The 21st century is considered the era of strategic competition among major powers, in which the Asia-Pacific region is the key area. Being located in an important region and both exploited and attracted by all major powers, ASEAN is facing unprecedented challenges and opportunities.

Strategic competition among major powers in the Asia-Pacific region

Strategic competition among power centres has always existed in the world as a nature of international relations. However, since the Cold War, strategic competition among major powers has never been as fierce and intense as it is today. Right in his first term, when announcing the National Security Strategy in 2017, US President Donald Trump publicly identified China and Russia as the biggest strategic rivals of the US. On the other hand, China and Russia also consider the US as their biggest strategic rival and challenger, threatening their core interests.

International research experts believe that the rise of China and the US-China strategic competition will shape the situation in the Asia-Pacific region, even the world situation in the 21st century. After decades of “hiding strength and biding time", China has shown its strong rise in all fields. If in the early years of the 21st century, China's GDP was equivalent to only about 12% of that of the US, now that ratio has reached 65%. In terms of military, although China is still relatively far behind the US at the global scale, in the Asia-Pacific region, China has affirmed its position as an equal opponent of the US, even exceed the US in some areas, especially anti-access capabilities. As for Russia, despite facing many difficulties due to sanctions from the US and the West after it conducted the special military operation in Ukraine, Russia still asserts its role as a world military superpower (Russia and the US account for about 90% of the total number of nuclear weapons worldwide). This makes the US-China and US-Russia strategic competition more complicated. Although each side has certain advantages over its opponents, currently no country is capable of imposing a completely desired regional and world geopolitical situation.

The 47th ASEAN Summit in Malaysia in Octorber 2025

In particular, the US-China-Russia strategic triangle is undergoing very unpredictable movements. Since the beginning of his second term, US President Donald Trump has tried to improve relations with Russia, and he has even sought to “divide” the Russia-China relationship to create a more advantageous strategic position for the US. The US-Russia Summit in Alaska in August 2025 and many other high-level phone calls and dialogues have been proactively promoted by the US. Although the US-Russia relationship has seen positive signs, there are still huge divergences that are difficult to resolve in a short time, both in terms of security, economy and strategic shaping, especially when the US is leaving open the possibility of supplying Tomahawk cruise missiles for Ukraine. Regarding China, although on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in South Korea in October 2025, President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping reached a temporary 1-year agreement on rare earths and tax reductions, public opinion generally believes that this is just a "ceasefire", and tensions can return at any time. From the above issues, many experts believe that the nature of China-US and Russia-US relations is strategic competition.

In addition, other countries, such as Japan and India, do not want to stay out of this game. In response to the strong rise of China and the adjustment of US policy, Japan is trying to adjust its security and foreign policy strategy in a way that both maintain its alliance with the US and promote cooperation with India, Australia and like-minded countries to respond to emerging strategic challenges in the region. India is promoting its "Act East" strategy; playing a more proactive role in the QUAD and BRICS, seeking to assert its role as an independent pole in the emerging multipolar world order. Despite US tariff pressure, India still maintains close relations with Russia to both diversify its strategic options and gain more leverage in strategic competition with other countries. It is worth noting that strategic competition between major countries is not only taking place in the fields of security and military but is also increasingly fierce on the economic, trade and technological fronts. The global supply chain crisis, trade wars under the influence of protectionism or tit-for-tat moves between countries in strategic export controls (most recently the issue of tightening China's rare earth exports) have become the "new normal", forcing UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and many other leaders to admit that the era of globalisation may have ended.

Implications for ASEAN in the coming time

The above situation has a profound impact on ASEAN as a bloc as well as its member countries. According to international researchers, after the end of the Cold War, ASEAN benefited from a peaceful and stable environment in the region and the globalisation. Those advantages have yet to disappear completely, but are facing many challenges.

