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Lawrence  Chung

It is an open secret among military watchers that for years, the United States has had the ability to monitor the southern coastline of China.
But last week, amid heightening tensions, a US spy plane flew deliberately into a disputed region of the South China Sea.
The P-8A Poseidon aircraft went over the areas where China had created islets through extensive land reclamation. Immediately, the Chinese navy issued eight warnings before the plane - which had on board a CNN television crew - went away.
"This is the Chinese navy, this is the Chinese navy, please go away quickly," said the recorded radio transmissions between the Chinese navy and the US spy plane, which were declassified and released by the US Navy.

Watch: US spy plane in tense radio exchange with Chinese navy over South China Sea
The US has since said it publicised the incident to raise awareness of China's massive land reclamation activities in the disputed waters.
Six days later, Beijing bluntly told the world it would not tolerate any party violating its overseas interests and would expand its naval power as part of a military strategy that aims to extend its offshore reach.
In a white paper by its defence ministry on Tuesday, China signalled a strategic shift to a more assertive military that will transform its naval power from pursuing "offshore defence" to one that also will commit to "open-seas protection".
INFOGRAPHIC: Surveying territorial claims in the South China Sea
The news came as it broke ground on the construction of two lighthouses in the disputed Spratly Islands.
This weekend, China and the US appear poised to cross verbal swords over the territorial claims issue at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.
But apart from words, what is the larger significance of Chinese actions? What is the endgame for China in the South China Sea?

A firm foothold
The intent is clear, analysts say, that China is using its reclamation efforts to establish a firm foothold to considerably strengthen its near-sea defence capabilities before expanding its naval reach to the world.
It is seeking to develop "situational awareness" of the regional waters that it has not yet mastered all these years, they say.
China's reclamation activities - and those of others such as the Philippines and Vietnam - have been ongoing for some time. But it was only after January last year that China started speeding up and expanding its efforts on an unprecedented scale that others became unnerved. The South China Sea island groups, or the Spratlys, through which passes US$5 trillion of shipping trade yearly - are claimed in part or wholly by China, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei.
Satellite images released by the Pentagon show that before last January, the Chinese presence in the Spratlys comprised only of outposts made of concrete blockhouses perched atop seven coral atolls. Today, the size of these reef-based constructions has grown from an area of two hectares to about 800 hectares, a 400-fold increase in acreage, according to a recent Pentagon report.
US Defence Secretary Ash Carter on Thursday said the scale of Beijing's activities - rather than actions by the US - was altering the status quo in the region.
"We've been flying over the South China Sea for years and years and years, and will continue to do that: fly, navigate, operate. So that's not a new fact," Carter said.
"The new facts are the reclamation and the scale on which it is being done, and that's not an American fact, that's a Chinese fact."
China says that the construction is in its territory and follows similar actions by other claimants. It says the enlargement is meant for civilian, humanitarian, scientific and ecological environmental purposes. Yet, on some occasions it has admitted that the building programme is also to "satisfy the need of necessary military defence".
The US has stepped into the fray in recent weeks in a more forceful fashion, accusing China of being provocative and warning that nothing less than freedom of navigation in open waters is at stake. The US moves are to prevent China from having a firm grip in the region. Even though Washington has no claims in the disputed waters, it considers itself as the guarantor of security in the region and it is protecting its own geostrategic interests, analysts say.
"Freedom of navigation is the bottom line the US must maintain" to sail through those waters, said Dr Li Mingjiang, an associate professor at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.
But China and other analysts have said that the US argument is an excuse to interfere in South China Sea matters, as China has never threatened freedom of navigation.
Li, a China studies expert, said that based on international ocean law, the US believed only islets that remained above sea level during high tides were covered by the sovereignty of the 12 nautical-mile territorial waters.
"But of all the coral atolls controlled by China, at least two submerge under the sea in natural conditions during high tide, and so in their perception, the US does not think these islets enjoy the same sovereignty even after they are reclaimed to become a big island," Li said.
He said the US was concerned that China might eventually use the U-shaped nine-dash line that it uses to demarcate its territorial claims to identify most parts of the South China Sea as its historical territory. This would mean the US and others would require permission from China to sail in the region. He said the US also needed to step in because of its desire to maintain its peacekeeper image and "address the expectation from its strategic allies in Southeast Asia".
Zhang Mingliang, a Southeast Asian affairs expert at Jinan University in Guangzhou, said the region felt uncomfortable because China was seen as a big and powerful neighbour.
"Rarely would people see Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia as a threat because they are small enough to be ignored, though they are doing the reclamation of the islets they control too," Zhang said. China, however, needed to adopt a strong stance in order to pacify the nationalistic sentiment back home, Li said, calling the spy plane incident an orchestrated bluff rather than a trigger to any military crisis.
Both sides know that confrontation would be risky and counterproductive given that Sino-US ties in other spheres are on an even keel.
Still, China lodged a formal complaint with the US on May 22, two days after the incident, calling the flying of the US surveillance aircraft in the region controlled by Beijing "not only dangerous but also irresponsible". It also asked the US to "make corrections, keep their rationality and stop any provocative actions".

