South China Sea ruling has all sides bracing for fallout

Washington, Beijing and nervous capitals around the Asia-Pacific region are bracing for the fallout from a highly anticipated ruling by an international tribunal on China’s territorial claims in the hotly contested South China Sea, a decision that could set a key precedent in efforts to curb Chinese expansion in the region.

Members of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, based in The Hague, are slated to issue their decision Tuesday over a legal challenge filed by the Philippines against Beijing’s efforts to build up military installations on rocky outcroppings in the Spratly Islands, the Scarborough Shoal, the Fiery Cross Reef and other strategic points in the South China Sea.

U.S. diplomatic and military leaders are hoping a decision against China could establish and reinforce new diplomatic norms in addressing territorial disputes in the South China Sea and elsewhere in the Pacific, but Beijing has boycotted the case and already signaled it does not respect the tribunal’s authority and will not be bound by an adverse decision.

The tribunal’s decision “does have the potential to crack the door open to new [opportunities] among the parties that would help manage tensions in those disputed spaces,” Colin Willett, deputy assistant secretary of state for strategy in East Asian and Pacific affairs, told a congressional hearing late last week.

The decision will be watched closely by Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Japan, all of whom have clashed with China as its expanding and assertive navy has aggressively pressed sovereignty claims in the waters of China’s long Pacific coastline.

“There’s a real game of nerves going on here with China perhaps assuming that the U.S. is bluffing and the U.S. hoping that China will actually not test American resolve,” Hugh White, professor of strategic studies at the Australian National University, told The Associated Press.

On Sunday, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter discussed the looming decision along with other regional security issues with the Philippines’ new Secretary of National Defense Delfin Lorenzana, according to a Pentagon statement. The tribunal’s decision is coming down just days into the term of tough-talking, populist President Rodrigo Duterte.

Both defense chiefs agreed to “consult closely as the ruling is announced” and to “discuss ways to continue to deepen and enhance defense cooperation” between Washington and Manila, Mr. Carter told Mr. Lorenzana.

Mr. Duterte notoriously claimed he would ride a jet ski out to the Spratlys to personally plant the Philippine flag on the disputed island chain, but he has also sent signals he might support Beijing’s preference for direct bilateral talks.

Even though Manila’s efforts to curb Chinese expansion in the South China Sea would likely fall short of such threats, the underlying tensions will only intensify should China decide not to abide by the tribunal’s decision — which Beijing has vowed to do should the ruling not go in its favor, according to the Pentagon’s East Asia chief.

“The ruling will present an opportunity for those in the region to determine whether the Asia-Pacific’s future will be defined by adherence to international laws and norms that have enabled it to prosper or whether the region’s future will be determined by raw calculations of power,” Mr. Denmark said during last week’s House Armed Services Committee hearing.

China insists it has legitimate historical and geographic claims to a broad swath of the South China Sea, which has emerged as one of the world’s most strategic waterways carrying vast amounts of international commercial traffic. Beijing’s preemptive campaign against the legitimacy of the international court’s pending ruling is already setting the stage for increased tensions in the region should the decision go in the Philippines’ favor.

It has also insisted any clashing sovereignty claims should be resolved bilaterally, and has angrily rejected when groups like the G-7 of the Asia-Europe summit meeting later this week in Mongolia weigh in on the issue — usually against Beijing’s claims. “Third parties are only making things worse” was the title of the lead editorial Monday in the government-controlled English-language China Daily newspaper.

Manila in its tribunal filing has also called for a ruling on whether several disputed areas are outcrops, reefs or islands, a move aimed at clarifying the extent of territorial waters they are entitled to or if they can project exclusive economic zones. The built-up outcrops are a key element of Beijing’s expanded sovereignty claims.

Some analysts fear Beijing may escalate the tensions in the event of a loss at the tribunal, perhaps by setting up an air defense identification zone over all or part of the South China Sea, or by militarizing its holdings close to the Philippines.

“The world will be watching to see whether China chooses a path of diplomacy and cooperation or continues to walk a long one of confrontation with its neighbors,” Mr. Denmark added.

Chinese officials characterized the tribunal as “illegal and ridiculous” in a recent op-ed in the state-run Xinhua news agency published last Thursday. Officials called into doubt the “questionable selection” of the body’s members and the court’s history of “flawed jurisdictional findings,” according to the op-ed.

The case is the latest example of China finding itself at odds with Washington and the international community regarding ownership of the territorial waters within the South China Sea and Beijing’s overall regional power struggle in the Pacific.

Cat and mouse

The cat-and-mouse game between China and the U.S. and its allies boiled over in May, when Beijing scrambled a team of fighter jets to track a U.S. warship as it sailed by a disputed patch of land in the heart of the South China Sea. The Obama administration ordered the voyages to underscore the right of navigation in what the U.S. and its allies consider international waters.

Chinese commanders ordered a team of fighter jets into the skies above the Fiery Cross Reef near the Spratly Islands after the USS William P. Lawrence conducted a “freedom of navigation operation” close to the reef, also claimed by Taiwan, Vietnam and the Philippines.

The U.S. ship’s course near the Fiery Cross, which Beijing maintains falls within Chinese territorial waters, was also part of a suspected surveillance mission to observe the 10,000-foot runway newly constructed on the reef, Chinese officials said.

Beijing characterized the incident as an act of provocation, designed to further inflame regional rivalries and embolden U.S. allies to take action against China.

China and the U.S. found themselves sharply at odds on another key security question late last week, when the Defense Department announced the deployment of several long-range missile defense systems in South Korea. China and Russia have both sharply criticized the deployment, in large part for fear the U.S.-operated missile defense system could be used against their own arsenals in a future conflict.

The deployments of the “Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense” — THAAD — system were approved in order to counteract the growing nuclear threat from North Korea. A day before the missile defense systems were sent to South Korea, Pyongyang conducted another ballistic missile test over the Sea of Japan. The test shot of the Bukkeukseong-1 submarine-based missile was confirmed by officials at U.S. Strategic Command.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement issued almost immediately after the deployment was announced that it was “strongly dissatisfied and firmly opposed” to the idea, warning it will only exacerbate tensions in the region and upset the “strategic balance,” according to Xinhua official news service.

Such incidents are clear examples of China’s insistence on not abiding by international rules and norms when it comes to bolstering its position in the Pacific and elsewhere on the world stage.

Beijing’s reaction to Tuesday’s ruling will address that “fundamental issue” facing the U.S. and its allies in the Pacific.

“It’s not about the rocks, it’s about the rules,” Mr. Denmark told House lawmakers. “The world will be watching to see whether China chooses a path of diplomacy and cooperation or continues to walk a long one of confrontation with its neighbors.”