For decades, the U.S. has guaranteed freedom of navigation in Asia’s waters, patrolling the seas with a view to maintaining the principle that no sovereign state shall suffer interference from another. China’s growing military prowess, combined with a dogged assertiveness over its territorial claims, is testing the old ways and providing a potential flashpoint for the two powers, increasingly at odds over issues from cybersecurity to Covid-19. That tension is felt most keenly in the South China Sea.
1. Where is the South China Sea?
Stretching from China in the north to Indonesia in the south, the waterway encompasses 1.4 million square miles (3.6 million square kilometers), making it bigger than the Mediterranean Sea. To the west it touches Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore, and the Philippines and Brunei to the east. It’s a thriving fishing zone — yielding some 10% of the global catch — and holds promising oil and natural gas reserves. A vast amount of trade transits through its waters. In 2016, that amounted to some $3 trillion, including more than 30% of the global maritime crude oil trade.