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Aishal Hab Yousuf
7 June 2026 |
During 29-31 May, 23rd Shangri-La Dialogue was held in Singapore, bringing together defence ministers, military leaders, and security experts from across the Indo-Pacific and beyond. Discussions focused on regional security, maritime stability, military modernization, and the evolving balance of power in the Indo-Pacific. Concerns over China's growing military capabilities, maritime security in the South China Sea, defence partnerships such as AUKUS, and the need for stronger regional cooperation featured prominently. Vietnam's President To Lam delivered the keynote address, while several countries used the forum for high-level bilateral defence engagements.
1. The emphasis on UNCLOS and the rules-based maritime order, especially in the Indo-Pacific
The Philippines's Defence Secretary, Gilbert Teodoro, emphasized China’s refusal to participate in the Annex VII proceedings under UNCLOS. He stated that China’s refusal does not absolve it from its legal obligation to comply with the tribunal’s ruling. In addition, he drew attention to China’s preferred course of action: bilateral negotiations. He quoted former Indian Secretary Vijay Gokhale’s recent book China Wars, while characterizing the said bilateral negotiations as a “talk and take strategy.” In this approach, diplomacy may create a façade of restraint while realities on the ground may be quite different. Vietnam’s President, Tô Lâm, also reaffirmed peaceful dispute settlement within the UNCLOS framework. However, he avoided any direct confrontation with Beijing. Australia’s Defence Minister, Richard Marles, also highlighted that the South China Sea continues to depict a trend of extensive militarisation and artificial island construction.
All the speeches imply the longstanding limitation of international law, while the UNCLOS provides a coherent legal architecture, it is still not a strong deterrent, giving way to state impunity.
2. Focus on AI and Cybersecurity in military applications, but with no broad consensus
The dialogue repeatedly mentioned emerging technologies. President Tô Lâm cautioned against AI and autonomous systems making decisions that amplify suspicion and increase the risk of miscalculation, especially in regions with multiple unresolved territorial flashpoints. Minister Marles mentioned satellite-based monitoring and AI-enabled vessel tracking for grey zone attribution. Australia’s 2026 National Defence strategy allocates significant importance to AI for maritime domain awareness. China’s Meng proposed the strongest measures, calling for a legally binding international instrument along the lines of the Chemical Weapons Convention to regulate AI in military applications. He also submitted a position paper on the same, but there was no consensus on a shared protocol, code of conduct, or verification mechanism. While the dialogue incentivized the underlying issue, it failed to produce a pragmatic solution.
3. Repeated emphasis on Preventive Diplomacy, but no tangible action in place
President Tô Lâm delivered the most developed vision for preventive diplomacy, a topic touched upon by a few delegates. His proposal contained dedicated early-warning mechanisms, emergency communication channels, incident management protocols, quasi-formal exchange platforms, and wider confidence-building initiatives linking defence establishments, maritime law enforcement, businesses, and civil society. The primary aim is creating a “credible diplomatic off-ramps before parties become drawn into spirals of escalation.”
Minister Marles cited NATO’s Baltic Sentry operation and the Malacca Straits Patrols as scalable regional models. However, tensions lie in Hegseth’s posture of “strong, quiet, clear” doctrine, which implicitly discourages multilateral dialogue and, in turn, favours bilateral deterrence and hard power. Currently, the US is moving towards transactional burden-sharing, and China remained entirely absent from bilateral engagements throughout the conference. Thus, the multilateral preventive diplomacy infrastructure that delegates advocated for has no major power backing it to come to fruition.
4. High on principles without major mechanisms to reach them
Most speeches were rich in principle but lacking in a practical mechanism. Secretary Hegseth’s framing of the US strategy around “interest alignments” rather than shared values marks a significant shift from the US’s longstanding promotion of liberal internationalism. Akin to Hegseth’s words, other speeches, too, centered on self-reliance and strategic resilience rather than shared norms and collective security, which are considered more conventional for a rules-based liberal order.
Vietnam’s President Tô Lâm offered a highly ambitious vision with early warning systems, emergency communication channels, and preventive diplomacy. However, without the support and facilitation of major powers, the words remain just a mirage.
Proposals to reform multilateral institutions were made by China’s Meng Xiangqing, raising the valid point that the Global South is marginalized when it comes to global security governance; this assertion was largely uncontested by the Global North’s contingent that is increasingly reliant on realpolitik. The disruptions on the Strait of Hormuz had a direct impact on the Indo-Pacific, despite which, during the conference, no coordinated response was proposed. The Shangri La dialogue was firm in its rhetoric on a rules-based order while also accepting its current, gradual erosion in silence.
