![]() ![]() engagement in Asia and drove America to establish itself as a Pacific power in the first place. military forces against the Barbary States in response to piracy against American vessels. foreign policy since President Thomas Jefferson dispatched U.S. The idea of a maritime commons in which all nations are free to sail, fish, and engage in commerce has been a bedrock of U.S. ![]() The United States has an interest in upholding the rights of all countries to exercise freedom of the seas. The rules of the sea are critical to U.S. This failure to successfully contest China’s creeping dominance over the South China Sea doesn’t just damage the interests of America’s friends it threatens three of the United States’ most abiding strategic interests in the region: rules, relationships, and resources. The administration may have put America first, but it has left its South China Sea allies and partners behind. It provides relatively little benefit to Southeast Asian states steadily losing economic and other rights in their own waters. This is necessary but far from sufficient. China seeks to restrict a broad range of freedoms of the seas in clear violation of international law, but freedom of navigation operations narrowly assert only the rights of foreign military vessels. Freedom of navigation operations have proved insufficient to prevent Beijing from using gray zone pressure to expand its influence over the sea and airspace within the nine-dash line and block its neighbors from accessing resources (including oil, gas, and fish) in their own waters. The situation in the South China Sea is sometimes described as a stalemate, but the truth is that China’s neighbors and outside parties-including the United States-are losing ground. In short, for all its tough talk on China and increased activity in the South China Sea, the Trump administration’s credibility in Southeast Asia is eroding. engagement with Southeast Asia has declined and one-third have little or no confidence in the United States as a strategic partner and regional security provider. Yet a poll released this week showed that two-thirds of respondents in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) believe U.S. The operation followed Vice President Mike Pence’s assertion last November that “the United States is taking decisive action to protect our interests and promote the Indo-Pacific’s shared success.” This was the ninth known operation conducted by the Trump administration, which has undertaken South China Sea excursions more regularly despite risky Chinese challenges. 7, the USS McCampbell conducted a freedom of navigation operation near three features in the Paracel Islands chain. ![]()
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