South China Sea: Learning from Cold War Episodes

South China Sea was one of the more prominent flashpoints in 2012 and is likely to remain one as we start 2013. As I pored over news reports of new military exercises, deployment of troops and military hardwares (all of which are driven in one way or another by the US) to countries in the region, I can’t help but to compare this episode to those that happened during the Cold War era.

When Castro took control of Cuba and purchased crude oils from Soviet Union for processing, the reluctance of US oil companies based in Cuba to process the oils had the unintended effect of pushing Castro more towards Soviet Union and the eventual Cuban missile crisis. Similarly, Johnson’s operation rolling thunder and policies towards the peasants in then South Vietnam pushed them further towards the embrace of Communist North instead of convincing them of the ideals of freedom and democracy.

In both episodes, US’ hawkish stances had the unexpected effect of pushing these countries closer towards their rival instead of bringing them to the negotiation tables, where the probability of outcomes more favorable to the US would have been conceived. In our current South China Sea issue, China appears to have adopted similar hawkish attitude as the US did for the above episodes. I am not entirely sure if China realizes that if this behaviour is to continue, history may repeat itself; in other words, China will end up pushing their neighbours closer to the US and concurrently, give more boosts for Obama’s pivot to Asia.

In China’s interest, the sensible thing will be to tone down the rhetoric and find a middle ground to solve the issue. China had accumulated lots of neighbourly goodwill in the past and it is certainly not worth it to throw them away over a single episode.