The Hormuz blockade and threats have inspired a 17-country defence cooperation in critical underwater infrastructure (CUI) as evidenced by the launch of the “Guiding Principles for Underwater Infrastructure Defence Exchanges” (GUIDE) recently.
Launched in Singapore at the sidelines of the 23rd Shangri-La Dialogue (SLD), the 17 countries are (in alphabetical order): Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Estonia, Finland, France, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malaysia, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the Philippines, Qatar, Singapore, Sweden, Thailand, and the United Kingdom.
Countries conspicuously absent are the US, Indonesia, Japan and South Korea.
GUIDE spells out shared defence principles and potential areas of cooperation in CUI security. The cross-regional cooperation showed how underwater security transcends national boundaries.
Singapore Minister for Defence, Chan Chun Sing, said “… today, the waterways are not just avenues for us to conduct our trade, but underneath those waters are also critical underwater infrastructure that connects our energy grid and our telecommunications grid…” , according to a press release by the Singapore Ministry of Defence.
Chan added, “any disruption on one part of the network is a disruption on the entire network. That is why it gives us great joy to see so many countries – from Europe to Middle East to Southeast Asia, Asia-Pacific – coming together. We may not have all the answers, but we certainly want to work on these issues together to see how we can establish those international norms to build those infrastructures, maintain those infrastructures, and to protect those infrastructures, deterring those may mean harm to our infrastructure and our way of life.”