Washington is pushing Southeast Asia toward China

The United States may have struck a fragile ceasefire deal with Iran, but the war has inflicted damage on US relationships in Asia. They were already strained after more than a year of President Donald Trump’s unpredictable approach to foreign policy. 

In fact, a survey of leaders in Southeast Asian countries highlights the weakness of American influence in the region, even among allies and partners.

The annual State of Southeast Asia report produced by the Singapore-based think tank ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute is always hotly anticipated by regional experts, policymakers, and other opinion leaders. 

It surveys a range of Southeast Asian elites from academia, think tanks, research institutes, the private sector, governments, and civil society. 

Although it is not a complete public poll, it is generally considered the best gauge of Southeast Asian sentiment on a wide range of issues, including external powers’ influence in the region.

Popular state

In 2024, China surpassed the US for the first time to become the preferred partner for a majority of states in Southeast Asia, according to the survey in which participants were asked to choose between the two. 

Japan, the longtime most popular state in the region for years, cannot compare with the US or China in terms of defense support.

Released last week, the 2026 report showed that China once again topped the poll. Most respondents also perceive the country as the most influential economic power in Southeast Asia compared to just 15% for the US.

In a new development not shown in prior ISEAS surveys, more than half of those interviewed said that US global leadership had become their biggest geopolitical concern. 

This displaced China’s “aggressive behavior in the South China Sea,” which had been the region’s top concern in 2025. “New American leadership” was the third-highest concern among respondents last year.

“This perception demonstrates regional anxiety about inconsistencies in policy and the credibility of long-term commitments under Trump’s leadership,” the survey reported. 

Even in Singapore, a longtime American partner, this fear was so pronounced that more than three-quarters of respondents listed concern about US leadership as their biggest worry. 

Iran war

Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand – a country with close trading ties, a United States partner, and a treaty ally respectively – now also have massive concerns about Washington’s economic influence in the broader region. 

For anyone who has been following US-Southeast Asia relations over the past 18 months, and especially since the onset of the Iran war, these results should not be surprising. 

Even before Trump took office, American popularity had plummeted in parts of Southeast Asia – particularly Malaysia and Indonesia – because of the United States’ handling of the Gaza conflict.

Indeed, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who has close personal ties with many US opinion leaders and was once affiliated with Johns Hopkins University, had become publicly critical of the US. This probably reflected broader Malaysian views. 

The region has only become angrier with Washington in the last year, following the Trump administration hitting Southeast Asian exporters – and even close Indo-Pacific allies such as Australia – with tough tariffs. Many have now been nullified by the Supreme Court. 

Still, the tariffs, whose size seemed to fluctuate depending on factors hard for regional states to understand, made negotiations with Washington difficult. It also hurt the regional business environment, and demonstrated inconsistent support for partners.

The survey was conducted before the Iran war, and it reveals sentiments only heightened by the conflict. Anwar has strongly condemned the strikes on Iran, a sentiment shared by other Southeast Asian opinion leaders in Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. 

The fury at the US stems in greater part from the fact that the war has left Asia in a dire energy crisis. As the region most dependent on Persian Gulf oil and liquified natural gas (LNG), it is struggling to avoid running out of fuel. 

Oil dependence

For much of South and Southeast Asia, LNG was supposed to be the fuel that helped reduce dependence on oil. But the region is realizing that it can be held up in the Strait of Hormuz or hit by damage to critical operations in Qatar.

Several Asian states are panicking and blaming the US, which did not consult with them or major allies like Australia or Japan, before the war. Countries have imposed austerity measures, tried to cushion the blow with subsidies, and shortened workweeks. 

In the Philippines, Manilia has declared a national emergency. States are also reopening shuttered coal plants, planning for nuclear energy expansion, and clearly worrying that public anger could mount into widespread unrest.

Indeed, China is benefiting from Southeast and South Asian anger and shock at the Iran war, even though Beijing itself, which long promised greater regional energy cooperation, is actually doing little to help its neighbors right now. 

Facing slower domestic growth and major economic challenges, the world’s second-largest economy has made sure to shore up its own energy supply, which is already in better shape than its neighbors’ because of its investments in renewables.

Beijing’s ability to still access some Iranian oil has also helped, along with a sizable petroleum reserve. Beijing has banned petroleum and fertilizer exports.

Nations across South and Southeast Asia, including Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Thailand, have begged China to reconsider, but been met with vague or no responses.

“China may offer some ceremonial assistance, but it’s highly unlikely, if not wholly improbable, that it will share any substantive amount of its food, energy or other reserves with other countries,” Eric Olander, co-founder of the China-Global South Project, told Reuters. 

Southeast Asia

Yet with so much disappointment and fury in Southeast Asia toward the White House, China’s own lack of assistance has mostly gotten a pass.

Joshua Kurlantzick is senior fellow for Southeast Asia and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations.

This work represents the views and opinions solely of the author. The Council on Foreign Relations is an independent, nonpartisan membership organization, think tank, and publisher, and takes no institutional positions on matters of policy.

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