Conflicts are regional until the great powers pick a side

There is a slow-burning conflict in the South China Sea, essentially a regional conflict, that could suck the US into a third mess after Ukraine and Palestine. China has laid out territorial claims in Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone, and the US has picked a side, as it were.

Everybody seems to have some idea about “the rise of China,” but a wider context may be helpful. The Taiwanese went to the polls last weekend. The incumbent, Lai Chingte of the Democratic Progressive Party, returned to office with about 40% of the vote but with a loss of legislative majority.

Across the Taiwan Strait, in China, the mood was tentatively positive, and 12,600km away in Washington there was mild euphoria. With the exception of Singapore and the Philippines — Washington’s most loyal allies in the region — the littoral states of Southeast Asia went on with their daily business, but remain wary.

Lai is aggressively anti-Beijing. The (mainland) Chinese government considers him “a dangerous separatist”, which makes him an important ally of the US.

Wang Yiwei of Renmin University in Beijing explains: as long as Lai does not move towards formal independence “the Taiwan status quo will be kept until there is a power shift between China and the US”.

It is worth remembering, as more than just a footnote, that the US is indirectly involved in the war on Ukraine and the Palestinian conflict and has a fairly active presence in Taiwan Strait relations — with significant political economic and financial benefits.

On October 17 the New York Times reported that the wars in Palestine and Ukraine and “the rise of China ... have brought a boom for weapons makers”. That same week US President Joe Biden praised the value and contribution of US arms to conflict (in Palestine and Ukraine): “Just as in World War 2, today patriotic American workers are building the arsenal of democracy and serving the cause of freedom.”

Biden hailed the benefits of military sales to the US economy. “We send Ukraine equipment sitting in our stockpiles. And when we use the money allocated by Congress, we use it to replenish our own stores, our own stockpiles, with new equipment ... Patriot missiles for air defence batteries, made in Arizona. Artillery shells manufactured in 12 states across the country, in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas. And so much more.”

So we can be forgiven for thinking that on a global level things have not changed much since World War 2. Regionally, though, the waters along Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific, especially the South China Sea, are becoming a lot more turbulent.

For reasons of timing and proximity, attention is now focused on Houthi attacks on vessels linked in some way to Israel in the narrow Bab el-Mandeb Strait of the Red Sea, and away from a set of potential complications in Southeast Asia that would suck the US into a third conflict.

While concerns about flows of global trade through the Taiwan Straits and across the South China Sea are heightened (20%-30% of global trade passes across these waters), any hot conflict in the region could fracture relations among Southeast Asian countries.

Increasing Chinese territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific could be a catalyst for regional conflict. Let us keep this in perspective. The wars in Ukraine and Palestine are essentially regional conflicts, but the US picked a side and stepped into the fight.

It is too easy, as a general postulate, to simply blame China. The “fear of China” is often misplaced and actually contradicts the fact that the country’s rise as a regional and global power has been more peaceable and stable since the Opium Wars (1839-41). There is always a “but”...

While Sinophobia remains high among US allies, notably Japan, South Korea and the Philippines, countries in East and Southeast Asia have pinned their political economic futures to China. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations wants to maintain strategic autonomy and prevent outside influences from dividing it or undermining peace, stability and prosperity in the region.

The association wants to serve as “a reliable facilitator of co-operation” and avoid relying too much on any one power to ensure security. In general, Southeast Asian states do not unequivocally welcome China; they are willing to defer judgment about what China really wants and what its role in the region will become.

This is where a serious regional problem rears its head. China has territorial claims in the South China Sea and has repeatedly forced Indonesian vessels out of the nation’s exclusive economic zone. In late 2019, Indonesian warships and fighter jets patrolled the waters around Natuna Island, over which China has claimed “sovereign rights and jurisdiction”.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo insisted that there would be “no compromise” on Indonesia’s territorial sovereignty.

At the end of 2023, China reportedly deployed its largest coastguard vessel into Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone. Meanwhile, the US (and its allies) joined Indonesia in a military show of force, which China has described as a Nato-type Indo-Pacific alliance to limit China’s presence and influence in the region.

INCREASING CHINESE TERRITORIAL CLAIMS IN THE INDO-PACIFIC COULD BE A CATALYST FOR REGIONAL CONFLICT