The South China Sea Is the Next Test of US Resolve
Much is at stake for the US in those distant reefs and shoals. And from Europe to the Middle East and East Asia, America’s allies are watching.
China vs. the Philippines (in the middle); the US not yet in the picture.
Photographer: Ted Aljibe/AFP/Getty Images
If we weren’t so preoccupied with Russia and Ukraine, Israel and Gaza, North and South Korea or China and Taiwan, we’d also be paying due attention to another conflict zone: the South China Sea. US strategizing there, as it happens, can clarify Washington’s stance in those other hotspots. The question in all of them is when, why and how the US should intervene, and whether it should be prepared to go to war.
The aggressor in the South China Sea is communist China. Like five other littoral nations — Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam — China is a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. A sixth, Taiwan, can’t sign the treaty only because it isn’t a member of the UN. (The US is not a signatory, although in practice it abides by Unclos.) If China respected international law, therefore, there wouldn’t be any disputes in the first place.