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The Pacific Ocean is no longer merely a vast maritime space separating Asia from the Americas. It is becoming an increasingly consequential arena in which maritime surveillance, fisheries governance, critical infrastructure, strategic access and great-power competition intersect. For Indonesia, an archipelagic state positioned between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, these developments raise a fundamental strategic question: who will shape the rules, information systems and security partnerships that determine how the region’s maritime domain is governed?
The answer cannot be found solely in naval deployments or defence spending. It lies equally in the institutions that coordinate maritime operations, the data that governments can access, the economic value extracted from ocean resources, and the ability of Pacific Island countries to retain meaningful control over their own strategic choices.
The Pacific Islands Forum’s 2018 Boe Declaration on Regional Security recognised that the region faced an increasingly complex security environment. Its expanded conception of security encompassed not only conventional defence but also climate change, human security, transnational crime, cybersecurity and maritime security. The subsequent 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent reinforced the ambition to protect the region’s people, ocean and collective interests.
Yet a declaration of shared interests does not necessarily produce an integrated security system. Pacific security cooperation remains distributed across bilateral partnerships, subregional initiatives, multilateral institutions and arrangements led by external powers. This network has delivered practical benefits, but its fragmented character raises questions about coordination, accountability and strategic autonomy.
For Indonesia, the significance of this fragmentation extends beyond the South Pacific. It concerns the future of maritime governance across the wider Indo-Pacific, including the eastern Indonesian archipelago, the protection of marine resources, the resilience of regional connectivity and the balance between national sovereignty and international security cooperation.
The Strategic Value of a Fragmented Maritime Order
The Pacific’s security arrangements are better understood as a patchwork than as a single regional architecture. Different organisations address fisheries enforcement, policing, disaster response, maritime surveillance and defence cooperation, often with different memberships and sources of funding.
This diversity is not necessarily a weakness. Smaller, functionally focused arrangements can respond to specific threats more quickly than a centralised institution burdened by competing political priorities. Pacific fisheries cooperation, for example, demonstrates how shared economic interests can support practical coordination across national jurisdictions.
The difficulty emerges when these arrangements fail to connect. Information collected through one surveillance programme may not be available to another agency. A regional assessment may identify a maritime risk without establishing which national authority should respond. Multiple partners may provide equipment and training while leaving unresolved questions about long-term maintenance, data governance and operational interoperability.
The result is a distinction between possessing maritime capabilities and exercising coordinated maritime power.
Australia’s Pacific Maritime Security Program illustrates both the value and the complexity of external assistance. The programme combines Guardian-class patrol vessels, training, maintenance, technical advice and aerial surveillance to strengthen the maritime capabilities of Pacific Island partners. Australia’s Department of Defence describes it as a long-term commitment to national and regional maritime security.
These investments can help Pacific governments protect fisheries, monitor their exclusive economic zones and respond to transnational crime. They also demonstrate that effective maritime security depends on much more than the delivery of vessels.
A patrol boat without reliable maintenance, trained personnel, usable intelligence and enforceable legal procedures offers only limited protection. Similarly, sophisticated surveillance systems cannot deliver their full value if the resulting information is not connected to decision-making and operational response.
The strategic challenge, therefore, is not simply to increase the number of maritime assets. It is to ensure that national and regional institutions can convert those assets into a coherent capacity to monitor, interpret and govern the ocean.
This distinction matters to Indonesia. The country already faces the challenge of coordinating maritime surveillance and law enforcement across an extensive archipelago. Pacific experience offers a useful comparative lesson: fragmented capabilities become strategically effective only when supported by clear responsibilities, reliable information-sharing mechanisms and sustainable national capacity.
Maritime Domain Awareness: The New Currency of Ocean Power
One of the most important shifts in maritime geopolitics is the growing significance of Maritime Domain Awareness, or MDA: the ability to understand activities and conditions across the maritime environment sufficiently well to make informed decisions.
MDA draws on multiple sources, including vessel tracking systems, coastal radar, satellite imagery, fisheries monitoring, aerial surveillance, port records and intelligence assessments. When integrated, these sources can help authorities identify suspicious activity, monitor fishing operations, protect infrastructure and direct patrols towards areas of elevated risk.
