Media headlines are stolen by talk of China’s island building in the South China Sea and whether Australia should join in Freedom of Navigation operations with the US Navy. But in truth this is a sideshow to a much larger ‘battle’ underway: not a clash of opposing armies but the gradual extension of China’s sphere of influence into Southeast Asia. Should Australia try to resist the Chinese thrust, take advantage of it or seek to modify it in some manner?
In a ‘sphere of influence’, the dominant state can constrain and guide the foreign and domestic policy choices of other states within a particular region without using direct military coercion. For China, establishing a Southeast Asian sphere of influence would bring several benefits. In making regional states more pliable, China could gain implicit veto power over any unfavourable actions they might take. Regional states would become less willing to provide long term basing to American forces or short term support for transiting US forces. The US would progressively become less able to exert military pressure in the region as it became more difficult to operate there. The US would be gradually pushed out of the region, and China would have excluded US access without resort to armed force.
Domestically, a sphere of influence would help prevent regional countries acting as ‘colour revolution’ conduits through which counter-Chinese Communist Party activities might gain access. The Party’s big fear is political instability; there are advantages in ensuring adjoining states cannot export dangerous ideas into China. Moreover, the Party’s standing in Chinese society would be enhanced by gaining regional deference towards Beijing. This is implicit in President Xi Jinping’s ‘China dream’ of a restored, rejuvenated Chinese super-state.
China is steadily gaining a sphere of influence by taking a broad approach to its relations across Southeast Asia. China stresses that issues between it and other regional states should be managed bilaterally, not multilaterally. A bilateral approach allows China to make the greatest use of its power and allows the smaller state to be split off from others and isolated. This is reinforced through China’s use of strategic comprehensive partnerships that engage another state across a broad front, allowing various domestic factions to be liberally supported when they support China, or disparaged if they do not. The flag follows trade, with the aim being to create and sustain like-minded governments.
Please click here to read the full “The battle for Southeast Asia’s soul” article in The Interpreter by Griffith Asia Institute Visiting Fellow, Dr Peter Layton.
