The Construction of an Ideal Indonesian Foreign Policy in Response to the AUKUS Defense Pact

Abstract

AUKUS is a trilateral defense pact between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, with the initial goal of building nuclear-powered submarines and defense cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region. Indonesia's geographical location is close to Australia, as a result of AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines and other Australian defense equipment developed based on the AUKUS agreement have the potential to pass through ASEAN territorial waters that intersect with Indonesia thereby violating the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon Free Zone which is feared will have a significant impact on ASEAN member states, particularly Indonesia. This research will build an ideal and just Indonesian foreign policy to respond to AUKUS. The research was conducted using a normative juridical method with a statutory and conceptual approach. The collection of legal materials was carried out through a literature study and analyzed using a prescriptive method. The results of this research are that Indonesia's free and active political policy is to signify the direction and implementation of international interactions that uphold national sovereignty and interests in determining domestic and foreign policies. Indonesia's ideal foreign policy in response to the AUKUS defense pact is to arrange an international agreement that is legalized in the form of law under the provisions of Article 10 of the Republic of Indonesia Law Number 24 of 2000 concerning International Agreements. The substance of the international agreement arranged must contain the values of Pancasila as the foundation of the state and fulfill the elements of K.J Holsti's foreign policy theory in the form of elements of value, time, types of objective demands, and particular concatenation of assumptions and goals so that the resulting Indonesian foreign policy can respond to the problems faced according to the capacities and policies needed by Indonesia.