Strategic. The United States needs to maintain a difficult balancing act, supporting the democratic aspirations of the Thai people while remaining a security and economic partner of choice for the elites and armed forces. The strategic importance of the South China Sea is mainly due to its geographical location as the area is one of world's busiest and most strategic shipping lanes. The U.S. China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and. Ownership claims to them are used to bolster claims to the surrounding sea and its resources. 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 . Today's world is the US-led where China is a rising giant economically and politically. Countries across the region prioritized economic growth and modernization. These islands are large enough for military runways and well as SAM installations. At the economic front, it is estimated that an annual global trade of $5.3 trillion passes through the SCS. It is a rich source of hydrocarbons and natural resources. Improved governance will lead to stronger economies over the long term and dampen the influence of Chinese dirty money. The security assurances provided by the U.S. military presence coupled with the advent of regional institutions, notably ASEAN and the Asian Development Bank, nurtured that growth. multifaceted fiscal and strategic benefits, acting as a magnet for the regional as well as . Then again, China may see its efforts in the South China Sea blunted. Persistent American military presence at the eastern, southern and western points of the compassespecially when combined with regional states advancing ISR capabilities, for which the United States is providing investmentwould enable the United States to respond rapidly to incidents in disputed island chains or to Chinese attacks on U.S. and allied naval and air assets or on commercial shipping. Whomever is elected to be the next American president, that person would be wise to have in place a Plan B should the TPP fail to pass the Senate this year (such a Plan B is admittedly unlikely, given that both major candidates would bear responsibility for its failure in the first place). Yet, it was and is all of that. Utapao has been suggested as a permanent Southeast Asian Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) hub. The Balloon Incident and Evolution of Espionage. As maritime security such as safety and freedom of . The Art of War helps expose the motivation behind past, current, and future Chinese actions. 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. Moving forward, freedom of navigation and routine presence operations should be executed on a regular basis to demonstrate U.S. resolve to fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows. Select Accept to consent or Reject to decline non-essential cookies for this use. Finally, the United States should prioritize governance issues in its relations with Southeast Asian states. The Tribunal rejects Chinas maritime claims that go beyond the entitlements set out in the Law of the Sea Convention. It would also open the option of persistently jamming Chinese radar installations in the Spratlys. 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. With a new Southeast Asian strategic alignment taking shape as described, geography makes Indonesia and Malaysiaespecially due to its Sabah and Sarawak states on Borneothe regions key swing states. 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. In addition, this thesis intends to propose a solution to the dispute by pulling from a variety of sources. The Asia Program promotes policy debate and intellectual discussions on U.S. interests in the Asia-Pacific as well as political, economic, security, and social issues relating to the worlds most populous and economically dynamic region. Because of its location, this sea is extremely strategic because it connects the Indian and Pacific Oceans (Strait of Malacca). The refusal, likely prompted by Beijing, might seem to be just another way for China to put pressure on Taiwan, which it has long regarded as a renegade province. South China Sea and possible options. But if China continues to play its cards wrong and if the United States proves itself a dependable partner, American warships could one day regularly operate out of Cam Ranh Bay, the strategically located port-of-call, for the first time since the Vietnam War. Hanoi will move cautiously and such access may be limited to the purposes of logistical support for the time being. Thanks to the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA), American power projection capabilities will be regularly present in the Philippines for the first time since the early 1990s. 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. The United States has an interest in seeing that these partners maintain their strategic autonomy, but capacity building efforts to help them resist coercion are not keeping pace with Chinas growing capabilities. Southeast Asia will inevitably be rendered subordinate and compliant to Chinas will. The global focus of economic power has traditionally been centred over the west with the UK and the USA as the key contributors; however in recent years, this has shifted east (see Figure 1), with the main reason for this being rapid urbanization in developing countries, in particular China. As one of the busiest trade routes in the world and home to a wealth of marine and mineral resources, the South China Sea holds great economic and geostrategic importance. It is clear that increased maritime power projection in the SCS, from the Chinese in particular, has upset regional stability, and this is likely to continue. Shortly after the ARF concluded, an official spokesman for the Chinese Defense Ministry asserted Chinas indisputable sovereignty over the South China Sea. 