US, Asean To Push Back Against China

Asean, Push, Against, Back, China

The U.S. and its Asian allies are starting to push back at China's growing assertiveness in the region, strengthening security ties and taking more robust positions in territorial disputes in the East and South China seas.

The newest evidence of the resistance is set to come on Friday when President Barack Obama is due to discuss the South China Sea -- almost all of which is claimed by China -- during a lunch in New York with leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or Asean. The meeting will take place on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York and will follow Mr. Obama's meeting Thursday with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao.

Ahead of the meeting, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong told The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday he plans to tell Mr. Obama that the U.S. needs to maintain an activist presence in Asia to show it is 'here to stay' as a power in the Pacific.

'America plays a role in Asia that China cannot replace,' he said, which includes 'maintaining peace in the region.'

Japan -- the main U.S. ally in the region -- is leading the way in confronting China, taking an unusually firm line in a dispute over a collision between a Chinese fishing trawler and two Japanese coast guard ships near disputed islands in the East China Sea two weeks ago.

Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku called Wednesday for high-level bilateral talks between Japan and China to ease tensions.

Southeast Asian nations are also quietly pushing back, with several encouraging the U.S. to assert its own national interests, especially in the South China Sea, parts of which are claimed by Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei.

South Korea, which has burgeoning commercial ties with China, has been alienated by Beijing's refusal to condemn the sinking of a South Korean warship in March, which an international investigation blamed on North Korea.

The simultaneous backlash suggests a broad failure of diplomacy from China, which has long strived to achieve balance in its foreign relations, and has poured aid and investment into Southeast Asia in the past decade.

One explanation put forward by analysts is that China's diplomatic tone has become more arrogant as it emerges stronger than ever from the global economic crisis, reinforcing deep-seated anxieties in the region about how it will project its new power.

Others say that what appears to be a clumsier foreign policy reflects how the People's Liberation Army, unpracticed in diplomacy, is starting to call the shots on matters of key national interest, including the South China Sea. The PLA's influence in domestic politics is growing in the run-up to a leadership transition in 2012, as aspirants to top Communist Party posts court powerful generals for support.

Public opinion in China is also playing a role, as diplomats -- already struggling to cope with multiplying international engagements -- are now also under pressure to talk tough to appease nationalistic sentiment inflamed by populist newspapers and academics.

A newly invigorated U.S. foreign policy toward Asia is further stirring up diplomatic rivalries as Washington competes with China for regional influence after a decade of focusing on Iraq and, more recently, Afghanistan.

'What you see here is Japan, South Korea and Southeast Asia, backed by the United States, trying to manage an emergent China that's pushing the envelope,' said Ernest Bower, director of the Southeast Asia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

On Friday, Mr. Obama and the Asean leaders will issue a joint statement in which Washington has proposed text reaffirming the importance of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, according to the Associated Press.

It said the statement would oppose the 'use or threat of force by any claimant attempting to enforce disputed claims in the South China Sea.'

The wording is significant -- and provocative for China - because it mirrors that of a speech by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at another Asean meeting in Hanoi in July.

That speech was a response to Chinese officials' assertion, in a meeting with U.S. counterparts in March, that Beijing viewed the South China Sea as one of its 'core national interests' -- on a par with Tibet and Taiwan -- meaning it saw no room for compromise.

Several Southeast Asian nations are understood to have encouraged Mrs. Clinton to make the statement, which her Chinese counterpart, Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, described as an 'attack' on China.

Mr. Lee, the Singapore prime minister, said that Mrs. Clinton's remarks were a 'useful reminder' of the U.S.'s crucial role in the region and the importance of freedom of navigation there. Singapore, because of its role as an advanced economy and important financial center, and possibly thanks to its longstanding strong relations with the U.S., may feel more comfortable about voicing such views than other countries in the region.

Vietnam, meanwhile, which is leading Asean this year, held its first defense talks with the U.S. in August, 15 years after the two countries normalized relations.

Tensions between China and Vietnam, too, have been growing since last fall, when Hanoi accused Chinese military personnel of beating and robbing Vietnamese fishermen who sought shelter from a typhoon in the South China Sea.

Carlyle Thayer, a Southeast Asia expert and professor at the University of New South Wales in Canberra, says that some Southeast Asian countries look at China and think: 'You've been telling us about your peaceful rise for years, but it does not look peaceful to us,' he said. 'This is not what we want.'

On Monday, White House spokesman Ben Rhodes said Mr. Obama planned to use Friday's lunch with Asean leaders to build on Mrs. Clinton's July meeting in Hanoi. 'Secretary Clinton . . . articulated some very important views during her recent meetings with Asean,' Mr. Rhodes said. 'And so I do believe the president will follow on those discussions.'

Although several Asean members back the proposed text for Friday's communique, it will likely to be toned down in order to avoid antagonizing Beijing, according to Asian diplomats.

'It didn't seem like the right time to get into heavy China-bashing,' said a senior Asian official involved in the lunch's preparations. The White House declined to comment on the discussions over the communique.

China has pre-empted the summit by voicing its opposition to the U.S. proposals on the South China Sea.

'We firmly oppose any country having nothing to do with the South China Sea issue getting involved in the dispute,' Jiang Yu, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said Tuesday. 'This will only complicate rather than help solve the issue.'

Nonetheless, China does appear to be gradually pulling back from its 'core interest' assertion, with some Chinese experts suggesting it was an unwise move, and others disputing that it happened at all.

Evidence of the backlash -- and its effect on China -- is apparent in the current dispute between Beijing and Tokyo over the ship collision near the disputed islands called Diaoyu in China and Senkaku in Japan. Japan has released the trawler and the 14 crew, but continues to detain the ship's captain.

China has summoned Japan's ambassador six times and suspended high-level government exchanges. Mr. Wen, China's premier, personally demanded the captain's release on Tuesday. Yet Tokyo has stood firm, apparently gambling that Beijing doesn't want to damage commercial relations or provoke the kind of anti-Japanese violence that almost spiraled out of control during a similar row in 2005.

'Clinton's stand in Hanoi may have contributed to Japan's demonstration of more backbone than most of us give it credit for having in its current territorial confrontation with China,' said Mark Borthwick, director of the United States Asia Pacific Council at the East-West Center in Washington.

'If that's the case, the strategy is working, because for it to work, there has [to be] an underlying assumption by our partners and allies of unwavering U.S. attention and support.'