Southeast Asia’s Subtle Shift on Taiwan

Indonesia's joint exercises with China off Taiwan and Southeast Asia's broader diplomatic shift away from the US directly erodes the coalition of regional states that Australia depends on to constrain China's freedom of manoeuvre and underpin US Indo-Pacific strategy. A fracturing Southeast Asian consensus on Taiwan—the region's most strategically consequential flashpoint—weakens the political and military architecture that deters Chinese aggression and raises the risk that Australia faces a China emboldened by regional accommodation rather than regional resistance.