America’s 2025 National Security Strategy marks one of the most consequential updates to Washington’s regional playbook in more than a decade, with ripple effects extending far beyond the US–China rivalry or the empowerment of Japan as the US’s most consequential Indo-Pacific ally.
For Indonesia, the document is not a distant declaration of great-power intent; it represents a structural shift that will redefine the geopolitical environment in which Jakarta operates.
Indonesia now stands at an inflection point where external power dynamics will increasingly shape its strategic behavior, its regional leadership and the future trajectory of its long-cherished doctrine of an independent and active foreign policy.
The first and most immediate implication for Indonesia comes from Washington’s explicit directive to elevate Japan as a fully mature strategic actor. The NSS encourages Tokyo to transition from a constitutionally restrained defense posture to a more assertive role in regional deterrence.
This shift alters the strategic geometry of East and Southeast Asia. For Indonesia, the consequences are direct: a Japan that plays a more robust security role means the Indo-Pacific’s balance of power will tighten and increasingly operate along a north–south axis.
Japan’s expanding maritime footprint, whether through capacity-building missions, joint exercises or defense technology cooperation, will inevitably draw Southeast Asia into the broader arc of US–Japan security planning. Indonesia, as the region’s largest maritime state, becomes an unavoidable part of this calculus.
Yet the implications extend beyond a more muscular Japan. The NSS reframes the Indo-Pacific as the primary theater where American grand strategy is contested and defended. Unlike earlier doctrines that balanced attention between the Middle East, Europe and Asia, the 2025 document positions the Indo-Pacific as the gravitational center of US national security.
This means a future where every major geopolitical tension, whether over Taiwan, cyber infrastructure, supply chains, or maritime access, will exert pressure to varying degrees on Jakarta. Indonesia’s strategic geography becomes a premium asset for external powers, and its role in shaping regional norms becomes more consequential.
A second implication arises from how the NSS structures the US approach to China. It underscores a long-term strategic competition that is no longer framed in purely military or economic terms; instead, it casts China as a comprehensive challenger to the regional order Washington seeks to preserve. This reframing forces Indonesia to navigate a sharper competitive environment.
Jakarta has long maintained that it is not a claimant in the South China Sea dispute. But with China’s maritime operations edging closer to the Natuna Sea and a Taiwan contingency becoming increasingly central to US regional planning, Indonesia will find it harder to insulate itself from the competing demands of the two superpowers.
The NSS anticipates greater coordination among allies in managing China’s maritime behavior, heightening expectations that Indonesia clarify its position, strengthen its maritime domain awareness and assert a more consistent legal posture – steps that could complicate its delicate balancing act with Beijing.
A third consequence for Indonesia lies in the NSS’s approach to coalition architecture. Washington envisions a region where strategic coordination is distributed across alliances, minilaterals and issue-based coalitions. The document endorses flexible arrangements, such as the Quad and trilateral partnerships, that bypass ASEAN’s consensus-driven structure.
This trend directly challenges Indonesia’s long-standing ambition to keep ASEAN at the center of regional affairs. If coalition-building accelerates outside ASEAN frameworks, Jakarta’s ability to shape security norms and guide Southeast Asia’s diplomatic posture may diminish. The risk is not merely marginalization, but fragmentation of the regional order – one in which Indonesia’s leadership is structurally constrained by the speed and scale of extra-regional coordination.
The NSS also creates opportunities for Indonesia, provided Jakarta acts with strategic clarity. A more assertive Japan, empowered by Washington, could become Indonesia’s most reliable partner for defense modernization.
Japan offers high-quality maritime capabilities, disaster-response technologies and surveillance platforms without carrying the geopolitical baggage that often accompanies US or Chinese systems.
Indonesia could leverage this emerging alignment to accelerate its naval modernization, secure strategic investments and build a maritime security ecosystem that protects sovereignty while preserving strategic autonomy. Doing so, however, requires a deliberate strategy that ensures cooperation with Japan complements, not undermines, Indonesia’s broader foreign policy doctrine.
The NSS also elevates economic security as an integral element of geopolitical competition. This matters for Indonesia, which aims to anchor itself in emerging supply chains for critical minerals, batteries and digital infrastructure. Washington’s emphasis on diversifying global supply lines away from China aligns with Indonesia’s industrial ambitions, particularly in electric vehicles and strategic commodities.
If Jakarta aligns its economic diplomacy with these currents, without alienating Beijing, it can secure investment, technology and market access that enhance its regional economic influence. Failure to anticipate the strategic logic behind US economic initiatives, however, risks leaving Indonesia caught between competing industrial blocs that impose contradictory demands on domestic policy.
Finally, the NSS compels Indonesia to recognize that the era of geopolitical ambiguity is narrowing. As US-China rivalry intensifies and Japan assumes a more explicit security role, Jakarta will face more frequent and consequential decisions on access, transit, diplomatic coordination and security signaling.
The archipelago sits astride the world’s most vital maritime arteries, which will become increasingly contested in any regional crisis scenario. Indonesia must therefore prepare for a future in which strategic neutrality demands greater investment in national capability, diplomatic precision and regional leadership.
The challenge before Indonesia is not simply to avoid entanglement, but to actively shape the environment in which great-power competition unfolds. America’s NSS 2025 accelerates the geopolitical transformation of the Indo-Pacific.
Whether Indonesia emerges strengthened or pressured by this shift will depend on its ability to act with foresight, to modernize its strategic toolkit and articulate a coherent grand strategy befitting a pivotal Indo-Pacific power.
Indonesia no longer enjoys the luxury of strategic deferral. The Indo-Pacific’s power realignment is advancing faster than the region’s mechanisms to absorb it, and states that fail to anticipate the contours will find themselves reacting to an environment shaped by others.
For Jakarta, the imperative is clear: articulate a grand strategy with sharper intent, accelerate defense modernization with disciplined priorities and wield diplomacy capable of withstanding great-power pressures without compromising strategic autonomy.
Indonesia’s ability to navigate this moment will determine whether it emerges as a stabilizing force or a bystander to its own geopolitical future.
Ronny P Sasmita is senior analyst at the Indonesia Strategic and Economics Action Institution
