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Singapore and American Business Community--Draft for Singapore Lecture 1/4/92 [OA 8332] [6]
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Singapore and American Business Community--Draft for Singapore Lecture 1/4/92 [OA 8332] [6]
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Singapore and American Business Community--Draft for Singapore Lecture 1/4/92 [OA 8332] [6]
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26
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1
7
12. 06. 91 06:22 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
P01
Draft for Ding Lecture United
States Department of State
Washington, D.C. 20520
BUREAU OF EAST ASIAN AND PACIFIC AFFAIRS
FAX COVER SHEET
SMN /TS:
DATE: December 6, 1991
This is a
TO:
White House - Attention: Ms. Carol Aarhus
Do not copy!
bootleg
FAX NUMBER: 456-6218
ADDRESSEE'S PHONE: 456-7750
Do not distribute
FROM: EAP/ IMBS - Richard W. Teare
FAX NUMBER: 202-647-7350
SENDER'S PHONE NUMBER: 202-647- 3276
NUMBER OF PAGES INCLUDING COVER SHEET: Nine Ten
REMARKS:
As promised, I am forwarding two separate
on January 4
sets of suggested themes for the Singapore Lecture, which is
envisioned as a regional (Southeast Asia) foreign-policy
address and is the major speech of the Singapore stop.
Both documents were passed to the NSC Asia staff some
time ago, but we've had no reaction.
Others as available.
-ROP
UNCLASSIFIED
ONLY
12. 06. 91
06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
PO1
-- 31 years ago this month, on a cold, snowy day in
Washington, newly elected American President John Kennedy
articulated Americas commitment to our friends and allies
throughout the world. That we would stand with them in
their efforts to resist Communism, embrace freedom and
support efforts to develop economically and thus improve
the lives of their people.
-- It was a commitment that was to bear a heavy price,
over 58,000 dead in Indochina and billions of dollars
spent on assistance and maintaining a military presence in
the region.
-- But it was a commitment that has been shared by
Republican and Democratic presidents alike.
-- It is appropriate that standing here now in a country
which represents one of the most remarkable economic
success stories in the world, we can look back and see
that the outcome we all worked and sacrificed for has
indeed become a reality.
--- It is with great pride that I say that history will
record that America did indeed keep its commitment to its
friends in SE Asia and that together we have built a
region which is at once free, at peace, and experiencing
unprecedented prosperity, part of the new world order
which offers the promise of enduring global stability.
-- To judge just how far we have come and to see what we
have accomplished, it is instructive to look back 25 years
and recall the situation in SE Asia at the time Singapore
was first charting its independent course.
-- In January 1967, the concern was about the rapid spread
of Communist ideology. Almost every country in SE Asia
had or was about to have an active Communist insurgency.
-- As the war in Vietnam raged, from Jakarta to Rangoon
and from Bangkok to Manila, the worry was about falling
dominoes. The nightmare vision was of a radical ideology
being imposed throughout the region.
-- It is important to keep in mind that while there was a
large U.S. military presence in the region in the mid
60's, U.S. economic interaction with Southeast Asia was
still rather small.
-- On the eve of the Tet offensive, the U.S. had a higher
trade turnover with Latin America than with East Asia.
-- Today, the situation is dramatically reversed. The
steadfastness of our military commitments and the
12. 06. 91 06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
PO2
In 1975 there were about 300,000 T.V. sets in
Indonesia, today there are 7 million (and it seems at
least that many more for sale in all of Singapore
shopping malls.)
Direct dial long distance phones and FAX machines
means someone in Manila, the Philippines can place an
order in Manila, Iowa in less than a minute.
-- We understand each other because of the flow of people
between us.
In 1975 there was only slightly more than a million
Americans of Southeast Asian origin.
Today that figure has quadrupled to over 4 million,
including one senior member of my White House staff
Sicwan Siv who survived the horrors of the Khmer Rouge
run Cambodia.
Based on this population of SE Asian origin, the U.S.
would rank as the fifth largest ASEAN country.
There are more Lao in the U.S. than in Vientiane
There are more Filipinos in California than in Cebu.
-- All of these developments - people telecommunications,
jet aircraft, trade, investment, security commitments, and
common belief in economics and freedom have created a web
of interaction, knitting us together as never before.
-- Our challenge is to use this structure to promote
continued peace, stability and increased economic
progress. And common efforts to deal with the challenges
we face in terms of the environment, narcotics, human
rights and other scientific and technical areas such as
public health.
