US and 10 ASEAN Navies Kick Off First Joint Southeast Asia Military Exercises

A U.S. V-22 Osprey takes off from the USS Wasp, U.S. Navy multipurpose amphibious assault ship, during the amphibious landing exercises as part of the annual joint U.S.-Philippines military exercise on the shores of San Antonio town, facing the South China Sea, Zambales Province, on April 11, 2019. Ted Aljibe/AFP/Getty Images

The United States and the 10 nations of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in a historic first kicked-off joint-naval exercises in the Gulf of Thailand.

China has had decades of institutionalized security cooperation with ASEAN and held ASEAN-China naval exercises last October. China unsuccessfully tried in 2014 to ban ASEAN members from holding U.S. exercises by proposing a “Single Draft Negotiating Text” for its proposed “Code of Conduct with ASEAN” that “parties shall not hold joint military exercises with countries from outside the region, unless the parties concerned are notified beforehand and express no objection.”