SNAPSHOT November 22, 2016
President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to withdraw the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) on his first day in office. That would be an especially excessive move, given that the TPP can have no effect, anyway, without the president’s signature affixed to legislation implementing the deal. A wiser approach would be for Mr. Trump to put the TPP on the back burner and keep open the option to reconsider it in the future, when the deal’s geostrategic imperative becomes more apparent.

THE UNITED STATES IN THE ASIAN CENTURY

Completed in 2015 after six years of rigorous negotiations, the TPP is an agreement to reduce trade and investment barriers among 12 Pacific Rim countries, including the United States. If implemented, the TPP would deliver real economic benefits to U.S. businesses, workers, consumers, and investors. Perhaps more important in a time of growing uncertainty about the direction of global affairs, the TPP would reaffirm the primacy of the rules and institutions established under U.S. leadership after World War II. That architecture provided the conditions for trade to flourish, relative peace to take hold, and unparalleled prosperity to persist for 70 years. 

Indeed, the geostrategic rationale for TPP is much less about achieving overt economic and security objectives than it is about preserving—and strengthening—U.S. soft power. As the economic center of gravity shifts from West to East across the Pacific, those successful trade rules and institutions could yield to lesser, opaque, and discriminatory rules, which could become the norm in Asia without the TPP. And those rules could very well subvert the existing order, advance parochial objectives, and disadvantage U.S. commercial interests.

Ratification of the TPP is the greatest insurance policy against those outcomes. It would affirm the primacy of open trade, non-discrimination, and transparency. It would ensure that rules—and not the whims of autocrats—continue to govern global commerce, reducing uncertainty and the scope for denying U.S. entities rightful opportunities to partake of the benefits of Asia’s economic expansion in the decades ahead. In that sense, TPP implementation would extend Pax Americana deep into what has been called the Asian century.

Through eight successful rounds of multilateral trade liberalization under the auspices of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade between 1947 and 1994, the global economy shed the tightest shackles of protectionism. The last successful multilateral agreement—the Uruguay Round, held between 1986 and 1994—created the World Trade Organization, which enshrines the previous half century’s trade rules and serves as a beacon that guides disputes away from trade wars and toward resolution.

But in the last decade momentum for continued multilateral liberalization stalled and the ill-fated Doha Round was unofficially eulogized.

Link to article here.

Published time: 14 Jan, 2017 20:35
Edited time: 15 Jan, 2017 20:04

China and Vietnam have promised to settle their differences regarding territorial claims in the South China Sea and to safeguard peace in the region, the two countries said in a joint communique.
 
Then statement came after Vietnamese Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong held talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Saturday.
 
The communique, released by China’s Xinhua news agency after the talks, described the discussions of bilateral relations by the top officials as “candid.”
 
Beijing and Hanoi agreed to “manage well their maritime difference, avoid actions that complicate the situation and escalate tensions, and safeguard the peace and stability of the South China Sea," the agency said.
 
The joint communique also said that the parties agreed to continue to "fully and effectively" implement the Declaration on the Conduct (DOC) of Parties in the South China Sea and strive for the early conclusion of a Code of Conduct (COC) on the basis of the declaration.
 
During the talks, Xi also urged both China and Vietnam to increase communication and consolidate mutual trust in order to lay a solid political foundation for the settlement of disputes in the South China Sea and work together on maritime exploration.
 
He stressed that China “is willing to work with Vietnam to advance their comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership in a sustained, healthy and steady way, making more contributions to peace, cooperation, development and prosperity in Asia and the world as a whole.”
 
Conflicting territorial claims in the South China Sea have become a stumbling block in relations between the neighboring states in recent years.
 
Hanoi has started a quite military buildup in order to be able to secure its 200-nautical mile Exclusive Economic Zone as Beijing’s claims currently span almost all of the South China Sea.
Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan also have claims in the sea, through which $5 trillion worth of maritime trade passes every year. 
 
Xinhua said that China and Vietnam have jointly patrolled and explored for oil in the Beibu Gulf in the South Chia Sea, calling it one of the “success stories” that “demonstrate that both countries are committed to shelving their maritime differences through cooperation rather than confrontation, which will yield more win-win results and larger-scale cooperation.” 
 
