In 1974, Chinese gunboats attacked and defeated a small South Vietnamese military outpost in the Paracels an archipelago of reefs, atolls, and islets in the South China Sea. Washington (United States of America), February 27 (ANI): A Chinese J-11 fighter jet armed with air-to-air missiles intercepted the US Navy reconnaissance jet over the South China Sea, the Wall Street Journal reported. China has tried to effectively annex the whole South China Sea region as its territorial waters, according to Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI). The United States can, if necessary, accept a continental Southeast Asia that leans China without major concern for Americas primary interests. The most likely single scenario for a major military engagement against a great power adversary would be one against China centered on the South China Sea. The post-war regional order. The United States and the West more broadly can live with such an outcome. We will defend freedom of the seas and skies.. The United States should intensify capacity building efforts with allies and partners to improve their ability to resist Chinese coercion. That line was given little credence or attention in the U.S. or in Asia over the first five decades of the PRCs history. A South China Sea Strategy By Dan Blumenthal, Michael Auslin, and Michael Mazza I. Beware China: America Fights Back In recent years, China's inventive engineering feats have allowed it to. China perceives Vietnam as an obstacle for acquiring its control over this strategic sea. The South China Sea (SCS) consists of over 200 tiny islands, reefs, shoals, atolls and sandbanks grouped in to 3 archipelagos the Spratlys, the Paracels and the Pratas Macclesfield Bank and Scarborough Shoal. To counter China's efforts to control the South China Sea, the United States needs a sustainable strategy to bolster its own capabilities, work more effectively with capable allies and partners, and strengthen the regional order. Chinas militarization and territorial expansion in the South China Sea is illegal and dangerous, Vice President Pence said at the East Asia Summit last year. What is more important from a strategic viewpoint, however, is that global energy projections that the EIA issues in the International Energy Outlook, issued in October 2021, make it clear that China and Asia will have a sharply growing dependence on MENA and Gulf petroleum exports that may well extend through 2050. Its strategic economic importance and its geographic location at the confluence of several spheres of influence have rendered it one of the "world's hotspots". You can update your choices at any time in your settings. The strategic landscape of the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia in the early 1990s was remarkably benign with optimism in full flower. This puts more pressure on Washington to intervene and U.S. allies and partners in Asia are watching carefully and drawing conclusions about U.S. commitment and staying power in the region. Chinas significant increase in spending and capability of its maritime forces is of note. The South China Sea (SCS) has great strategic and economic significance in the contemporary international politico-security environment. Notably, the paper identified Malaysia's maritime claims in the South China Sea as its top security concern. The United States has leverage over China in areas not directly related to South China Sea and may have to consider using or threatening to use these tools to stabilize the regional order. World. If this sounds overstated or overwrought it is not. 1. The second will analyze the strategic landscape in and around the South China Sea. These factors combined give a strategic importance to the South China Sea that has led to numerous states Brunei, the People's Republic of China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam each pressing their own claims to . Japan and South Korea will face a perilous new reality with China in control of the seaborne lifeline of both countries. In the past two weeks, Filipino . U.S. interests in the South China Sea fall into three broad categories including: (1) Economic interests tied to the sea-lanes; (2) Defense ties with allies and other security partners; and (3) Implications for the global balance of power and influence. As building of military facilities continued in 2015, the US explicitly announced its opposition to these constructions and tasked surveillance assets to conduct over flights in the SCS and significantly raised tensions. the South China Sea that would be " - S " ["permitting a leaf to obscure one's view of the mountain"]. What evidence is there of increased projection of Maritime Power? However, there were a number of reasons to conclude that the line was no cartographic anomaly; it was an official indication of Beijings contention that the sovereign territory of China included the South China Sea. U.S. access to the South China Sea is coming under increasing threat as Chinese power increases, but can be preserved if the United States maintains a sufficient military advantage over China. Expanding U.S. access to Vietnamese facilities as described above could eventually render access to Thai facilities somewhat redundant, further weakening the institutional support for the alliance in the United States. Under President Xi Jinping, Beijing has undertaken more assertive policies that have greatly improved Beijings position in the South China Sea. The Strategic Importance of the South China Sea (With reference to the geopolitical, economic, and military aspects) South China Sea is known as one of the most significant and dangerous cluster of Islands in the contemporary world. The South China Sea is not only economically important for Malaysia as a maritime nation, but it is also as important from the perspective of national security. In sum, the United States has built and maintained a dense network of security links and obligations throughout East and Southeast Asia all sustained by regular contact with the Seventh Fleet as it transits the region via the South China Sea. Cobra Gold, hosted by Thailand and led by the United States, is the largest annual multilateral military exercise in Asia. Security, Strategy, and