Key Takeaways

• In the past, China’s strategy in the South China Sea had tended to be more akin to the spirit of the ancient Chinese general and philosopher Sun Tzu, who famously wrote: “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” However, recently emboldened by its neighbouring countries’ fear and lack of political will to escalate the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP)  illegal encroachments into an open military conflict, China’s strategy quickly escalated to critically high degrees of aggression.
• The consequences of submitting to this Chinese policy of intimidation for the rest of the liberal world are equally unambiguous as China’s strategy: The red dragons contemplated bathtub (the South China Sea) would not only exclude Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Malaysia from their exclusive economic zone, but with 30 per cent of the world’s shipping trade passing through it, it would effectively surrender any trade flow towards the booming economic markets of Southeast Asia into the CCP’s tight chokehold.
• The stakes are enormously high, since Xi Jinping line of thought appears to be that if China gains sole authority over what and who is allowed to sail through these waters, he will gain massive leverage in terms of foreign policy compliance. Moreover, if nations do not have access to these waters- a global trade artery through which goods worth trillions of dollars are shipped annually - it is likely that the economies of some of these nations will bleed inexorably.
• It was the United States that fed the PRC’s growth to its present level of power and probably did more for its recovery and rejuvenation after the devastation of the Mao period than the Party itself had done for the Chinese people. The US helped create probably the most secure and benign international environment that China had seen since the late 19th century under the assumption that free trade with China will continue to bring about a harmonic convergence in Asia and provide the economic foundations for a lasting peace.
• It was in the fall of 2013, that China had asserted its air defense identification zone across the East China Sea and slowly began to violate Japanese airspace. The build-up of concentration camps in Xinjiang, particularly since 2016, helped facilitate a shift in the mind of the American people by creating public outrage.
• This shift resulted in the Sino-US trade war especially during the Trump era which escalated after Xi Jinping concentrated power in his hands completely. There was also a reaction in the United States to the PRCs expansionism. 
• The United States has to do a lot of work under the Biden administration in order to meet the challenges posed by the PRC. If the United States with its allies in East Asia including Japan and South Korea and Taiwan continues to prevent or to forestall a war, then Biden’s policy should be judged a success.
• Another perspective that emerged during the discussion was that the goal of China is still to gain maximum flexibility for itself, in order to extend its hold over the South China Sea to put maximum pressure on Taiwan, but not to start a war, although the risk of course is there. China is achieving this on the military side by a constant demonstration of military power including for instance naval exercises and armed fishing militias.
• However, the main thrust of the argument during the meeting was that the pushing of tenuous legal positions and claims are helping Beijing expand as well as consolidate. Until recently several countries have wittingly or unwittingly cooperated in such processes. 
• Several nations came out against China’s dubious “historical right claims” including Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines as ASEAN members. India along with the other three quad members, as well as UK, Germany, and New Zealand also spoke out against such claims.
• On the other hand, India has not mentioned China as a violator or specifically expressed concerns about the South China Sea developments either for its own sake, or as a measure of less ambiguous support for those ASEAN nations who are really concerned about the de jure and de facto developments in the South China Sea.
• However, India must see the similarities between China’s Coast Guard; maritime jurisdiction laws and its new boundary laws.  Thus, India’s policy needs to span over the continental and maritime space. 
• India and the Quad could play a bigger role in providing maritime and overall defense security beyond the low-end activities and low-end threats to the wide-ranging threats now looming from China, primarily in the politically turbulent waters of the South China Sea and across the Himalayas
• As far as the South China Sea is concerned and as far as China’s interests there are concerned, a new potential flashpoint has come onto the scene now being the Russo-Ukrainian war. 
• As far as the Chinese are concerned, Xi Jinping has been watching the developments very closely to see whether he can make a surprise move on Taiwan, in case the western world shows weaknesses in dealing with the Russian invasion of the Ukraine. 
• In the meantime, China has laid claims to 3 million square kilometres in the South China Sea and they have already started reclaiming lands, extending islands and islets, building air strips and placing missile sites on many of these islands.
• China has also dismissed the judgment of the Permanent Court of Arbitration and ignored it, including its assertion that China’s so called “historical claims” were baseless.  In the meantime, ever since the Democratic Progressive Party came to power in Taiwan with Tsai Ing-wen as its president, Xi Jinping has been steadily and systematically applying greater military and political pressure on Taiwan. 
• However, the other countries have also stepped in and a growing presence of foreign powers is seen in the South China Sea. 
• Thus, all likeminded countries must come together to ensure and enforce an internationally- approved and guaranteed- neutral Indo-Pacific region including the South China Sea.

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