Could Washington Be Dragged into a "Sea" of Fire?

Could Washington Be Dragged into a "Sea" of Fire?

05/24/14

Ted Galen Carpenter

Security, China

Tensions are rising in the East and South China Seas. America needs to walk a fine line between appeasement and confrontation when it comes to China. 

Tensions are rising fast in East Asia as relations between China and several of its neighbors continue to deteriorate.  There have been ominous developments in just the past few days.  Speaking in Shanghai to the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), Chinese President Xi Jinping issued a veiled warning to countries about forming or strengthening alliances to counter China. “To beef up military alliances targeted at a third party is not conducive to maintaining common security in the region,” he admonished.   Just hours later, the governments of Vietnam and the Philippines issued a statement that they would jointly oppose “illegal” Chinese actions in the South China Sea.

Manila has steadily escalated its territorial disputes with Beijing regarding the South China Sea in recent years, and China’s decision to build an oil drilling platform in disputed waters has caused its simmering dispute with Hanoi to flare.  Although the new bilateral statement falls far short of being an “alliance,” it does indicate the formation of a common front against China’s policies.

Such developments place Washington in a most uncomfortable position.  As the world’s leading maritime power, the United States cannot readily concede China’s extremely ambitious territorial claims.  Those claims regarding the South China Sea, for example, encompass some 90 percent of that body of water.  Much of the world’s commerce, including U.S. trade, passes through the sea lanes in the region.  Allowing the South China Sea to gradually become de facto Chinese territorial waters through the creation of a vast Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) would give China a strategic stranglehold in an important region, something that is clearly not in America’s best interests.  

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