, 148 APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) 3, 11, 108, 135, 137, 138 Aquino, President Corazon 90 ARF (ASEAN Regional Forum) 3, 25, 40, 107, 124, 132–4, 136, 156, 158, 159 ASEAN (Association of South-East Asian Nations) 3, 11, 24–5, 34, 39, 58, 63, 66, 72, 77, 89, 131–2, 134– 5, 138, 154, 158–9, 161; Singapore’s attitude to 39, 79–81, 84–5, 86; summit meeting Bali 1976 81, 126; summit meeting Kuala Lumpur 1977 83, 126: summit meeting Manila 1987 90; summit meeting Singapore 1992 134; summit meeting Bangkok 1995 120, 137 ASEM (Asia-Europe Meeting) 3, 40–1, 129, 138, 161 Australia 16, 46, 49, 60, 64, 79, 83–4, 88, 102, 133; Singapore’s relations with 128–9, 154–5

Badawi, Abdullah Ahmad 24, 146 Bahrain 13 Baker, Maurice 70 Bandung Conference 1955 62 Bangladesh 86 Barisan Sosialis Party 31, 45 Barker, E.M. 73 Bolkiah, Sultan Hassanal 88 Borneo 27, 28, 53, 109 Brezhnev, Leonid 123 Britain 2, 4, 11, 14, 26–8, 29, 32, 39, 44, 46, 49, 53–4, 56, 59, 60, 63, 64, 69, 100, 102, 109, 128 British Airways 74 Brunei 13, 16, 39, 88–9, 96, 136, 138, 153 Bundy, William 62 Bush, George 133 Cambodia 25, 39, 40, 46, 49, 52, 62, 66, 75–6, 84, 85, 86–8, 89, 96, 99, 118, 131, 154 Castro, Fidel 28 Central Intelligence Agency 62, 101 Chan Heng Chee 57 n. 20, 62 n. 27 Chan, Peter 135 Changi airport 2, 117 Changi naval base 18, 62, 105 Chiang Ching Kuo 117 China, People’s Republic of 4, 12–3, 18, 22–3, 28, 45, 61, 76, 77, 85, 96, 104, 108, 130, 134, 135, 137, 140,

174

Index

160, 166; Bank of 18, 61, 109, 111– 12; Cultural Revolution in 110, 112–13; Singapore’s relations with 18, 76, 77–8, 108–21 Clinton, President Bill 107, 108, 127, 133, 160 CLOB (Central Limit Order Book) 141, 148 Commonwealth 22, 56, 60, 61, 95, 102, 112, 158 Concorde 74 Confrontation by Indonesia 2, 4, 20, 34, 37, 44, 46, 54, 55, 57, 58, 62, 75, 88, 101 Cooperative Security 134 Cuba 85

Habibie, Dr B.J. 39, 142, 143, 144, 145, 158 Hashimoto, Ryutaro 127 Healey, Dennis 58 Herzog, President Chaim 50, 91–4, 146, 148 Hobbes, Thomas 5, 35 Hon Sui Sen 116 Hong Kong 10, 12–13, 76, 116, 119 Horsburgh Lighthouse 3, 91 Howard, John 128 Hussain Onn 71

Fadzil, Abdullah 148 Fay, Michael 107, 138 Five Power Defence Arrangements 63– 4, 88, 102, 103, 128, 137, 160 France 16, Fraser, Malcolm 83 Fukuda, Takeo 83, 126

IMF (International Monetary Fund) 144 India 46, 49, 65, 86, 120, 129, 137, 140 Indonesia 2, 4, 5, 13, 16, 37, 39, 44, 49, 58, 62, 70, 72, 81, 84, 88, 91, 93, 112, 159; Singapore’saccess for air force training 16, 91, 96; Singapore’s relations with 57, 59– 61, 71–8, 82–3, 90–1, 141–6 Institute for Defence and Strategic Studies 142, 143 International Confucian Association 119, 120 International Court of Justice 3, 91 International Institute for Strategic Studies 108 Iraq 1, 13, 67 Irian Jaya (West New Guinea) 59, 101 Israel 16, 24, 50, 64–5, 71, 76, 91–4, 95, 100, 148–9 Ivory Coast 56

Gang of Four 111 Goh Chok Tong 2, 6, 17, 21, 22, 36–7, 40, 50–1, 107–8, 119, 120, 129, 137–8, 140, 144, 147, 151, 161 Goh Keng Swee 6, 17, 31, 33, 65, 73, 76, 117 Grenada 66, 99 Growth Triangle 91, 140 Guam 103, 125