 Link to article here. 

SPUTNIK NEWS
Politics 18:56 24.12.2016 (updated 18:57 24.12.2016) 

The world is witnessing the post-Cold-War re-emergence of regional great powers and the Trump administration needs to seek ways to advance its interests under these new circumstances. Vietnam's foreign policy reflects changes in the Asia Pacific geopolitical landscape.

While the new balance of power is taking shape in the Southeast Asian region, Hanoi is trying to reconcile itself to reality. "More so than most of its neighbors, Vietnam can neither fully reject nor embrace the growing power on its northern border," Strategic Forecasting, Inc. (Stratfor) pointed out in its latest analytical report of the Asia Pacific region, in a reference to China. "Some, such as the Philippines and Malaysia, have eagerly joined Chinese-led trade blocs and dispute-settling mechanisms. Others, like Japan and Singapore, have firmly backed Washington's regional agenda. Vietnam has historically opted to strike a delicate balance between the two, but as the region adjusts to a new political reality, Hanoi's strategy is becoming increasingly difficult to pull off," the report stated.

Stratfor's analysts emphasized that since the end of the Cold War Vietnam has been seeking independence from both Beijing and Washington.

"Choosing between US- and Chinese-led initiatives in trade and security has not been an option for Vietnam since the Cold War ended," the report noted, adding that Hanoi has taken full advantage of its location by maintaining relations with the US, China and ASEAN nations. The analysts pointed out that Hanoi has long been one of the "staunchest advocates" for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). However, it has recently backed off from the deal. Shortly after Donald Trump's win in the US presidential election Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc announced that although the country's legislature was almost certain to ratify the TPP agreement, Hanoi would shelve the US-led trade accord. "The United States has announced it suspends the submission of TPP to the parliament so there are not sufficient conditions for Vietnam to submit its proposal for ratification," the Prime Minister told the National Assembly on November 17, as cited by Reuters.
Meanwhile, Vietnam has jumped at the opportunity to join the China-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership initiative and strike the free trade agreement with the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU).

Hanoi "doesn't put all its eggs in one basket," Pham Quang Minh, rector of Hanoi National University's University of Social Sciences and Humanities, highlighted in his November interview with Sputnik Vietnamese. He admitted, however, that "the TPP was a hope for Vietnam for some time." "Vietnam has always worked from the principle 'don't put all your eggs in one basket,' and wasn't completely relying on TPP. But now it is necessary to activate economic reforms. Vietnam has to wake up and quickly adapt to the new economic situation," Pham told Sputnik.

Stratfor's analysts called attention to the fact that Vietnam's motives for striking these trade and investment agreements with China and the EEU "are not solely economic."

"Hanoi's deal with the Eurasian Economic Union, for instance, offers only limited access to the bloc's market but lays the groundwork for a stronger military and energy partnership with Russia, its former ally," the report highlighted.

While insisting that Vietnam's "resistance" to China's influence has deep historic roots, Stratfor can't overlook the fact that Hanoi is drifting away from Washington and softening its criticism of Beijing.

And so are other Washington's longstanding allies in Southeast Asia, according to Douglas H. Paal, director of the Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "Traditional American allies Thailand and the Philippines are increasingly estranged from Washington, leaving greater scope for Beijing to cultivate influence," Paal noted in his op-ed for South China Morning Post. "As the Trump administration gathers itself, it should take stock of the post-cold-war re-emergence of regional great powers… Moscow, Beijing and Delhi will join the US in defining the future of Asia, and Washington should figure out how best to advance its interests in this new era," the American academic stressed.

Link to article here.

New York Times
​
By HELENE COOPER DEC. 16, 2016
 
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon on Friday demanded the return of an underwater drone that was seized by China as an American crew was moving in to retrieve it. The episode threatens to increase tensions in a region already fraught with great-power rivalries.

A Chinese warship had been shadowing the Bowditch, a United States naval vessel, in the international waters of the South China Sea when the Chinese launched a small boat and snatched the unmanned underwater vehicle, the Pentagon said.