The strategic value lies not in collecting the greatest volume of data, but in transforming information into timely, lawful and actionable decisions.
A vessel that disables its Automatic Identification System, for instance, is not necessarily engaged in illegal activity. However, when an unexplained interruption coincides with unusual movements, suspected transshipment or activity in a protected fishing area, the combined indicators may justify further investigation.
The ability to distinguish ordinary activity from credible risk is particularly important in a region as vast as the Pacific. Continuous physical patrols across every maritime area would be prohibitively expensive for many island states. Intelligence-led surveillance can help them allocate scarce resources more efficiently.
Recent institutional developments reflect this shift. On 5 September 2026, the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) and the Pacific Fusion Centre signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen information-sharing, database access, analytical training and evidence-informed policymaking in support of fisheries security.
This partnership highlights an emerging principle of regional security: the ability to share and interpret maritime information is becoming as important as the ability to deploy patrol vessels.
However, information-sharing also creates governance questions. Who controls the data? Which authorities can access it? How are sensitive sources protected? Can participating countries independently analyse the information they receive, or must they rely on external partners for interpretation?
These questions should not be treated as evidence of improper conduct by external partners. They are normal considerations in any security relationship involving unequal technological capabilities.
For Pacific Island countries, the objective should be to ensure that international assistance expands their independent capacity to understand their maritime environment. For Indonesia, the equivalent objective is to build a maritime information system that integrates national capabilities while preserving lawful control over sensitive data and operational decisions.
In a maritime environment increasingly shaped by digital infrastructure, data governance is becoming an integral component of sovereignty.
Fisheries, Blue Economy and the Economics of Maritime Security
The geopolitical significance of the Pacific is also economic. Its fisheries are essential to food security, public revenue, employment and export earnings across many island economies.
Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing threatens these interests by weakening regulatory authority, undermining legitimate operators and reducing the economic benefits that coastal communities and governments can obtain from marine resources.
The FFA’s coordinated surveillance operations demonstrate the practical value of regional cooperation. In May 2026, Operation Tui Moana brought together participating Pacific Island countries and supported partners for a three-week maritime surveillance operation targeting illegal fishing and other transnational maritime crimes.
Such operations show that regional cooperation can produce tangible results without requiring every participating country to surrender its national jurisdiction or establish a centralised maritime command.
The next challenge is to connect surveillance with economic transformation.
Detecting illegal fishing is necessary, but it does not automatically ensure that coastal communities retain more value from legitimate fishing. That requires investment in processing facilities, cold-chain logistics, port infrastructure, market access, sustainable harvesting and local skills.
The FFA’s September 2026 discussions with development partners placed greater economic value addition and a modernised Regional Fisheries Surveillance Centre among the region’s priorities.
This illustrates an important relationship between maritime security and economic policy: surveillance protects the conditions under which marine resources can be governed, while industrial and trade policies determine how much economic value remains within the region.
Indonesia faces a comparable challenge on a much larger national scale. Protecting fisheries in the Arafura Sea and other Indonesian waters is not only a matter of law enforcement. It is also connected to domestic processing, export competitiveness, sustainable resource management and the livelihoods of coastal communities.
A maritime strategy that measures success exclusively through patrols and interceptions risks overlooking these wider objectives. The more meaningful measure is whether security arrangements protect national rights, preserve marine resources and support sustainable economic returns.
The United States–China Rivalry and the Risk of Strategic Overreach
The Pacific’s maritime geography gives it particular importance in the strategic competition between the United States and China.
For Washington, the region contributes to military access, logistics, communications and the defence of its wider Indo-Pacific posture. Guam is a major American military hub, while US relationships with Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands are shaped by distinct Compact of Free Association arrangements.
For Beijing, diplomatic engagement, trade, infrastructure investment and development partnerships provide opportunities to deepen its regional presence. These activities can increase political and economic influence, although economic engagement should not automatically be equated with military access or political control.
The distinction matters. Treating every Chinese-funded project as a security threat risks obscuring the legitimate development priorities of Pacific governments. Conversely, treating infrastructure investment as geopolitically neutral in every circumstance ignores the possibility that ownership, financing conditions, operational access and technological dependence can have strategic consequences.
