Japan's Human Security Role in Southeast Asia‪.‬

Tokyo's traditional security role in post-Cold War Southeast Asia remains an indirect one: supporting Washington's regional presence through the US-Japan Alliance and providing military bases for US forces in Japan. That the US military is able to project its naval presence in the South China Sea, the Straits of Malacca, the Indian Ocean, and the Persian Gulf is, in part, thanks to the military facilities and financial subsidies provided by Japan. Tokyo's role as a US ally to maintain the regional balance of power will remain important in the post-Cold War era against the backdrop of an unpredictable North Korea and a rising China which has generated ambivalence in the region. On the one hand, the phenomenal economic growth of the Chinese Mainland will act as a key engine of economic growth for both Southeast Asia and Japan and even help to further integrate the region economically; on the other hand, China's rising economic power will conceivably underpin greater Chinese political and military clout in the region.