A proposed 60-40 split favoring the Philippines over China in rights to any oil or gas discovered together in a contested sea helps Beijing protect an iffy but valuable diplomatic relationship with Manila and prove its neighborly credentials in other parts of Asia, analysts say.

The foreign minister under Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was quoted saying July 31 Beijing is willing to take the minority stake in any fossil fuel discoveries found under a tract of the South China Sea where the two countries have competing sovereignty claims.

A minority stake for China would help Beijing prove itself to a skeptical Philippine public, analysts say. Philippine President Duterte has sought strong relations with China since he took office in 2016 by laying aside their maritime sovereignty dispute. China has offered aid and investment in return. But polls have shown many Filipinos still do not trust China.

The two countries once vied bitterly over the South China Sea, culminating in Manila’s victory in a world arbitration case two years ago.

“This plan for the government has received a lot of criticisms, because others would argue if these areas are in the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines, that belongs to the Philippines and it should not be shared,” said Maria Ela Atienza, political science professor at the University of the Philippines Diliman.

Unsettled dispute, Chinese military strength

Duterte advocates friendly ties with China because, he says, the Philippines could not win a war with the country. China, which commands Asia’s strongest armed forces, has built military installations on three islets in the Spratly Islands, a South China Sea archipelago that each side claims as its own. Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam also dispute rights to the Spratlys.

​Chinese vessels pushed Filipino fishing boats out of Scarborough Shoal near the Philippine island Luzon in 2012, plunging relations and leading to the arbitration case that wrapped up in 2016.

Some Filipinos cite constitutional issues with letting China explore for fuel under a sea that the Philippines calls its own. Others point to private oil firms, for example from Japan, that are willing to develop undersea gas and oil without a sovereignty hassle, Atienza said.

Goodwill toward the Philippines

China, if it inks the deal, would be taking 40 percent to show goodwill toward the Philippines, which might otherwise tap China’s geopolitical rival the United States for help, experts say.

“Joint development in the Philippines is a contentious issue with respect to provisions in the Constitution,” said Carl Thayer, a Southeast Asia-specialized emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

“By agreeing to a lesser portion, China seeks to disarm domestic opposition by Filipinos,” he said. “President Duterte has taken a more conciliatory stance and China is eager to capitalize on this, hoping to pressure other states to follow suit.”

A deal to explore off the coast of the Philippine island Palawan with a consortium of private firms would also give the government a 60 percent share of revenues.

A message for other Asian countries

China wants to placate not just the Philippine but also other Southeast Asian countries with competing maritime claims, analysts believe. Shows of goodwill could mute impacts of the arbitration ruling, which rejected the legal basis for Chinese maritime claims, and stop other countries from seeking aid from the United States, they argue.

A conciliatory oil deal could resonate around Asia where China is developing infrastructure as part of its $1 trillion, 5-year-old Belt and Road initiative, said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

Beijing wants to keep favor with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations as the two sides discuss a code of conduct for avoiding accidents in the disputed sea, he added.

“I think this is one way of signaling that China is willing to be different kind of aid giver,” Chong said. “And then I think China wants to help Rodrigo Duterte a little, because he’s facing a lot of criticism from his own countrymen about selling out to China, ‘you’re being cozy with China, and you’re not getting very much in return.’”

China’s end of the deal

China might not go for a 60-40 deal requiring that a Chinese drilling company get a license from the Philippines under Philippine law, said Gregory Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative under the American think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies.

But a purely commercial license could eliminate political disputes, said Alexander Huang, strategic studies professor at Tamkang University in Taiwan.

China might not come through on its pledge, he warned. “China sometimes does not have the good reputation of fulfilling its capital commitment,” he said. “From the very beginning there are many reports, but sometimes the funding [is] not met.”
…

A proposed 60-40 split favoring the Philippines over China in rights to any oil or gas discovered together in a contested sea helps Beijing protect an iffy but valuable diplomatic relationship with Manila and prove its neighborly credentials in other parts of Asia, analysts say.

The foreign minister under Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was quoted saying July 31 Beijing is willing to take the minority stake in any fossil fuel discoveries found under a tract of the South China Sea where the two countries have competing sovereignty claims.

A minority stake for China would help Beijing prove itself to a skeptical Philippine public, analysts say. Philippine President Duterte has sought strong relations with China since he took office in 2016 by laying aside their maritime sovereignty dispute. China has offered aid and investment in return. But polls have shown many Filipinos still do not trust China.

