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"Former Indonesian trade minister Tom Lembong urged Indo-Pacific nations to increase defence spending as a 'preventative' response amid global conflicts, speaking on the sidelines of the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue 2026 in Singapore. Lembong described US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth's call for Asian allies to boost defence budgets as a 'realistic' reflection of a more unstable global environment. "We live in a world of increasing geopolitical turbulence and rising military conflict. And so I think countries do have to substantially increase their military budgets," the former minister stated. Lembong argued that many regional governments remain too focused on domestic concerns and risk overlooking major security threats. "Most governments in the region are still very preoccupied with domestic issues, which in my view is very short-sighted. It's ten times cheaper to address things preventively and not wait until something's happened," he said. However, he admitted that developing nations face difficult choices, as defence spending competes with funding for education, healthcare, and infrastructure. "For developing countries, that heightens the importance of technocratic and rational policies and really professional budget allocation, because defence has become an imperative expenditure," Lembong explained. Turning to the South China Sea, the former trade minister warned that a potential conflict over the waterway could cause severe economic fallout. "If a kinetic conflict breaks out in the South China Sea, the impact on global trade would be perhaps even larger than what we're seeing so far from the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz," he asserted. For his part, international relations expert Klaus Heinrich Raditio stressed that cooperation remains essential for regional security, saying developing countries cannot strengthen their defence capabilities alone. This follows US War Secretary Pete Hegseth's Shangri-La Dialogue address, where he urged Indo-Pacific partners to increase defence spending to 3.5 percent of GDP, asserting that the era of the United States subsidising the defence of wealthy nations is over and demanding they contribute real combat power. Widely recognised as Asia's premier defence and security summit, this year's IISS Shangri-La Dialogue arrives at a critical geopolitical juncture, bringing together government figures, military chiefs and security experts to discuss a range of security issues in the Indo-Pacific. It will run in Singapore from May 29-31."
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