THE United States’ decision to declare China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea illegal is a “significant” policy shift which risks increasing already heightened tensions in the region still further, an expert has warned.
However, Gregory B Poling, Senior Fellow for Southeast Asia and Director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), has said the move also has the potential to force China, which claims 90 percent of the sea, to soften its stance. Meanwhile the United States has deployed two aircraft carriers to the South China Sea for the second time in a fortnight.
Speaking earlier this week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo branded China maritime claims across most of the key strategic waterway as “completely unlawful”
Assistant Secretary of State David Stilwell followed up during an online forum at the Center for Strategic and International Studies by warning Beijing specifically in respect of Scarborough Shoal, an uninhabited island which is claimed by the Philippines.
He said: “Any move by the PRC [Peoples’ Republic of China] to physically occupy, reclaim, or militarise Scarborough Shoal would be a dangerous move on the part of the PRC and will have lasting and severe consequences for the PRC’s relationship with the United States as well as the entire region.”
China’s President Xi Jinping and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
USS Nimitz, which, along with USS Ronald Reagan, has returned to the South China Sea
Mr Poling, writing for the CSIS website, described the US stance as a “significant” shift.
He said: “The next time a China Coast Guard ship plays chicken with an oil rig off Vietnam or a flotilla of Chinese fishing boats appears in Indonesian waters, the United States will likely speak up more forcefully to decry the illegal action
“And that will have a proportionately greater effect on China’s international reputation.
“The next time China does engage in illegal harassment of its neighbours within their EEZs, a more forceful US response might lead China to double down out of a sense of nationalism”-Gregory B Poling