-- There are two mechanisms which promote and enhance this
new reality:
The ASEAN-Post Ministerial Dialogue in which our
foreign ministers and those of ASEAN's other
dialogue partners meet to discuss issues and
coordinate approaches to dealing with problems;
and
APEC, which offers the increasingly real promise
of cooperation on the full range of economic
issues across the entire Asian-Pacific region.
-3- -
12. 06. 91 06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
P03
stability which they promoted, gave the countries of the
region time to grow economically and deal effectively with
the political challenge. Having collapsed in Europe and
the Soviet Union, Communist is no longer a viable threat,
and is acknowledged as a failed and bankrupt economic and
political philosophy.
-- Democracy, personal freedom and free market economies
are demonstrably the keys to real improvement in the
quality of people's lives.
-- And this has been accompanied by an explosion in trade
between the U.S. and Southeast Asia, particularly the six
ASEAN countries.
U.S. two way trade with Singapore grew from 2
billion dollars to 20 billion dollars since the
end of the Vietnam War.
In the same period, Thailand went from 700
million dollars to 9 billion dollars.
-- This has made the U.S. ASEAN's number one customer. We
take one fifth of all of ASEAN's exports, while ASEAN
imports from the U.S. have increased 1600 percent since
1975.
-- As a result, today U.S. two way trade with ASEAN stands
at over 46 billion dollars - just about equal to our
commerce with Germany - and exceeded by only three other
U.S. trading partners.
-- To put it in better perspective, in 1990 the U.S.
exported:
More to Singapore than to Italy or Spain
More to Thailand than to India
More to Malaysia than the Soviet Union
More to Indonesia than all the rest of Eastern Europe
put together.
-- But it is not just trade that has brought us closer
together.
-- Satellites and the expansion of telecommunication
technology mean that more messages and images are going
back and forth between our people than ever before.
- 2
1 2. 06. 91 06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
P04
- - Having invested so much in this region in terms of
American lives and national treasure and having attained,
together with you, so many of our policy goals, the U.S.
is not now going to turn its back on South East Asia.
-- The U.S. is committed to meeting its obligations in SE
Asia and will continue to play the positive role by
maintaining our military presence, even with our three
year phase out from Subic Bay.
Our new Access Agreement with Singapore contributes
importantly to this goal.
-- The U.S. is committed to a successful transition to a
freely elected government in Cambodia. In that regard, I
am today announcing that the U.S. has lifted its trade
embargo and all other economic restrictions against
Cambodia. This should permit increased economic activity
which will help solidify and maintain the process.
-- The U.S. is prepared to move forward in our
relationship with Vietnam, provided that progress
continues to be made in Cambodia and on our POW/MIA issue.
The countries of Indochina have real promise for
economic growth if there can finally be an end to violence
and they join the rest of the region in emphasizing
development.
-- The U.S. is committed to working productively with our
friends in addressing global problems and so therefore I
am today announcing a new environmental initiative aimed
at enhancing our work together in preserving our planet
and natural resources.
-- We are truly embarking on a new era - one in which the
last remnants of the Cold War are being put behind us
- For America, our Vietnam syndrome is a thing of the
past.
-4-
12. 06. 91
06:24
PM
*DEPT OF STATE EAP
P05
POSSIBLE THEMES FOR SPEECH IN SINGAPORE
Security/New World Order
- My generation fought a world war -- in Asia and the Pacific,
in Europe, in North Africa. Those of us who experienced that
war vowed that it would be the last world war, that the forces
of totalitarianism must be resisted and their aggressive
designs frustrated. As visionaries, we founded the United
Nations; as prudent men and women, we also established a
structure of alliances to contain totalitarianism.
In the largest sense, we have achieved our goals. Despite
-- and perhaps in some ways because of -- the advent of weapons
of mass destruction, the threat of global war today is smaller
than at any time since 1945; indeed, it has almost vanished.
The specter of world communism has disappeared; state-
controlled economies are discredited; the democractic tide is
higher than it has ever been, with elected governments in many
nations on all continents; the advantages of the free-market
system are evident worldwide.
-- For many years the United States, by its military presence
and its influence, has fostered stability in several parts of
the world. Nowhere have the benefits of that stability been
greater than here in East Asia, where many nations have
prospered to a degree beyond anything that might have been
imagined 20 years ago: first Japan; then the Dynamic Asian
Economies of Singapore, Hong Kong, the Republic of Korea and
Taiwan; and now Malaysia and Thailand. Others such as
Indonesia are following rapidly. Economic growth in East Asia
today far outstrips growth anywhere else in the world.
