RIPS Policy Perspectives
No.11
Asian Perspectives in 2011:
China’s “Coercive” Diplomacy
Leads to New Power Realignments

Masashi Nishihara
August 201

Research Institute for Peace andSecurity Tokyo

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RIPS Policy Perspectives

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RIPS Policy Perspectives Back Issues(available at http://www.rips.or.jp/english/publications/policy_perspectives.html)

No.1 Akio Watanabe, Perspectives on Asian Security 2006, October 2006
No.2 Masashi Nishihara, Can Japan Be a Global Partner for NATO?, December
2006
No.3 Chiyuki Aoi, Peace Support Operations: Contemporary Challenges and theRole of Japan, March 2007
No.4 Masashi Nishihara, Heading for a Strategic Uncertainty?: Perspectives on
Asian Security, 2007, April 2007
No.5 Kazuto Suzuki, Space: Japan’s New Security Agenda, October, 2007
No.6 Masashi Nishihara, Tenser in Southwest Asia, Calmer in East Asia －Perspectives in Mid-2008－, July 2008
No.7 Yukari Kubota, Japan’s New Strategy as an Arms Exporter－Revising theThree Principles on Arms Exports－, November 2008
No.8 Masahiro Matsumura, Japan’s Policy Options for Taiwan, June 2009No.9 Masashi Nishihara, Asian Perspectives in 2009: Hopeful Signs and Growing
Concerns, July 2009
No.10 Michimi Muranishi, North Korea’s Abduction of Japanese Citizens: The
Centrality of Human Rights Violation, January 2010

Asian Perspectives in 2011:
China’s “Coercive” Diplomacy Leads to New Power Realignments
Masashi Nishihara＊

With its economy and military power growing rapidly, China now isincreasingly employing a much more aggressive diplomacy. It has become
more assertive in protecting its national interests throughout East Asia andis even competing with the United States by trying to limit its presence there.
Over the last few years, this more forceful diplomacy also has been clear in
China’s relations with both the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN)
and Japan. During this time, the United States, by siding with ASEAN, has
attempted to take advantage of the tension both between China and theASEAN countries over the disputed territories in the South China Sea andbetween China and Japan over the Senkaku Islands. Then, in an effort tofend off the U.S. intervention, China persuaded the ASEAN countries to tone
down their criticism of its country by offering the member nations handsome
economic aid packages.
Moreover, since 2010, perhaps to limit the U.S. presence in the region,
China and Russia have become close partners, to support both their own
interests and those of North Korea. These developments have divided＊

President of the Research Institute for Peace and Security and Chairman of the Japan

Association for International Security.

1the Asian Pacific nations into two camps: one made up of China, Russia, andNorth Korea, and the other, led by the United States, of Japan, South Korea,
the ASEAN nations, Australia, and India. The ASEAN nations, however,
have been careful not to ally themselves firmly with either camp. But
Japan—having to rebuild after the disastrous earthquake, tsunami, andnuclear reactor meltdown—is working even more closely with the UnitedStates than before. The result of all this is new power realignments in theregion.

The United States’ Thwarted Support of ASEAN
On July 23, 2011, at the ASEAN Regional Forum held in Bali, U.S. Secretaryof State Hillary Clinton proposed that China present the legal basis for its
claims to the disputed islands in the South China Sea. China refused. The
event nonetheless showed that the United States was siding with ASEAN,
thereby challenging China’s expansive and forceful diplomacy.
The United States’ support of ASEAN is typical of the new direction of
power realignments in the Western Pacific. Since 2010, the disputes between
China and ASEAN and between China and Japan have brought ASEAN,
Japan, and the United States closer than ever before. At last year’s Regional
Forum meeting in Hanoi, the United States stressed the importance of “thefreedom of navigation” in regard to China’s claim of “core national interests”
in the South China Sea, thereby attempting to keep China’s militaryactivities in check. Then in August, the U.S. Pacific Fleet conducted naval
exercises with the Vietnamese navy. In addition, in response to China’s
allegedly building structures on an island to which the Philippines have laid2

