Introduction

As we enter 2026, the stakes, and the complications, associated with a secure Indo-Pacific continue to increase. The People’s Republic of China continues to signal its ambitions for the region, especially for Taiwan, and the United States’ capacity to deter a forced unification scenario is questioned. In keeping with this theme, several of the papers in this volume address relevant topics.

Just in time for Pacific Forum’s flagship Honolulu Defense Forum (Jan. 11-13), Pacific Forum Senior Director Kimberly Lehn discusses the stakes associated with US preparation for conflict, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies Prof. Mason Richey covers what might happen in the event of a simultaneous crisis in the region (namely in Taiwan and South Korea) and how to prepare for it, while Army Reserve Logistics Officer Sandra Roshonda Thomas discusses how defense production can be modernized to meet upcoming challenges. Pacific Forum has a long-standing mission of identifying the crises to come, and the related challenges of deterring aggression, preventing forced cross-strait unification, and the modernizing defense production are among the greatest challenges on the horizon.

But Pacific Forum’s mandate extends further than that, to covering the entire Indo-Pacific and training the next generation of analysts who will do the work in the coming decades. To that end, Resident James A. Kelly Korea Fellow Marialaura De Angelis discusses how narrative conflict must be resolved to create conditions for fruitful US-North Korea talks, while Resident Lloyd & Lilian Vasey Fellow Aung Thura Ko Ko describes how the ongoing conflict in Myanmar has revealed the institutional weaknesses of ASEAN, and how they might be reformed. Lastly, with the PRC’s economic and diplomatic influence casting a long shadow over all corners of the Indo-Pacific, Pacific Forum Young Leader Moses Sakai and Nonresident Vasey Fellow Sheewon Min discuss what the influence means for Pacific Islands Countries and ASEAN (specifically Brunei), respectively.

The collected papers in this volume represent Pacific Forum’s commitment to a safe and secure Indo-Pacific, and hope each of them contribute to a more informed readership.

Rob York

Director for Regional Affairs

Pacific Forum International

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

THE CRISIS NOW: WHAT’S AT STAKE IN CONFRONTING SECURITY CHALLENGES IN THE INDO-PACIFIC AND BEYOND

CRITICAL MISSION PREPAREDNESS: THE US AND NORTHEAST ASIAN ALLIES IN A DUAL TAIWAN-KOREA CONTINGENCY

FRAMING THE IMPASSE: BREAKING THE NARRATIVE DEADLOCK IN US-NORTH KOREA DIPLOMACY

COMMANDING THE FUTURE: ECONOMIC STATECRAFT IN THE NATIONAL FRAMEWORK FOR THE DEFENSE PRODUCTION ACT

THE INTERNAL SECURITY DYNAMICS IN THE PACIFIC ISLAND COUNTRIES: DOES IT MATTER TO CHINA

FROM HEDGING TO BAND WAGONING: BRUNEI MEETS DILEMMA BETWEEN TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY AND ECONOMIC SECURITY

ASEAN’S MYANMAR DILEMMA: INSTITUTIONAL PARALYSIS IN REGIONAL DIPLOMACY

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

About the Authors

KIMBERLY LEHN is the Senior Director of the Honolulu Defense Forum (HDF) at the Pacific Forum. HDF seeks to facilitate dialogue and solutions between a wide range of actors from the private and public sectors to bolster deterrence in the face of an increasingly contested regional security environment.

She is a national security professional with over 20 years of experience in the U.S. federal government and in the private sector. She advises leading companies on national security issues and previously served in management and analytic roles at the Central Intelligence Agency as well as on assignments to the National Security Council, the Department of State, and on the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee. As a professional staff member, she focused on the national security challenges facing the United States, particularly strategic competition with China and Russia, and the important role alliances and partnerships play to build collective security.

She publishes regularly on national security, Indo-Pacific, and defense and technology issues. She is also a non-resident senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Analysis in Washington, DC.

MASON RICHEY is Associate Professor of international politics at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies (Seoul, South Korea), and Senior Contributor at the Asia Society (Korea). Dr. Richey has also held positions as a POSCO Visiting Research Fellow at the East-West Center (Honolulu, HI) and a DAAD Scholar at the University of Potsdam. His research focuses on U.S. and European foreign and security policy as applied to the Asia-Pacific. Recent scholarly articles have appeared (inter alia) in Pacific Review, Asian Security, Global Governance, and Foreign Policy Analysis. Shorter analyses and opinion pieces have been published in 38North, War on the Rocks, Le Monde, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung, and Forbes, among other venues. He is co-editor of the volume The Future of the Korean Peninsula: Korea 2032 (Routledge, forthcoming 2021).

MARIALAURA DE ANGELIS is a James A. Kelly Fellow at Pacific Forum in Hawai‘i and an affiliated researcher at the East-West Center. She also serves as Senior Advisor at Track2Asia, a Brussels-based NGO specializing in Track 2 and Track 1.5 dialogue between Europe and East Asia. A passionate advocate for peaceful conflict resolution, Marialaura has been actively involved in mediation efforts on the Korean Peninsula since 2008.

SANDRA ROSHONDA THOMAS is an Army Reserve Logistics Officer of 19 years who has served in the US and overseas during wartime.  She has served in various assignments that has allowed her insights into the Defense Industrial Base as well as command Soldiers by the hundreds.  She consults for various industry clients and supports them through the verification of data and developing their business processes.  Under her business firm, Roshonda has hosted defense of the homeland wargames and been selected as a panelist to confer on critical materials, wargaming and supply chain logistics.

MOSES SAKAI is a Research Fellow at the Papua New Guinea National Research Institute and a member of the Young Leaders Program of the Pacific Forum. In June-July 2024, Moses was a visiting scholar on US Foreign Policy at the University of Delaware under the US State Department’s Study of the US Institute (SUSI) for Scholars Program. He is also a Regional Research Associate (honorary) since August 2025 of the Indo-Pacific Studies Centre (IPSC), a Sydney-based foreign policy think tank in Australia.

SHEEWON MIN ([email protected] / [email protected]) holds a Master’s degree in Asian Studies from Georgetown University and is an incoming DPhil candidate in International Relations at the University of Oxford. Her research explores political behaviors of small and middle powers in the great power competition with a particular focus on international organizations and multilateralism.

AUNG THURA KO KO is a resident Vasey Fellow at the Pacific Forum and an East-West Center affiliate scholar. Aung previously worked at the Oxford Global Security Programme and holds a Master of Public Policy from the University of Oxford.