Pacific Hyperventilation on China's Declared ADI Zone

Del Rosario Not Afraid to Be Stupid About ADIZ 

by Peter Lee - China Matters

An article in Asia Times Online quoted Philippine Foreign Minister Albert Del Rosario as saying:

"There's this threat that China will control the air space [in the South China Sea] ... It transforms an entire air zone into China's domestic air space," Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert Del Rosario said in response to China's ADIZ announcement. "That is an infringement and compromises the safety of civil aviation ... it also compromises the national security of affected states."

A couple observations:

1) This is unmitigated horseshit.
2) Nobody called him on it.

Remember that Rosario's office also went off half cocked about the PRC Hainan coast guard regulations a year ago:

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said over the weekend that China's reported plan to interdict ships that enter what it considers its territory in the South China Sea is a violation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Because of these reports, coming mostly from the media, the DFA said it would like China "to immediately clarify its reported plans to interdict ships that enter what it considers its territory in the South China Sea". ...

"[It is also] a direct threat to the entire international community, as it violates not only the maritime domain of coastal states established under Unclos, but also impedes the fundamental freedom of navigation and lawful commerce."

The DFA said this planned action by China is illegal and will validate the continuous and repeated pronouncements by the Philippines that China's claim of indisputable sovereignty over virtually the entire South China Sea is not only an excessive claim but a threat to all countries.

Anybody remember that? Anybody remember that the Chinese coast guard regs had nothing to do with freedom of navigation, lawful commerce, or sovereignty over the South China Sea? Anybody? Anybody? Bueller? Bueller?

The ADIZ hysterics remind me of the Hainan coast guard regs nothingburger, both for the Del Rosario's inflammatory blathering and the clueless strutting of the Western news outlets in reporting the situation.

As I wrote in my piece for Asia Times:

Reuters for some reason continued to beat the Hainan coast guard regulations dead horse with an analysis posted on December 9 that begins:

Imagine if the U.S. state of Hawaii passed a law allowing harbor police to board and seize foreign boats operating up to 1,000 km (600 miles) from Honolulu.

That, in effect, is what happened in China about a week ago.

It’s not what happened in China a week ago, either actually or "in effect", as I think can be concluded by reading my ATOl piece. Even if ATOl is not on Reuters’ radar, Dr. Fravel of MIT (and his commentary at The Diplomat, which is quoted and footnoted below) should be. ..

And it is a dismal fail as a piece of snark. The jurisdiction of the state of Hawaii extends 1380 miles from Honolulu to the outermost Northwestern Hawaiian Island, the Kure Atoll.

For the mathematically challenged Reuters scribe, that’s more than twice as far as 600 miles that supposedly symbolizes the irresponsible overreach of the Hainan provincial government.

We live in interesting times, at least as far as the PRC is concerned. Entire articles are spun out of threat perceptions, assumptions, inferences, assertions, and indignation.
The stirring call to arms is the "threat" that "raised concerns". There is "alarm".

Facts don't matter. To quote the song, It's feelings...nothing more than feelings..."

That, by the way, is why my current twitter handle is "Facts are stupid things".

Facts might be confirmed or rebutted by the focus of scrutiny and concern. But feelings are a subjective matter for the observer.

The only suitable recourse is "confidence-building"; and in some situations that oppressive sense of threat in the Western bosom is never relieved, no matter what the anxiety-provoking other does.

People with long memories (only me I guess) remember the run-up to the Iraq War, when everything that Saddam Hussein did or didn't do in his efforts to forestall the invasion were insufficient to allay the dreaded concerns. Until recently, the same tactic was used to declare that Iran was unable to allay the concerns of the international community about its nuclear program. Now the U.S. is reassured...but Israel isn't. What's a mullah to do?

The media variation is to blame the victim, i.e. blame the PRC for its disinterest or clumsiness in getting its message across to "allay the concerns" and "build confidence".

The whole concern/confidence-building dynamic is fundamentally flawed. Make that "logically unsound". Maybe "intellectually dishonest".

And I think it's deployed when the "concerned party" is unwilling to say what is genuinely on its mind.

For China, the ultimate confidence-building gesture for the West would be "Could the Chinese Communist Party please collapse under a wave of popular democratic unrest, the Chinese economy undergo a painful free market restructuring, and the PLA footprint get shrunk by a combination of budget reductions, mission modification, demoralization, and conciliation by a new pro-Western liberal democratic government?"

Don't be afraid. Ask for it!

And if you can't get it, start wondering if you're asking for the wrong thing.

We're probably headed in the opposite direction. Instead of less anxiety/confidence rhetoric, we'll get more of it.

From the same article:

Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations are drafting a joint statement to express concern over any "threat" to international civilian aviation. The draft statement, which reaffirms the common positions of Southeast Asian nations and Japan on "maritime security" and "freedom of navigation" in international waters, will be presented at the upcoming Japan-ASEAN summit in Tokyo.

I don't mind government officials playing the "feelings" card. It's a negotiating ploy, a way to deflect demands or decline offers that don't pass muster. (Having said that, I really don't know what endgame Del Rosario has in mind, now that he's taken another step to up the confrontation with the PRC. I get a feeling the rest of ASEAN doesn't really know, either.)

I really do wonder why the media plays along. Maybe anxiety genuinely overcomes analytics. Maybe resentment over the PRC's churlish treatment of Western journalists means that the Chinese position is doomed to short shrift until conditions improve. Maybe overall loyalty to Western values elicits support for empty Western rhetoric. Probably, it's realized that the PRC is doing a careful and responsible job of slicing the diplomatic and security salami, but we don't like them and don't want to give them the credit.

That's my feeling, anyway.