China has lost an important international legal case over control of strategic reefs and atolls that it asserts give it the right to control much of the South China Sea. It has been rapidly militarizing some of these features to cow other nations with claims in the region, through which goes 30 percent of world trade in physical things.
But expansionist dictatorships have a tendency to ignore international law.
The judgment by an international tribunal in The Hague overwhelmingly favors claims by the Philippines and will intensify diplomatic pressure on Beijing to scale back military expansion in this geopolitically very sensitive area.
As The Guardian noted, “By depriving certain outcrops of territorial-generating status, the ruling effectively punches holes in China’s all-encompassing ‘nine-dash’ line that goes almost ridiculously far into the South China Sea, far, far away from China.
China predictably denounced the verdict, which declares large areas of the sea to be neutral international waters or in the exclusive economic zones of other countries. Xinhua, the country’s official news agency, attacked what it called an “ill-founded” ruling that was “naturally null and void”.
The Communist Party newspaper the People’s Daily said that the tribunal had ignored “basic truths” and “tramped” on international laws and norms. “The Chinese government and the Chinese people firmly oppose [the ruling] and will neither acknowledge it nor accept it,” it added.
The tribunal declared that “although Chinese navigators and fishermen, as well as those of other states, had historically made use of the islands in the South China Sea, there was no evidence that China had historically exercised exclusive control over the waters or their resources.”
China has strongly criticized Japan over a scramble of military aircraft from the two countries amid a dispute over islands in the East China Sea.
Japan is in an old dispute with China over ownership of a group of islands northeast of Taiwan, known as the Senkakus in Japan and the Diaoyus in China.
The Chinese Defense Ministry said that two Japanese fighter jets took “provocative actions” at a high speed near a pair of Chinese fighter jets patrolling the sea on June 17.
The Japanese planes used radar to “light up” the Chinese aircraft, the Chinese statement added. Japan has acknowledged that there was a scramble but has denied that there was any radar lock.
“The Japanese plane’s provocative actions caused an accident in the air, endangering the safety of personnel on both sides, and destroying the peace and stability in the region,” China’s Defense Ministry said.
Japan has accused China of escalating military activity in the East China Sea, saying that Japanese emergency scrambles to counter Chinese jets have almost doubled over the past three months.
Reuters reports that Japan “is worried that China is escalating its activity in the East China Sea in response to Tokyo’s pledge to support countries in Southeast Asia, including the Philippines and Vietnam, that oppose China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea.”
China is saber-rattling this week in the South China Sea in advance of an international legal ruling that might put into even more doubt China’s claims to much of the sea. The government of President Xi Jinping has sent extra naval vessels into the waters.
The court will rule on whether the Philippines has the right to exploit waters also claimed by China.
A ruling could cast into doubt China’s vast claims in the region, through which about 30 percent of world trade goes through. But Beijing has refused to recognize the court’s authority.
As Chinese expansionism fuels fears all over East Asia, Japan plans to buy new fighter jets worth a total as much as $40 billion. Japan is increasingly worried about Chinese aggression in the East China Sea, where there are a number of islands whose ownership the two nations dispute. It’s also worried about Chinese militarization of the South China Sea, which could threaten freedom of navigation in some of the world’s most important shipping lanes.
The Japan Times reported: “The program will dwarf most recent fighter jet deals in value, likely attracting global contractor interest. But analysts say Japan’s preference for an aircraft that can operate closely with the U.S. military, given close Washington-Tokyo ties, makes a non-U.S. option a long shot.”
Japan seeks a kind of warplane that will let it maintain air superiority over China. China’s warplanes still lag behind those used by the U.S. and its allies, but Beijing has been building its capability, fueling a more muscular security agenda under Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
U.S. officials say that at least one Chinese military ship tailed the USS John C. Stennis , an aircraft carrier, daily during its recent cruise through the South China Sea. But The Washington Post, in another of its frequent updates on tensions in the sea, said that no hostile incidents were reported.
The P0st reported that “Despite lingering suspicions, the two navies have been gradually expanding contacts and have agreed to protocols to avoid unintended incidents at sea.’’
(June 13th, 2016) A poll of Australians suggest that most believe that China has become the most influential nation in the Asia-Pacific region and that more want stronger ties with the rising superpower than with the U.S., The Guardian reported.
Enthusiasm for a strong U.S. role in the Asia-Pacific was also significantly lower in Australia than in South Korea, Indonesia, Japan and even China in some cases, according to the research released on Wednesday by the University of Sydney’s U.S .Studies Centre and regional partners.
The Guardian reported that “More Australians (70%) were likely to see Beijing and Washington as ‘competitors’ than even the Chinese citizens surveyed (50%), though the poll also found a significant lack of regional awareness among Australian respondents, 42% of whom were not aware that Japan was a U.S. ally.”
Only the South Koreans and the Japanese felt generally positive about the U.S. role in the region.
James Brown, a research director at the U.S. Studies Center, told The Guardian that the results suggested Australians “remain seized by the narrative that U.S. power is declining in the region” and had a “a benevolent view” of the rivalry between China and the U.S. and “might not automatically identify with Japanese concerns over China” – including disputes over islands in the South China Sea.
(June 13th, 2016) In the context of China’s repeated incursions into Japanese territorial waters in the East China Sea and attempts to dominate the South China Sea by military force, Japan, India and the United States will hold major trilateral naval exercises off the east coast of Okinawa Prefecture through June 17, the Japan Maritime Self Defense Forces said June 7.
The large-scale exercises are part of an annual event that since last year has included Japan as a permanent member.
The Japan Times reported that drills, “which will focus on anti-submarine warfare and air-defense training, are likely to bolster ties among the three allies.’’
China has been rapidly bolstering its submarine and other naval forces in the East China and South China Seas for the past several years, worrying other nations in the Asia/Pacific region.
(June 13th, 2016) Scarborough Shoal, in the South China Sea, may be becoming a line in the sand against Chinese militaristic expansionism in that sea, most of which China claims. China seized and occupied the shoal in 2012.
It is unclear what the United States and nations friendly to it in the region would do if China continues to seize and militarize reefs and islands in the sea.
China has warned that it might respond to an unfavorable international arbitration ruling against its claim to the “island’’ in favor of the Philippines by putting structures on the shoal to give it a military outpost very close to the Philippines’s door. Chinese Admiral Sun Jianguo says China will not accept the tribunal’s ruling, expected sometime this summer.
Speaking at a Singapore forum, U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said that the U.S., as an ally of the Philippines, would take action, without elaborating. Hit this link for more information.
(June 6th, 2016) NATO’s top military officer, Gen. Petr Pavel, has denounced U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump for calling the alliance obsolete and said that such comments played into the hands of its opponents.
Chairman of NATO’s military committee Petr Pavel speaks to Reuters on the sidelines of the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su
In unusual criticism of a presidential candidate, Pavel, chairman of the NATO Military Committee, said that Russian “President (Vladimir) Putin and some others may be pleased by this approach”.
“To take such an approach would be a great mistake,” he said.
Mr. Trump has criticized the NATO alliance, created in 1949, as allegedly obsolete and too costly for America.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was set up in a different era, Trump has said, when the main threat to the West was the Soviet Union. He said that it was ill-suited to fighting terrorism.
Pavel, a former Czech Republic army chief, said the NATO alliance formed in 1949 was not perfect but it had great potential to protect the security of members.
He also said about Chinese expansionism in the South China Sea:
“Freedom of navigation in this region, through the South China Sea, is crucial for any further development in the region and it’s difficult to imagine that without this freedom, there will be stability and peace in this region.’’ For more information, read this link.