-- The alliance structure succeeded in containing
totalitarianism and preventing global conflict, but it did not
preclude smaller wars or other kinds of regional or local
conflict. We are still dealing with some of those situations,
but the end of superpower rivalry has made the search for
solutionsd more productive. We have reached a stage at which
we can realistically discuss what I have called the New World
Order, under which nations will resolve their disputes without
resort to the use of force.
-- We have already seen the United Nations take on new vitality
and begin to exercise the role its founders intended for it,
most notably in rolling back the invasion of a small state,
Kuwait, by a much larger one, Iraq. We have enjoyed good
cooperation from the Soviet Union in convening a historic
Middle East peace conference.
-- Here in Southeast Asia multilateral diplomacy has achieved
what we trust will be a notable and lasting success: the case
of Cambodia. I will not try to trace here the history of that
12. 06. 91
06:24
PM
*DEPT OF STATE EAP
P06
-2-
unhappy country -- a history in which the United States itself
is of course involved. But I want to record my appreciation
for the solidarity of Singapore and four other ASEAN members
with Thailand, the nation immediately threatened in the 1970s
and 1980s by the potential spillover of combat. More recently,
another ASEAN member, Indonesia, together with France, has led
the search for a settlement, in which the four other Permanent
Members of the Security Council have joined, together with the
United Nations, Australia, Japan and other governments. That
long search reached a milestone six weeks ago in Paris with the
signing of the settlement documents.
-- A settlement in Cambodia truly means the start of a new
era. For virtually the first time since World War II,
Southeast Asia is without serious conflict. For the United
States, that settlement makes possible a process of healing in
our relations with the states of Indochina: representation in
Cambodia for the first time since 1975, accredited to the
Supreme National Council headed by Prince Norodom Sihanouk; a
restoration of our diplomatic relations with Laos -- never
broken -- to the pre-1975 level; and the start of the process
of normalization with Vietnam. Just how far and how fast we
move in that process with Vietnam will depend on progress in
resolving the cases of our military personnel missing in action
-- but the trend in recent months has been decidedly positive.
-- For the people and the governments of Indochina, the
settlement in Cambodia holds great promise. The embargos on
trade and investment which many governments imposed can now be
lifted; travel and communications can be opened up; the
international financial institutions will be able to lend
freely for worthwhile projects. Most important, perhaps,
Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia will be able to emerge from their
isolation and, if they chose, free themselves of the policy
constraints that have hindered their development. In fact,
Laos and Vietnam in recent times have both shown a
receptiveness to foreign private investment. The United States
looks forward to this new era, as, I am sure, do the peoples
of Singapore and the other five ASEAN nations.
-- Clearly, then, the situation in East Asia has improved in
recent months, as has the world situation generally. But we
remain in a transitional phase; we cannot wish away continuing
threats to peace and stability in such areas as the Korean
peninsula, and we cannot rule out sudden threats to world peace
and the rule of law such as the one that arose in the Persian
Gulf only sixteen months ago.
-- For those reasons, the United States will remain engaged
militarily in East Asia and the Pacific for the foreseeable
future. Here, as in Europe, we will take advantage of reduced
12. 06. 91 06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
P07
-3-
levels of threat and of increases in the speed, range and lift
capability of our ships and aircraft to slim down our
forward-deployed forces and the number of our bases. The
character of our presence will change; we will place more
reliance on access to a larger number of facilities owned and
controlled by others. Our total numbers may be reduced, but
our presence in the region could be more widespread and more
frequent.
-- The agreement signed in Tokyo a year ago by then-Prime
Minister Lee Kwan Yew and Vice President Dan Quayle exemplifies
this new type of arrangment. Under its terms, our ships and
aircraft -- based elsewhere -- are making increased use of
Singaporean military facilities. They exercise jointly with
Singapore's forces as well as on their own. They are gaining
familiarity with the geography and the operating conditions of
this part of Asia. We are open to the possibility of similar
arrangements with other nations of the region.
-- The eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in June
settled the fate of Clark Air Base there. If we are able to
remain at Subic Bay, we shall do so, but if not we shall
continue to honor our treaty commitments. We have already
relocated headquarters, troops and equipment to Guam.
Meanwhile, United States forces will remain in Japan and
Korea. Our treaty relationship with Australia, the country I
shall visit next, is stronger than it has ever been. We hope
the day will come when New Zealand allows us to resume defense
cooperation under the historic ANZUS alliance.