In his second term, the US President Donald Trump used tariffs as an important policy tool, in which ASEAN countries are subject to relatively high tariffs, ranging from 10% to 40%. In addition to economic goals, the US's tariffs on Southeast Asian countries also aim to contain China and separate ASEAN countries from the China-centred supply chain in the region. As the world's largest trading power and the largest trading partner of ASEAN countries, China has also promoted economic and infrastructure connectivity initiatives such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Global Development Initiative (GDI), etc. to increase its influence on ASEAN countries and counter US strategic containment. At the same time, China has also put forward many other initiatives such as Global Civilisation, Global Security, and Global Governance to assert its role as a major power in shaping the regional and international landscape. Russia and India are also seeking to increase their economic and military presence in Southeast Asia. Japan is also stepping up cooperation with ASEAN countries. Notably, it has acted with the US, India, and Australia, to promote group cooperation mechanisms on security with the Philippines, especially maritime security.

US President Donald Trump met with his China's counterpart Xi Jinping in Busan, Korea in Octorber 2025

According to international observers, the formation of the US-led sub-multilateral security mechanisms QUAD, AUKUS, and other "trilateral, quadrilateral" security cooperation mechanisms can increase the risk of US-China confrontation and affect ASEAN's centrality in the regional security structure as shown through ARF, ADMM, ADMM+, etc. The risk of "securitising" cooperation areas will increase with the increasing momentum of strategic competition between major powers.

Pressure from technological, economic and trade competition is also making hard for many ASEAN countries to choose whether the technology ecosystem led by China or that of the US. Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said that technological separation is a real danger, which can fragment the global economy and force ASEAN to diversify its partners and increase its resilience. Sharing this view, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim expresses his concern that the foundation of peace and stability, the key to Asia-Pacific development, is being challenged under the pressure of major power competition.

Besides the negatives, the strategic competition between major powers is also bringing about advantages for ASEAN. Despite divergences in interests and strategic intentions, all major powers affirm and support ASEAN's centrality and respect the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (AOIP). In their policies towards the Asia-Pacific region, all major powers (US, China, Russia, Japan, India) identify ASEAN as one of their priority partners.

To date, all ASEAN-led mechanisms, such as the East Asia Summit (EAS), the ASEAN Summit with major countries, the ASEAN+1 and ASEAN+3 Conference, etc., have involved all major countries in the Asia-Pacific region. The fact that US President Donald Trump personally participated in the mediation efforts to find a peaceful solution to the Thailand-Cambodia border conflict and witnessed the signing ceremony of the joint statement between the two sides in Kuala Lumpur recently once again affirmed that the US is still very interested in ASEAN and Southeast Asian countries and considers this an important part of the US Indo-Pacific Strategy.

In another field, the technology race between major countries also creates many development opportunities for ASEAN countries. Recently, leaders of the world's leading high-tech giants, especially semiconductor chips and artificial intelligence such as NVIDIA, Intel, Samsung, TSCM, etc., have visited Southeast Asian countries to seek investment and business opportunities. This is an important opportunity for ASEAN countries to “take shortcuts and leap ahead” to improve their position in the regional and global value chain. The fact that ASEAN is prioritised by major countries will bring Southeast Asia many advantages in the process of regional economic development.

According to research experts, strategic competition among major countries in the Asia-Pacific has entered a new, complex and unpredictable phase, creating both challenges and great opportunities for the future of ASEAN. The history of ASEAN over the past half century shows that this is not the first time ASEAN has faced difficulties and challenges. Although major power strategic competition is posing ASEAN both external and internal difficulties, if it proactively adapts, improves its self-reliance, does not choose sides with any major country and actively promotes mediation efforts between opposing power centres, ASEAN is still able to maintain its centrality and play an important role in the strategies and policies of major powers. After all, with the power of a market of nearly 700 million people and the prospect of becoming the world's fourth largest economy by 2030, ASEAN is still an important geostrategic entity in the Asia-Pacific region that any major country must take into account.

Research experts believe that ASEAN's success depends on its ability to maintain solidarity, mediate disagreements between major partners and within the bloc; maintaining its centrality means that ASEAN must adapt quickly in managing uncertainties; at the same time, not be divided by the pressure of major countries to divide into factions. If this is the case, ASEAN can completely protect its legitimate interests and have a worthy role in the strategic chessboard in the Asia-Pacific region in the 21st century.

MINH KHUE