{"id":22546,"date":"2013-12-19T11:18:03","date_gmt":"2013-12-19T19:18:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=22546"},"modified":"2013-12-19T11:18:34","modified_gmt":"2013-12-19T19:18:34","slug":"us-meddling-is-making-china-more-aggressive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2013\/12\/19\/us-meddling-is-making-china-more-aggressive\/","title":{"rendered":"US Meddling Is Making China More Aggressive"},"content":{"rendered":"

A lengthy report<\/a> in the Spring 2012 issue of the Washington Quarterly<\/em>, the journal published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, reiterates the argument I have repeatedly put forth, that the U.S.’s pivot to Asia is exacerbating tensions in the region by emboldening China’s neighboring rivals and putting Beijing on the alert.<\/p>\n

“As China rises in economic power,” Leszek Buszynski writes, “its maritime interests similarly\u00a0expand (and with it its naval power), bringing it into conflict with the dominant\u00a0naval power in the Western Pacific – the United States.”<\/p>\n

To counter this, the U.S. “has been searching for positions from\u00a0which forces may be surged forward into\u00a0conflict zones in the Western Pacific,” and “has moved to strengthen defense ties\u00a0with ASEAN states that share concerns about China.”<\/p>\n

I cover these issues often here at the blog, but I also published two pieces this month, one at The American Conservative<\/em><\/a> and another at The Washington Times<\/em><\/a>, reviewing these kinds of arguments. The tensions between China and its smaller neighbors like Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Vietnam, and others are intensified by the U.S.-China fight for geopolitical supremacy in the Asia Pacific. I’ve argued that if the U.S. backed off of trying to dominate the region, problems may be mitigated.<\/p>\n

“From the Chinese\u00a0perspective,” the report explains, “the U.S. naval presence in the Western Pacific prevents the\u00a0reunification of Taiwan with the mainland and emboldens the ASEAN\u00a0claimants in the South China Sea to oppose Chinese claims.”<\/p>\n

And this: “As the United States strengthens its role in the region,\u00a0ASEAN claimants would become more emboldened to resist Chinese pressure,\u00a0which has increased over the past two years. If these trends continue, the region\u00a0would become polarized between the United States and China, and tensions\u00a0would increase particularly in the South China Sea.”<\/p>\n

Here is one explanatory anecdote of this phenomenon:<\/p>\n

ASEAN has engaged China in\u00a0regular dialogue hoping that its leaders could be convinced of the value of a\u00a0regime of norms which would govern behavior in the South China Sea. ASEAN\u00a0was habitually careful to avoid in any way provoking China expecting that\u00a0China would in time reciprocate, and that the ASEAN way of encouraging\u00a0agreement by consensus would in time be embraced by Beijing.\u00a0Had the issue involved only competing claims to energy and fisheries, an\u00a0agreement which would specify the rules of interaction and dispute management\u00a0(otherwise called a maritime regime) might have been possible in the way that\u00a0ASEAN policymakers have argued. Strategic rivalry with the United States,\u00a0however, reshapes the dispute in a way that reduces the role of ASEAN and its\u00a0ability to negotiate a resolution of the issue with China. It makes China\u00a0unresponsive to ASEAN apprehensions and more concerned about U.S. moves\u00a0outside the area and U.S. naval activity. It imparts a particular assertiveness to\u00a0Chinese behavior as greater control over the South China Sea is a necessary\u00a0accompaniment to its extended naval strategy and deployments.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There are other interesting arguments in the piece. Read it in full here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A lengthy report in the Spring 2012 issue of the Washington Quarterly, the journal published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, reiterates the argument I have repeatedly put forth, that the U.S.’s pivot to Asia is exacerbating tensions in the region by emboldening China’s neighboring rivals and putting Beijing on the alert. “As […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-22546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22546"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22577,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22546\/revisions\/22577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22546"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=22546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}