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. It remains entirely plausible that any Chinese strategy could have a long term goal of possessing the power to deny US or western warships access to the SCS, with China largely laying claim to most of the area as it's own waters. Journals and books. In 1989 troops from the Peoples Liberation Army entered Tiananmen Square and terminated the student-led democracy demonstrations and hundreds died. China, of course, has important strengths in Burma. Second, the United States should feel comfortable adopting a patient approach in pushing a return to full democracy in Thailand. With a maturing coast guard, navy and air force, Vietnam will become an increasingly prickly foe. The United States and the West more broadly can live with such an outcome. The South China Sea contains some of the world's most important shipping lanes. U.S. policy in the South China Sea has been overly reliant on military options, which may not always be the most effective response. The strategic signal of an Indian presence in the South China Sea Harsh V. Pant India has wider stakes in South China Sea as nearly 55% of India's trade with the Indo-Pacific region passes through these waters. by M A Hossain 3 March 2023 The geostrategic significance of Bangladesh derives from its strategic location at the crossroads of South and Southeast Asia, endowing it with a pivotal role in the re The 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea is an international treaty that sets out importantmaritime rules. What is the strategic importance of the South China Sea. The United States has been less successful in supporting local partners as they resist Chinese coercion. In sum, the South China Sea is the immediate arena where two alternative geopolitical paradigms are contesting for supremacy. 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). These same sea-lanes are a vital military artery as the U.S. The United States needs to consider a wider variety of non-military responses to Chinas efforts to control the South China Sea, and more effectively build a local coalition to support these responses. Sign up to receive The Evening, a daily brief on the news, events, and people shaping the world of international affairs. The United States now has the opportunity to secure for another generation the peace that has held in Asia for nearly four decades now. NEW DELHI (The Straits Times/Asia News Network): Singapore's Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan urged China and the US to de-escalate tensions in the Taiwan Strait and the South . 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. by Geoffrey Hartman The power politics, military interests created the South China Sea more important. The USSJohn C. Stennistied up there for a few days in April. Such access would complement the renewed U.S. presence in the Philippines; facilitate a regular American presence in the western part of the South China Sea; enable the United States to more easily defendor seal upthe Malacca Strait; and, it should be noted, put American forces within striking distance of major Chinese bases on Hainan, including port facilities that host Chinas ballistic missile submarines. Since 2014, China has stepped up the construction of artificial islands over the disputed Spratlys and Paracels in the SCS, causing an escalation of tensions, upsetting stability. The two major power of the world i.e. The third will assess the policies/strategies currently employed by the United States in this arena as well as other plausible options. 2016 The Arbitration Tribunal rules in favor of the Philippines. Enduring U.S. interestsfreedom of navigation and overflight, support for the rules-based international order, and the peaceful resolution of disputesare at risk in the region. The post-war regional order. Cooperation on areas of shared interest is important not only to the United States, but also to China. 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. Vietnam's coastline bordering the South China Sea is over 3,000 kilometers long. The primary challenge to American regional predominance came from Maoist China first through the Korean War and then via communist insurgencies throughout Southeast Asia culminating in the Vietnam War (1963-75). In a context of great power competition, the South China Sea (SCS) has emerged as an arena of U.S.-China strategic competition. The strategically important South China Sea is an increasingly prominent stage for the spiraling tensions . This principled stand allows the United States to defend its interests without embroiling itself in the murky sovereignty claims at the heart of the South China Sea dispute. South China Sea or even some part of its strategically significant zones will provide the sovereign nation state significant seat in global trade agreements. With Burma internationally isolated for much of the past three decades, Beijing invested heavily in that countrys leadership. European access to Asia will be through Beijing. In addition to conventional concerns about territorial defense, the South China Sea is also important for China because of its nationalist claims to all of the tiny land . Diplomatic, informational, legal, and economic responses are currently underrepresented in U.S. China policy, and their incorporation into the policy toolkit will be important for successfully dissuading China over the long-term. Marcos Jr. had previously said his country would pursue oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea even without a deal with China, which claims almost all of the 1.3 million square mile South . Tokyo and Manila agreed to a strategic partnership in 2011. American littoral combat ships are rotating through Singapore, at the South China Seas western extremis, and the city-state has also quietly built the only Asian port outside of Yokohama at which an American aircraft carrier can dock. The strategic landscape of the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia in the early 1990s was remarkably benign with optimism in full flower. Strategic Landscape of the South China Sea: While geopolitics indicates geographical relations with politics, there is another importance which is strategic. It is unlikely that any states in the region possess the wealth and power to oppose this, although there is always a realistic possibility that they may receive backing from the USA if it is in their interests. China has steadily built capabilities and infrastructure, most notably military facilities on artificial islands, that enable greater control of the South China Sea. In a meeting attended by the foreign ministers of 26 nations from the broader region, Clinton simply asserted that the South China Sea was subject to multiple territorial claims and a multinational mechanism should be established to find a peaceful diplomatic solution. In particular, Chinas growing assertiveness over sovereignty and maritime rights in the South China Sea could be assessed as a serious challenge to the status quo in the region. 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). A third of the world's shipping passes through it, its fisheries are critical sources of food for millions of people. 