Did China Blink in the South China Sea?

Barring a secret deal where Hanoi might commit to more substantial concessions, the tacit bargain suggested above is noteworthy for its symmetrical nature and the fragility of its mutual concessions. Like China’s acts of deescalation, Vietnam’s are both reversible and cheap. Instead of sending Foreign Minister Minh, Vietnam dispatched Hanoi City Communist Party boss Pham Quang Nghi to the United States on a trip that started only a few days after the oil rig’s removal, on July 20. As a member of the Politburo, Nghi is politically more senior than Minh, who does not sit on this highest echelon of Vietnamese politics. What’s more, Nghi is known to be close to Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong, who is the highest-ranking official in the country. Nghi’s visit would bring back some firsthand sensing for Trong to shape Minh’s trip, which is now rescheduled for September.

The legal actions against China were something that Hanoi would have had to postpone anyway even without Chinese pressure. While Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung went ahead with his plan of preparing for suing China in court, most other key members of the Politburo were unsure whether this would be the best option. Fear of Chinese retaliation combined with chances of an unfavorable verdict and the fact that no rulings can be enforced without China’s consent dominated their calculation.

Was Hanoi’s deference the key to Beijing’s deescalation? The fragility and inexpensiveness of these concessions suggest that compromise makes up only a small portion of the recipe, if any portion at all. What really caused China to climb down the ladder of conflict is the fact that several actors, including Vietnam and the United States, have significantly raised the ceiling for what is permissible in dealing with China. Beijing’s action may look like a tacit bargain, but its real nature is something different.

The Salami Slices Are Getting Thick

China’s behavior makes the most sense if seen in light of its salami-slicing tactic. This is Beijing’s signature method for materializing its territorial claims and changing the status quo in the South China Sea and the East China Sea. The crux of this salami-slicing tactic is to strike a delicate balance between assertiveness and restraint so that your actions are enough to change facts on the ground but not enough to create a good reason for others to turn decisively against you. There are plenty of reasons to think that this delicate balance has reached its limits and Typhoon Rammasun has given China a good excuse to defuse tensions without losing face.

The deployment of the HYSY-981 into the Vietnamese EEZ has caused the biggest international crisis in Southeast Asia since the end of the Cold War. With China bullying its smaller neighbor so aggressively and for so long, the world’s perception of China has changed for the worse. We’ve seen members of the Vietnamese National Assembly calling China an adversary, which had been impossible just before the oil-rig incident. Vietnam also revived memories about its war with China, which was a taboo in the last two decades. In mid-July, Hanoi commemorated, for the first time ever, the previously ignored armed clashes at Vi Xuyen on the Sino-Vietnamese border during 1984-1988, with stories about the bloody war featured prominently in Vietnamese media, and President Truong Tan Sang publicly praised the patriotism and heroism of those who fought on the Vietnamese side. All these things are unprecedented and, together with the threat of a de facto alliance with the United States, they indicate a huge change in Hanoi’s approach to Beijing.

In the United States on July 10, the Senate unanimously passed a resolution (S.Res.412) that condemns China’s coercive actions and urges it to withdraw the drilling rig and associated maritime forces. The resolution also “sets forth U.S. policy regarding supporting allies and partners in the Asia-Pacific region and opposing claims that impinge on the rights, freedoms, and lawful use of the sea.” Several influential U.S. policy makers and scholars began to call for a tougher approach to China. One example is an op-ed entitled “China’s territorial advances must be kept in check by the United States” by Michèle Flournoy and Ely Ratner in the Washington Post. Another example is chairman of the House’s intelligence committee Mike Rogers’ remarks that the United States must respond more aggressively to China’s territorial claims and must empower allies and partners to be more aggressive.

Overall, the general trend is that China’s unilateral drilling in the Vietnamese EEZ has added more impetus for several states, including Japan, the Philippines, Australia, India and Vietnam, to readjust their military postures and foreign-policy alignments to more effectively counter China’s aggressiveness. Seeing this trend and the related change in perception, China must undoubtedly sense that its aggressive action has inflicted sufficient costs to its own strategy and reputation.

So What?

For years, China’s rivals, such as Vietnam and the United States, have adopted a policy of restraint for fear of provoking the giant dragon. They have created a glass ceiling that limits what they deem permissible in dealing with the rising power. China, for its part, has adroitly exploited this fear with its salami-slicing tactic. Salami slicing works as long as the other side lacks the resolve to break free of their self-censorship, which is kept in place by their fear of escalation. The success of salami slicing is predicated upon one trick: if you can render your opponent’s restraint one-sided, you can win without fighting. In light of this, the countertrick is obvious: you must show your opponent that restraint cannot be one-sided.

China’s oil-rig move was the culmination of a long process of salami slicing. But it also provided an opportunity for its rivals to break the glass ceiling that limited their actions. The outcome of this crisis suggests that China is not much different from other actors—it also has its own fear of escalation.

Dr. Alexander L. Vuving is an associate professor at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, Honolulu. The views expressed in this article are his own and do not reflect those of his employer. He tweets @Alex_Vuving

Image: Flickr/Official U.S. Navy/CC by 2.0