By Prof Dr Adam Leong Kok Wey

Malaysia’s defence policy has long been underpinned by the strategic need to be self-reliant with indigenous niche defence equipment. Both the 2020 Defence White Paper and the 2025 Midterm Review have stressed on the development of policy guidance for utilising local defence industry to bolster the innovation and acquisition of locally built products for the Malaysian Armed Forces.

The Minister of Defence, on 12 January 2026, in his New Year address has also reiterated the continued importance of supporting and developing our local defence industry to meet niche equipment demands from the Malaysian Armed Forces. A National Defence and Security Industry Policy is also slated to be launched later this week.

ASEAN defence platform

Nonetheless, the Malaysian local defence industry players may need to leverage on ASEAN defence cooperation via its defence platform, the ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting (ADMM), to build regional defence industry collaboration to attain better economy-of-scale in cross-building and sharing of common defence technology that can be used by ADMM members. Besides that, Malaysia’s stellar performance as ASEAN Chair in 2025 has laid a strong foundation to enhance closer cooperation among ASEAN members.

ASEAN already has a mechanism set up in 2011 to build regional collaboration in defence industry research, development, innovation and production known as the ‘Concept Paper on the Establishment of ASEAN Defence Industry Collaboration’ (ADIC) with the aim to foster stronger defence ties among ASEAN members and initiate regional economy-of-scale acquisitions of defence assets and technologies.

A few members of ASEAN have already established some bilateral defence industry collaborations in the region. For example, Malaysia has procured eight CASA/IPTN CN-235 from PT Dirgantara Indonesia, and a submarine rescue ship operated by the Royal Malaysian Navy, MV Mega Bakti, from Keppel Singmarine, Singapore. There are also some bilateral maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) of transport aircraft and small arms production contracts between ASEAN members.

Regional defence collaboration

However, more can be achieved in regional defence collaboration. Although ADIC makes strategic sense in harnessing each ASEAN member’s strengths and utilising economy-of-scale to build common defence capabilities, progress in establishing concrete defence industry collaboration via ADIC has been very slow. There are a few plausible reasons why ADIC’s progress has been stunted.

The first reason, and most critical issue, is the protection of national sovereignty and military technological secrets which have continued to influence ASEAN members to view defence industry collaboration with caution. Unlike the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), where its members are formal defence treaty allies, military technologies are easily shared among its members to enable cohesive joint military operations with sustainable logistics, ASEAN is not a formal defence pact and it is difficult for member states to share sensitive arms technologies for defence collaborations.

The second reason is that each individual ASEAN member has different strategic culture, and military doctrines and concept of operations. This will in turn create difficulties in defence industry collaboration to build common defence assets.

The third reason posits on the geopolitical leanings of individual ASEAN members and their influence on arms procurement. Each member state has its own preferred strategic partners (some even have formal defence treaty allies) with extra regional powers such as the United States, Russia, China, France, South Korea, Japan, India, Australia and the United Kingdom. A few of these major powers are in competing geopolitical blocs and have political leverage on some ASEAN members.

Cohesive joint operations

Despite the problems plaguing tangible regional defence industry collaboration, there is a potential way forward for ASEAN via ADMM to strategise regional defence industry collaboration. ASEAN has done well in cooperating in non-traditional security issues via ADMM such as humanitarian and disaster rescue operations (HADR), counter-terrorism and anti-piracy tasks, which can be used as a viable foundation to jumpstart regional defence industry collaboration. For example, the ADMM can capitalise on the development of common regional HADR equipment for cohesive joint operations in disaster areas.

ADMM can focus on developing and producing humanitarian equipment such as mobile toilets, food ration packs, mobile hospitals, and common land logistics vehicles, prioritising each ADMM member’s industrial strengths to build niche equipment optimising economy-of-scale benefits. This commonality in equipment and material will enhance the rapid deployment and distribution of military personnel and equipment to disaster-hit areas, and start rescue and relief operations with a sustainable and homogeneous logistics chain.

This will be a good starting point to rejuvenate regional defence industry collaboration. If successful, it may, in turn, build a more truly unified ASEAN Community and directly serve as a bastion to maintain peace and security in Southeast Asia, enabling the region to continue building economic prosperity in a stable environment.

For Malaysia’s local defence industry players, ADMM defence industry collaboration will create new demands for niche defence-related products, offering better cost advantage and revenues, and penetration of the lucrative international defence equipment market.

-- BERNAMA

Adam Leong Kok Wey, PhD, is a professor of strategic studies and director of the Centre for Defence and International Security Studies (CDISS) at the National Defence University of Malaysia (NDUM). He is also the Distinguished Fellow at the Malaysian Armed Forces Staff College.