-- In short, we will stay on the scene in East Asia. The test
of our security policy, or of any nation's, is not the size or
location of our forces; rather, it is the ability to deal with
any and all likely threats to the peace, and to deal quickly
and decisively with unpredictable crises, and that is precisely
how the United States and its partners in the multinational
coalition -- acting through the United Nations -- dealt with
the Iragi invasion of Kuwait.
Economic Cooperation
- Interdependence and cooperation are equally important in the
world economy. That lesson is fully understood here in
Singapore, where total trade is three (77) times the value of
your gross domestic product. If the prosperity that so much of
East Asia already enjoys is to continue and spread, we must
have an open global trading system. To reach that goal, we
need a framework for economic integration, and we must avoid
regional fragmentation.
12. 06. 91 06:24 PM *DEPT OF STATE EAP
P08
-4-
-- Trade across the Pacific has expanded dramatically in recent
years, in step with dramatic economic growth in many East Asian
countries. Some ten years ago America's trade with the Pacific
surpassed our trade across the Atlantic; today, it is nearly
one-third larger. The ASEAN countries, taken together,
constitute America's fifth-largest trading partner. Singapore
alone is a bigger export market for U.S. goods than Italy,
Spain or the USSR. Nations on the eastern rim of the Pacific,
from Mexico to Chile, are eager to join in this booming
trans-Pacific commerce. I urge U.S. firms take advantage of
these dynamic markets and to redouble their efforts to export
to and invest in the ASEAN countries.
- The Pacific Basin is a natural trading region, and it is
logical that the governments of the region concert to promote
that trade by eliminating barriers and establishing common
policies. An excellent forum for doing so already exists: the
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, or APEC, grouping. The
concept had occurred to a number of people in several
countries, but it was Prime Minister Bob Hawke of Australia who
developed the idea and convoked the first APEC ministerial
meeting in Canberra two years ago.
November
in 1990
-- APEC has since met twice more, here in Singapore lost year
and again last month in Seoul. Its original group of twelve
participants has grown substantially with the simultaneous
addition of China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, and APEC can look
forward to further growth in the years ahead.
-- APEC is performing many useful functions, but none is more
important than mobilizing the support of all fifteen
participants for a successful conclusion of the Uruguay Round
of multilateral trade negotiations to update and extend the
system known as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
The nations of APEC are convinced that the GATT system must
cover world trade in agricultural products, as it has long
covered manufactured goods, and that it must be extended to new
realms such as intellectual property rights, services, and
investment.
-- The alternative is a likely failure of the global trading
system, a reversion to exclusionary trading blocs, and,
eventually, the constriction of world trade. It is incumbent
on all of us -- in North America, in Asia, in Europe -- to
overcome parochial interests, abandon protectinist rules and
tactics, and expose our economies to the rigors of competition.
-- Even while we pursue reform of the global system in the
Uruguay Round, we can reduce and eliminate barriers to trade
with our immediate neighbors. That is what the United States
and Canada are doing right now, and what we and Canada propose
12. 06. 91
06:24
PM
*DEPT OF STATE EAP
P09
-5-
to do with Mexico, thereby creating a North American Free Trade
Area, or NAFTA, which will have few internal barriers and will
be more accessible than at present to other world traders such
as Singapore.
-- Thailand has proposed that ASEAN establish a free-trade area
of its own over the next fifteen years, and the other five
governments have agreed. Such action is the direct parallel of
what we in North America are doing in NAFTA, and the United
States applauds this decision by the ASEAN nations.
The Spread of Democracy
-- The most inspiring single event of the last few years was
the tearing down of the Berlin Wall. The Wall symbolized the
worst of totalitarianism, and its destruction stands for the
desire of people everywhere to control their destinies and to
be governed only by their own consent.
-- To a gratifying degree, that is happening. The democratic
impulse is alive, whether fed by relative proposerity, as
seemed to be the case in China, or by economic failure, as in
the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. And in many places the
impulse is flourishing. In recent years elected governments
have come to office everywhere from the Philippines to Poland
and from Nicaragua to Mongolia.
---- There are basic human rights, universally recognized though
not universally observed, but there is no copyright on
democracy and no one form of government or set of practices to
which every nation must adhere. The United States recognizes
the legitimacy of diversity.
-- What the United States cannot condone, however, is the
suppression of the popular will -- and that is what has
occurred in Burma, where the military leadership permitted
elections last year but, when the results proved not to the
military's liking, refused to allow the winners to take their
rightful seats and organize a government. So long as this
situation continues, the people of Burma will remain victims,
subject to torture and intimidation and deprived of the chance
to share in the general properity and well-being which so many
of their neighbors already enjoy.
(NEEDS CONCLUSION)