Ignoring radio demands from the Americans to return the drone, the Chinese ship sailed off.
The episode set off one of the tensest standoffs between Beijing and Washington in 15 years and occurred a day after the Chinese signaled that they had installed weapons along a string of disputed islands in the South China Sea.

The seizure of the drone brought a formal protest from the United States at a time when China is extending claims over the South China Sea and is watching the United States — and its incoming president — with wariness.

The episode did not have the life-or-death drama of the April 2001 midair collision between a Chinese fighter jet and a Navy surveillance plane that forced the Americans to make an emergency landing on Chinese territory. Acknowledging the odd nature of Chinese sailors seizing the drone close to its American mother ship, one official here likened it to watching a thief steal a wallet in broad daylight.
American officials said they were still trying to determine whether the seizure was a low-level action taken by Chinese sailors who spotted the drone — which the Pentagon said was conducting scientific research — or a strategic-level action ordered by more senior Chinese leaders to challenge the American presence in those waters.

“We call upon China to return” the underwater vehicle “immediately,” Peter Cook, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement Friday, “and to comply with all of its obligations under international law.”
The incident complicates already testy relations between China and the United States, ties that have been further frayed by President-elect Donald J. Trump’s phone call with the president of Taiwan. Mr. Trump angered Chinese officials by holding a phone conversation with President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan, an island that Beijing deems a breakaway province of China. It had been nearly four decades since a United States president or president-elect had such direct contact with a Taiwanese leader.
In an interview broadcast on Sunday, Mr. Trump also criticized China over its trade imbalance with the United States, its military activities in the South China Sea and its links to North Korea. Aides to the president-elect have defended Mr. Trump’s words and actions as important to bringing a fresh eye to a number of foreign policy issues.

Pentagon officials said on Friday that they were trying to determine if the seizure of the underwater drone had anything to do with Mr. Trump’s comments.

At the White House on Friday, President Obama was asked about the issue during a news conference, and he made clear that he viewed the question of Taiwan as especially sensitive. While the president refrained from directly criticizing Mr. Trump, he warned his successor to carefully consider his actions and any new policy, lest he ignite what could be a significant response from Beijing.
“I think all of our foreign policy should be subject to fresh eyes,” Mr. Obama said. But he added: “For China, the issue of Taiwan is as important as anything on their docket. The idea of a One China is at the heart of their conception of a nation.”

“And so if you are going to upend this understanding, you have to have thought through what the consequences are, because the Chinese will not treat that the way they’ll treat other issues,” he said, adding that the Chinese would not even treat it the way they treated issues around the South China Sea, “where we’ve had a lot of tensions.”

China experts said on Friday that it was unclear whether the seizure of the American drone was linked to anger in Beijing over Mr. Trump, or a continuation of years of tensions over competing claims in the South China Sea.

The Bowditch episode came after China signaled on Thursday that it had installed weapons on disputed islands in the South China Sea that it would use to repel threats. In describing the new weapons deployment, a Defense Ministry statement suggested that China was further watering down a pledge made by its president, Xi Jinping, to not militarize the islands.

That indicated that such installations were part of China’s plan to deepen its territorial claim over the islands, which has created tensions with its neighbors over their rival claims and with Washington over freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, one of the world’s busiest commercial waterways. The United States Navy routinely sends warships to sail the South China Sea as part of ongoing American policy meant to demonstrate that all countries have the freedom of navigation in disputed waters.
M. Taylor Fravel, an associate professor of political science at M.I.T. who studies China’s territorial disputes and has written on the South China Sea, called the seizure of the drone “a big deal, as it represents the deliberate theft of U.S. government property and a clear violation” of maritime law.
“By stealing a drone versus threatening the safety of the ship, China may be trying to find a way to signal its opposition to U.S. activities without creating a larger incident,” Mr. Fravel said. “Nevertheless, it will be viewed by the U.S. as a clear challenge.”

The Bowditch, an oceanographic ship, was operating in international waters and carrying out scientific research, said Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. The drone was part of an unclassified program to collect oceanographic data, including salinity in the sea, clarity of water and ocean temperature, factors that can help the military in its collection of sonar data.

The Chinese Navy ship, which had been shadowing the American ship, approached within 500 yards of the Bowditch before seizing the drone, which American officials say was around 50 nautical miles northwest of Subic Bay, the Philippines.

