The past decade has witnessed a significant shift in the EU's foreign and security policy towards Asia, especially following the Union's 'pivot to Asia' in 2012. In 2018, the adoption of the Council conclusions on enhanced EU security cooperation in and with Asia denotes the Union's ambition to increase its security and geopolitical leverage and visibility in Asia. Against this backdrop, this paper aims to examine the new dynamics and main characteristics of the EU's recent security-related policies and activities in East Asia by drawing on the concept of the capability-expectations gap. Using this concept, this paper seeks to provide a holistic understanding of the EU's capabilities in its relations with Asia, as well as EU internal actors' and Asian actors' expectations about the Union's role in Asian security affairs.

In a declining liberal order within the context of great power competition, the European Union needs a more realist and geopolitical approach, including the creation of an EU capability of global projection to gain credibility and influence as a global actor. Thus, the centrality of the Indo-Pacific in this new scenario should motivate an “EU pivot to Asia”. Nevertheless, the EU has still not moved in that direction on its own and should establish a clear strategy toward the Indo-Pacific. However, there is a growing security relationship of EU member states (above all France, and until recently the United Kingdom) with Indo-Pacific powers like India, Japan, Australia, and Vietnam, and the incipient German interest in a more visible joint European presence. This represents a clear turn towards this new approach.

The recent wave of China's acquisitions has expanded the perimeter of FDI screening based on national security grounds in many advanced economies. Only a few good shave been generally part of this protected perimeter, consistently with the methodology proposed by Theodore H. Moran according to which trade works as a safety net to compensate for the unexpected unavailability of a critical good. The recent Covid-19 pandemic has revealed that import might be unavailable or controlled by providers whose nationality might hinder the effective availability. Amidst the emergency, European States have extended protection against foreign acquisitions to the manufacturing of personal protective equipment; this new wave of protectionism for cheap and low-tech goods would have been hardly justified, before Covid- 19, according to Moran's methodology.

Since 2012, China' assertive policy toward the South China Sea dispute has led to increasing geopolitical competition that affects one of the most important trading routes. To engage with the South China Sea dispute, the EU, however, faces sets of hardly compatible roles, which would be either an offshore player or an onshore fighter, either a soft-power influencer or a hard-power enforcer. Despite ambitions to be a global maritime security provider, the EU is restrained by the division of Member States and thus, has to adopt an offshore position strategically. The EU, on the one hand, expresses disapproval of China's policy without shaking the overall EU-China strategic partnership and on the other hand, prioritizes security and defense cooperation with other claimants and extra-regional stakeholders without building any formal alliances. Instrumentally, this article specifically sheds light on the EU's diplomatic instruments, the role of the French navy and European arms sales to Southeast Asia. China's opposition to internationalize the South China Sea dispute and its following countermeasures offset the EU's diplomatic approach. Accordingly, the EU is developing coercive measures to promote its visibility in the South China Sea.