The Asia Pacific region is a dynamic but complex area where much of the history of the 21st Century will be scripted. Although the strategic and economic importance of the region continues to grow, challenges of reconciling national interests with regional and global interests continue. Security architectures during the Cold War were based primarily on military alliances. However the need today is to base these architectures on shared values, interests and challenges. We need not only define but believe in these universal values. This book brings out this important aspect of this region and explains them briefly.

Contributors Lieutenant General PK Singh, PVSM, AVSM (Retd) Director USI Ambassador Kanwal Sibal, IFS (Retd) Former Foreign Secretary Shri Asoke Kumar Mukerji, Special Secretary, UN Headquarters Dr. Daesung Song (ROK) Major General YK Gera (Retd) Mr TC Venkat Subramanian, Ex CMD Exim Bank India Ms Tsun-Tzu Hsu (Taiwan) Cmde Ranjit B. Rai (Retd) Vice Admiral PS Das, PVSM, AVSM, VSM (Retd) Dr. Annika Bolten-Drutschmann, (Germany) Vice Admiral Arun Kumar Singh, PVSM, AVSM, NM (Retd) Sr Col Le Kim Dung (Vietnam) Mr. Ivan Safranchuk (Russia) Major General Dato' Pahlawan Dr. William R. Stevenson (Malaysia) Prof. Richard Rigby, Australia Dr. Brendan Taylor, Australia Prof. Swaran Singh, JNU Sr. Col (Ms) Do Mai Khanh, (Vietnam) Dr. Satoru Nagao, (Japan) Air Chief Marshal SP Tyagi, PVSM, AVSM, VM (Retd) Dr. Elichi Kathara (Japan) Major General BK Sharma, SM** (Retd) Dr. Tuan Yao Cheng (National Chenchi University)

This edited book examines the contemporary regional security concerns in the Asia-Pacific recognizing the ‘Butterfly effect’, the concept that small causes can have large effects: ‘the flap of a butterfly’s wings can cause a typhoon halfway around the world’. For many Asia-Pacific states, domestic security challenges are at least as important as external security considerations. Recent events (both natural disasters and man-made disasters) have pointed to the inherent physical, economic, social and political vulnerabilities that exist in the region. Both black swan events and persistent threats to security characterize the challenges within the Asia-Pacific region. Transnational security challenges such as global climate change, environmental degradation, pandemics, energy security, supply chain security, resource scarcity, terrorism and organized crime are shaping the security landscape regionally and globally. The significance of emerging transnational security challenges in the Asia-Pacific Region impact globally and conversely, security developments in those other regions affect the Asia-Pacific region.

Myriad challenges to regional stability and security threaten East Asia’s burgeoning growth and prosperity. Mutual Security in the Asia-Pacific: Roles for Australia, Canada and South Korea addresses the economic and security challenges that loom in the region and the role that these three countries can play to ensure a stable, predictable political environment.

The security architecture of the Asia/Pacific region is in a profound transformation. Such changes are not without problems, which are discussed here.

"Since September 11, 2001, our newspapers have been filled with the ""war on terror""; our governments have mobilized their resources for ""homeland security""; and people everywhere are braced for more terrorist attacks. Yet while the new threat is genuine, w"

From the war on terror to the rise of China, this book unlocks the major strategic themes and security challenges of the early twenty-first century. Strategy and Security in the Asia-Pacific provides the analytical frameworks needed to make sense of this complex but exciting strategic universe. Offering a unique mix of global strategic thinking and Asia-Pacific security analysis, this book is for readers from Sydney to Seoul who want to put their own local security challenges in a wider regional and global context. It is also for North American and European readers requiring an understanding of the dynamic security developments in the Asia-Pacific region around which so much of global strategy is increasingly based. The really vital questions facing the international community are dealt with here: Why do governments and groups still use armed force? Has warfare really changed in the information age? Why should we be concerned about non-traditional security challenges such as water shortages and the spread of infectious disease? Is a great clash imminent between the United States and China? What are the prospects for peace on the Korean peninsula and between India and Pakistan? Can Southeast Asia survive the challenges of transnational terrorism? What does security mean for the Pacific island countries and for Australia and New Zealand? With contributions from leading commentators and analysts, Strategy and Security in the Asia-Pacific offers a comprehensive and authoritative introduction to the field.