Opinion | In countering China, the US must not lose its knack for nuanced diplomacy
- America’s ability to provide leadership and stability in a dangerous world depends on its skill in managing complexities
- While it must support allies and resist Chinese aggression, it may lose balance if it believes in black-and-white narrative of virtuous allies and evil Chinese
For 10 days in July, a familiar kind of conflict occurred in the Pacific. One Asian country had piled concrete on a tiny rock, then called the rock an island and declared a 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone around it.
Another country was conducting freedom of navigation operations inside that zone, declaring that the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea does not permit exclusive economic zones around rocks built up into artificial islands.
Familiar – except that the country that had built a rock into an artificial island and declared an illegal exclusive economic zone was Japan. The country conducting freedom of navigation operations (ostensibly a survey) was China.
The rocks in question, Okinotori, which Japan calls its southernmost territory, are way out in the Pacific between Taiwan and Guam, vastly farther from Japan than the South China Sea islands are from China. The Japanese transformation of a minuscule rock there into an artificial island began years ago.
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The squabble over Okinotori was important news in Japan but did not make the cut in most US media. It does not fit the prevailing narrative, which is that evil China does bad things like building up phoney islands and making illegal claims while the virtuous US and Japan strive to uphold international law.