Vietnam’s dramatic growth of synthetic land on the 21 reefs, shoals, and different options that it occupies within the Spratly Islands of the South China Sea will doubtless surpass the extent of China’s personal land reclamation within the coming years. Such is the conclusion of a current bombshell report from the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI), a Washington-based assume tank that has been monitoring Hanoi’s dredging and landfill actions.
As of March, the assume tank noticed, Vietnam had created roughly 70 p.c as a lot synthetic land as China had within the previous 4 years. Usually, this case could be ripe for Beijing to confront Hanoi militarily or in any other case—all within the identify of imposing its sweeping claims of Chinese language sovereignty over the area’s waters to incorporate these options and waters couched nicely inside Hanoi’s internationally acknowledged unique financial zone (EEZ).
Curiously, none of this has occurred. Beijing has remained all however mum concerning the report, responding to a reporter’s query on it with boilerplate speaking factors. And whereas fishing fleet and coast guard clashes involving China and Vietnam nonetheless routinely happen within the South China Sea, they’re often low-level incidents and go unreported, in line with my interlocutors. In contrast with the extended standoff at Vanguard Financial institution inside Hanoi’s EEZ in 2019, for example, the previous six years have been exceptionally quiet and peaceable. It looks like this may proceed regardless of Vietnam’s sturdy land reclamation actions that can doubtless embrace new army services, resembling piers for coast guard and navy entry, in line with the AMTI report.
That is definitely not the case with one other maritime counterclaimant in Southeast Asia: the Philippines. For years, Manila has drawn Beijing’s ire throughout the South China Sea. On Sept. 16, China sprayed a water cannon at a Philippine vessel that it claims was intruding within the waters round Scarborough Shoal, a series of reefs close to the Philippines’ foremost island of Luzon. The most recent incident occurred towards the backdrop of Beijing calling to transform Scarborough Shoal right into a Chinese language nationwide nature protect, a transfer that Manila rejects.
Final month, a extra severe incident occurred at Scarborough Shoal. A Chinese language navy ship collided with a Chinese language coast guard ship whereas chasing a Philippine ship, ensuing in severe injury to the ships and potential casualties.
Previous to concluding a provisional diplomatic settlement in July 2024, tensions at Second Thomas Shoal—the place Manila stations troops on the deliberately grounded Sierra Madre, a World Conflict II-era warship—had reached a boiling level. Throughout a routine resupply of the outpost, a Filipino seaman misplaced his thumb after a Chinese language coast guard ship rammed his vessel, and different Filipino personnel had been injured by Chinese language attackers who boarded their ship wielding melee weapons, together with knives, machetes, spears, and an ax.
Though the Second Thomas Shoal has quieted down because the provisional diplomatic association went into impact, Chinese language and Philippine sovereignty disputes across the area proceed to be extraordinarily hostile, elevating the opportunity of escalation to armed battle sooner or later.
It’s arduous to know precisely what’s driving Beijing’s starkly differing responses to every of those rivals, however there are doubtless a number of key elements.
One is that China in all probability believes that the Philippines, below President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., has considerably strengthened its alliance with the US to counter China, and subsequently Beijing has strategically misplaced Manila—a minimum of for now. If Marcos’s vice chairman, Sara Duterte, runs and wins the presidential election in 2028, then this might change, as she might share the views of her father, ex-President Rodrigo Duterte, who believed that the Philippines should turn into much less depending on the U.S. alliance and friendlier with China. However for now, this isn’t the case, and Beijing has correspondingly resorted to extra sticks and fewer carrots.
In contrast—and though the 2 international locations are historic enemies—Vietnam has been extra loyal to China than the Philippines. Earlier this month, for instance, Vietnamese President Luong Cuong attended Beijing’s Victory Day celebration marking the eightieth anniversary of Japan’s defeat in World Conflict II. Vietnam additionally accepted an invite from China to take part as a visitor nation on the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit held a few days beforehand, and it additionally now has accomplice nation standing in BRICS. Each organizations are considered as anti-Western and even anti-American, and China is a core member in every.
Vietnam additionally seems to be to China in instances of want. For instance, after U.S. President Donald Trump’s return to the White Home and his announcement of reciprocal tariffs on many international locations, together with Vietnam, Chinese language President Xi Jinping was welcomed to Hanoi, the place the 2 nations signed dozens of agreements, together with on economics and commerce. In an op-ed previous to his arrival, Xi wrote that “There aren’t any winners in commerce wars and tariff wars,” a lot to his host’s delight.
Though Vietnam additionally welcomed President Joe Biden to Hanoi in 2023 to raise relations to the very best degree of “complete strategic partnership,” on par with China and others near Vietnam, Beijing confirmed no concern, rightly understanding that Hanoi’s multialigned coverage was not essentially aimed toward countering China.
