Analysts disagree over risk of confrontation in WPS

THE possibility that China will abandon hope of peacefully reuniting with Taiwan is still “more dangerous” to regional and global peace than the continued escalation of tensions in the South China Sea, the head of a US-based maritime transparency project said Monday.

The view of retired US Air Force Col. Ray Powell, who heads Sealight, which monitors and reports activities in the South China Sea, contrasted with that expressed by former US diplomat Douglas Paal, who told the South China Morning Post that the risk of a confrontation over Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal was much higher and “something more dangerous” than an invasion of Taiwan.

Powell told The Manila Times that the situation in the West Philippine Sea (WPS) is “indeed quite dangerous.”

This photo taken on March 5, 2024 shows China Coast Guard vessels deploying water cannons at the Philippine military chartered Unaizah May 4 (R) during its supply mission to Second Thomas Shoal in disputed waters of the South China Sea. JAM STA ROSA / AFP 

“China has continued to escalate as it has tried to intimidate the Philippines into submission, but the Philippines has thus far refused to submit but has instead turned to its US and its alliance network for support and leverage,” he said.

However, Powell pointed out that the possibility that China will engage in armed conflict with the Philippines, who is a long-standing treaty ally of the US, “for the prize of a rusty ship on a faraway shoal” is still unclear, referring to the BRP Sierra Madre, a World War II-era warship that the Philippines grounded onto Ayungin in 1999 to serve as an outpost in the WPS.

“It seems more likely that Beijing will continue to test the limits of nonlethal force in hopes that Manila will eventually grow weary of the struggle and accept unfavorable terms,” said Powell, who has monitored the situation in the South China Sea for several years.

He said Taiwan, by contrast, is a “deeply symbolic and very near target for Beijing” and it is “growing farther” from China’s “coercive grasp with each generation.”

“If Beijing should abandon hope of a peaceful annexation and see its window of maximum opportunity slipping away, that seems to me to still be the most dangerous to regional and global peace,” he said.

The pro-China Asian Century Philippines Strategic Studies Institute, however, said it is the presence of the US in the region that is stirring up trouble and “agitating” China.

The group’s president, Herman Tiu-Laurel, said the US, in particular, is “taking the Philippines for a ride on the back of its Indo-Pacific strategy” and that the US-Philippine alliance favored by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is the “biggest threat to the Filipino people and Asia today.”