Any military strategist will tell you if you're engaged in a battle, nay, war and open up too many fronts (one good example is Pakistan in its border dispute with India), you can be most vulnerable.

There are many examples of this in ancient China when the country was run by warlords always in the quest for new territorial control. Afghanistan is vulnerable not only because of its continuing legacy of warlord-ism but also because it opens up too many border fronts - north, south, east and west - therefore in perpetual crisis.

Realising this, many Malaysians cannot, therefore, be unconcerned when our country seems to be always at odds with its neighbours both far and near.

Examples:

The inconclusive deal on the supply of water to Singapore and the ban on the use of tudung (head scarf); the labour issue with Indonesia that has led to demonstrations outside the Malaysian embassy in Jakarta; the continuing suspicions in the United States that Malaysia had been used as a launchpad for the Sept 11 terrorist attacks; the concern expressed in Malaysia over the presence of US forces in the region ostensibly to help Filipino forces nab the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group; turning the Hollywood film Black Hawk down into a local controversy, and many more.

Indonesian workers riot

However, the Malaysian media has not reported fully the official views from the other side as to what Indonesia thinks about the Malaysian government's decision not to allow any more Indonesian workers into this country.

In fact, Jakarta immediately ordered all recruiting agents based in Sumatra to stop sending any more workers to Malaysia while angry Indonesians in Jakarta, carrying placards in the streets condemning Malaysia, said we would become 'bankrupt' if we stopped foreign workers from coming.

Certainly rough words have been used at official levels when Indonesia reacted to the latest Malaysian move to start rounding up Indonesian workers and repatriating them home following the riot in Nilai.

One high-level Indonesian official in Jakarta asked Malaysian authorities to investigate the causes for the riot though he acknowledged that the government had every right to take action against those who broke the law.

Did the Indonesians really riot because some of their countryfolk were caught for drug pushing and the like? Or were there other reasons for the action? Was it true that, for instance, Indonesian workers were badly treated as claimed by some Indonesian authorities?

Ill-treatment and exploitation

Most if not all foreign workers who arrive in this country - legally or otherwise - have only one purpose and that is to earn money and send it home to their impoverished families.

So it is not likely they will want to create problems. But if they have been exploited as cheap labour, that is because some employers see the advantage in recruiting workers from some neighbouring countries. Otherwise they would have settled for local workers.

Can Indonesia, therefore, legitimately claim that ill-treatment or exploitation exists because their nationals are paid less than other Malaysians?

It is exactly because there are no prospects for finding jobs at all in Indonesia that many of their men and women risk their lives to cross the Straits of Malacca or cross on foot over dangerous terrains along the common border in Sarawak and Sabah to look for better economic opportunities.

Most Malaysian employers are decent chaps who are into business only to make money and they naturally see a lot of advantage in sourcing for workers from countries with an abundance of unused labour that is useful in the construction and plantation sectors.

Indonesia may be poor, to quote a regular traveller to Jakarta, but it is fiercely nationalistic and remembers for a long time when someone has put salt into its wounds. Thankfully, Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has, as always, displayed a great deal of wisdom and tact in dealing with the problem.

According to newspaper reports, he prefers to hear officially first from the Indonesian government on Malaysia's move to deport illegal immigrants before saying anything else to avoid exacerbating the situation.

But this may be easier said than done, because, according to latest reports, many of the illegal immigrants who have been caught in the round-up exercise are not only without proper travel documents; some have even destroyed them so that it is utterly difficult to tell from which country they come from.

Their reason for doing this is simple - they would rather languish in Malaysian jails where they are guaranteed food and shelter and, who knows, they probably think they can hope against hope that one day they may be allowed to stay in this country.

The Sabah example

Sabah is an example where some politicians of the past foolishly thought refugees from southern Philippines, because they share a common faith, could add to their political strength in the long term.

It has instead become everybody's problem in Sabah. Sabah would have been a much nicer state to live and work in minus the hundreds of thousands of immigrant workers and illegals from Indonesia and southern Philippines today. It's all very sad.