Whatever the case, the Pentagon said that China had no right to seize the drone. “This is not the sort of conduct we expect from professional navies,” Captain Davis said.
Michael Swaine, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, called the theft “low-level provocation.”

“This doesn’t involve lives,” Mr. Swaine said. “It involves the Chinese grabbing something that belongs to the United States. The normal thing to do in these cases is, you issue a démarche and demand it be returned ASAP.”

Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, criticized the Obama administration for what he called a failure to provide a “strong and determined U.S. response” to Chinese actions in the South China Sea. “Freedom of the seas and the principles of the rules-based order are not self-enforcing,” he said. “American leadership is required for their defense. But that leadership has been sorely lacking.”
There was no immediate comment from Mr. Trump or his transition team.
 
Link to article here.
 

FORBES - OPINION
Andrew Corr, Contributor
AUG 29, 2016 @ 05:18 PM

China’s actions in the South China Sea are increasingly militaristic. Due to Vietnam’s lack of strong treaty allies, the country is particularly vulnerable compared to its peers. In response to Vietnam’s deteriorating security situation, it is likely to choose one of three strategies: 1) continue the current strategy of hedging between the U.S., China and Russia; 2) ally with the U.S. against China; or 3) develop Vietnam’s military capabilities, including a potential nuclear deterrent.

China’s actions against Vietnam’s territory, Vietnam’s strategic response, and the outcome of the interaction, have global consequences. A win by China against Vietnam would intimidate other countries into granting concessions, and embolden China militarily. For this reason, Vietnam’s strategic decisions in the coming years should be of concern to everyone with an interest in international politics.
China’s threat against Vietnam is principally an attempt to take over Vietnam’s maritime exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) reserves to Vietnam. Vietnam will likely address the threat through a mix of accommodation and two types of deterrence. Due to the exclusion effects of these strategic options, however, the emphasis of Vietnam’s strategy will likely be only one of the three.

All three strategies incur costs, entail risk, and will likely cause fundamental changes in Vietnam’s politics and economy. Vietnam’s decision will profoundly affect the domestic and international outcome of events in the near future, including whether China strengthens its de facto presence in Vietnam’s maritime territory, the stability of Vietnam’s current leadership, and China’s strategy against other countries.

Vietnam’s current strategy, hedge between the U.S., China, and Russia, is the most complex, but least likely to lead to diplomatic, economic, or even military conflict. Vietnam is highly likely to follow this path. It includes the relatively inoffensive elements from all three strategies: seeking negotiations, development funding and trade with all potential allies, including the U.S. and China; only moderately increased defense cooperation with the U.S. and its allies; and new weapons purchases short of a nuclear deterrent.

Overemphasizing any single element of the three strategies that compose hedging will lead to unintended consequences and exclude the effectiveness of the other strategies. Too obvious hedging will alienate all major allies, and erode Vietnam’s image as a committed ally. Too close alliance with the U.S. against China will lead to retaliatory measures by China and perhaps Russia. Obtaining a nuclear deterrent would produce, at the very least, strongly negative diplomatic reactions from both the U.S. and China.

Hedging reduces the risk of war, but leaves Vietnam relatively weak and vulnerable to increasing Chinese influence. As China increases its absolute and relative economic and military strength in Asia, its influence over Vietnam will increase proportionately. This Vietnamese vulnerability will mean increasing political, diplomatic, and economic concessions to China over the next decade or two. If Vietnam chooses to hedge as its primary strategy, it should expect China to demand, and obtain, concessions such as a private recognition of Chinese sovereignty within the 9-dash line, joint development and revenue sharing of hydrocarbon and fishing resources, and possibly even discreet forms of taxing Vietnam’s maritime trade. Increasing Chinese influence in Vietnam and the resulting concessions will create discontent among Vietnam’s population, risking political stability and the tenure of the current Vietnamese leadership.

A second strategy would be for Vietnam’s leadership to largely eliminate China’s influence on Vietnam andally closely with the U.S. and its allies, including Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines, Australia, and India. As part of this strategy, Vietnam could bring its own arbitration case against China through UNCLOS. This strategy of allying with the U.S. is most likely to maintain Vietnam’s independence and sovereignty over its hydrocarbon, fishing, and maritime shipping economies. But Vietnam’s newly close allies would, over time, have their own influence on Vietnam, including more active encouragement of democratization and freedom of speech reforms.