Military Dynamics in South China Sea: Cross-National Perspectives on JSTOR. These straws-in-the-wind gained strategic context because the PRC had long published official maps showing a boundary encompassing almost the entire South China Sea the nine-dash line.. Guidelines for a South China Sea Strategy. No other state in the region can match this increase in projection and rival China due to the economic differences. In particular, shifting explanations for how the United States will manage Chinas rising power and influencealong with the military-heavy implementation of the rebalancehave exacerbated suspicions that Washington seeks to contain Beijings rise. The United States has several enduring advantages that make regional states continue to seek it out as the security partner of choice, including the worlds best military, high favorability ratings in most local populations, and a less threatening foreign policy than that of China. by Geoffrey Hartman LinkedIn and 3rd parties use essential and non-essential cookies to provide, secure, analyze and improve our Services, and to show you relevant ads (including professional and job ads) on and off LinkedIn. More than half of the worlds fishing vessels are in the South China Sea, and millions of people depend on these waters for their food and livelihoods. The area marked with a blue line is based on the UNCLOS 200 nautical mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) relating to each countrys claims and the islands marked in green are the ones over which sovereignty is disputed. China has seized the initiative in the South China Sea, however, and the United States needs to revamp its strategy to reverse current trends and escape the trap of reactive and ineffectual policymaking. From a strategic perspective, the geographical significance of the SCS is that whoever has dominance over it, dominates the future of East Asia. That should, of course, remain the goal, but Washington must recognize that Thailand is in the midst of a decade-long political crisis, which is unlikely to be resolved until after King Bhumibols passing and the royal succession is completed. All countries want positive economic and security ties with both China and the United States. Not taking a position on sovereignty allows the United States to flexibly intervene in the South China Sea to defend its interests and international rules and norms, while undercutting Chinese attempts to paint U.S. actions as a threat to Beijings sovereignty. If Chinese coercion goes unchallenged by the United States, it will send a dangerous signal about the strength of the U.S. alliance system and lessen the appeal of the United States as a security partner. Coral reefs, which are vital to marine habitats, have been declining by 16 percent per decade, according to a report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies. This article aims to highlight security dynamics of the US-China competition in the Indo-Pacific associated with the Malacca Strait and the South China Sea through the prism of Balance of Threat Th. The USA have a direct connection to the area through various allies, connections and trade, and this will naturally continue. Thats why the United States has urged countries to resolve maritime claim disputes peacefully and in accordance with international law. Certainly, the ongoing reform process and the opening of relations with the United States amount to a strategic setback for Chinas position in the region. It is little surprise, then, that Southeast Asian states are drawing closer to the United Statesboth seeking aid in developing their own defense capabilities and hoping that stronger ties act as a deterrent to Chinese assertiveness. Those bases may be vulnerable, but before and at the outbreak of hostilities, they will allow China to project power deep into maritime Southeast Asia, to threaten commercial and military passage through the sea, and to impose and enforce an air defense identification zone. A new arrangement for U.S. naval access to Cam Ranh Bay may well be in the offing. Close allies such as Australia and Japan have a great deal to offer in terms of capability and capacity, and should be encouraged to do more. the South China Sea in all scenarios short of war with the United States." Chinese control of the SCS-and, more generally, Chinese domination of China's near-seas region, meaning the SCS, the East China Sea (ECS), and the Yellow Sea-could substantially aect U.S. strategic, political, and economic interests in the Indo-Pacic region and . South China Sea is a strategic sea lane is significance for connectivity, navigation, trade and resources is a global hotspot as a potential flashpoint. Vietnam and the Philippines have also attempted to form a strategic alliance with Japan in their struggle with China in the SCS. In recent years, U.S. military planners have shifted their focus from counterterrorism, low intensity conflict to great power, high intensity threats. All Rights Reserved. Russian long-range aviation, despite performing frequent combat missions against Ukraine, is also conducting Pacific patrols, sometimes together with Chinese H-6K strategic bombers (Nikkei Asia, November 30). There are certainly other situations involving other challenges, but this is the most plausible and dangerous. All these aspects highlight the strategic indispensability of the South China Sea for global trade routes. Read more, One Woodrow Wilson Plaza1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NWWashington, DC 20004-3027, 2023 The Wilson Center. You are approaching Chinese airspace. Brunei's statement seems to present a unified front with the Philippines and Vietnam, in preparation for its ASEAN chairmanship in 2021, where ASEAN and China hope to finalise the formulation of the code of conduct to reduce tensions in the South China Sea. U.S. responses to Chinas South China Sea activities have been insufficient to alter Chinas behavior and have fed the narrative that China is pushing the United States out of the region. The South China Sea has become important to the US because of China's challenge to the liberal rules-based order that America has promoted since the Pacific war. 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