During his state visit to Australia, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang (李克強) kept up the gentle pressure on Canberra to draw closer to Beijing. Australia is a US ally in the region and part of the Australia, New Zealand, US Security Treaty.
With China dredging new islands in the South China Sea and building military facilities to claim almost all of its waters, it is clearly upsetting — if not threatening — regional stability and security.
Australia, like most nations in the region, has an important stake in regional peace and stability.
China is pushing ahead with its agenda to establish regional dominance by ignoring the rival territorial claims of some of its neighbors. Although Australia tries to be neutral on the issue of sovereignty, as it is not a claimant, it nevertheless wants the issue resolved peacefully through negotiation based on international norms and law.
In other words, Australia is against unilateral action on China’s part to change the realities in the South China Sea.
However, even while maintaining principled respect for international law and institutions, Canberra appears to be softening its tone.
The reasons for this are not far to seek. An important one is the reality of China’s power.
Second, even though the US is talking the talk against China’s projection of power in the region, it has not been able to match the rhetoric with concrete action.
True, it has sent a naval ship or two through Chinese-claimed waters, but it has been lacking clear resolve to back up former US president Barack Obama’s “pivot to Asia” policy, declared in a 2011 visit to Canberra.
This would have required the deployment of the bulk of the US navy in the region to send a strong signal to China that the US was still the predominant regional power and was not going anywhere.
This gap in rhetoric and practice has only encouraged China to declare its own version of the Monroe doctrine.
With US President Donald Trump’s election, and despite the initial strident anti-China rhetoric over trade, currency manipulation and the South China Sea, Beijing now appears more confident about its narrative that the South China Sea and its islands have historically been part of China.
It is so confident — on the surface at least — that what it is propounding is not just China’s narrative, but also promotes regional stability.
For instance, during his visit to Australia, Li sought to neatly mix together Chinese and regional interests to support its activities in the South China Sea.
He said with a straight face at a news conference that “China never has any intention to engage in militarization in the South China Sea.”
As for “China’s facilities on Chinese islands and reefs, [these] are primarily for civilian purposes, and even if there is a certain amount of defense equipment or facilities, it is for maintaining the freedom of navigation and over flight in the South China Sea, because without such freedom or without stability in the South China Sea, the Chinese side would be among the first to bear the brunt of it,” he said.
The question is: Who is posing a threat to maritime traffic?
Before China started to build military facilities and claim much of the sea, international trade was largely flowing smoothly through those waters. It is only after China started militarizing the islands and reefs that the region began experiencing tension and instability.
With the US seemingly unsure of how to respond to China’s projection of power, some nations in the region are seeking their own accommodation with China.
The Philippines, under President Rodrigo Duterte, is most notable. Malaysia is another case of leaning in that direction. On its own, no individual Southeast Asian nation is able to match or challenge China’s economic and military power.
These nations are, to varying degrees, susceptible to China’s economic pressure with their increasing dependence on Chinese trade and investment. South Korea is feeling the pressure of an undeclared Chinese blockade of its trade and services exports.
Australia is coming under continuous, though seemingly gentle, pressure to become part of what might be called “China’s Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.”
During Li’s visit, he was keen to emphasize the positives in their relationship, like their growing trade that was in 2015-2016 valued at A$150 billion (US$114.1 billion), with a healthy surplus in Australia’s favor.
Talking about the deal to expand China’s beef market for Australian imports, Australian Prime Minister Turnbull said: “Australia is the only country in the world with this market access.”
Highlighting the growth in investment, Turnbull added: “We continue to welcome investment from China with the stock of direct investment growing to A$35 billion by the end of 2015.”
There are increasingly powerful voices within Australia favoring a closer relationship with China.
Former Australian prime minister Paul Keating made a strong pitch in a national daily for creating stronger bonds.
“The ‘pivot’ or ‘stay-as-we-are’ [policy] has meant that the US is seeking to maintain strategic hegemony in the western Pacific, rather than recognizing the rise of China as a legitimate event and a state now as large as the US itself,” he said.
He argued that as the world has moved to a position of bipolarity with the US and China, Australia should similarly be developing a policy of cooperation with China, and not of “resigned reluctance.”
On the South China Sea, Keating felt that anxiety over artificial islands was being exaggerated and they were no challenge to Australia.
On the other hand, “If Australia were to have a positive strategic policy of engagement with China rather than a negative one, our influence on China’s behavior would be much greater than it is today,” he said.
As for containing China, he attacked the advocacy of enhanced strategic ties between the US, Australia, Japan and India, describing this doctrine of “quadrilateralism” as “reckless on an international scale.”
Of course, Keating does not represent the official policy, which still favors the US alliance, but he is not alone in advocating a radical reevaluation of relations with China to suit Australia’s interests.
This re-evaluation process is gaining ground in the region, even more so after Trump became US president.
As Australian Minister for Defence Industry Christopher Pyne said, while reiterating that Australia remains one of US’ closest allies: “Every US ally … is considering how that will operate in the next four years.”
Sushil Seth is a commentator based in Australia.
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