Military Security

Abstract

This chapter assesses levels of EU–Asia cooperation in military security from the 1990s until 2019. First, the meaning and implications of the military security concept are examined from European and Asian perspectives, showing that the conventional account of military security is incomplete when examined through Asian experiences. In Asia, the broader security agenda has old and deeply influential military roots with unsettling normative and policy implications. Then, the scope of policy cooperation and concrete EU–Asia joint actions is critically examined by looking at threat perceptions and policy-response convergence, divergence or stability over time. Levels of cooperation in military security between the EU and Asia are consistently low, overdetermined by normative, material and institutional factors, rather than geographical distance. State and regional capacity for force projection is severely limited by differing normative and institutional limits on both force projection and the meaning of military security.