Turbulence forecast for Asia-Pacific

S P SETH

Asia-Pacific region has been and still is, largely, an American dominated part of the world. It is not surprising then that China’s rise, particularly its growing military power and naval reach, is creating tensions in the region. Even more so because China is not only claiming a number of islands and vast stretches of waters in the South China Sea and East China Sea, but is actively taking measures to assert its claims. It has an ongoing sovereignty dispute over a cluster of rocky islets with Japan, which has brought the two countries close to naval skirmishes with the potential to develop into a military conflict. And the tensions escalated recently when China declared “an air defence identification zone” over a vast swathe of the East China Sea over and around the disputed islands, including some in the South Korean claimed maritime zone. What it means in effect is that any foreign aircraft entering the zone will be required to notify their flight plans as well as maintain radio contact or else face unspecified “defensive emergency measures”. All this activity, with claims and counter-claims, is deepening the fault lines in the region raising serious concerns.   

Added to this were concerns recently when a Chinese naval flotilla conducted an unannounced naval exercise through the approaches into the Indian Ocean. An Australian journalist captured his country’s concern this way: “Three Chinese warships on an exercise that included combat simulations sailed through the Sunda Strait, turned east, passed by Christmas Island [Australian offshore territory] before skirting the southern edge of Java and turning north again.” He added, “Never before has a Chinese drill come so close to Australia.” Of course, China’s naval flotilla was operating in international waters and wasn’t obliged to inform/consult Australia or any other country.

But that is not the point for China’s critics. The real issue is that China is developing a navy that can now operate where it never treaded before. As Rory Medcalf, program director at the Lowy Institute, an independent think tank here, reportedly said, “they’re going to have to expect the Chinese to be able to operate in considerable force in the vicinity of our [Australian] territories.”

Even though the Australian government has been trying to be calm and understanding, it is not a welcome development for them. Australia’s US alliance has been, and is, the cornerstone of Australia’s security policy. And Canberra sees China rocking the boat, thus posing a threat not only to Australia but also to the region. But from Beijing’s viewpoint, it works both ways. Just as Australia sees China as a potential or real security threat, Beijing is not happy about Australia’s deepening security nexus with the United States. They regard it as part of a policy to contain China, with Japan included in the trilateral arrangement.

Apparently, China wants the region to become used to the projection and display of its military power as a back up to its sovereignty claims in the oceans around. And some Chinese commentators are not shy about saying this. According to Shen Dingli, professor of international relations at Fudan University in Shanghai: “Expect more of China’s naval exercises around [Australia], per international law.” He is further reported to say that as a “normal great power”, China has every right to build its navy in order to deter American “interference.” Amplifying it, he said, “ China’s legitimate national interests are still undermined by the US. America has interfered in mainland China’s unification with Taiwan, and its region-based alliances have served its purpose of military intervention.” And: “Australia is on the US strategic chessboard for such purposes… Australia shall not expect to be entitled to follow the US to threaten China without hurting itself.”

As of now, China is militarily still fairway behind the United States. Therefore, it would probably be not keen on a military conflict with the United States and its regional allies. But with its growing economy, it has the capacity to keep raising its defence expenditure every year to further modernize and expand its military power. In the last couple of decades, its defence expenditure has been rising at the rate of 10 per cent or more, with a 12.2 per cent rise this year, as announced by Premier Li Keqiang during his annual work report to the National People’s Congress (NPC). If such increased allocation is maintained and/or increased and compounded, China’s defense budget might come close to the US’ over a couple of decades. At the same time the US defense allocation is on a downward trajectory because of its twin debt and deficit problems.  At present, though, the US defence budget of about $700 billion is way ahead of China at about $130 billion; though China’s official figure is regarded by many as a gross under-estimate.

But China is not shying away from its determination to increase its military profile. As Premier Li told the NPC, “We will comprehensively enhance the revolutionary nature of the Chinese armed forces, further modernize them and upgrade their performance, and continue to raise their deterrence and combat capabilities in the information age.” What China is seeking at present is to build up enough deterrence to make it costly for the US to come in support of its regional allies. At a broader level, China might want to treat the Asia-Pacific as its own strategic backyard with its own Monroe Doctrine, like the US in an earlier era for the Western Hemisphere. But as long as the US is committed to regarding the region as its primary focus (“pivot”, as Obama has said), with China equally determined to assert its primacy, there will always be potential for military conflict by miscalculation rather than design.

Though China is now an emerging superpower and might soon be on par with the United States, both countries would like to avoid an open conflict. In the case of China, it needs a decade or more of relative peace to foster social stability and equity at home. The pace of change since the eighties has been so fast that the Chinese society needs to strike a new balance. Just to take one example, mass migration of working people from rural areas to urban industrial centres is not only depopulating villages but destroying traditional culture and networks. And these rural workers, because of residency restrictions, cannot settle permanently in urban centres where they work. Suffice it to say that the pace of change in China is creating serious social and economic problems.

Over and above, there is this scourge of widespread corruption at the highest levels, threatening the credibility of the Communist Party. One of the revolutionary veterans’ daughter, 72-year old Hu Muying, put the enormity of the task in some perspective. She reportedly told a recent gathering of princelings (sons and daughters of party leaders and veterans) that “ [The corrupt] have gained lots of power” through relationship networks and have formed many “self-interested groups.” As a result, “It is all intertwined in many ways, touching one affects the whole network…”

The enormity of challenges at home might constrain external push for regional dominance at any cost. The only danger is that perceived sovereign interests (on all sides) tend to generate their own momentum. And before you know, it is already too late. The First World War, started hundred years ago, illustrates this.