Marking their territory

I initially refrained from commenting on the US-China naval spat in the South China Sea earlier this month, assuming that it was perhaps a one-off misstep; a faux pas, if you will. These things happen, right? Well, yes, but it would appear that the incident is part and parcel of China's broader attempts to assert itself in the South China Sea or, as James Kraska writes, a careful and deliberate attempt to promote "a vision that de-legitimizes the forward presence of the U.S. Navy in the region." This warrants some commentary.

The FT today reports that China is sending even more navy patrols to the South China Sea, seeking to extend its reach over the disputed Spratly Islands (disputed insofar as they are claimed in full (!) by China, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei). The Chinese have indeed become more aggressive and forward-looking than they were several years ago, both in terms of their hard and soft power strategies. Such activity begs two key questions: first, with respect to the incident in particular, who or at what level in the Chinese government was the incident (de facto harassment) ordered?; and second, with respect to China flexing its naval muscles, what is an appropriate U.S. response?

Gordan Chang writing in RealClearWorld (the global edition of RealClearPolitics) certainly seems to have some thoughts:

Analysts speculate as to Chinese intentions, but in a sense it really does not matter what Beijing is trying to accomplish. Its conduct is simply unacceptable. Washington, however, seeks to establish “dialogue” with China’s generals, admirals, and officials as if their belligerent acts are the result of the lack of contact. It is simply ludicrous for the Obama White House to claim that the Chinese want to “strengthen cooperation” or build a “positive and constructive” relationship after engaging in such truculent behavior.

And it is wrong to suggest that incidents can be avoided in the future if we only increase the level of communication or its frequency. We have had formal and informal military relations with China for decades, and now there is even a brand new mil-to-mil hotline connecting the United States to China. So it is an attack on common sense for the Pentagon to claim that “face-to-face dialogue in Beijing and in Washington will go a long way to clearing up any misunderstanding about this incident.” The problem is not that we don’t talk to the Chinese enough or that we misunderstand them. It is that they are hostile.

The hostile Chinese? David Axe doesn't appear to think so:

To be clear, Beijing and Washington are not enemies, Robert Kaplan stressed in a recent article for Foreign Affairs. Rather, China is a "legitimate peer competitor" of the United States. The task of the U.S. Navy will therefore be to quietly leverage the sea power of its closest allies -- India in the Indian Ocean and Japan in the western Pacific -- to set limits on China's expansion.

One would be hard-pressed to deny China as a "legitimate peer competitor," yet I would argue that some of this legitimacy is lost when harassment is adopted as a strategic tactic. There is nothing wrong with a state wanting to mark its territory; it is the fashion by which it goes about doing so, however, that sets the tone. As the old adage goes, actions speak louder than words.