South China Sea: Scott Swift, commander of the US Pacific Fleet sounds alarm
- THE AUSTRALIAN
- SAVE
US Pacific Fleet commander Admiral Scott Swift.
Growing alarm about China’s “aggressive” activities in the South China Sea is provoking an unprecedented military build-up in the region, the commander of the United States’ Pacific Fleet has warned.
Admiral Scott Swift, one of the US Navy’s most senior commanders, said the acceleration of China’s “disruptive activities” in contested waters was causing widespread anxiety in the Indo Pacific region.
Combined with a lack of transparency around China’s behaviour, other Asia Pacific nations had responded by spending more on their own military build-up.
“The resulting climate of uncertainty not only threatens freedom of the seas, it chips away at the rules-based system, it encourages nations to transfer an ever larger share of national wealth to the purchase of naval weapons beyond what is needed for merely personal defence,” he said at the Australian National University today at an event co-hosted by the Japanese and Australian embassies.
“Most troubling are the undeniable signs of militarisation in select parts of the region, unprecedented in scope and scale,” he said, adding that there was a proliferation of new military barracks, deep water ports, radars and squadrons of aircraft.
While not naming China, Admiral Swift said “some countries” were bucking the international rules governing the freedom of the seas, which was threatening freedom of navigation and creating “increasing chaos” after more than 70 years of stability.
“I remain concerned the freedom of the seas in some Indo Asia Pacific waters is not only at risk from long-standing challenges like piracy, smuggling and other illicit activities, it is increasingly vulnerable to a state-led resurgence of the principle of might makes right,” he said.
This was manifested by “unprecedented examples of aggressive construction and militarisation” that was inconsistent with international law.
“Attempts to justify these activities at sea are often based on channelling nationalistic history outwards, the sort of thing that may stoke patriotism at home, but have no place among responsible nations in international waters.”
He said smaller nations were particularly vulnerable, “and increasingly alarmed by these disruptive trends.”
The Admiral’s comments come after he warned last year that China’s expansionist behaviour in the South China Sea needed to be confronted to prevent it spreading to land and becoming a “friction point”.
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