Thinking high of power, countries will talk with each others by warships. But if armed conflict occurs, all involved parties will be harmed. The change of approach way is necessary from all parties.
To harmonize China’s rising, the US’s attitude is the key. The role of the US in the order of Asia-Pacific after the cold war is defined via two pillars. The first is the military umbrella of the region with the function of a sheriff of its Fleet 7 and its military facilities in the region.
Experts say that besides its impressive growth rate, in terms of quantity, Beijing’s naval strategy is still limited and it is power is exaggerated in some cases.
A scholar from the US Naval Research Institute says that over 60 submarines owned by the Chinese army are sourced from Russia and they lag behind standards of the West.
Kirchberger from the Hamburg University also says that Chinese navy is ranked in the last group of marine powers, besides Japan or South Korea. These countries’ naval power is restricted in a region. The first group comprises only the US, which has global strength. The second group includes countries with global strength but restricted in some targets like the UK and France. The third group is countries with inter-regional power like India and Russia.
In addition, China’s access to military technology is held back by western powers, owning to strategic reasons, in comparison with that of countries with similar naval development as India or Japan.
Secondly, the security mechanism in Asia-Pacific is mainly based on bilateral alliances between the US and its strategic or semi-strategic alliances, from high to low levels. To maintain its influence in the region, this country has built a strategic fence, consisting five alliances – Japan, South Korea, Australia, the Philippines, Thailand, an important security partner – Singapore, and many logistic countries – Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia. It also maintains its presence on the mainland and patrol fleet of Guam.
The US’s attitude on the East Sea disputes has been consistent in recent years: remaining neutral in disputes over island sovereignty, supporting freedom of navigation and protesting infringement and self delimitation of territorial waters.
This attitude is seen as appropriate for Washington because it guarantees the US’ interests and helps avoid direct involvement in disputes. However, with rising challenges from the US, this policy seems to be no longer appropriate.
A multilateral forum to solve territorial disputes, with the third countries as intermedia, in which the US is a coordinator or a supporter besides the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) may be a better choice. By this way, the US does not involve in disputes but involves in solving disputes, through which protecting its interests and win the support of countries in the region.
Japan and Australia have showed their support to settle the East Sea disputes by multilateral efforts. Japan’s Yomiuri Shimbun emphasizes in an article that Japan and the US need to actively assist ASEAN to reduce tension in the East Sea.
Recently, seven member states of ASEAN, including Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Laos and Singapore, raised a common call in New York for seeking a peaceful solution and the application of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea to solve the East Sea disputes.
For ASEAN, calling for the participation of the third parties will help implement soft balancing to reduce the gap of power against China. The solution for the East Sea is not an armed race or establishment of military alliances. These are only means of deterrence to force all parties to join negotiation.
It is necessary to repeat of the role of international public opinion in protesting acts that go contrary to common values, such as protesting the use of forces to solve disputes or national sovereignty infringement.
International public opinion is not warships, weapons, etc. to roll back unilateral activities using forces but the voice of international community is very important. Without legitimacy in actions, power is only violence.
Institutionalism is the target, with soft balance and establishing interest alliances through institution and public opinion as rocks to pay the way to the target. More importantly, it is the determination to negotiate a new order in the East Sea via international institutions and the trust in a new order, in which law and rules guide every behavior.
On that view, the public security creating mechanism, conducted by ASEAN (with the supoort of the US and its alliances), may be a good start for the long process to solve the East Sea disputes.
Nguyen Chinh Tam
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