At the other end, Laos and Cambodia have deep economic dependencies on China. Beijing has invested billions in hydropower, railways, and special economic zones in both countries. Laos owes China debts equivalent to nearly half its GDP, giving Beijing enormous leverage. Cambodia's Hun Sen, now in his fourth decade in power, has repeatedly used Chinese backing to deflect Western criticism of authoritarian governance.

Myanmar's military junta, facing international isolation since the 2021 coup, has little choice but to rely on Beijing and Moscow for diplomatic cover and weapons supplies.

The middle-ground states face their own pressures. Indonesia, ASEAN's largest economy and most populous nation, has historically championed non-alignment. But Chinese coast guard incursions near the Natuna Islands have tested Jakarta's patience. Thailand maintains a decades-old security alliance with the United States while simultaneously pursuing closer defense ties with China—a hedging strategy that looks increasingly unstable.

Malaysia faces a similar dilemma: China is its largest trading partner, but Beijing's claims in the South China Sea overlap with Malaysian oil and gas fields off Sarawak.

The divergence undermines ASEAN centrality—the doctrine that the bloc should remain the primary driver of regional security architecture, balancing major powers rather than choosing sides. That principle worked during the Cold War, when ASEAN states shared common concerns about communist expansion. It worked during the post-Cold War period, when US unipolarity allowed hedging without hard choices.

But as US-China competition intensifies, the middle ground is collapsing. When Cambodia chaired ASEAN in 2012, it blocked a joint communiqué on the South China Sea for the first time in the bloc's history—an explicit favor to Beijing. When the Philippines won a landmark arbitration case against China in 2016, ASEAN as a bloc could not even issue a statement supporting the ruling.

The survey data suggests this fragmentation is deepening. For diplomats in Jakarta, Bangkok, and Singapore who staff the 1,500 annual ASEAN meetings, the challenge is stark: how to maintain consensus when member states have fundamentally opposed security interests.

Ten countries, 700 million people, one region—but increasingly, two incompatible visions of which great power to trust. ASEAN's founders built the bloc on the principle that small states gain strength through unity. The survey suggests that principle is under severe strain.