claim, the United States made clear that in case of an armed conflict with
China, it would honor its bilateral security treaty with the Philippines.
Although ASEAN appreciated the U.S. gesture, the organization
always is careful not to upset China, owing in large part to the overriding
importance of economic relations. Indeed, ASEAN itself continues to be atarget of Beijing’s intimidation. At the Hanoi ARF (ASEAN Regional Forum),
Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi responded angrily to the ASEAN
delegates’ and Americans’ criticisms of China’s behavior in the South China
Sea. Consequently, that September at the ASEAN-U.S. Summit in New York,ASEAN refrained from issuing a joint statement critical of China. Then in
December, under pressure from China, all the ASEAN ambassadors declined
to attend the ceremony in Oslo at which the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded
to the Chinese human rights activist Lee Xiaobo, who himself was notallowed to attend.
China’s policy toward the ASEAN countries has been of the
carrot-and-stick variety. In late April 2011, Premier Wen Jiabao visited
Indonesia, which chaired this year’s ASEAN and related meetings, andoffered it a $9 billion loan, which would result in doubling by 2015 the twocountries’ bilateral trade of $40 billion. The goal of Wen’s visit was topersuade Indonesia to put aside its claims on disputed islands by offering thecountry an attractive economic package. The dispute had flared up again in
June 2010, when the Indonesian navy intercepted Chinese fishing boats
operating in Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone. But the navy had torelease the boats when it was confronted by a more powerful Chinese naval
vessel. After receiving the offer of economic aid, Indonesia gradually shifted
its position to Beijing’s, that territorial disputes were best settled on a3

bilateral rather than a multilateral basis. (The United States and ASEAN
favored multilateral consultation.)
There was another dispute in May 2011 when Chinese patrol vessels
cut the undersea cables laid by Vietnamese oil-rigging companies, after
which the position of Vietnam and the Philippines toward China noticeably
hardened. Then in late June, Vietnam’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, Ho
Xuan Son, went to Beijing, a visit that ended with a surprising jointstatement calling for “effective measures to be taken to avoid any action thatmay damage mutual trust and friendship.” China’s tactics of penalty andreward may indeed have worked. However, it should be noted that while theVietnamese authorities have begun to tighten their control over the students’anti-Chinese demonstrations in front of the Chinese embassy in Hanoi, theyalso reportedly have a plan to refit Cam Ranh Bay to allow the entry ofAmerican aircraft carriers. This is how Vietnam is delicately handling its
relations with the big powers.
Later, in a meeting before this year’s ARF, the ASEAN delegates again
compromised with China, issuing a joint document suggesting that China
and ASEAN together would draw up an agreement codifying their conduct
regarding the disputed islands in the South China Sea. Clearly, the aim ofChina’s tactics of alternating between penalty and reward is to prevent U.S.
intervention and defeat U.S. interests in the region.

China’s ”Coercive”Coercive”
Coercive” Diplomacy toward Japan
Another example of China’s “coercive” diplomacy took place in September
2010, this time toward Japan. When Japanese coast guard vessels were
pursuing Chinese fishing boats that had entered Japan’s territorial waters
4around the Senkaku Islands, two of the fishing boats deliberately struck thecoast guard vessels. The Chinese captain and his three crew members weretaken into custody. Because the Chinese Communist Party was meeting
when this happened, the Beijing government had to act forcefully. Around
10,000 Chinese “voluntarily” canceled their planned vacation trips to Japan;
four Japanese company workers were arrested taking photos of a militarycompound, not realizing that it was restricted; and China’s exports of rareearths to Japan were suddenly suspended. Both Prime Minister Naoto Kan
and Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara were in New York when the incident
took place, but in any case, Japan’s new government, which had been in
office for only three months, did not handle the situation well. Tokyo gave in
to Beijing’s coercive tactics and freed the Chinese.
The Senkaku incident, however, strengthened Japanese-U.S. relations.
In September 2010, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Undersecretary of
Defense Michele Flournoy stated that if China were to attack the Senkaku
Islands, the United States would honor its defense commitment to Japan inaccordance with their bilateral security treaty.
Since mid-2009, China has stepped up its naval activities in theWestern Pacific. Its fleet based in Qingdao sailed to the South China Sea in
April 2010 and through the Miyako strait (the strait between the mainisland of Okinawa and the Miyako Islands) to the Okinotorishima area in the
Pacific. This was a clear demonstration of China’s intention to expand its
area of control beyond the “first island chain” (Okinawa, Taiwan, and thePhilippines) to the “second island chain” (Tokyo, Iwoto, and Guam).