Link to article here.

New York Times
By Jane Perlez, Sept. 5, 2016HANGZHOU, China — An unusually large number of Chinese vessels have been positioned close to a disputed reef in the South China Sea near the coast of the Philippines for the last week, despite warnings by the United States that China should stay away.

The Philippine Defense Department has photographs of four Chinese Coast Guard ships, and six other vessels, less than a mile from Scarborough Shoal, which is claimed by the Philippines and China, the defense minister, Delfin Lorenzana, said in an interview.

The presence of the Chinese ships during the Group of 20 summit meeting in Hangzhou, China, where President Obama and President Xi Jinping met on Saturday, seemed particularly provocative.
President Obama specifically warned Mr. Xi at a meeting in Washington in March not to start building an island at Scarborough Shoal. White House officials said that Mr. Obama planned to deliver the same message to Mr. Xi at their meeting in Hangzhou.

American officials had been waiting to see what China would do around Scarborough Shoal after the summit meeting, assuming that the Chinese would not act sooner in the interest of preserving a seamless conference. The appearance of ships while global leaders were still in Hangzhou was not expected.

The meeting had already been rocked by a chaotic arrival when the Chinese did not provide a rolling staircase for President Obama to disembark from the main door of Air Force One on his arrival in Hangzhou on Saturday.

Mr. Obama got off the plane by a staircase carried on board Air Force One and released from the belly of the aircraft.

Scarborough Shoal has been the center of attention as one of the most desirable places in the South China Sea for the Chinese to convert into an artificial island. It is close to military bases in the Philippines where the United States military has access.

In the last several years, the Chinese have built a group of artificial islands with military capabilities in the Spratly Archipelago, not far from Scarborough Shoal.

American military officials fear that China plans to build a bigger military base on Scarborough Shoal, which lies about 140 miles from the coast of the Philippines.

In a sweeping ruling against China on the South China Sea in July, an international tribunal in The Hague focused on Scarborough Shoal.

The tribunal said China had violated international law by interfering with fishing, endangering ships of the Philippines and failing to protect the marine environment at the shoal, the tribunal said.

Some of the Chinese vessels spotted off the shoal last week could be dredges to do preliminary building work, said Mr. Lorenzana, the defense minister. One of the vessels was actually in the mouth of the shoal, he added.

Four Chinese Coast Guard vessels have been permanently positioned near the shoal, an area of about 56 square miles, in recent weeks, he said. The six other vessels, one with what looked like large cable-laying machinery, were new additions spotted by Filipino fishermen last week, he said.

A Philippine Navy plane was then dispatched to take photos. The six vessels that look like civilian ships could be navy ships “masquerading” as other ships, Mr. Lorenzana said.

The Chinese ambassador in Manila had been warned about the ships last week, but the envoy denied that Chinese vessels were in the vicinity of the shoal, Mr. Lorenzana said. Now that the Philippines had photographs, the images would be taken to the Chinese Embassy as evidence, he added.

The new president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte, said on Friday in Davao City that it was “unsettling” to read his government’s intelligence reports that a lot of Chinese ships were in the Scarborough Shoal area.

Mr. Duterte is scheduled to attend an East Asian summit meeting in Laos on Tuesday. The Chinese premier, Li Keqiang, is also expected to be there, but Mr. Duterte said he may reserve stating his concern to the Chinese for another occasion, presumably when Mr. Xi is present.

“There will be a time when I have to make a stand and I have to make it clear to China, ‘You know every time you talk about sole ownership or even entitlements there, it’s something which is totally unacceptable to us,’ ” he told a crowd of supporters in Davao City on Friday.

Scarborough Shoal was at the center of a major dispute between the Philippines and China in 2012 after Chinese fishing vessels were found in the center of the lagoon, traditional Philippine fishing grounds.

The State Department brokered a deal that called for the Chinese and the Philippine vessels to leave the shoal. The Chinese later defied the deal, placing a cordon across the mouth of the shoal and positioning a coast guard vessel nearby.