The two countries once vied bitterly over the South China Sea, culminating in Manila’s victory in a world arbitration case two years ago.

“This plan for the government has received a lot of criticisms, because others would argue if these areas are in the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines, that belongs to the Philippines and it should not be shared,” said Maria Ela Atienza, political science professor at the University of the Philippines Diliman.

Unsettled dispute, Chinese military strength

Duterte advocates friendly ties with China because, he says, the Philippines could not win a war with the country. China, which commands Asia’s strongest armed forces, has built military installations on three islets in the Spratly Islands, a South China Sea archipelago that each side claims as its own. Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam also dispute rights to the Spratlys.

​Chinese vessels pushed Filipino fishing boats out of Scarborough Shoal near the Philippine island Luzon in 2012, plunging relations and leading to the arbitration case that wrapped up in 2016.

Some Filipinos cite constitutional issues with letting China explore for fuel under a sea that the Philippines calls its own. Others point to private oil firms, for example from Japan, that are willing to develop undersea gas and oil without a sovereignty hassle, Atienza said.

Goodwill toward the Philippines

China, if it inks the deal, would be taking 40 percent to show goodwill toward the Philippines, which might otherwise tap China’s geopolitical rival the United States for help, experts say.

“Joint development in the Philippines is a contentious issue with respect to provisions in the Constitution,” said Carl Thayer, a Southeast Asia-specialized emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

“By agreeing to a lesser portion, China seeks to disarm domestic opposition by Filipinos,” he said. “President Duterte has taken a more conciliatory stance and China is eager to capitalize on this, hoping to pressure other states to follow suit.”

A deal to explore off the coast of the Philippine island Palawan with a consortium of private firms would also give the government a 60 percent share of revenues.

A message for other Asian countries

China wants to placate not just the Philippine but also other Southeast Asian countries with competing maritime claims, analysts believe. Shows of goodwill could mute impacts of the arbitration ruling, which rejected the legal basis for Chinese maritime claims, and stop other countries from seeking aid from the United States, they argue.

A conciliatory oil deal could resonate around Asia where China is developing infrastructure as part of its $1 trillion, 5-year-old Belt and Road initiative, said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

Beijing wants to keep favor with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations as the two sides discuss a code of conduct for avoiding accidents in the disputed sea, he added.

“I think this is one way of signaling that China is willing to be different kind of aid giver,” Chong said. “And then I think China wants to help Rodrigo Duterte a little, because he’s facing a lot of criticism from his own countrymen about selling out to China, ‘you’re being cozy with China, and you’re not getting very much in return.’”

China’s end of the deal

China might not go for a 60-40 deal requiring that a Chinese drilling company get a license from the Philippines under Philippine law, said Gregory Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative under the American think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies.

But a purely commercial license could eliminate political disputes, said Alexander Huang, strategic studies professor at Tamkang University in Taiwan.

China might not come through on its pledge, he warned. “China sometimes does not have the good reputation of fulfilling its capital commitment,” he said. “From the very beginning there are many reports, but sometimes the funding [is] not met.”
…

Beijing has stationed its first permanent search and rescue ship in a hotly disputed part of the South China Sea as a public relations move after alarming smaller countries with a military buildup in the same waters, analysts say.

The Ministry of Transport in China sent the vessel, called South Sea Rescue 115, to the Spratly Islands on July 27, the official Xinhua News Agency said. The vessel can work in storm gales and waves up to six meters high, according to Xinhua. It’s also equipped with a helicopter pad. More such vessels will be built, the agency added.

The ministry’s Rescue and Salvage Bureau will “consistently improve its standby mechanism in the South China Sea region to better carry out maritime rescue duties and obligations under international treaties,” bureau head Wang Zhenliang said as quoted by Xinhua.

China may have sent and publicized this vessel’s deployment to look good after angering other states over militarization, experts say.

“The whole thing about making big announcements about like having a humanitarian activity is kind of just trying to put a friendly veneer on top of what is pretty clearly militarization and just trying to kind of like brainwash,” said Jonathan Spangler, director of the South China Sea Think Tank in Taipei.

Military buildup

Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam contest all or part of Beijing’s claims to about 90 percent of the South China Sea including the Spratly Islands. The sea, which covers 3.5 million square kilometers, is prized for fisheries, oil, natural gas and shipping lanes.

