The news that China deployed surface-to-air missiles and fighter jets to the disputed Paracel Islands is only the latest example of Beijing’s increasingly aggressive posture over its claims of sovereignty over the South China Sea. China’s island-building and subsequent militarization efforts are part of a broader strategy to reduce American influence in the region, but these moves have come with a regional cost: China’s neighbors have competing claims over the islands in question, and they are turning to the United States to serve as a counterbalance to Beijing. The U.S. should capitalize on this opportunity to broaden and deepen its ties to the other countries in the Western Pacific.

Beijing has long feared becoming bottled up by the U.S. via the “first island chain” – a set of islands and archipelagos including Borneo, Taiwan, and the Japanese Archipelago that surround the eastern coast of Asia – in the event of a military conflict. Chinese military doctrine has therefore placed an emphasis on breaking free from these constraints, and China’s activities vis-a-vis the Paracel Islands and Spratly Islands in the South China Sea should be seen as an outgrowth of that doctrine; in theory, Chinese military installations on these disputed islands allow for a significant uptick in China’s power projection capabilities.

However, allowing military doctrine to dictate Chinese foreign policy has, in this case, created unintended diplomatic consequences for Beijing.



Certain islands and other landmasses in the South China Sea claimed by China are also claimed by Taiwan, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, the latter four of which are members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, an important regional body for economic and political cooperation. Beijing has sought to negotiate its disputes with these nations (Taiwan excepted) bilaterally, presumably hoping to capitalize on its vastly superior clout by every metric. Pressured by its giant neighbor, the four ASEAN nations with South China Sea claims have increasingly, to varying degrees, looked to develop their relationships with the United States, as has ASEAN as a whole. These countries have little other recourse given Beijing’s refusal to accept international arbitration over the disputes, and the U.S. is the only other major global player with an interest in the region.

For its part, the United States has been keen to maintain its active role, recently agreeing to elevate its relationship with ASEAN to the level of a “strategic partnership” and engaging in negotiations over the wide-ranging Trans-Pacific Partnership that would include a host of Pacific Rim countries, including Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam. Washington has also seen its challenges to Chinese sovereignty over the South China Sea viewed favorably by the ASEAN claimants, and the U.S. should use this as a launching pad for building upon its relations with these nations.

Improved ties would provide greater legitimacy to American freedom of navigation claims in the South China Sea, and ancillary benefits could accrue as well: For instance, Malaysia might be more willing to heed U.S. calls to clamp down on its recent corruption troubles and go further down the path towards ethnicity-blind, pluralistic democracy.

Certainly, China’s actions in the South China Sea may be viewed as a victory for Beijing given that the United States has not offered a military response to such moves beyond freedom of navigation operations – there does not appear to be any appetite in Washington to risk a shooting war with China over the matter. This apparent success is sure to satisfy nationalist impulses at home, something the current regime in Beijing has been careful to cultivate. But all this posturing might prove to be a blunder in the long run.



Beijing seeks dominion over the disputed islands to, at least in part, prevent a giant American blockade of China’s coast in the event of an armed conflict, but the odds of a full-blown shooting war breaking out between the U.S. and China remain incredibly low given the astronomical potential costs of such an encounter. Thus, Beijing has pursued a solution to a merely imagined problem. Perhaps worse, deeper U.S. engagement in the Western Pacific is something Beijing has overtly sought to avoid, but the pressure China has placed on its neighbors have forced them to turn to the U.S. for support, providing convenient diplomatic cover for American activity and interest in the South China Sea.