Point of no return
Jonathan Holslag, head of research at the Brussels Institute of Contemporary China Studies, said it did not make sense for the US to start shouting after the damage had been done. "Satellite images were available from the very beginning of the land reclamation projects," he said.
He added that for the Chinese side, "the reclamation work has reached the point where they can no longer be stopped".
In other words, the Chinese have presented a near fait accompli with physical possession of new vantage points in the waters. Engineers have pointed out that large-scale reclamation must be fast to avoid the sand from being washed away.
But Alexander Neill, a Shangri-La Dialogue senior fellow for Asia-Pacific security, said: "For China to have deployed such staggering resources at breakneck speed a thousand miles from its coast would have required a long-standing, intricate master plan and huge cash reserves.
"This maritime terraforming plan is not, as some Chinese commentators would suggest, some kind of fast-tracked reaction to a beefed-up US navy presence in the region. This project must have been devised by the best planners and engineers in the People's Liberation Army and personally endorsed by Chinese President Xi Jinping ."
Analysts said China's aggressive reclamation efforts had an important strategic goal in mind.
"In addition to upholding its territorial claims, mainland China has an ambition to eventually expand its naval reach to the world," said Philip Yang, president of the Taiwan Association of International Relations.
Global ambition
The South China Sea islands had thus become a strategic base for China to develop its near-sea defence capabilities before expanding its naval reach globally, he said. To do so, China must also make the archipelagos it controls large enough to accommodate military and naval facilities. It has a naval base near Sanya but not much else in those waters.
The Chinese white paper mapped Beijing's strategy to become a maritime power with capabilities in open seas while ensuring territorial sovereignty. The document vowed to safeguard China's overseas interests, including in the South China Sea.
The Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative under the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said last month China was building a 3,000-metre runway on Fiery Cross Reef - called Yongshu Reef by China - that would enable it to monitor and potentially control the airspace over the South China Sea.
Bonnie Glaser, a senior associate with CSIS Pacific told the Lowy Institute for International Policy on May 20 that China might plan to declare an air defence identification zone (ADIZ) similar to the one it established in November 2013 in the East China Sea, which drew protests from Japan and Taiwan.
"In years past China has not had the capability to defend its interests in those waters and airspace, but increasingly China does, and with that capability comes more ambition to do so," she said. "So I think it is inevitable that we are going to see a great effort by China to try to prevent other countries from engaging in any activities in near-sea regions," she added.
Neill, however, said for China to announce an ADIZ, it had "to be confident" enough to do so.
The Chinese declaration of the East China Sea ADIZ in 2013 was relatively easy, given that China already had an early warning radar system in that part of Asia to monitor Japan and Taiwan. "Once they finish building the islands and the radar system, they may have the confidence to declare the ADIZ."
Yang said by swiftly building up the region it controls, China wanted to secure the South China Sea as a transport base for energy and other shipments.
Taiwanese pundits have said the land reclamation is aimed at developing the South China Sea into a gateway for China to the Pacific in the east and the Indian Ocean, and Europe, in the west.
The South China Sea - thought to be oil and gas rich - is home to strategically vital shipping lanes serving the South Pacific and Indian Ocean. It is also a crucial in the development of China's "One Belt, One Road" Maritime Silk Road initiative.
Meanwhile, Taiwan, one of the claimants, has stayed out of the dispute with its president, Ma Ying-jeou, proposing on Tuesday a peace initiative to resolve territorial rows in the South China Sea. The 10 nations of Southeast Asia have prioritised spending US$52 billion by 2020 on their navies and coastguards amid escalating tensions in the region, according to IHS Janes Defence Weekly. They are also attempting to create a code of conduct for South China Sea disputes.
Until then, analysts expect Chinese plans to continue, unless the United States decides to intervene. If that happens, the geostrategic calculations will change - for all players.
Additional reporting by Minnie Chan, Andrea Chen and Reuters


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Focus

China's foothold in South China Sea: analysts reveal endgame to Beijing's reclamation efforts

Chinese work on Yongshu, or Fiery Cross Reef, in the Spratlys.

A US Navy crewman (above) aboard a P-8A Poseidon spy plane views a computer screen showing Chinese construction on the reclaimed land of Yongshu, or Fiery Cross Reef, in the disputed Spratly Islands. Photo: Reuters

The Chinese navy frigate Yulin fires an anti-surface gun during an exercise in the South China Sea. Photo: AP

INFOGRAPHIC: Surveying territorial claims in the South China Sea

INFOGRAPHIC: South China Sea Disputes

News

China

Diplomacy

Beijing aims to use reclamation in the South China Sea as a base before extending its naval reach to the world, analysts say


Apart from words, what is the larger significance of Chinese actions? What is the endgame for China in the South China Sea?