The pressure being mounted by the combined Filipino and US forces in Basilan could drive more Bangsamoro people to Malaysia's easternmost state to swell the number further, according to Sabah's former chief minister Yong Teck Lee.

How is Kuala Lumpur going to respond to this? One way is to scrap the daily ferry service, a move that is going to hurt a lot of genuine traders and travellers. Another is to mount more sea patrols day and night along the common border.

Malaysia may find itself incurring more problems than it is able to solve if the pressure in southern Philippines against the Muslim terrorist groups mounts. It is therefore important Malaysia responds to all this in the most diplomatic way.

There is evidently a strong bias on the part of the West, particularly the US, towards Malaysia because of the outspokenness of our leaders. The feelings are probably mutual. Recent airing of the Hollywood film and US media reports of tragic events in Muslim countries are an indication.

All this is not lost on US diplomats based in Kuala Lumpur and on US tourists who read in local newspapers the frequent anti-US rhetoric by opposition politicians (and sometimes non-opposition figures).

Of course, anyone who knows the US well will know there must be a distinction made in many cases between the views of the US administration and the man-in-the-street in America.

Many Malaysians, including those working or studying in the US, have talked about the warmth, friendliness, understanding and concern of many American citizens for their safety following the Sept 11 incidents. The real danger comes from only from the ultra-nationalists or extremists present in every society.

Sailing ahead

In a recent conversation with a KL-based Singaporean diplomat, I gather that Malaysia is a challenging location (for Singaporean diplomats) but this is hardly surprising because with our long and common history there are obviously to be a lot of sticky issues that crop up from time to time.

And it is not just over water and the tudung but also what may be perceived in most quarters as a relatively minor prick in or bilateral relations - big customers of Singapore Port being openly enticed to leave for Malaysian ports, especially the Port of Tanjung Pelepas (PTP) in Johor.

The island republic has always prided itself in running the world's one-time largest container port, but no thanks to Malaysia it has started to lose some of its shine, and has been relegated to second place behind Hongkong, now the world's largest.

And there is now a real threat it may lose more customers to PTP. The port business is very important to the republic, of course, because it is about sustaining Singapore's role as a global port with all the inherent benefits that come with it such as financing, insurance, ship repair, maintenance, etc.

After losing as a client Maersk-Sealand, the world's largest container line, the Port of Singapore Authority (PSA) is now in real danger of losing another mainline operator, the Evergreen Marine Corporation of Taiwan, the world's third largest shipping line.

These two key players, if they can show they are more than satisfied with PTP's services, can also draw more PSA's customers away not necessarily to PTP but to other equally cost-effective and efficient ports such as Port Klang, the Johor Port, the Penang Port or the Bintulu Port in Sarawak.

Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong has asked outsiders not to interfere in Singapore's internal affairs (over its decision to ban the use of the tudung in its schools) although he never mentioned Malaysia by name.

That Johor has decided not to buy treated water from Singapore goes to show that economic ties between the two countries may be, in the long run, treading on sensitive grounds. What's next from Malaysia?

Domestic issues

Singaporeans must accept as inevitable that their counterparts in Malaysia have moved forward, perhaps faster than they had thought possible.

Perhaps, realising all this and in the interest of good neighbourly relations, we can expect some Malaysian politicians and the media to tone down on hostile or unfriendly rhetoric. Where no direct physical or economic harm can come to us, we should learn to mind our own business.

In fact there is no sense in perpetuating some issues when they can also affect our own long-term interests. Lest we forget, we need to remind ourselves that opening up too many fronts on our home front can only make us more vulnerable.

Instead, we should focus more on coping with and solving domestic problems and issues such as tackling the mess in the banking and financial sector, improving the standards and performance of our public administration, ensuring that our defence is well equipped for any eventuality, raising the standards of corporate governance, promoting the ideals and translating into realities policies of multi-culturalism, making every Malaysian irrespective of race and creed proud of being one and finally facing the challenges that will come when the Asian Free Trade Area (Afta) and World Trade Organisation (WTO) regimes are in place.

TONY THIEN is malaysiakini s correspondent based in Kuching, Sarawak