China cites historical records to support its claims. Over the past decade it has used landfill to expand some of the sea’s tiny islets. That expansion, followed in some cases by military installations, irritates other claimants as China has the region’s strongest armed forces.

“China might try and sort of take the heat off the military function by publicizing the search and rescue function, but I don’t think that’s really going to alter perceptions,” said Euan Graham, international security director with the Lowy Institute for International Policy in Sydney.

“There is a sort of PR war going on, but I think China’s ability to win that PR war is much less than it was a few years ago just because I think the military dimension has become more open, more difficult to hide,” he said.

Chinese military vessels and aircraft preceded the search-and-rescue vessel, he noted, so China is putting its “cart before the horse.”

Other countries offering aid

Beijing may hope its search-and-rescue ship will help it catch up to other governments, analysts believe.

Chinese political rival Taiwan does search and rescue work from its base at Taiping Island, the largest in the Spratly chain. A Taiwanese coast guard official said in 2015 his agency had rescued non-Taiwanese fishermen from storms in the Spratlys.

Last year, Australian troops did a disaster relief exercise with the Philippines in a bay along the South China Sea.

And Japan’s Izumo-class helicopter-carrying warship can do humanitarian work as well as rescues, said Collin Koh, maritime security research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Japan sent the ship into the South China Sea in mid-2017.

Australia and Japan do not claim any part of the sea but oppose any exclusive use of it by China.

Philippines watching

In the Philippines, which holds nine islets in the Spratly chain, policymakers may see the search-and-rescue vessel as a dubious though overdue gesture, said Maria Ela Atienza, political science professor at the University of the Philippines Diliman.

The two countries have gotten along over the past two years, but the Philippine Star news website said in May China had set a “red line” with the Philippines, saying uninhabited islets should stay that way.

China “could play a bigger role in the region” when civilians are hurt, Atienza said. Filipinos scorned China for perceived lack of aid after Typhoon Yolanda killed more than 6,000 people in the Philippines in 2013, she said.

“From a diplomatic perspective, it can be considered good neighborly action,” Atienza said. “(China) has not played that kind of a role in recent cases where rescue operations are needed.”

Economic aid

Beijing has been particularly image conscious since 2016, when it lost a world arbitration court verdict over the legal basis for its South China Sea claims.

China rejected the verdict but began building up relations after that with the Southeast Asian maritime claimants by offering development aid and investment in infrastructure construction. China commands the world’s second largest economy, dwarfing those of Southeast Asia.

Countries with “greater power” and China’s level of resources also have a greater responsibility to offer humanitarian aid, Spangler said.
…

Beijing has stationed its first permanent search and rescue ship in a hotly disputed part of the South China Sea as a public relations move after alarming smaller countries with a military buildup in the same waters, analysts say.

The Ministry of Transport in China sent the vessel, called South Sea Rescue 115, to the Spratly Islands on July 27, the official Xinhua News Agency said. The vessel can work in storm gales and waves up to six meters high, according to Xinhua. It’s also equipped with a helicopter pad. More such vessels will be built, the agency added.

The ministry’s Rescue and Salvage Bureau will “consistently improve its standby mechanism in the South China Sea region to better carry out maritime rescue duties and obligations under international treaties,” bureau head Wang Zhenliang said as quoted by Xinhua.

China may have sent and publicized this vessel’s deployment to look good after angering other states over militarization, experts say.

“The whole thing about making big announcements about like having a humanitarian activity is kind of just trying to put a friendly veneer on top of what is pretty clearly militarization and just trying to kind of like brainwash,” said Jonathan Spangler, director of the South China Sea Think Tank in Taipei.

Military buildup

Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam contest all or part of Beijing’s claims to about 90 percent of the South China Sea including the Spratly Islands. The sea, which covers 3.5 million square kilometers, is prized for fisheries, oil, natural gas and shipping lanes.

China cites historical records to support its claims. Over the past decade it has used landfill to expand some of the sea’s tiny islets. That expansion, followed in some cases by military installations, irritates other claimants as China has the region’s strongest armed forces.

“China might try and sort of take the heat off the military function by publicizing the search and rescue function, but I don’t think that’s really going to alter perceptions,” said Euan Graham, international security director with the Lowy Institute for International Policy in Sydney.

“There is a sort of PR war going on, but I think China’s ability to win that PR war is much less than it was a few years ago just because I think the military dimension has become more open, more difficult to hide,” he said.

