China, Geopolitics, and the Global South
Uwe Hoering, July 17, 2024
The situation in Southeast Asia’s waters, commonly referred to as the South China Sea, is serious, but not hopeless. Serious because the skirmishes between China and the Philippines are tinkering with a new fuse for an explosive device. But not hopeless, because no one can really have any interest in a military conflict here.
A Gordian knot
The alliance of Southeast Asian nations, ASEAN, is once again spreading optimism that it will be able to conclude talks with China on a code of conduct within two years in order to reduce the risks of conflict in the South China Sea. The conflicts are old. Most countries are laying claim to parts of the sea area with its many islands. There are historical claims, such as those made by China with its ’10 or 9-dash line’. There are rights arising from international regulations on territorial waters and economic zones. And there are substantial economic interests in resources such as fish, oil and natural gas.
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For decades, the conflicts in the region, through which a significant share of world trade passes, largely simmered on a low heat, occasionally becoming violent, as between Vietnam and China in 1974 over the Paracel Islands. All the countries around the sea have been busy occupying islands, expanding bases and building up land, with powerful China being the most successful. This also included linguistic reclaiming: what is generally regarded as the South China Sea is the West Philippine Sea from the perspective of Manila, and the East Sea from the perspective of Hanoi. However, there have always been some efforts to unravel the Gordian knot and establish rules of conduct based on regional agreements and international law.
This has not yet been achieved. The differences in opinion are too pronounced. Two of the many obstacles to reaching an agreement: Beijing has so far rejected legally binding regulations. And many governments of the ten ASEAN countries are reluctant to take sides, to tackle the hot potato so as not to alienate either side, i.e. neither Beijing nor Vietnam or the Philippines. But the current escalation over the Spratly Islands is making it ever more urgent to find a peaceful solution.
Creating facts, without weapons so far
In the meanwhile, neighboring countries are challenging China’s claims more and more openly. Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia are exploring oil and gas fields in disputed sea areas. In particular, however, the government of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr in Manila, in office since the summer of 2022, is asserting its claims vigorously, after decades of policies aimed at not provoking Beijing. Manila’s standing was strengthened by the ruling of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in July 2016, a decision that Beijing does not recognize. The coast guards and fishing boats of both countries are increasingly involved in skirmishes around the Second Thomas Shoal atoll, and the rhetoric is becoming more and more combative. The Philippine government has the backing of the USA, with which it has a mutual defense pact. Military cooperation is being expanded with new US bases, arms deliveries and maneuvers (see Newsletter 27/January 2024). At the same time, allegations are being raised about President Marcos’ ambitions to turn the country into a regional power. On the other hand, the government is also trying to maintain good relations with China, by far its most important trading partner.
In contrast, the relationship between China and Vietnam is quite different, although here, too, the clash of competing interests has been very harsh. Vietnam has massively expanded ports and other infrastructure on the Spratly Islands without Beijing reacting as harshly as it did over the Second Thomas Shoal. Despite improved relationships with the USA, Hanoi has never left any doubt that it is adhering to a non-aligned foreign policy. Similarly, most other ASEAN countries are using the competition between China and the USA for a self-confident balancing act in terms of security and economic policy.
„A dress rehearsal for Taiwan“
In particular, the claims made by the People’s Republic of China, which are actually shared by Taiwan, are quite controversial, if not downright questionable. However, the USA’s reaction to China’s refusal to integrate into the international order as a junior partner on the terms of the West also contributes to the rigid stance and worsening of conflicts. The announcement of an increased military, economic and political presence in the Asia-Pacific region by President Obama’s administration a decade ago (‘Pivot to Asia’) raised fears of containment and encirclement in Beijing. Since then, the USA has declared the region to be a test case for the new rules-based world order it has defined: under the banner of ‘Free and Open Indo Pacific’, although free trade was never threatened by the regional disputes. Now nationalism and military build-up, especially of the Chinese naval forces, are being interpreted as confirmation that there is a threat from China.
As a result, the ‘Island Chain Strategy’, a string of naval bases established by the US in the 1950s during the Korean War as a “line of defense” against the Soviet Union and China, is gaining contemporary geopolitical and military strategic relevance: Now, from Beijing’s perspective, the South China Sea is becoming an outlying area in the event of further escalation, a buffer for the coastal regions of mainland China with their industrial areas. And with the Philippines at the very front line, the region will become another stage for the showdown between the US and China.
“The question of Philippine territorial integrity would be superseded by the question of maintaining U.S. primacy in the Western Pacific,” concludes Sebastian Strangio in the July issue of The Diplomat Magazine. Former US National Security Advisor Matt Pottinger, who is considered a Trump buddy, is already framing the skirmishes over the Second Thomas Shoal as a Chinese “dress rehearsal for Taiwan” and calling for an “airlift” to support the Philippine presence on the atoll, similar to that of Berlin during the Cold War. In this convoluted situation, German armed forces are proudly flying the flag.
So while the situation in the region is hopelessly muddled, it is not actually serious. It would only become really serious if the governments allowed themselves to be drawn into another regional war as a spin-off of the broader conflict between China and the USA. The disputes with the Philippines provide a second fuse alongside Taiwan that could go off at any time, even if nobody in the region can really have any desire for this to happen.
Siehe Renato Cruz De Castro, Exploring the Philippines’ Evolving Grand Strategy in the Face of China’s Maritime Expansion: From the Aquino Administration to the Marcos Administration. In: Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs 2024, Vol. 43(1), 94–119
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)