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. According to the U.S. State Department, it has been estimated that China is effectively blocking the development of $2.5 trillion worth of oil and gas resources in the South China Sea. director of the South China Sea Strategic Situation Probing Initiative at Peking . How that competition will evolve remains to be seen, but the very fact of the contest should be understood as a reversal of fortune for China. 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. The geopolitical message was unmistakable: Western expectations that China was transitioning toward political democracy were entirely illusory. Historically, Taiwan's pivotal location off the China coast and between Northeast and Southeast Asia has served a variety of strategic purposes for regional powers, both offensive and defensive. The largest and most powerful of these . In this article, let us look at the strategic importance of the South China Sea, History of the South China Sea Dispute, countries involved, causes, impacts, India's stand on the dispute and the way forward for the UPSC IAS Examination. In the contemporary era, Taiwan remains geographically at the intersection of most of East Asia's danger points. Sun Tzu Explains China's Shaping Operations in the South China Sea. Importance of South China Sea The South China Sea is a busy international waterway, one of the main arteries of global trade worth more than $5 trillion and is growing year on year. Several countries in the area, including China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia, make overlapping sovereignty claims over the islands and maritime rights in the SCS. The Korean War produced formal defense treaties with each of these countries plus a new, permanent military presence in South Korea. But the South China Sea has been dangerously overfished. Chinese missiles on the mainland already hold all U.S. Asian bases at risk. President Musharraf requested China to invest in this important strategic chokepoint in the Indian Ocean., to which China agreed. The United States also faces a challenge in enforcing international law in the South China Sea. As the new administration sets out to revamp U.S. strategy in the South China Sea, it should keep the following guidelines in mind: Although Chinese cooperation is necessary to address some regional and global issuessuch as North Koreas belligerent behavior and climate changethe United States should not be held hostage by concerns that a more robust deterrence strategy will thwart bilateral cooperation. Giving ground on vital interests in Asia will not encourage greater cooperation on global issues. 2013 The Philippines challenges Chinas claims of historic rights and other actions in an arbitration case under the Law of the Sea Convention. It can receive large aircraft (including C-17s and C-130s); it is close to a deep seaport; and it has infrastructure capable of handling command and control systems. To understand the statement we have to have a particular knowledge over the issue and have to look over the geopolitical and strategic importance of South China Sea. In such a complex environment, it is important to have well-established, recognizable rules of international law. Since 2009, China has growingly asserted its influence over the SCS by enforcing an annual fishing ban, conducting regular maritime patrols, undertaking scientific surveys and conducting military exercises in the disputed islands and waters. Check out the linked article on the Belt and road initiative now. The strategic importance of the SCS is mainly due to its geographical location, as the area is one of the world's busiest and most strategic shipping lanes. - Interview with Ana Krstinovska, Russia's Growing Influence in the Middle East: an interview with Alexander Hoffmann, Serbia's Uneasy Balance Between Moscow and the EU: an interview with Suzana Grubjesic, Gulf States' Economic Momentum: an interview with Omar Al-Ubaydli, Prospects for Turkey-EU Relations Amid Tensions, Need to Cooperate and Lack of Trust: an interview with Nilgn Arsan Eralp, Germany's Shifting Stance in the Greek-Turkish Dispute: an interview with Ioannis P. Sotiropoulos, Bulgaria's Economic Perspectives amid Political Uncertainty and Challenges, Saudi Arabia's Reforms, Relations with the United States, and Choice of New Allies: an interview with David H. 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Speaking to Anadolu Agency on Thursday, Bonji Ohara, a senior fellow at the Tokyo-based Sasakawa Peace Foundation, said the marginal sea is key to China's security. Follow the Asia Program on Twitter @AsiaProgram. China, Russia and the Munich Security Conference. Due to the strategic importance of the area, China will continue to establish a maritime power in the SCS as the most dominant player among states in the region. This button displays the currently selected search type. Sign up to receive ShareAmerica updates. In addition, tensions have been raised with the Philippines after assertive Chinese naval patrols which they described as aggressive action. This is the first of three short essays examining the South China Sea as a first order strategic problem for the United States. The three core areas that must be defended and secured are the Malay Peninsula, Sabah and Sarawak. China, for example, has asserted a maritime claim to a large majority of the South China Sea that is not consistent with international law. Thus, it is said that the South China Sea could be the battleground of World War III. Leung, The Consequences of Conquest: Why Indo-Pacific Power Hinges on Taiwan, United States vs China: from Partnership to Antagonism - Interview with Alfredo Toro Hardy, How the Ukraine War changes Global Geopolitics, What The Economist omits to address in President Xi's vision of a global security order, Armenia: Trapped in Between Interview with Gayane Novikova, How Chinas COVID Policy Reversal Impacts Globally: an interview with Neeraj Singh Manha, Marcos-Xi Durian Diplomacy Climbs to Higher Gear, Is the EU Really Willing to Enlarge in the Western Balkans? The message will be clear; the era of American international leadership and predominance is over and a new preeminent power has taken its place. or join us on Facebook. A new arrangement for U.S. naval access to Cam Ranh Bay may well be in the offing. Seventh Fleet patrolled the regions seaways, including the South China Sea, unchallenged including agreed access to ports throughout much of the region. . Most of China's global trade is seaborne. Read more, One Woodrow Wilson Plaza1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NWWashington, DC 20004-3027, 2023 The Wilson Center. Talks are focused on articles that are relevant to disaster relief, but the agreements eventual parameters could expand as the U.S.-Vietnam security relationship matures.