Chinese military vessels and aircraft preceded the search-and-rescue vessel, he noted, so China is putting its “cart before the horse.”

Other countries offering aid

Beijing may hope its search-and-rescue ship will help it catch up to other governments, analysts believe.

Chinese political rival Taiwan does search and rescue work from its base at Taiping Island, the largest in the Spratly chain. A Taiwanese coast guard official said in 2015 his agency had rescued non-Taiwanese fishermen from storms in the Spratlys.

Last year, Australian troops did a disaster relief exercise with the Philippines in a bay along the South China Sea.

And Japan’s Izumo-class helicopter-carrying warship can do humanitarian work as well as rescues, said Collin Koh, maritime security research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Japan sent the ship into the South China Sea in mid-2017.

Australia and Japan do not claim any part of the sea but oppose any exclusive use of it by China.

Philippines watching

In the Philippines, which holds nine islets in the Spratly chain, policymakers may see the search-and-rescue vessel as a dubious though overdue gesture, said Maria Ela Atienza, political science professor at the University of the Philippines Diliman.

The two countries have gotten along over the past two years, but the Philippine Star news website said in May China had set a “red line” with the Philippines, saying uninhabited islets should stay that way.

China “could play a bigger role in the region” when civilians are hurt, Atienza said. Filipinos scorned China for perceived lack of aid after Typhoon Yolanda killed more than 6,000 people in the Philippines in 2013, she said.

“From a diplomatic perspective, it can be considered good neighborly action,” Atienza said. “(China) has not played that kind of a role in recent cases where rescue operations are needed.”

Economic aid

Beijing has been particularly image conscious since 2016, when it lost a world arbitration court verdict over the legal basis for its South China Sea claims.

China rejected the verdict but began building up relations after that with the Southeast Asian maritime claimants by offering development aid and investment in infrastructure construction. China commands the world’s second largest economy, dwarfing those of Southeast Asia.

Countries with “greater power” and China’s level of resources also have a greater responsibility to offer humanitarian aid, Spangler said.
…

The Philippines has expressed concern to China over an increasing number of Chinese radio messages warning Philippine aircraft and ships to stay away from newly fortified islands and other territories in the South China Sea claimed by both countries, officials said Monday.

A Philippine government report seen by The Associated Press showed that in the second half of last year alone, Philippine military aircraft received such Chinese radio warnings at least 46 times while patrolling near artificial islands built by China in the South China Sea’s Spratly archipelago.

The Chinese radio messages were “meant to step up their tactics to our pilots conducting maritime air surveillance in the West Philippine Sea,” the report said, using the Philippine name for the South China Sea.

Philippine officials have raised their concern twice over the radio transmissions, including in a meeting with Chinese counterparts in Manila earlier this year that focused on the Asian countries’ long-unresolved territorial disputes, according to two officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue publicly.

It’s a new problem that emerged after China transformed seven disputed reefs into islands using dredged sand in the Spratlys, where the new islands now stand in close proximity to islands occupied by Vietnam, the Philippines and Taiwan. Malaysia and Brunei are the other claimants to the chain of islands and barren islets and atolls.

The messages used to originate from Chinese coast guard ships in past years but military officials suspect transmissions now are also being sent from the Beijing-held artificial islands, where far more powerful communications and surveillance equipment has been installed along with weapons such as surface-to-air missiles.

“Our ships and aircraft have observed an increase in radio queries that appear to originate from new land-based facilities in the South China Sea,” Commander Clay Doss, public affairs officer of the U.S. 7th Fleet, told the AP by email in response to questions about the Chinese messages.

“These communications do not affect our operations,” Doss said.

Although the U.S. lays no claims to the strategic waterway, its Navy has deployed ships and aircraft to patrol the region in a security presence it says is aimed at promoting freedom of navigation and overflight, but which China protests as foreign meddling in an Asian dispute.

U.S. Navy ships and aircraft communicate routinely with regional navies, including the Chinese navy. “The vast majority of these communications are professional, and when that is not the case, those issues are addressed by appropriate diplomatic and military channels,” Doss said.

A Philippine air force plane on patrol near the Chinese-held islands received a particularly offensive radio message in late January when it was warned by Chinese forces that it was “endangering the security of the Chinese reef. Leave immediately and keep off to avoid misunderstanding,” according to the Philippine government report.

Shortly afterward, the plane received a veiled threat: “Philippine military aircraft, I am warning you again, leave immediately or you will pay the possible consequences.” The Filipino pilot later “sighted two flare warning signals from the reef,” said the report, which identified the Chinese-occupied island as Gaven Reef.