Pacific Island countries are not merely passive recipients of this competition. Their governments seek markets, infrastructure, development finance, climate assistance and security cooperation from multiple partners. Their interests, however, differ according to geography, domestic priorities, political relationships and exposure to specific threats.
This produces a recurring strategic dilemma. A bilateral security agreement may serve one country’s immediate objectives while generating concern among its neighbours. A partnership intended to increase national security can therefore contribute to regional insecurity if its implications are not communicated or managed.
The challenge for the Pacific is to preserve the benefits of external cooperation without allowing strategic rivalry to displace the region’s own priorities.
For Indonesia, this is an important distinction. A sustainable maritime policy should not be reduced to choosing between Washington and Beijing. It should preserve the country’s ability to work with multiple partners while evaluating cooperation according to its contribution to national interests, international law and regional stability.
Strategic autonomy does not require isolation. It requires sufficient institutional capacity, technological competence and diplomatic flexibility to prevent external dependence from becoming an obstacle to independent decision-making.
Indonesia’s Maritime Position: A Bridge Between Two Oceans
Indonesia’s geographical position makes the evolution of Pacific security directly relevant to its national interests.
As an archipelagic state connecting the Indian and Pacific Oceans, Indonesia occupies a central position in regional maritime connectivity. Its waters support international shipping, fisheries, energy transport and communications. Its eastern maritime approaches also connect it geographically and politically with the wider Pacific Island region.
The strategic significance of this position should not be confused with a claim that every development in the South Pacific presents an immediate threat to Indonesia. Rather, the point is that maritime systems do not operate within neat political boundaries. Shipping movements, illegal fishing networks, environmental risks and communications infrastructure can create cross-border consequences that require coordination.
For Indonesia, three areas deserve particular attention.
The first is maritime surveillance in the eastern archipelago. The Arafura Sea, the waters around Maluku, and the maritime approaches to Papua have different operational characteristics, but all demonstrate the importance of connecting information with effective enforcement and sustainable resource management.
The second is regional diplomacy. Indonesia’s associate membership in the Melanesian Spearhead Group provides an institutional channel for engagement with Melanesian partners. This relationship can support cooperation in maritime governance, fisheries, disaster preparedness, education and economic development. Its effectiveness will depend on the extent to which Indonesia can offer practical benefits while respecting the different political priorities of partner countries.
The third is economic connectivity. Ports, shipping services, fisheries processing and digital communications can help translate Indonesia’s geographical position into economic value. Yet connectivity also creates dependencies and vulnerabilities. Infrastructure must therefore be planned with attention to resilience, cybersecurity, maintenance and the consequences of service disruption.
Indonesia’s maritime position is an asset, but geography alone does not create strategic influence. That influence depends on the ability to provide reliable services, protect lawful maritime activity and develop partnerships that remain useful beyond periods of geopolitical tension.
Why Indonesia Should Look Beyond Naval Power
Traditional naval capabilities remain important for deterrence, territorial defence and the protection of maritime interests. Yet the Pacific experience demonstrates why a broader model of maritime security is necessary.
A country may possess modern vessels and still struggle to detect illegal fishing across a vast maritime domain. It may have access to satellite imagery but lack the analytical systems required to identify patterns of risk. It may participate in regional agreements without having the personnel or institutional procedures needed to implement them effectively.
For Indonesia, a more integrated maritime approach should connect four functions: surveillance, analysis, enforcement and economic governance.
Surveillance provides information about what is happening at sea. Analysis establishes which activities require attention and why. Enforcement translates lawful decisions into operational action. Economic governance ensures that the resulting protection of maritime rights contributes to sustainable national prosperity.
These functions need not be placed under a single institution. They do, however, require clear responsibilities, secure information-sharing arrangements, interoperable systems and accountability for results.
The Pacific also demonstrates the value of functional cooperation. Instead of waiting for a comprehensive regional security architecture, countries can develop practical arrangements around shared problems such as illegal fishing, search and rescue, disaster response, pollution control and the protection of maritime infrastructure.
Indonesia could apply this principle through carefully designed partnerships with Pacific Island countries. Joint training, technical exchanges, fisheries monitoring and disaster-response cooperation can build trust while delivering concrete benefits.
Such cooperation should be demand-driven rather than imposed as a geopolitical programme. Pacific governments have their own priorities, and Indonesia’s credibility will depend on whether its engagement addresses those priorities consistently.