Japan 2, 4, 14, 46, 72, 73, 75, 76, 109, 123, 130, 133, 148; Singapore’s relations with 124–7 Japanese Red Army 65 Jayakumar, Professor S. 7, 15, 150, 151, 153 Johnson, President Lyndon B. 101, 106 Johor 4, 19, 23, 38, 52, 55, 91, 140, 146; Strait of 19, 27, 44, 93, 94;

Daim Zainuddin 148, 150 Davos 20, 152 Dayan, Moshe 92 Democratic Kampuchea 86 Deng Xiaoping 111, 114–15, 116, 120 Dhanabalan, Suppiah 7, 92, 104, 122 EAEC (East Asian Economic Caucus) 138 Egypt 46, 65, 102 European Community/Union 79, 137–8

Index Sultan of 95 Johor Bahru 23–4, 149, 150 Jordan 56 Jurong industrial estate 69 Kaifu, Tohiki 127 Keating, Paul 128, 135 Kennedy, President John F. 101 Kennedy, Robert 101 Khmer Rouge 66, 88 Ko Teck Kim 49 Koh, Professor Tommy 38, 66–7 n. 30, 79–80, 86, 104, 139 Kuomintang 109 Kuwait 1, 9, 13, 67, 99 Kwik Kian Gie 145 Laos 134, 135, 154 Lau Teik Soon 47 n. 8 Lee Hsien Loong 19, 21, 51, 94, 98 Lee Khoon Choy 75 Lee Kuan Yew 5, 6–7, 8–9, 12, 17, 19, 22, 24, 27–8, 30, 31–2, 33, 35, 37, 39, 41, 43, 44–5, 47, 49, 56, 57, 58– 9, 60, 62, 63, 64–5, 68, 70–1, 74–5, 76–7, 78, 79, 84, 88, 89, 90, 91, 93, 95, 101, 104–5, 108, 110, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118–19, 120, 121, 122, 125, 131, 133, 141, 142, 146, 150, 151, 161–2; mark on foreign policy 7–8, 50–1, 95–6; memoirs of 9, 51; visit to Israel 95 Lee Teng Hui 22, 117 Lim Kim San 19, 20 Lingle, Christopher 107 London School of Economics 33 Machiavelli, Niccolo 5, 31 Mahathir Mohamad, Dr 19, 38, 92–3, 95, 138, 147, 148, 150, 151–2, 158 Mahbubani, Kishore 107 Malacca and Singapore, Straits of 38, 60, 73–5, 76, 77, 78, 90, 125 Malayan Communist Party 28, 3, 56, 109

175

Malayan Railway 147–8, 149 Malaysia 2–3, 5, 8, 16, 19, 21, 29, 37, 43, 49, 58, 72, 78, 93, 95, 97, 160; Customs, Immigration and Quarantine post 149–53; Singapore’s entry into 2, 8, 14, 27, 29; Singapore’s relations with 23, 34, 48–57, 70–1, 88, 91–6, 140–1, 146–53; Singapore’s separation from 2, 4, 14, 27, 30–2, 50, 52, 53– 4, 140–1, 146–53; Singapore’s water supply from 19–20, 54, 55, 71, 147–8 Malik, Adam 57 Mandarin 18, 118 Mao Zedong 111, 113, 120 Maphilindo 38 Marcos, President Ferdinand 90 Marshall, David 110 MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore) 21, 144 Megawati Sukarnoputri 142 Miki, Takeo 126 Mischief Reef 119, 160 Morocco 66 Muldoon, Robert 83 Myanmar (Burma) 46, 137, 138, 154 Nakayama, Taro 126 Nathan President S.R. 142, 143 Netherlands 101 New Zealand 16, 46, 49, 60, 64, 83–4, 102 Nixon, President Richard M. 103, 10; doctrine 103, 123, 125 Nol, Lon 76 Non-Aligned Movement 7, 61, 62, 76, 77, 85, 86, 102 Ong Teng Cheong 143 Oslo Peace Accords 1993 95 Pacific War 2, 14, 84, 124, 125, 127 Pakistan 62 Palestine 33, 91; Popular Front for the