Chinese Embassy officials did not immediately reply to requests for comment but Beijing officials have repeatedly said they have the right to build on what they say is their territory and defend their sovereignty at all costs.

Philippine air force chief Lt. Gen. Galileo Gerard Rio Kintanar Jr. said Filipino pilots respond calmly to the Chinese radio messages and proceed with their mission as planned, adding that the higher number of reported radio challenges reflects the Philippine military’s commitment to protect the country’s territorial interests through intensified patrols.

“They do that because of their claim to that area and we have a standard response and proceed with what we’re doing,” Kintanar said.

In April last year, Chinese forces attempted by radio to drive away two Philippine military aircraft carrying the country’s defense and military chiefs, along with other top security officials and about 40 journalists, to Philippine-occupied Thitu island, which in the Philippines is called Pag-asa.

Thitu is more than 22 kilometers (14 miles) from Subi Reef, once a coral outcrop that now resembles a small Chinese city with a runway and skyline visible from the Philippine-held island when its lights glow at night.

China warned the Philippine planes that they were straying into its territory, and that they should turn around to avoid any mishap. The aircraft responded by saying they were flying over Philippine territory.
…

A surge in naval maneuvers in the South China Sea by Western allies this year is keeping China from any further expansion into the contested waters, analysts say.

Vessels from Australia, France, Japan and the United States have sent ships to the 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea in 2018. They believe the sea rich in fisheries and fossil fuel reserves to be an international waterway, but China claims about 90 percent of it and has militarized several key islets.

The foreign military exercises, naval ship passages and ports of call, along with one U.S. B-52 flyby have effectively stopped China from pushing ahead with expansion that’s also opposed by five other maritime claimants in Asia, experts believe.

“You take a realist perspective of power, and it’s a way of ensuring the South China Sea is permanently contested,” said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“So, the Chinese will issue angry statements and so on, warning of consequences, but the fact that all these multinational navies keep doing it in spite of Chinese warnings, it defies Beijing,” he said.

Year of military exercises

The number of hours of that navy ships have spent in the South China Sea has hit a high this year, said Carl Thayer, Asia-specialized emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

The U.S. Navy has sailed naval vessels into the South China Sea eight times over the past 18 months and flew two B-52 bombers over it last month. This month the United States and the Philippines kicked off their own joint naval exercises to train Manila’s navy.

Australia passed three ships though the sea in April en route to a goodwill visit to Vietnam, and Japan anticipates sending an Izumo-class helicopter carrier through the sea again this year as it did in 2017. Last year military officers from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations bloc boarded the Izumo.

France passed a frigate and an assault ship through near Chinese-held islets in May.

Reports in May of Chinese missiles deployed to the sea’s Spratly Islands galvanized much for the foreign naval attention this year, Thayer said.

On Monday the U.S. Navy wrapped up its biennial RIMPAC exercises, which are based out of Honolulu. The series of live-fire drills and scenario-based exercises brought together 25,000 people from 25 countries including South China Sea claimant states such as Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

The Philippines gained from RIMPAC by “becoming comfortable” with allies and learning to “operate smoothly with them,” said Jay Batongbacal, a University of the Philippines international maritime affairs professor.

All four Southeast Asian countries contest some of the waters that China calls its own. The United States dis-invited Beijing from RIMPAC this year.

China’s conundrum

China criticizes these movements and often responds with its own. It cites historical records to back its claim to most of the sea.

Chinese vessels followed their Australian and French counterparts. Its navy sent an auxiliary general intelligence ship this month to track the RIMPAC exercises near Honolulu, according to American media reports quoting a Pacific Fleet spokesman.

In April, China held military drills for two days in the sea. They brought together about 10,000 personnel and 48 naval vessels.

China wants to keep the others away, said Jonathan Spangler, director of the South China Sea Think Tank in Taipei.

“There’s the demonstrating that you are a world leader politically and militarily, the power projection thing, and there’s the deterrent aspect,” Spangler said. “There’s also the sort of insurance policy aspect. In the off chance there’s a conflict, then (China) will be prepared.”

But use of the sea by Western navies effectively keeps China from building up more islets – many of which it has landfilled since 2010 – or testing the patience of the Southeast Asian maritime claimants, experts say.

