South China Sea: US-led Southeast Asian strategy to contain Beijing would ‘complicate’ disputes, Chinese experts warn

US think tanks and analysts urge Washington to set up joint regional maritime counter-insurgency strategy aimed at containing China’s expansionist moves
Such a strategy risks making the South China Sea issue more complicated, and even escalating tensions in the region, Chinese expert warns

US-China relations

Minnie Chan

Published: 9:30pm, 9 Jul 2022

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A proposed US strategy to bring together Southeast Asian coastguards and fishery organisations to counter Beijing in the South China Sea would further complicate territorial disputes in the busy waterway, Chinese observers have warned.

This comes after a US think tank and analysts advised Washington to set up a new regional maritime counter-insurgency strategy aimed at containing China’s expansion of maritime territory in the resource-rich sea where several countries have overlapping claims.

Chinese maritime and defence experts warned against the new strategy proposed by the US Naval Institute (USNI), aimed at protecting American political influence in the region and constraining China’s so-called maritime militia – a huge fleet of blue-painted vessels dubbed “little blue men” by Western media.

China has 300 ‘maritime militia’ in Spratlys at any time: US report

Beijing lays claim to nearly all of the strategically important waterway, but this is disputed by Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan.

“The US Coast Guard’s participation in the region will definitely make the South China Sea issue more complicated, and even escalate tensions in the region,” a Beijing-based international law expert said, speaking on condition of anonymity, noting that the Chinese maritime militia forces have a geopolitical advantage over their US counterpart.

Zhang Mingliang, specialist in South China Sea studies at Jinan University in Guangzhou, said such a US-led regional framework was likely to restrict Chinese coastguard and maritime militia’s operations in the area.

“Once the US-led regional maritime enforcing mechanism is built, it will post a great threat and challenge to Chinese maritime militia forces,” Zhang said.

“China’s coastguard and maritime militia forces are much stronger and more capable than their counterparts in Southeast Asian countries. But those weak and disorganised regional maritime forces can become a powerful and unified enforcing mechanism if the Americans come to lead them.”

00:36

It’s our ‘intrinsic territory’, China says amid latest South China Sea dispute with Philippine

Expanding US Coast Guard presence and cooperation in Southeast and South Asia and the Pacific Islands is a key US policy under President Joe Biden, to counter transnational threats and maintain “a free and open Indo-Pacific”.

The focus is on “sustained and creative collaboration … within the region and beyond” on advice, training, deployment and capacity-building, according to a Indo-Pacific Strategy fact sheet released by the White House in February.

In a series of recent USNI research articles, American naval experts expanded on the idea of what they called “maritime counter-insurgency”. Many suggested that US Sea Services – made up of its Navy, Marines and Coast Guard – and its Asian partners and allies jointly develop and deploy an actionable strategy, to counter “maritime insurgency operations” conducted by Chinese coastguards and maritime militia.

China harassing Malaysian oil and gas vessels on ‘daily’ basis: US think tank

Alleging “systematic maritime barbarism” by Chinese coastguard and militia forces to harass and subjugate fishermen in the region, the USNI reports cited Beijing’s moves to mobilise “little blue men” operating in “grey zones” where the US and other countries’ military rules of engagement prevent tough countermeasures.

Such coercive moves, aimed at avoiding costly and hazardous armed conflict over territorial disputes, work to subjugate the more than 3.7 million-strong civilian maritime population of Southeast Asia that depends “on access to the South China Sea for their daily livelihoods”, the reports said.

“[China’s] strategic objective is clear: to overturn the rule of international law that enshrines the long-standing principle of the freedom of the sea, a foundational US national interest,” wrote Hunter Stires, a maritime historical researcher at the US Naval War College.

“To realise this, China does not fight conventionally with the US Navy and its regional partners, but rather circumvents them in the ‘grey zone’ to impose its will directly on the civilians who dwell in places Beijing wishes to make its own.”

01:19

US Vice-President Kamala Harris: China continues to ‘coerce’ and ‘intimidate’ in South China Sea

Collin Koh, a research fellow at Singapore’s Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, said Chinese “grey zone” actions in the South China Sea had had direct and indirect impact on the regional fishing industry due to the claimant countries’ overlapping exclusive economic zones.

“Chinese fishers have long enjoyed consistent support from Beijing aimed at encouraging them to go out there to catch ‘patriotic fish’, especially in the form of such incentives as fuel subsidies,” Koh said.

He said the global energy crisis and spiralling fuel prices had caused at least part of the South China Sea fishing fleets of some Southeast Asian parties becoming non-operational, causing them to inevitably concede ground to China.

South China Sea: calls to honour Hague ruling 5 years on, but Beijing digs in

Washington’s promotion of its Indo-Pacific Strategy would encourage weaker Southeast Asian countries to work together with the US Coast Guard to mount a “more robust pushback against what they perceive to be increasing Chinese aggression [in the region],” Koh said.

“That said, the extent to which they will cooperate with the US will be tempered by their prevailing national interests, which of course includes seeking to maintain buoyant, at least cordial and productive, broader ties with China,” he added.

The Beijing-based law expert said whether it was the USNI’s “maritime counter-insurgency project” or the White House’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, the Americans were clearly studying how semi-military countermeasures could effectively contain a rising and aggressive China, while looking to avoid all-out armed conflict between the two rival powers.

“As an external country, the most effective way for the US to link up with other claimant states in South China Sea disputes to counter China is by following Beijing’s semi-military operations in the ‘grey zone’,” said the expert, who requested anonymity as he is not authorised to discuss the issue in public.

“But China still has geographic advantage due to its close economic ties with regional countries, letting it take the initiative when dealing with other claimant states during one-on-one bilateral talks.”

01:05

Philippine coastguard sends strong warning to Chinese vessels during South China Sea patrol

Macau-based military observer Antony Wong Tong noted that Beijing’s muscle-flexing in the South China Sea was pushing regional neighbours to seek US protection. “China’s use of its powerful coastguard and maritime militia forces to escort Chinese ocean fishing flotillas has pushed South Korea, Japan and the Philippines to work with the US Coast Guard to protect their fishing boats,” he said.

Zhang said Beijing should offer so-called public goods at sea – infrastructure and facilities promised years ago – to help secure peace, stability and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.

‘Only choice is to be friendly, friendly, and more friendly’: China to Manila

Chinese authorities promised to contribute these goods as soon as possible a decade ago, when they began building artificial islands near the Spratly archipelago, all or some of which is also claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei, and Malaysia.

“China should keep its promise and be responsible, letting its neighbours share the developing economic fruits. Otherwise, they are likely to seek support from great powers like the US if they feel insecure when dealing with Beijing,” Zhang warned.