Link to article here.

The Straits Times PUBLISHED AUG 25, 2016, 5:00 AM SGT

HANOI • France and other countries should help to keep the peace in the disputed South China Sea, Vietnam's President said yesterday, as unease grows over China's increasingly muscular approach in the key waterway.

China claims most of the sea where it has built up reefs capable of hosting military equipment, sparking ire from competing claimants, including Vietnam.

Speaking to AFP ahead of a visit by French leader Francois Hollande next month, Vietnam's President Tran Dai Quang said he hopes France and others will help to defuse regional tensions in the waterway, which it calls the East Sea.

"We highly welcome the cooperation from France and other nations in the process of maintaining peace and stability in the region and the world and on the East Sea," he said.

Hanoi and Beijing have traded diplomatic barbs over disputed island chains and waters in the South China Sea and in 2014 China moved a controversial oil rig into contested territory, prompting riots in Vietnam.

The strategic waterway is also claimed by the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan.
Mr Quang's comments come after French Defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said in June he would ask European countries to conduct coordinated patrols in the South China Sea.

France and the United States have sent naval ships to the sea in recent months and have vowed to send more, angering Beijing.

The Vietnamese President, whose role is mostly ceremonial, said Mr Hollande's visit would help to boost military ties between the former colonial foes, as Hanoi has rapidly increased its defence bud- get in the last decade.

He added that Vietnam wants more unity in Asean, which has yet to forge a unified front against Beijing's militarisation in the sea.
​
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on August 25, 2016, with the headline 'Vietnam seeks help to ease S. China Sea tensions'

Link to article here.

ASIA & PACIFIC
21:41 13.08.2016 (updated 04:02 14.08.2016) 
​
Tensions in the South China Sea resulting from The Hague arbitrational court’s ruling against China’s longstanding claim to the disputed area are at risk of spilling over with rhetoric and tactics escalating.

On Thursday, China’s state-run Global Times newspaper warned Vietnam against the deployment of rocket launchers targeting Chinese facilities reminding Hanoi of the devastation that ensued the last time the two countries went to war.

"If Vietnam’s latest deployment is targeting China, that would be a terrible mistake," said the editorial. "We hope Vietnam will remember and draw some lessons from history."

The statement follows a Reuters report, citing “Western officials,” that Vietnam had deployed advanced mobile rocket launchers targeting China’s runways and military installations amid a brewing regional dispute in the South China Sea that the United States has been all too willing to meddle in.

"Fortifying the islands with rocket launchers, if proved to be true, will only demonstrate Vietnam’s determination to strengthen its military deployment," said the editorial. "Vietnam has been enhancing its control of the islets and islands in Nansha in order to consolidate the beneficial status quo."
Vietnam’s Foreign Ministry vehemently denied the report following the stern warning from China’s state media saying that the information about the rocket launchers was "inaccurate" although US State Department officials acknowledged that they were aware of the report and did not refute its claims.

The editorial ultimately laid the blame at the feet of the West, most prominently the United States, that incited the regional diplomatic row by encouraging the Philippines to seek a ruling from The Hague arbitrational court contesting China’s longstanding claim to most of the South China Sea territory.

"It can be expected that the West won’t easily give up using arbitration as leverage to pile pressure on China and continue to stoke more tensions in the region," opined the editorial. "The regional stakeholders should be wary of the West’s tactics."

Beijing has warned its people to be prepared to go to war over the valuable waters and islands of the South China Sea, home to one of the world’s largest natural gas and oil deposits and through which over 40% of the world’s shipborne trade travels each day. China has already deployed combat patrols to the area in an effort the head off regional efforts to seize on the arbitration court’s rulings to deprive Beijing of its historically held territory.
 

WORLD NEWS | Wed Aug 10, 2016 3:23pm EDT
By Greg Torode | HONG KONG

Vietnam has discreetly fortified several of its islands in the disputed South China Sea with new mobile rocket launchers capable of striking China's runways and military installations across the vital trade route, according to Western officials.

Diplomats and military officers told Reuters that intelligence shows Hanoi has shipped the launchers from the Vietnamese mainland into position on five bases in the Spratly islands in recent months, a move likely to raise tensions with Beijing.

