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SEOUL, South Korea — Both the United States and the Philippines are agonizing over their ability to deter China as confrontations between an under-resourced Manila and an expansionist Beijing increase.
While security issues in East Asia are multiple — North Korea’s nuclear threat, Chinese claims to Japanese-administered islands in the East China Sea, Chinese intimidation of Taiwan — senior U.S. officials, officers and congressional researchers have been concentrating on the flashpoint South China Sea.
Tensions over disputed maritime territories there are escalating, with barely a week going by without an incident.
On Saturday, Beijing and Manila traded accusations over who rammed whom in an incident in which Chinese and Philippine vessels physically clashed in disputed waters off Sabina Shoal, which lies just 87 miles west of the Philippines and 746 miles south of China.
Similar tensions had arisen exactly one week prior.
The U.S. stands ready
Earlier, at an Indo-Pacific Command conference held last week in the Philippines, the senior U.S. officer in the region said his command stood ready to act — if so ordered.
“We certainly have prepared a range of options and USINDOPACOM stands ready, if so called, after consultations in accordance with the treaty to execute those shoulder to shoulder with our ally,” U.S. Indo-Pacific Commander, Adm. Samuel Paparo told a conference in the Philippines this week, The Associated Press reported.
He declined to detail those measures, stating that would enable a potential adversary to design countermeasures. However, he did say he was open to consultations on U.S. vessels escorting Philippine vessels carrying out operations in the disputed waters.
That drew immediate ire in Beijing.
State-run media Global Times editorialized that the step would “… only fan the flames and encourage Manila to make more infringing provocations.”
Chinese newswire Xinhua stated, “Illegally intruding into China’s territories in the South China Sea while portraying itself as the victim, the Philippines is perfectly employing the age-old tactic of the thief crying ‘stop thief!’”
Ignoring a 2016 international arbitration which found for the Philippines, China claims most of the South China Sea.
Chinese media claims Beijing’s “sovereignty” over maritime features, and insists on the “illegality” of other states’ claims, but declines to detail any ethical, geographical or legal argument backing that stance in international fora.
Adm. Paparo was speaking at a joint press conference with the Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief of Staff Gen. Romero Brawner Jr., on the sidelines of an annual security dialogue in the Philippine city of Baguio, home to the Philippines Military Academy.
Philippine discomfort
One question is whether Manila is prepared to invoke its mutual defense treaty with Washington. Articles IV and V of the treaty mention “armed attack” as a trigger for invocation, but the two-word term is not clarified.
This lack of detail in the 1951 document is proving problematic in 2024.
China, in its “salami slicing” takeover of maritime features of the South China Sea, has, per August research by the U.S. Congress, constructed 13 bases on the waterway’s reefs and islets. Twelve include helipads, four include large harbors, four include large, fixed-wing pads, and four include missile platforms.
China’s creeping advance across the waterway is being spearheaded not by the powerful PLA Navy, but by the Chinese coast guard. Tactics used include rammings, water cannonings and laser firings, as well as flare drops by aircraft and area denial using centrally directed fleets of fishing vessels.
Critically, China’s advancing forces are not firing weapons of war.
Manila’s point man on security expressed frustration at Beijing’s infiltration through gaps in the mutual defense treaty (MDT).
“I think we should broaden the scope of MDT to face a dynamic and cunning adversary,” Secretary of National Defense Gilbert Teodoro Jr. said this week, when asked about the issue by Philippine reporters.
Earlier, in prepared statements, he had said, “The MDT itself between the United States and the Philippines is a great deterrent, and I think it is important that it should be interpreted dynamically, and the biggest danger for us is to narrow down or canalize our operational limitations.”
The issue is on the minds of persons other than Amd. Paparo and Mr. Teodoro.
Is the U.S. ready to counter China’s advance?
The U.S. Congressional Research Service updated on Aug. 26 a 123-page report, “U.S.-China Strategic Competition in South and East China Seas: Background and Issues for Congress.”
The report lists issues central to the U.S. strategic interest, ranging from the rule of law and freedom of navigation to support for allies and contesting China’s hegemonic regional claims.
The major question the report raised is whether Washington has the will and means to support these strategic interests.
“The issue for Congress is whether the Administration’s strategy for competing strategically with China in the [South China and East China Seas] is appropriate and correctly resourced, and whether Congress should approve, reject, or modify the strategy, the level of resources for implementing it, or both,” the report stated. “Decisions that Congress makes on these issues could substantially affect U.S. strategic, political, and economic interests in the Indo-Pacific region and elsewhere.”
These questions are especially germane given that — for the first time since 2001 — not a single U.S. carrier strike group is currently patrolling the region.
Even though these flagship U.S. force-projection assets are expected to return to Indo-Pacific, the overstretch that the globally deployed U.S. armed forces face, compared to China’s PLA and PLA Navy, which are predominantly based in the region, is striking.
The PLAN currently fields two carrier strike groups, with a third carrier undergoing sea trials and a fourth under construction. Moreover, the four bases in the South China Sea that boast jet runways are de facto “unsinkable aircraft carriers.”
When it comes to the gray-zone assets that are prosecuting China’s strategy — predominantly Coast Guard vessels and maritime militias — the disparity is even more striking.
This lopsided strategic reality may explain high-level U.S. calls for deconfliction.
U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan recently held meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping and one of his key military advisers, Gen. Zhang Youxia.
In a press conference, Mr. Sullivan admitted his talks involved “vigorous give and take” and covered “tough issues in areas of disagreement,” but said, “We believe that competition with China does not have to lead to conflict or confrontation.”
According to a White House readout, Mr. Sullivan and Gen. Zhang “… recognized the progress in sustained, regular military-military communications, as directed by President Biden and President Xi … [and] planned to hold a theater commander telephone call in the near future.”
A call between Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi is also anticipated in the coming weeks.
Even so, Mr. Sullivan admitted, “We did not reach any specific agreements” on South China Sea disputes, saying those must be negotiated between Beijing and Manila.
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.
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