5

China’s Move toward Closer Links with North Korea and Russia
Since May 2009, North Korea has not tested any nuclear weapons. Instead,in March 2010, it launched a torpedo against a South Korean corvette andthen, in November, shelled Yeonpyeong island. Why North Korea resorted tothese attacks remains unclear. Perhaps it wanted to persuade the UnitedStates to resume bilateral talks. Perhaps it wanted to give Kim Jong-on, theheir apparent of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-il, an opportunity to see
North-South tensions at first hand. Perhaps it wanted to force South Korea’s
president, Lee Myung-bak, to become more conciliatory toward Pyongyang.
North Korea apparently is feeling the bite of the tougher sanctions
imposed by Japan, South Korea, and the United States. Therefore, to show
its people the country’s “strong and prosperous power” in the year 2012 (theone-hundredth anniversary of Kim Il-song’s birth), the Kim regime now
wants to ease tensions with South Korea and the United States, which isnecessary in order for the country to obtain economic aid. The United Statesand South Korea, however, have demanded that North Korea return to the
six-party talks, which have not been held since 2007, by agreeing to give up
its nuclear arms. Although meetings between South and North Korea held in
Bali on July 22 and between North Korea and the United States in New Yorkon July 29 have resulted in an agreement to resume the talks, Pyongyang
has not agreed to relinquish its nuclear weapons.
China also has urged North Korea to return to the six-party talks,
although its principal strategic interest is a politically and economicallystable North Korea rather than a denuclearized North Korea leaning toward
Washington. That is, China would settle for stable relations with a nuclear
North Korea. To that end, China has been constructing a bridge between
6Dandong and Shinuiju across the Yalu River as a Chinese model of economic
development.
Kim Jong-il’s visit to the Russian Far East and Siberia in August 2011
produced an agreement in which Moscow will supply natural gas to thecountry. Because North Korea is unlikely to be able to pay the $8 billion for
the gas in the foreseeable future, Moscow’s geostrategic interest would seemto be a greater presence in the Korean Peninsula.
Together, China’s and Russia’s policies toward North Korea have
prevented the UN Security Council from adopting a resolution condemning
North Korea for testing its long-range missiles and nuclear weapons in 2009
and for sinking the South Korean naval vessel Cheonan and shelling
Yeonpyeong island in 2011. China, especially, has strenuously opposed such aresolution. Both Beijing and Moscow see the strategic benefit of keeping
North Korea on their side, at a political distance from the United States.
Accordingly, despite their public statements, the two countries seem toacquiesce in North Korea’s possession of nuclear arms.
Beijing and Moscow also have formed a united front in their territorial
disputes with Japan. At the peak of the Sino-Soviet rift, China supported
Japan’s claims to the Northern Territories against the Soviet Union. But on
September 28, 2010, Presidents Dmitry Medvedev and Hu Jintao issued ajoint statement commemorating the sixty-fifth anniversary of their “victory
against Japanese militarism,” in which they condemned any “attempts” torevise the history of World War II. Their statement came three weeks after
the Senkaku incident. With Beijing’s support, Russia wanted to end its
territorial dispute with Japan. For its part, China may have been provoked7

by the statement regarding the applicability of the Japan-U.S. Security
Treaty to the defense of Senkaku.
Tensions between Japan and Russia rose in November 2010 when, forthe first time as president, President Medvedev visited the Northern
Territories. Foreign Minister Maehara immediately summoned the Russian
ambassador to warn him of the impending deterioration of bilateral relations.
Then, on February 7, Northern Territories Day, Prime Minister Kan referred
to President Medvedev’s visit to the Northern Territories as an “unforgivable
outrage.” In response, on February 9 President Medvedev ordered thedeployment of additional arms to Russia’s “Southern Kuriles,” and on
February 11 Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov welcomed Chinese andKorean business firms’ investment in the area. These remarks have raised
new concerns in Japan.
Despite their strategic partnership, China and Russia still see eachother as competitors in several important areas, including the arms market,
space technology, and access to oil and gas resources in Central Asia.
Nonetheless, their partnership may gain influence in international power
relations as the higher price of oil makes Russia richer and stronger andChina’s increased consumption of oil and gas makes it more dependent on
Moscow.