China “cannot assume on a roll and can take the South China Sea by stealth” as they build economic ties to get on the good side of other claimants, Chong said. Too much pushback against other navies would scuttle Chinese statements that it’s a good neighbor in Asia, he added.

Western-allied ship movement now follows a Cold War pattern where American and Soviet ships tested each other’s influence, Thayer said. U.S. and Soviet vessels had faced off, for example, in the Indian Ocean.

China may have called off plans to build on Scarborough Shoal, which is contested by Beijing and Manila, as former U.S. President Barack Obama sent ships, he said. A U.S. carrier strike group reached the sea in 2015.

“Both sides are contributing to the tensions in the sense that anything America does China will push back,” he said. “Several years ago, the expression was you do 1 we do 1.5 times, you do two, we do 2.5.”
…

A surge in naval maneuvers in the South China Sea by Western allies this year is keeping China from any further expansion into the contested waters, analysts say.

Vessels from Australia, France, Japan and the United States have sent ships to the 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea in 2018. They believe the sea rich in fisheries and fossil fuel reserves to be an international waterway, but China claims about 90 percent of it and has militarized several key islets.

The foreign military exercises, naval ship passages and ports of call, along with one U.S. B-52 flyby have effectively stopped China from pushing ahead with expansion that’s also opposed by five other maritime claimants in Asia, experts believe.

“You take a realist perspective of power, and it’s a way of ensuring the South China Sea is permanently contested,” said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“So, the Chinese will issue angry statements and so on, warning of consequences, but the fact that all these multinational navies keep doing it in spite of Chinese warnings, it defies Beijing,” he said.

Year of military exercises

The number of hours of that navy ships have spent in the South China Sea has hit a high this year, said Carl Thayer, Asia-specialized emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

The U.S. Navy has sailed naval vessels into the South China Sea eight times over the past 18 months and flew two B-52 bombers over it last month. This month the United States and the Philippines kicked off their own joint naval exercises to train Manila’s navy.

Australia passed three ships though the sea in April en route to a goodwill visit to Vietnam, and Japan anticipates sending an Izumo-class helicopter carrier through the sea again this year as it did in 2017. Last year military officers from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations bloc boarded the Izumo.

France passed a frigate and an assault ship through near Chinese-held islets in May.

Reports in May of Chinese missiles deployed to the sea’s Spratly Islands galvanized much for the foreign naval attention this year, Thayer said.

On Monday the U.S. Navy wrapped up its biennial RIMPAC exercises, which are based out of Honolulu. The series of live-fire drills and scenario-based exercises brought together 25,000 people from 25 countries including South China Sea claimant states such as Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

The Philippines gained from RIMPAC by “becoming comfortable” with allies and learning to “operate smoothly with them,” said Jay Batongbacal, a University of the Philippines international maritime affairs professor.

All four Southeast Asian countries contest some of the waters that China calls its own. The United States dis-invited Beijing from RIMPAC this year.

China’s conundrum

China criticizes these movements and often responds with its own. It cites historical records to back its claim to most of the sea.

Chinese vessels followed their Australian and French counterparts. Its navy sent an auxiliary general intelligence ship this month to track the RIMPAC exercises near Honolulu, according to American media reports quoting a Pacific Fleet spokesman.

In April, China held military drills for two days in the sea. They brought together about 10,000 personnel and 48 naval vessels.

China wants to keep the others away, said Jonathan Spangler, director of the South China Sea Think Tank in Taipei.

“There’s the demonstrating that you are a world leader politically and militarily, the power projection thing, and there’s the deterrent aspect,” Spangler said. “There’s also the sort of insurance policy aspect. In the off chance there’s a conflict, then (China) will be prepared.”

But use of the sea by Western navies effectively keeps China from building up more islets – many of which it has landfilled since 2010 – or testing the patience of the Southeast Asian maritime claimants, experts say.

China “cannot assume on a roll and can take the South China Sea by stealth” as they build economic ties to get on the good side of other claimants, Chong said. Too much pushback against other navies would scuttle Chinese statements that it’s a good neighbor in Asia, he added.

Western-allied ship movement now follows a Cold War pattern where American and Soviet ships tested each other’s influence, Thayer said. U.S. and Soviet vessels had faced off, for example, in the Indian Ocean.

China may have called off plans to build on Scarborough Shoal, which is contested by Beijing and Manila, as former U.S. President Barack Obama sent ships, he said. A U.S. carrier strike group reached the sea in 2015.

