Mainland China does lots of saber-rattling and posing. How much of it should diplomats from other nations take seriously? Although eager to expand its hegemony, China does not want a major war with a major global power: it does not want a war, at least at the present moment, with the United States.
It does, however, want to intimidate its smaller neighbors in the region. In May 2014, Michael Auslin wrote:
Just over six months ago, China set up an air defense identification zone (ADIZ) over a large part of the East China Sea, including in airspace over the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands. Tokyo had already established its own ADIZ decades earlier that included the Senkakus. Beijing’s move was provocative, destabilizing, and an indicator of its relentless attempts to redefine Asia’s international order for its own interests. The Obama administration’s response was either praised as rightfully downplaying an insignificant action that didn’t really change much in Asia or was derided as a weak attempt to pretend that nothing serious had happened. Washington flew two B-52s through some part of the zone and then let the whole matter slip from public view, even though civilian airliners changed their operating practices to comply with Beijing’s unique demands to identify themselves even when not approaching Chinese airspace.
Developments in the region are shaped largely by maritime considerations. Robert Kaplan concludes from this that the likelihood of a major land war is small. He writes:
East Asia is a vast, yawning expanse, stretching from Arctic to Antarctic reaches — from the Kuril Islands southward to New Zealand — and characterized by a shattered array of coastlines and archipelagos, themselves separated by great seas and distances. Even accounting for the fact of how technology has compressed distance, with missiles and fighter jets — the latter easily refueled in the air — rendering any geography closed and claustrophobic, the sea acts as a barrier to aggression, at least to the degree that dry land does not. The sea, unlike land, creates clearly defined borders, and thus has the potential to reduce conflict. Then there is speed to consider. Even the fastest warships travel comparatively slowly, 35 knots, say, reducing the chance of miscalculations and thus giving diplomats more hours — and days even — to reconsider decisions. Moreover, navies and air forces simply do not occupy territory the way armies do. It is because of the seas around East Asia that the twenty-first century has a better chance than the twentieth of avoiding great military conflagrations.
Despite Kaplan’s optimism, there is cause for concern. Chinese and Japanese military pilots are playing a complex form of chess - or a supersonic form of “chicken” - with each other. If a misstep occurs, a handful of pilots and millions or billions of dollars of aircraft could wind up at the bottom of the Pacific.
If that happens, the two belligerents might begin trading missiles with each other - first at each other’s navies, then possibly at military installations on land.
Although the United States would probably want to play the role of peacemaking diplomatic intermediary in such a scenario, increasing escalation could force the U.S. to choose a side.