The launchers have been hidden from aerial surveillance and they have yet to be armed, but could be made operational with rocket artillery rounds within two or three days, according to the three sources.
Vietnam's Foreign Ministry said the information was "inaccurate", without elaborating.

Deputy Defence Minister, Senior Lieutenant-General Nguyen Chi Vinh, told Reuters in Singapore in June that Hanoi had no such launchers or weapons ready in the Spratlys but reserved the right to take any such measures.

"It is within our legitimate right to self-defense to move any of our weapons to any area at any time within our sovereign territory," he said.

The move is designed to counter China's build-up on its seven reclaimed islands in the Spratlys archipelago. Vietnam's military strategists fear the building runways, radars and other military installations on those holdings have left Vietnam's southern and island defenses increasingly vulnerable.

Military analysts say it is the most significant defensive move Vietnam has made on its holdings in the South China Sea in decades.

Hanoi wanted to have the launchers in place as it expected tensions to rise in the wake of the landmark international court ruling against China in an arbitration case brought by the Philippines, foreign envoys said.

The ruling last month, stridently rejected by Beijing, found no legal basis to China's sweeping historic claims to much of the South China Sea.

Vietnam, China and Taiwan claim all of the Spratlys while the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei claim some of the area.

"China has indisputable sovereignty over the Spratly islands and nearby waters," China’s Foreign Ministry said in a faxed statement on Wednesday. "China resolutely opposes the relevant country illegally occupying parts of China’s Spratly islands and reefs and on these illegally occupied Spratly islands and reefs belonging to China carrying out illegal construction and military deployments.”

The United States is also monitoring developments closely.

"We continue to call on all South China Sea claimants to avoid actions that raise tensions, take practical steps to build confidence, and intensify efforts to find peaceful, diplomatic solutions to disputes," a State Department official said. 

STATE-OF-THE-ART SYSTEM

Foreign officials and military analysts believe the launchers form part of Vietnam's state-of-art EXTRA rocket artillery system recently acquired from Israel.

EXTRA rounds are highly accurate up to a range of 150 km (93 miles), with different 150 kg (330 lb) warheads that can carry high explosives or bomblets to attack multiple targets simultaneously. Operated with targeting drones, they could strike both ships and land targets.

That puts China's 3,000-metre runways and installations on Subi, Fiery Cross and Mischief Reef within range of many of Vietnam's tightly clustered holdings on 21 islands and reefs.

While Vietnam has larger and longer range Russian coastal defense missiles, the EXTRA is considered highly mobile and effective against amphibious landings. It uses compact radars, so does not require a large operational footprint - also suitable for deployment on islets and reefs.

"When Vietnam acquired the EXTRA system, it was always thought that it would be deployed on the Spratlys...it is the perfect weapon for that," said Siemon Wezeman, a senior arms researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

There is no sign the launchers have been recently test fired or moved.

China took its first Spratlys possessions after a sea battle against Vietnam's then weak navy in 1988. After the battle, Vietnam said 64 soldiers with little protection were killed as they tried to protect a flag on South Johnson reef - an incident still acutely felt in Hanoi.

In recent years, Vietnam has significantly improved its naval capabilities as part of a broader military modernization, including buying six advanced Kilo submarines from Russia.

Carl Thayer, an expert on Vietnam's military at the Australian Defence Force Academy, said the deployment showed the seriousness of Vietnam's determination to militarily deter China as far as possible.

"China's runways and military installations in the Spratlys are a direct challenge to Vietnam, particularly in their southern waters and skies, and they are showing they are prepared to respond to that threat," he said. "China is unlikely to see this as purely defensive, and it could mark a new stage of militarization of the Spratlys."

Trevor Hollingsbee, a former naval intelligence analyst with the British defense ministry, said he believed the deployment also had a political factor, partly undermining the fear created by the prospect of large Chinese bases deep in maritime Southeast Asia.
​
"It introduces a potential vulnerability where they was none before - it is a sudden new complication in an arena that China was dominating," he said.
 
(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington, Michael Martina in Beijing and Martin Petty in Hanoi.; Editing by Lincoln Feast)