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America Must Confront China for Ramping Up Belligerence in South China Sea


By: James Di Pane / Erin Leone / December 05, 2023

Read more at https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/12/05/america-must-confront-china-for-ramping-up-belligerence-in-south-china-sea/

China has used everything from warships and cutters to fishing boats to harass and intimidate the Philippines and other regional actors. Pictured: The Philippines’ coast guard takes part in a maritime exercise June 6 with the U.S. and Japan in waters facing the South China Sea. (Photo: Jes Aznar/Getty Images)

COMMENTARY BY

James Di Pane

James Di Pane is a policy analyst focusing on defense policy in the Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy at The Heritage Foundation.

Erin Leone

Erin Leone is a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping last week told the communist regime’s coast guard simply to enforce maritime law, but we all know what that really means—and it has nothing to do with upholding the rule of law on the high seas.

Chinese vessels collided last month with a Philippine resupply boat and a Philippine coast guard ship within the span of a few hours. These confrontations were the latest of many between the two countries over competing territorial claims to a submerged reef called the Second Thomas Shoal, a military outpost in the Spratly Islands some 120 miles from the Philippines. 

This situation underscores the need for America to adopt a robust response in the region and defend its treaty allies from Chinese bullying—before the situation escalates into the next major international conflict.

The Second Thomas Shoal is the site of a critical yet unorthodox Philippine military outpost in the form of a World War II warship run aground on the Spratly Islands, equipped with relatively few marines. The ship’s presence maintains Philippine sovereignty over the shoal, but the vessel remains a liability; its dilapidated state requires frequent resupply missions. In fact, international scrutiny has grown with the belief that the grounded ship may fall off the reef and sink, allowing China to seize the shoal. 

Philippine resupply missions are fodder for increasingly aggressive Chinese vessels that attempt to isolate the post, including the two collisions last month. 

It’s not new that Chinese ships operate within the Second Thomas Shoal, the Spratly Islands, and the Philippine Exclusive Economic Zone. China increasingly has used its “maritime militia” to conduct illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing as well as coercive activities against others who claim the South China Sea.

  • To date, China has used everything from warships and cutters to fishing boats to harass and intimidate the Philippines and other regional actors. 
  • In October, for example, a Chinese naval vessel followed and attempted to cross in front of a Philippine resupply ship near the Spratly Islands.
  • In September, the Philippines accused China’s maritime militia of damaging coral reefs in the Spratly Islands. 
  • In August, a Philippine military supply boat en route to the shoal reportedly was blocked by Chinese coast guard vessels using water cannons.
  • In July, the Philippines noted almost 50 Chinese fishing ships “swarming” around a reef in the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone.
  • And in April, a Chinese coast guard ship came alarmingly close to colliding with a Philippine patrol vessel heading toward Second Thomas Shoal.

China’s escalation from using fishing boats to deploying naval and coast guard ships and increasing the frequency of these dangerous encounters is a clear warning signal that Xi is taking off the gloves. Now that China has succeeded in physically preventing supplies from reaching the shoal, what will its next moves be?

Although the Second Thomas Shoal is over 8,000 miles from the U.S. mainland, China’s belligerent actions there have major implications for America. The Philippines, with a shared wartime experience, is a longstanding treaty ally with which we have enjoyed strong relations for over 75 years. 

During Oct. 22 discussions, Manila and Washington explored the possibility of conducting joint maritime patrols in the South China Sea. The U.S. government has reiterated that any action against Philippine territory in the South China Sea, including islands and shoals claimed by China, would be covered by the U.S.-Philippines mutual defense treaty. Consistent with this, the U.S. could consider joint resupply missions and engage in a persistent, robust naval presence surrounding the shoal. 

A lacking response to China’s prior provocations enabled and empowered Xi to pursue the escalations seen today. China’s illegal fishing and maritime bullying activities in neighbors’ waters are a litmus test to gauge the willingness of the United States and the international community to uphold and enforce maritime law.  America must do a better job of matching Chinese aggression with steadfast deterrence while highlighting China’s blatant violations of international law.

As The Heritage Foundation has pointed out, the U.S. is in a new Cold War with China. The U.S. should help the Philippines develop better airlift capabilities for resupplying and also shadow Philippine ships to deter China from interfering during resupply missions.

What’s happening at the Second Thomas Shoal is a harbinger of events to come if the U.S. permits this multipronged Chinese pressure campaign to destabilize Indo-Pacific security and international law to go unchecked.

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Chinese Military Admits It Just Tested An Intercontinental Ballistic Missile


waving flagReported by Jonah Bennett; National Security/Foreign Policy Reporter

An unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile launches during an operational test from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California at 11:01 p.m. On February 25, 2016. The unarmed Minuteman III missile blasted off from a silo at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California late on Thursday, headed toward a target area near Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands of the South Pacific. REUTERS/Kyla Gifford/U.S. Air Force Photo/Handout via Reuters.

An unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile launches during an operational test from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California at 11:01 p.m. On February 25, 2016. The unarmed Minuteman III missile blasted off from a silo at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California late on Thursday, headed toward a target area near Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands of the South Pacific. REUTERS/Kyla Gifford/U.S. Air Force Photo/Handout via Reuters. ∧

The Chinese Defense Ministry just confirmed it recently tested an intercontinental ballistic missile, sending a strong signal to outside observers, just as disputes over the South China Sea mount. The ministry released a statement saying “technological research experiments conducted according to plan within China’s boundaries are normal and are not aimed at any specific nations or targets,” according to a Thursday Associated Press report.

As usual, the ministry, though tacitly admitting of the launch, did not confirm the location of the test site.

A Tuesday report from the Free Beacon quoted Pentagon officials saying the Chinese military tested a DF-41 missile. What seems clear is the Chinese are working on retooling their ICBMs to carry nuclear warheads, based on testimony from U.S. Strategic Command Adm. Cecil Harry back in January. Additionally, the missile test comes at a time when tensions over the South China Sea are heating up. One of China’s most prominent military officials, Gen. Fan Changlong, paid a visit to the Spratly Islands at roughly the same time Secretary of Defense Ash Carter flew over to the region.

China claims almost the entirety of the South China Sea, and although the Pentagon has not taken any stance on ownership claims, it has urged China to stop building artificial islands and reclaiming land. China appears to have ignored the Pentagon completely and regularly balks when the Pentagon conducts freedom of navigation patrols in the region, saying the U.S. is unnecessarily militarizing the area by developing alliances with other countries under threat by China.

Meanwhile, China is also slowly militarizing its artificial islands, making it more obvious that the purpose of the islands is not purely or even primarily civilian. But to maintain that image, China has paid civilian fishing boats to assert its claims in the region, so that it does not appear as though the military is stepping up efforts to claim the South China Sea as its sovereign territory.

China’s display of force with the DF-41 is significant, given that it has a range of 7,456 miles. This means it can reach any part within the United States.

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US-China war ‘inevitable’ unless Washington drops demands over South China Sea


Warning from state-run China newspaper as Beijing reveals plans for development of disputed South China Sea islands

China’s frigate ‘Yulin’ in action in the South China Sea Photo: GETTY

China’s armed forces are to extend their operations and its air force will become an offensive as well as defensive force for the first time, in a major shift in policy that will strengthen fears of accidental conflict. A policy document by the state council, or cabinet, said China faced a “grave and complex array of security threats”, justifying the change. The People’s Liberation Army, including its navy and air force, will be allowed to “project power” further beyond its borders at sea and more assertively in the air in order to safeguard its maritime possessions, the white paper stated.

Chinese dredging vessels in the waters around Mischief Reef

The navy will add “open seas protection” to a traditional remit of “offshore waters defence”, it said.

The posture risks escalating the tension over disputed islands in the South China Sea and elsewhere in the Pacific, where the United States is determined to protect the interests of allies like Taiwan and the Philippines.

Only last week, a US aircraft ignored repeated warnings from the Chinese military to fly a reconnaissance mission over the islands.

The on-going reclamation by China at Subi reef seen from Pagasa island

Global Times, a tabloid newspaper run by the Communist Party, said that China might have to “accept” there would be conflict with the United States. “If the United States’ bottom line is that China has to halt its activities, then a US-China war is inevitable in the South China Sea”, said the paper, which is often seen as a mouth-piece of hardline nationalists in the government in Beijing.

  • State media reported on Tuesday that Beijing had begun building two lighthouses on reefs in the Spratly Islands, a smattering of outcrops that are claimed by an array of countries including not only China but also Vietnam and the Philippines.
  • Last month, satellite imagery revealed the Chinese had almost completed an air strip on another reef – Fiery Cross – while they are turning another rock, Mischief Reef, into a full island through land reclamation.
  • The Global Times article described the construction of runways, harbour facilities and buildings on the disputed Spratly Islands as the nation’s “most important bottom line”.

Speaking at a press conference in Beijing, Yang Yujun, a spokesman for the Defence Ministry, dismissed international criticism of China’s policies in the South China Sea, claiming the work was the same as building roads and homes on mainland China and that it would benefit “the whole of international society”. “From the perspective of sovereignty, there is absolutely no difference”, he said, adding that “some external countries are also busy meddling in South China Sea affairs”.

Analysts say neither Washington nor Beijing appear to be in the mood to back down and that there is a serious risk of a minor incident in airspace around the islands escalating rapidly. “I think the concern has to be that China misjudges the situation”, said Robert Dujarric, director of the Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies at the Japan campus of Temple University.

“Neither party wants a war if it can be avoided, but there are red lines for both sides”, he said. “I worry whether Beijing considers the US to be a declining power and assumes that Washington will back down if it shoots down a US observation aircraft”.Picture7

Washington chose to “de-escalate” a major crisis that blew up after a Chinese fighter collided with a US Navy intelligence-gathering aircraft off Hainan Island in April 2001. However, Prof. Dujarric said there would be a different response if a similar incident were to occur in what Washington insists is international air space over the South China Sea.

Recent developments have provoked new concerns in the region, with Ma Ying-jeou, the president of Taiwan, calling for the different nations laying claim to the South China Sea to put their differences aside and carry out joint development of natural resources.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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