Pushback in the South China Sea

Pushback in the South China Sea

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A satellite image taken in March showed Chinese vessels in the Spratly Islands. Credit Digitalglobe/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The United States has good reason to push back more forcefully against China’s grab for power in the South China Sea, as Defense Secretary Ashton Carter did on a trip to Asia this week. Beijing has repeatedly ignored earlier warnings to moderate the aggressive behavior that is unsettling its regional neighbors and further undermining its relations with the United States.

On Friday, American officials disclosed that China had installed two mobile artillery vehicles on an artificial island it is building in the sea, which is rich in natural resources like oil and gas and where China clearly hopes to establish some form of hegemony.

The weapons are not considered a threat to American naval forces. Still, they reinforce fears that China intends to militarize the Spratly Islands, a collection of reefs and rocks also claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Taiwan, and use them to control the waterway’s shipping lanes and dominate its smaller neighbors.

China’s ambitions have become increasingly clear since 2012 when it publicly asserted a claim to 80 percent of the South China Sea. In recent months, photographic evidence from commercial satellites and American spy planes has left little doubt that China is moving with alarming speed to turn the Spratlys into more substantial land masses, complete with runways and harbors.

Some American officials now believe China regards its claims in the South China Sea as nonnegotiable. If so, that’s terrible news for the region but also ultimately for China, which claims it prizes stability but will find it impossible to realize its economic goals if Asia is in constant tension. China’s bullying on the South China Sea has already caused many Asian countries to forge closer defense ties with the United States.

Now, the Obama administration has decided to more firmly underscore America’s intention to remain a Pacific power and to ensure that the region and its waters remain accessible to all nations. That is a role the United States has played constructively for decades, promoting a stability that has allowed Japan, South Korea and other countries, including China, to develop. “There should be no mistake: the United States will fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows, as forces do around the world,” Mr. Carter said in his speech. He also called for “an immediate and lasting halt to land reclamation by all claimants.”

Although the administration would obviously prefer a peaceful resolution of all South China Sea disputes, it cannot allow China’s claims to go unchallenged. It sent a surveillance plane close to one of China’s artificial islands, is considering air and sea patrols that could go closer to disputed reefs and shoals, and is expanding military exercises with regional partners.

President Obama and President Xi Jinping of China plan to meet later this year. In the meantime, American officials and their Chinese counterparts must avoid any miscalculation that could lead to a direct confrontation.

NYT

China Says It Could Set Up Air Defense Zone in South China Sea

BEIJING — A Chinese admiral said on Sunday that Beijing could set up an air defense zone above disputed areas of the South China Sea if it felt it was facing a large enough threat, according to Chinese news media.

Adm. Sun Jianguo, deputy chief of staff of the People’s Liberation Army, told a regional security forum in Singapore that China had not said it would create a so-called air defense identification zone, but that any decision would be based on an aerial threat assessment and the general security situation. He also said other nations should not overemphasize the issue.

The creation of an air defense zone would be viewed by the United States and Southeast Asian nations as a huge provocation. In recent years, foreign officials have speculated whether one of Beijing’s next moves in the South China Sea would be to set up such a zone, whose existence would further solidify China’s military presence in the waters.

In November 2013, to the dismay of Japan and the United States, China declared an air defense identification zone over disputed waters in the East China Sea. Chinese military aircraft began requiring all other aircraft flying through the zone to identify themselves, and commercial airliners complied, though the United States sent B-52 bombers through the zone without advance warning to challenge Beijing.

Admiral Sun’s remarks came during a question-and-answer session after he delivered the main Chinese speech at the annual Shangri-La Dialogue security conference in Singapore. As at previous such meetings, much of the focus of the conference, which ended on Sunday, was on territorial disputes in the South China Sea, where China, Taiwan and Southeast Asian nations all have competing claims to waters, islands, reefs, shoals and sandbars. In recent weeks, the United States has criticized China for island-building and land reclamation efforts on disputed reefs and atolls that were uninhabited until recently.

On Saturday, Ashton B. Carter, the United States defense secretary, reiterated an earlier demand for China and other nations to stop such island-building. The United States has said that China is building much faster than any other nation and has completed 2,000 acres of land reclamation in the last 18 months. Vietnam and the Philippines have built structures on some land formations, but much of that construction took place before 2002, when China and rival claimants to territory signed a nonbinding agreement to cease any provocative activity in the region.

About a month ago, the United States military spotted a pair of mobile artillery vehicles on one of the new islands, but those soon vanished, American officials said last week. China has said its islands will be used for maritime aid as well as military defense.

“China and the Chinese military have never feared the devil or an evil force, and we are convinced by reason but not by hegemony,” Admiral Sun said on Sunday, according to a transcript of his speech posted by the Chinese Defense Ministry. “Don’t ever expect us to surrender to devious heresies or a mighty power. And don’t ever expect us to swallow the bitter fruits that would harm our sovereignty, security and development interests.”

He added that the United States was guilty of hypocrisy, since it had criticized China’s military deployment on the islands while its officials had, at the same time, said they would bring weapons of their own to bear on the regional situation.

China has maintained that its right to construction is based on its understanding that the territory belongs to China. On Saturday, Hua Chunying, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, released a long, six-point rebuttal to Mr. Carter’s statements, including some phrases that Admiral Sun also used, saying that “the U.S. side made inappropriate remarks on China’s longstanding sovereignty as well as rights and interests in the South China Sea to foment dissension and criticized China’s normal and justified construction activities on islands and reefs.”

Admiral Sun said Sunday that the situation in the South China Sea had been “peaceful and stable” and that there was no problem with freedom of navigation in the sea.

He added that China remained committed to resolving the disputes with its neighbors through talks. But China has long insisted that any such talks be undertaken bilaterally, not by more than two countries at a time.

“We can’t enter the 21st century with our bodies alone while leaving our heads in the past, under the limits of colonial expansionism, a Cold War mentality and a zero-sum game,” he said, adding that China wanted to promote “win-win cooperation.”

The United States and countries in the region say China’s actions are taking place at the expense of other nations’ interests and are jeopardizing diplomatic relations. Most notably, in May 2014, China placed an exploratory oil rig near the Vietnamese coast and off the shores of the Paracel Islands, land formations also claimed by Vietnam. That prompted daily clashes between Chinese Coast Guard vessels and Vietnamese boats, along with deadly rioting in Vietnamese cities against factories perceived to have Chinese workers.

In a possible sign of the growing importance of the Chinese Navy, Admiral Sun was the first naval officer appointed by Beijing to lead its delegation to the Shangri-La Dialogue since China began attending in 2007. He was also the most senior military officer to lead the delegation since 2011.

Admiral Sun, 63, is the only naval officer in the current eight-person leadership of the People’s Liberation Army general staff headquarters, which oversees the navy. He joined the navy at age 16, when he began a decade of training at the main submarine college. He then served for many years as a captain of both conventional and nuclear submarines, earning the nickname Iron Captain. In 1985, he commanded a crew for a voyage of 90 days straight on a nuclear submarine, breaking a record held by the United States Navy, according to a report on the website of The People’s Daily, the flagship Communist Party newspaper. He was promoted to the rank of admiral in 2011.

Admiral Sun’s submarine background dovetails with the growing emphasis of the Chinese military on open-water force projection. On Tuesday, the Chinese military issued a strategy paper, its first in two years, that said it intended to project naval power in the open ocean in addition to defending coastal waters.

NYT