“Both sides are contributing to the tensions in the sense that anything America does China will push back,” he said. “Several years ago, the expression was you do 1 we do 1.5 times, you do two, we do 2.5.”
…

China, though barred from the world’s largest multi-country naval exercises this year, will shrug off the slight because it has accumulated enough power in Asia’s disputed seas to cause it little concern about the U.S.-led maneuvers, experts believe.

The United States uninvited China from attending the Rim of the Pacific Exercise in view of Beijing’s naval expansion, the U.S. Department of Defense said in a statement June 2. The exercises better known as RIMPAC bring together 25 countries, 45 vessels and 25,000 people.

Beijing need not worry because it has already militarized its key islets in the South China Sea over the protests of Southeast Asian states and cultivated a blue-water navy that plies the open Pacific Ocean despite objections from Japan and Taiwan, analysts say.

“They’ll shrug it off,” said Jeffrey Kingston, author and history instructor at Temple University Japan. “I think they know there’s displeasure about their actions, but they’re not going to lose sleep over it.”

RIMPAC 2018 exercises

RIMPAC exercises for 2018 began last week. The series of maneuvers coordinated from Honolulu were highlighted by amphibious assault vehicle training by U.S., Canadian and Mexican forces.

The exercises, set to last through July 16, will also cover live-fire drills, urban tactics and “scenario-based small-unit leadership exercises,” the U.S. Navy’s website said.

Exercises help the military personnel of participating countries — all fundamentally U.S. allies — get to know one another for future cooperation and emergency responses, said Jay Batongbacal, a University of the Philippines international maritime affairs professor. The event poses no threat to China, he said.

The U.S. government “disinvited” the People’s Liberation Army Navy from the 2018 exercises “as initial response to China’s continued militarization of the South China Sea,” Defense Secretary James Mattis was quoted saying on his department’s website.

“China’s behavior is inconsistent with the principles and the purposes of the RIMPAC exercise, an exercise in which transparency and cooperation are hallmarks,” he said.

Beijing sealed itself off from RIMPAC by placing missiles and fighter jets in the disputed South China Sea and passing naval vessels and military aircraft near Taiwan since 2016, analysts say.

“Beijing’s militarization of the South China Sea, as well as its continued encirclement and harassment of Taiwan, clearly places it outside our circle of like-minded partners,” said Sean King, vice president of the Park Strategies political consultancy in New York.

China undaunted

China attended the 2016 RIMPAC exercises with five warships, 1,200 officers and soldiers as well as combat divers. It was invited back to the event last year. RIMPAC was first held in 1971.

This year its Communist Party-run newspaper Global Times called “the provocative involvement of the U.S…. now the biggest source of risk” in the region.

Beijing need not fret over its exclusion because it has built military infrastructure on its main holdings in the South China Sea with unimpeded access for aircraft, radar systems and in one case reported earlier this year, missiles, scholars in Asia say.

“China’s policies over the South China Sea are pretty much set in stone, as far as it’s concerned, so even if it did participate in RIMPAC it would not have changed anything,” Batongbacal said.

Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam contest Chinese sovereignty over all or parts of the South China Sea. China has the strongest armed forces in the region. It has offered economic aid to much of Southeast Asia, effectively keeping some of the disputants there quiet, scholars have said previously.

All claimants prize the 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea for its fisheries and fossil fuel reserves. Washington does not have a claim to the waterway, which extends from Hong Kong south to the island of Borneo, but it periodically sends vessels to the sea to counter Chinese influence.

China has rattled Taiwan over the past three years with military aircraft flybys near the self-ruled island’s air defense identification zone and tested Japanese control over the uninhabited Senkaku islands in the East China Sea. China claims the same islands, which it calls the Diaoyu.

Japan and the four Southeast Asian states that dispute Beijing’s South China Sea claims joined RIMPAC this year. Japan will be glad China’s not there, Kingston said. The Philippines can “practice and learn” from RIMPAC’s joint operations, Batongbacal said.

China might retaliate against its un-invitation by spiking a future military exchange with the United States, said Huang Kwei-bo, vice dean of the international affairs college at National Chengchi University in Taipei. But in the long term, he said, “military exchanges will be normal.”

“I don’t know how [China] would react if it wanted to,” Huang said. “To react, for example, if a U.S. general were to visit, they could say ‘no need to come.’”
…

China, though barred from the world’s largest multi-country naval exercises this year, will shrug off the slight because it has accumulated enough power in Asia’s disputed seas to cause it little concern about the U.S.-led maneuvers, experts believe.