The objective is not to create a new bloc. It is to strengthen the capacity of regional states to manage their maritime interests without unnecessarily narrowing their diplomatic options.
Critical Infrastructure and the Next Maritime Security Frontier
Maritime security increasingly extends beyond ships, fisheries and territorial waters to include the infrastructure that sustains regional connectivity.
Undersea telecommunications cables, ports, energy facilities and digital networks support financial transactions, public services, trade and government communications. Disruptions can have consequences that extend far beyond the physical location of the affected infrastructure.
Pacific Island countries face particular challenges because long distances and limited redundancy can make infrastructure failures costly. Indonesia faces a different but related challenge: maintaining reliable connectivity across a large archipelago whose economic and administrative systems increasingly depend on digital networks.
Protecting this infrastructure requires coordination among maritime authorities, telecommunications operators, port managers, law enforcement agencies and national cybersecurity institutions.
It also requires careful threat assessment. A vessel operating near an undersea cable does not, by itself, establish hostile intent. Effective monitoring must combine maritime activity data, technical information, operational context and verifiable evidence before drawing conclusions.
The broader principle is that maritime security should include the resilience of the systems that make ocean-based connectivity possible.
For Indonesia, this means treating critical maritime infrastructure as part of national resilience planning. It also creates opportunities for regional cooperation on incident reporting, technical standards, emergency response and the exchange of best practices.
From a Patchwork to a More Resilient Maritime Order
The Pacific does not necessarily need a single centralised security institution. Its geographical diversity, differences in national priorities and sensitivity to sovereignty may make such a structure difficult to establish or sustain.
A more practical objective is to strengthen coordination among existing institutions and functional arrangements.
Three reforms would be particularly useful.
First, regional partners should clarify how maritime information moves between national agencies, fisheries organisations and security-analysis bodies. Common procedures and clear data-access rules can reduce duplication while preserving national control over sensitive information.
Second, maritime assistance should be evaluated across the entire capability lifecycle. Vessel delivery is only one component. Training, maintenance, replacement planning, operating costs and the ability to sustain operations independently are equally important.
Third, regional security cooperation should connect maritime enforcement with economic development and environmental protection. Illegal fishing, climate-related disruption and infrastructure vulnerability cannot be managed effectively if the agencies responsible for security remain disconnected from those responsible for economic planning and resource governance.
These priorities are consistent with the broader direction of Pacific regional cooperation, while leaving room for countries to select arrangements that reflect their circumstances.
For Indonesia, the same logic supports a maritime policy based on national capacity, regional partnerships and practical interoperability rather than institutional expansion alone.
The ultimate objective should be to reduce fragmentation without imposing uniformity: a system in which different institutions can cooperate effectively while retaining their distinct mandates and legitimate national responsibilities.
Maritime Sovereignty Is the Ability to Govern, Not Merely to Possess the Sea
The future of Pacific maritime security will be shaped by more than the balance of naval power between major states. It will also depend on who can monitor maritime activity, interpret information, protect infrastructure, govern fisheries and convert international partnerships into durable national capabilities.
The Pacific’s fragmented security arrangements illustrate both the opportunities and the risks of a region where many actors contribute to maritime governance but no single institution coordinates every relevant function.
For Pacific Island countries, the challenge is to use external partnerships without sacrificing the ability to set their own priorities. For Indonesia, it is to translate geographical advantage into effective maritime governance, sustainable economic returns and greater strategic resilience.
Indonesia should therefore approach the Pacific neither as a distant theatre of great-power rivalry nor merely as an arena for diplomatic competition. It should see the region as a partner in addressing shared maritime challenges and as an important part of the wider oceanic system connecting Southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands and the Indian Ocean.
The most consequential investment may not always be another ship or another security agreement. It may be the institutional capacity to connect information, law enforcement, infrastructure protection, economic development and diplomacy into a coherent national approach.
In the geopolitics of the twenty-first century, maritime sovereignty is not simply the ability to occupy or patrol the sea. It is the ability to understand, govern and sustainably benefit from the maritime domain while retaining the freedom to determine one’s own strategic choices.
For Indonesia, that is the essential connection between the Blue Pacific and national maritime resilience.
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