The “Arab Spring” in China
Since the beginning of 2011, two new factors have begun to affect East Asia’s
security environment. One is the impact of the “Arab spring,” or Arabawakening, which began in Tunisia in January 2011. The popularantigovernment demonstrations that drove President Ben Ali out of his
8country inspired similar demonstrations in Egypt, which ousted President
Hosni Mubarak, and in other Middle East countries, such as Bahrain, Libya,
and Syria. These demonstrations also have shaken China’s authoritarian
government, with Chinese activist bloggers calling for a “Chinese jasmine
revolution.”
Not wanting to repeat the developments in the Middle East, Chinese
security authorities immediately took preventive measures. For example,
activists gathering at McDonald’s restaurants in as many as thirteen major
cities on Sundays were reportedly ordered to disperse quickly, and some of
the activists were arrested. In March, the FY2011 budget for internal
security passed by China’s National People’s Congress was 624.4 billion yuan
(US$97 billion), which was larger than the defense budget (601.4 billion
yuan, or US$93.4 billion). In May, the government folded several Internet
control offices into the State Internet Information Office, in order to “direct,
coordinate and supervise online content management and handle theadministration of online newsreporting.”
These developments are indicative of how worried the authorities areabout the public attitude toward the government. Widespread corruption,
unsafe food, media control, and restricted information often are targets of
popular criticism. Then after the crash of China’s brand-new high-speed
train at Wenzhou on July 23 that killed thirty-nine people, bloggers flooded
the Internet with angry complaints about the government’s cover-up of thereal cause of the accident, the corruption, and the absence of safety features.
Chinese authorities began controlling media reports for fear that theincreasing criticism of the government might explode into demonstrations
against the government. These internal factors, which could well damage
9

China’s international prestige, may help restrain its diplomatic and evenmilitary activities.

The March 11 Disaster in JapanThe other factor that has affected the security environment of East Asia is
the impact of the strong earthquake and tsunami that struck on March 11,
2011, and severely damaged four nuclear reactors at Fukushima Daiichi.
Approximately 100,000 members of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces were
mobilized to the disaster areas, Japan’s largest disaster relief operation ever.
The United States also deployed about 20,000 troops, in what was called“Operation Tomodachi [friends].” This was the first time that the two forces
had conducted actual joint operations, which resulted in strengthening thebinational alliance.
At the same time, reconstructing the disaster area—as well as
repairing the damage to the reactors and mitigating the subsequent releaseof radioactivity—will require a huge amount of human and financial
resources and has caused serious cleavages in Japanese national politics
regarding the future of nuclear energy in the country. Abandoning nuclear
energy would lead to a severe shortage of electricity, which would weaken the
country’s industries and drive some factories to relocate abroad. In addition,with less national power, Japan would probably have to increase its relianceon the United States for its national security.
The United States also is faced with an urgent need to reduce its
defense budget, which probably will affect its military presence in Europe
and the Middle East. How much this smaller budget will impact the U.S.
military presence in Asia has not been determined. The transfer of 8,000 U.S.
10

Marines to Guam, as agreed on by Tokyo and Washington, will be difficult toachieve by 2014. Nonetheless, the two Pacific allies will take measures tostrengthen their alliance, as their foreign and defense ministers pledged in
Washington on June 23.

New Power Realignments
The ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting (ADMM), which met in Hanoi in
April 2010, was expanded by the invitation of their counterparts from eight
additional countries (ADMM Plus): Australia, China, India, Japan, South
Korea, New Zealand, Russia, and the United States. The first meeting of
ADMM Plus took place in October, again in Hanoi. The East Asia Summit(EAS) also welcomed the United States and Russia as new members and willmeet in Indonesia in October of this year.
These new associations may give Russia an opportunity to play a more
active role in the region than it has in the past. Russia will host the 2012
APEC Summit in Vladivostok, which will help enhance its regional presence,and it has shown increasing interest in expanding its economic and politicalcontacts with the ASEAN nations.
Kim Jong-il’s August visit with President Medvedev in Ulan Ude, eastof Lake Baikal, and his visit with Dai Bingguo, a state councillor, in Qiqihar
may be a move to balance North Korea’s relations with its two big neighbors.
China probably is not pleased to see strong ties developing between
Pyongyang and Moscow.
In the meantime, despite its domestic vulnerabilities, China hascontinued its economic growth and now has the second largest GDP after theUnited States. China also has demonstrated its expanding military11capability by testing its first aircraft carrier near Dalian on August 10.
Although the carrier is supposed to be only for training purposes, it
reportedly will be followed by six more by the end of this decade. On August
24, the U.S. Department of Defense issued a report warning that China’s
new aircraft carrier might become operational by 2015.
Tensions between the China-led camp and the U.S.-led camp thus arelikely to grow, with ASEAN being wooed by both. New power realignments
indeed appear to be on the rise.

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