Since 1990, when China’s rise expanded Beijing’s power into the Indian Ocean and helped Pakistan to counter India’s presence in
Jason Scott, “Australia Boosts Defense Spend as South China Sea Tensions Rise,” Bloomberg Business, February 25, 2016, <http://www.bloomberg.com/
news/articles/2016-02-25/australia-boosts-defense-spend-as-south-china-sea-tensions-rise>.
Jason Scott, “Australia Boosts Defense Spend as South China Sea Tensions Rise.”
Jason Scott, “Australia Boosts Defense Spend as South China Sea Tensions Rise.”
South Asia, New Delhi has adopted a “Look East Policy” to enhance economic relations with ASEAN and Japan.
From the Indian perspective, the South China Sea sees a heavy percentage of world trade and around 50% of India’s trade passes through the Malacca Straits. The SCS region is believed to have enor-mous reserves of oil and natural gas. But the presence of China’s military threatens trade and energy exploration for other countries.
In addition, from a strategic point of view, as suggested by Defense Minister, George Fernandez, India might be interested in developing a military and air base in SCS to counter China from different directions because of the increasing Chinese presence in Indian Ocean which has become an enormous problem of concern for the Indian Government.39
After Narendra Modi became Prime Minister and began India’s
“Act East Policy” and strengthened economic ties with ASEAN, co-ordinating with the U.S. in an “Indo-Pacific Strategy.” Therefore, India has not only enhanced its relations with Japan, but also increased military and economic exchanges with Vietnam. The purpose of India’s regional strategy is to become a balancing power and important ally of ASEAN. India’s involvement in the South China Sea is mainly due to economic reasons, to counter China and to maintain good re-lations with ASEAN.
Originally, India had friendly relations with ASEAN countries and a hostile relation with China. ASEAN nations have encouraged India to get involved in the SCS, because they see India as a strong
Bhavesh Ratan, “Why is India getting involved in the South China Sea?” Quora, April 29, 2015, <https://www.quora.com/Why-is-India-getting-involved-in-the-South-China-Sea>.
and influential nation that can counter China. At the same time, India sees this as an opportunity to develop strong relations with 10 ASEAN nations and Japan and also help India to gain support from other countries in case China generates a problem for India.40
In fact, Vietnam has approved India to set up a satellite tracking and imaging centre in southern Vietnam that will offer Hanoi pictures from Indian earth observation satellites, which cost US$24 million, and which will be run by India’s Space Research Organization. These satellites can cover Asia, including China and the South China Sea.
Vietnam’s Foreign Ministry has confirmed the tracking station would supply Vietnam real-time access to images from Indian satellites, to-gether with training in imagery analysis.
According to an expert on Vietnam from Australia’s Defense Force Academy the two nations’ interests are “converging over China and the South China Sea” and modernizing their militaries as China has assertively risked its claim for about all of the South China Sea.41 In addition, Indian experts have trained Vietnamese sailors to maintain their new advanced Kilo-class Russian-built submarines. In return, Vietnam has granted oil exploration blocks to India in waters that are disputed with China, while India has extended a US$100 million credit line for Hanoi to buy patrol boats.42
Bhavesh Ratan, “Why is India getting involved in the South China Sea?”
Lindsay Murdoch,“Vietnam to gain satellite views of South China Sea thanks to Indian agreement,” The Sydney Morning Herald, January 26, 2016, <http://
www.smh.com.au/world/vietnam-to-gain-satellite-views-of-south-china-sea-thanks-to-indian-agreement-20160126-gme23v.html>.
Lindsay Murdoch, “Vietnam to gain satellite views of South China Sea thanks to Indian agreement.”
According to a retired Indian Air Force group captain, Ajay Lele, at the New Delhi-based Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses the reason why India wants to engage Vietnam in every sphere is clear－－China.43
V. Conclusion
According to the outcome of prior studies, this paper believes that its main argument and three hypotheses have been verified to be logical assumptions, which coincide with the development of the SCS disputes. Firstly, the U.S. Navy has speeded up the tempo and range of its patrols because of China’s increased reclamation of land in the Spratly Islands. It has done this via a Freedom of Navigation Operation to restrain China’s claims on its man-made islands and manifest the U.S.’ maritime domination in the Asia-Pacific region.
Secondly, nations that claim sovereignty have different stances owing to different geo-strategic concerns, such as the Philippines with U.S. help not only wants international arbitration against China, but provides military bases and facilities for U.S. Air and Naval forces. Although Vietnam has strong economic ties with China, yet Vietnam enhances its military capabilities to counter Chinese maritime deployment. And Malaysia has also changed its modest position since China has patrolled a nearly Exclusive Economic Zone, in order to safeguard its maritime security and interest.
In summary, the three claimant nations of ASEAN publicly will not take either the U.S. or China side, in order to prevent jumping into
“Win-win against Beijing? India, Vietnam strike deal on South China Sea satellite tracking system,” RT, January 25, 2016, <https://www.rt.com/
news/330034-india-vietnam-china-satellite/>.
conflict between the two. Other non-regional major powers in the Asia-Pacific are eager to participate in this matter. For one thing they support the U.S. stance to counter China’s influence in the area; on the other hand, they can form close ties with claimant nations to widen their military and economic interests in the SCS, i.e., the U.S. has articulated a so-called “complex bilateral cooperation mechanism” (CBCM) among nations in the Asia-Pacific region to counter China’s unilateral changing the status-quo in the SCS.
After analyzing the situation in the SCS, Taiwan must seize this new development to boost its position and interests. Since the largest natural island, Taiping Island (Itu Aba), falls under Taiwan’s juris-diction, it has very important strategic significance. The entry of the U.S. destroyer, the USS Dilbert, into the seas around Duncan Island in the Parcels Islands was a challenge to three nations that claim so-vereignty: China, Vietnam and Taiwan. Taipei should stress its identity as a claimant to enhance Taiwan’s international participation and exercise the role of a peace-making stakeholder.
From a strategic perspective, Taiwan should not openly take the side of the U.S. or China regarding changing or maintaining the status quo, instead Taiwan has already released the “SCS Peace Initiative”
to carry out and accomplish Taiwan’s international responsibility to ease tension in the Spratly Islands and to create Taiping Island as a peaceful, humanitarian and non-traditional security hub in the region.
Technically, Taiwan should increase civil construction and facilities on Taiping Island in order to provide more assistance for the purpose of natural resources research, disaster relief and international parti-cipation.
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