176

Index

Liberation of 65 Palestine Liberation Office 99 PAP (People’s Action Party) 4, 8, 17, 27, 47, 51, 52, 56, 64, 109, 110 Patten, Chris 120 Pawanchee, Abu Bakar 49 Pedra Branca 3, 91, 147 Philippines 30, 38, 49, 58, 62, 63, 72, 90, 97, 103, 104, 105, 132, 160 Portugal 82, 99 Qiao Guanhua 113 Quayle, Dan 105 Rabin, Yitzhak 95 Raffles, Thomas Stamford 2, 11, 14 Rahman, Tunku Abdul 29, 30, 31, 34, 47, 57, 61, 70, 75, 109 Rajaratnam, Sinnathamby 6, 7, 33, 36– 7, 40, 45–7, 60, 79, 80–1, 83, 85, 92, 102, 113 Ramos, Fidel 90 Razak, Tun Abdul 61, 70, 71 Razaleigh Hamzah, Tengku 92 Riau Islands 20, 91, 140 Rithaudeen, Tengku Ahmad 95 Russia 130, 134, 135; Singapore’s relations with 122–4 Sabah 53 Saifuddin, Sir Omar Ali 88 Sasono, Adi 142 Sato, Eisaku 125 SEATO (South-East Asia Treaty Organisation) 46 Shanghai Communiqué 1972 114 Sihanouk, Norodom 52, 62, 76, 87 Silk Air 2 Singapore: balance of power factor in foreign policy 26–7, 41–2, 83, 98–9, 108, 117–18, 130; Customs, Immigration and Quarantine post 149–53; defence capability 3–4, 16– 17; global city concept 36–7, 80–1, 83; Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 6–

7, 21–2, 23, 48–9, 71, 80, 84, 85–6, 92, 96, 107, 131, 133, 136, 147, 154, 161; Parliamentary Committee for Defence and Foreign Affairs 8; racial violence in 53, 70; role in promoting ARF 25; role within ASEAN 25; water security 4, 19–20, 45, 54, 55, 147, 153 Singapore Airlines 2, 74 Singapore Strait 3, 91, 122, 145 Social Darwinism 5, 15, 17, 162 Socialist International 65, 112 Solarz, Stephen 104 South Africa 6 South China Sea 95, 96, 31, 158, 159 Spratly Islands 119, 159 Soviet Union 45, 49, 56, 61, 84, 85, 87, 96, 97, 103–4, 114, 118, 134; Singapore’s relations with 122–4 Sri Lanka 33 Subic naval base 134 Sudarsono, Professor Juwono 143 Suharto, President 34, 38, 39, 72, 75, 76, 89, 90, 93, 14, 120, 135, 137, 141, 142, 156 Sukarno, President 58, 72, 75, 101 Suzhou 117, 122 Sweden 16, 149, 157 Switzerland 20 Taiwan 4, 13, 16, 18, 22–3, 61, 105, 110, 112, 114, 117, 120, 160; Strait of 22, 121 Tan Liang Hong 119, 146 Tan, Dr Tony 18, 20, 157, 158 Tanzania 86 Thailand 16, 46, 49, 58, 63, 65, 84, 89– 90, 97, 141, 153 Tienanmen Square 106, 119 Timor, East 6, 24, 66, 82–3, 88, 91, 99, 129, 154, 155 Toh Chin Chye 6, 33 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (ASEAN) 81, 134, 136

Index Uganda 86 UMNO (United Malays National Organisation) 30, 52–3, 70, 92, 151, 152 United Nations 6, 25, 29, 33, 49, 66, 74, 81–2, 86, 87, 89, 99, 102, 125; Conference on the Law of the Sea 38; Convention on the Law of the Sea 13, 74; International Conference on Kampuchea 1981 85; Security Council 3, 40, 96, 131, 161; Singapore’s entry into 1, 8, 37, 56, 61, 148; Singapore and peacekeeping in 16, 96; Singapore’s voting record at 66, 112 United States 8, 10, 16, 17, 26, 35, 46, 49, 61, 64, 66, 72, 85, 87, 90, 97, 99, 111, 130, 132, 134, 135; access to Changi naval base 18; Singapore’s relations with 62–3, 100–8 Venice 13–14 Vietnam 25, 35, 39, 61, 63, 64, 66, 75, 81, 84, 85, 87, 96, 100, 114, 115,

177

118, 34, 135, 140, 154; Paris Peace agreements for 103 Vladivostock 103 Voice of the Malayan Revolution 116 Wahid, President Abdurrahman 142, 143, 145, 146, 158 Western (Spanish) Sahara 66 Williams College 107–8 Wilson, Harold 32 Wiranto, General 143 Wong Kan Seng 7, 105, 113–4 Woodlands Train Checkpoint 149–50 World Economic Forum 10, 152 WTO (World Trade Organisation) 11, 138 Yaakub, Mustapha 152 Yeo Cheow Tong 19 Yeo Ning Hong 137 Yong Nyuk Lin 73 Yusof bin Ishak 36, 44 Zhao Ziyang 116 Zhou Enlai 113 ZOPFAN (Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality) 58–9, 77, 78, 81, 132, 135, 136