The United States uninvited China from attending the Rim of the Pacific Exercise in view of Beijing’s naval expansion, the U.S. Department of Defense said in a statement June 2. The exercises better known as RIMPAC bring together 25 countries, 45 vessels and 25,000 people.

Beijing need not worry because it has already militarized its key islets in the South China Sea over the protests of Southeast Asian states and cultivated a blue-water navy that plies the open Pacific Ocean despite objections from Japan and Taiwan, analysts say.

“They’ll shrug it off,” said Jeffrey Kingston, author and history instructor at Temple University Japan. “I think they know there’s displeasure about their actions, but they’re not going to lose sleep over it.”

RIMPAC 2018 exercises

RIMPAC exercises for 2018 began last week. The series of maneuvers coordinated from Honolulu were highlighted by amphibious assault vehicle training by U.S., Canadian and Mexican forces.

The exercises, set to last through July 16, will also cover live-fire drills, urban tactics and “scenario-based small-unit leadership exercises,” the U.S. Navy’s website said.

Exercises help the military personnel of participating countries — all fundamentally U.S. allies — get to know one another for future cooperation and emergency responses, said Jay Batongbacal, a University of the Philippines international maritime affairs professor. The event poses no threat to China, he said.

The U.S. government “disinvited” the People’s Liberation Army Navy from the 2018 exercises “as initial response to China’s continued militarization of the South China Sea,” Defense Secretary James Mattis was quoted saying on his department’s website.

“China’s behavior is inconsistent with the principles and the purposes of the RIMPAC exercise, an exercise in which transparency and cooperation are hallmarks,” he said.

Beijing sealed itself off from RIMPAC by placing missiles and fighter jets in the disputed South China Sea and passing naval vessels and military aircraft near Taiwan since 2016, analysts say.

“Beijing’s militarization of the South China Sea, as well as its continued encirclement and harassment of Taiwan, clearly places it outside our circle of like-minded partners,” said Sean King, vice president of the Park Strategies political consultancy in New York.

China undaunted

China attended the 2016 RIMPAC exercises with five warships, 1,200 officers and soldiers as well as combat divers. It was invited back to the event last year. RIMPAC was first held in 1971.

This year its Communist Party-run newspaper Global Times called “the provocative involvement of the U.S…. now the biggest source of risk” in the region.

Beijing need not fret over its exclusion because it has built military infrastructure on its main holdings in the South China Sea with unimpeded access for aircraft, radar systems and in one case reported earlier this year, missiles, scholars in Asia say.

“China’s policies over the South China Sea are pretty much set in stone, as far as it’s concerned, so even if it did participate in RIMPAC it would not have changed anything,” Batongbacal said.

Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam contest Chinese sovereignty over all or parts of the South China Sea. China has the strongest armed forces in the region. It has offered economic aid to much of Southeast Asia, effectively keeping some of the disputants there quiet, scholars have said previously.

All claimants prize the 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea for its fisheries and fossil fuel reserves. Washington does not have a claim to the waterway, which extends from Hong Kong south to the island of Borneo, but it periodically sends vessels to the sea to counter Chinese influence.

China has rattled Taiwan over the past three years with military aircraft flybys near the self-ruled island’s air defense identification zone and tested Japanese control over the uninhabited Senkaku islands in the East China Sea. China claims the same islands, which it calls the Diaoyu.

Japan and the four Southeast Asian states that dispute Beijing’s South China Sea claims joined RIMPAC this year. Japan will be glad China’s not there, Kingston said. The Philippines can “practice and learn” from RIMPAC’s joint operations, Batongbacal said.

China might retaliate against its un-invitation by spiking a future military exchange with the United States, said Huang Kwei-bo, vice dean of the international affairs college at National Chengchi University in Taipei. But in the long term, he said, “military exchanges will be normal.”

“I don’t know how [China] would react if it wanted to,” Huang said. “To react, for example, if a U.S. general were to visit, they could say ‘no need to come.’”
…

Pakistan has a mixed record on press freedoms. Although the media is vibrant and there are many TV news channels, state and non-state actors often threaten or harass journalists. Since last year, harassment from state actors, particularly against those critical of Pakistan’s powerful military or intelligence agencies, has significantly intensified. VOA’s Ayesha Tanzeem reports from Islamabad.
…