South China Sea: It's Not Just About the Rocks, It's Also About the Fish

Wallace C. Gregson

Security, Asia

Beijing’s bad behavior is damaging the region’s common spaces.

The South China Sea remains politically roiled. It has been almost a month since the UN Tribunal’s announcement. Chinese rhetoric attacks both court and verdict, military demonstrations continue and ASEAN’s foreign ministers issued a decidedly equivocal statement following their meeting. Secretary of State John Kerry’s request for a reference to the decision of the UN’s Permanent Court of Arbitration failed. China’s diplomatic efforts to moot the verdict, and by extension moot the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), achieved an early success. This dispute now enters a new—and not especially encouraging—phase.

China’s nationalist ambitions mandate the recovery of lost territory, specifically including islands, rocks and low-tide elevations deemed—by China—to be Chinese from ancient times. The July 12 judgment by the UN Tribunal was a stunning rebuke to this goal.

All nations on the East and South China Sea littoral and the United States are directly affected. But the stakes of the affected nations vary widely, as do capabilities and vulnerabilities. Standing alone there is little hope that the nations of the region can come to an acceptable, viable and enduring solution. The gaps among various national interests, stakes and capabilities must somehow be bridged.

The United States seeks to fly, sail and operate our forces wherever international law allows, and peaceful settlement of disputes. Japan is tied to the United States by virtue of our strong alliance, a geography that defines the East China Sea, current issues there, Chinese air and sea territorial intrusions and China’s continued vilification.