The United States is still struggling with how to respond to China’s aggressive territorial claims to wide areas of ocean far off its coast, bolstered by land reclamation projects in disputed island chains, without disrupting progress in other areas important to the Obama administration. Those areas include preventing cybercrime, fighting climate change and fostering economic cooperation.
In his visit to Washington last month, Chinese President Xi Jinping made clear that China would not back off its claims in those areas, even though he and President Obama made progress on other issues during their talks.
“Islands in the South China Sea since ancient times are China’s territory,” he declared at a Sept. 25 news conference with Obama. “We have the right to uphold our own territorial sovereignty and lawful and legitimate maritime rights and interests.”
The administration so far has resisted pressure from Congress and recommendations by military leaders to more aggressively challenge China’s claims, preferring a more passive, diplomatic approach.
“We don’t adjudicate claims,” Obama said of the South China Sea in his speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 28. “But like every nation gathered here, we have an interest in upholding the basic principles of freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce, and in resolving disputes through international law, not the law of force. So we will defend these principles, while encouraging China and other claimants to resolve their differences peacefully.”
But that hasn’t stopped China’s work of building and militarizing man-made islands in the disputed areas, and Pentagon officials recently admitted that U.S. planes and warships haven’t challenged Beijing’s claims since 2012, angering lawmakers. It hasn’t helped that the administration keeps getting distracted from its priority of a “pivot to the Pacific” by crises in other areas, such as the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
“What did this state visit achieve to change this sorry state of affairs in U.S.-China relations? Can Beijing turn from a path from confrontation to cooperation? What should the U.S. policy be to effect positive change in Beijing’s behavior?” asked Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., at a Sept. 29 hearing on U.S.-China relations.
China’s aggressive actions have angered neighboring nations, which could benefit a strengthened U.S. effort to challenge its claims. Japan last month enacted legislation allowing its military to defend allies who come under attack for the first time since World War II. It’s a key step in implementing an agreement with the United States that commits Tokyo to extend its maritime and missile defense capabilities across the western Pacific in exchange for a U.S. commitment to defend its administration of the Senkaku Islands, which also are claimed by China.
U.S. officials also are working on a deal that would allow a rotational presence of U.S. troops in the Philippines for the first time in more than two decades.
In an essay published Oct. 1 in Foreign Policy, retired Adm. James Stavridis, former NATO supreme allied commander in Europe, argued for further cooperation with potential allies, including the lifting of the ban on weapons sales to Vietnam, another Asian nation pushed closer to Washington by Chinese claims.
He also joined lawmakers in calling for the military to challenge those claims.
“The United States has a long tradition of countering unjustified historical claims by sailing and flying through international waters and airspace. Now is the time to exercise it in the South China Sea,” he wrote.
This article appears in the Oct. 5 edition of the Washington Examiner magazine.