One more reason that Manila is bearing the brunt of Beijing’s anger is that the Philippines has been way more energetic in enlisting assist from different nations in its quest towards China. A number of days after visiting the White Home in July, Marcos met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the 2 leaders pledged to elevate their strategic partnership by deepening ties on commerce, protection, and maritime safety—the latter two factors being code for collaborating to counter China.
Concurrently with Marcos’s go to to New Delhi, each India and the Philippines carried out their first-ever joint army train within the South China Sea in one more unmistakable sign of deterrence towards Beijing. Over the previous few years, the Philippines has considerably ramped up cooperative army drills; signed new protection agreements; or carried out each with not solely the US, but additionally with Australia, India, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea. Late final month, Manila even welcomed Taiwanese Overseas Minister Lin Chia-lung, who joined a enterprise delegation to debate commerce and funding issues. He was apparently touring in a personal capability and held no official authorities conferences—an odd association that nonetheless enraged Beijing.
Vietnam’s strategy is much extra refined. In the course of the first eight years of Hanoi utilizing the label “complete strategic accomplice” to explain its most vital worldwide relationships, Vietnam solely established three: China, Russia, and India. Nonetheless, prior to now 9 years, Hanoi has opened the floodgates, forging 9 new complete strategic partnerships—some with controversial nations, from Beijing’s perspective, resembling the US and Japan.
Hanoi has all the time been clear in regards to the “4 nos” in its protection coverage: no participation in safety alliances, no alignment with one nation towards one other, no international basing inside its borders, and no preemptive battle. On the similar time, Vietnam’s complete strategic partnerships are centered on many different issues than simply protection. Put one other method, Hanoi can backdoor extra protection cooperation into these relationships below the peaceable guise of broader cooperative actions.
Lastly, a few of China’s frustration doubtless stems from the capriciousness of Philippine democracy. When Rodrigo Duterte was in energy from 2016 to 2022, for instance, bilateral relations had been far smoother; the truth is, there seems to have been a “gentleman’s settlement” on find out how to deal with South China Sea frictions. Duterte’s total international coverage was to rely much less on Washington, have interaction extra with Beijing, and discover cooperative areas, resembling joint exploration of the South China Sea for oil and fuel, and to leverage China’s Belt and Highway Initiative for Duterte’s personal “Construct, Construct, Construct” program to enhance the standard of life within the Philippines. None of his insurance policies panned out, and in the end, his successor—Marcos—reversed them.
In fact, the primary distinction is that Vietnam is a fellow authoritarian state dominated by one social gathering, which conveniently occurs to be the Communist Occasion. Though there’s all the time some degree of uncertainty and unpredictably in politics, even in a one-party regime, this issue is much much less vital than in a democracy. Consequently, Beijing is already fairly acquainted and comfy with not solely the present however doubtless additionally the longer term leaders of Vietnam. And the truth that they’re all Communist Occasion members strengthens their cooperative ties on ideological grounds.
Certainly, whereas Beijing hosted its Victory Day celebrations, Vietnam concurrently hosted its personal public parade to commemorate what each international locations have rewritten as a communist victory over imperialist fascists, a standard narrative amongst communist events around the globe. This shared governance and worldview helps the fruitful improvement of China-Vietnam ties regardless of their sovereignty disputes within the South China Sea.
It is very important be aware that whereas Beijing has certainly handled each the Philippines and Vietnam in a different way within the area, neither nation has provide you with a great way to get Beijing to utterly cease urgent its claims. For the previous few years, Manila has carried out what has turn into often known as “assertive transparency”—a tactic of utilizing video recordings and images to show unhealthy Chinese language conduct within the area.
Conversely, in what one would possibly name the “opacity initiative,” Vietnam has clearly reached a quiet association with China to not publicize any of their clashes within the area and to deal with disagreements and tensions strictly behind closed doorways to keep away from pointless escalation. Each methods have failed.
However a minimum of Vietnam can declare much less drama with China due to its lower-key strategy—a worthwhile achievement in itself. In the meantime, the Philippines and United States ought to recognize that whereas their safety alliance has doubtless prevented a full-blown battle, it has not deterred China from persevering with to conduct gray-zone operations and different harmful maneuvers within the South China Sea.
Manila and Washington ought to calibrate which Chinese language actions would possibly set off the alliance and find out how to conduct alliance operations in a simpler method. Manila might attempt to behave extra like Hanoi, however that may be anathema to the Philippine folks, for whom giving up resistance to China could be tantamount to give up. Maybe a little bit little bit of each, nevertheless, would do the trick.
