Atlantic Council won't succeed with its South China Sea scheme

The influential Atlantic Council think tank recently published a scandalous policy proposal titled "The Longer Telegram: Toward a new American China strategy". It's an extensive document which contains many different suggestions for how the United States could most effectively contain China, all of which the unnamed author summarizes in the following way: "The foremost goal of US strategy should be to cause China's ruling elites to conclude that it is in China's best interests to continue operating within the US-led liberal international order rather than building a rival order, and that it is in the Chinese Communist Party's best interests to not attempt to expand China's borders or export its political model beyond China's shores."

This boils down to simultaneously encouraging Washington to meddle in China's internal affairs, both political in terms of attempting to manipulate members of the Communist Party of China and territorial when it comes to Beijing's claims in the South China Sea and other areas. The second-mentioned corollary to this proposed grand strategy is explicitly stated elsewhere in the report. It's written that one of the redlines of the US should be "any major Chinese hostile action in the South China Sea to further reclaim and militarize islands, to deploy force against other claimant states, or to prevent full freedom of navigation operations by the United States and allied maritime forces".

The Atlantic Council also hints at the possibility of the US waging war against China in the South China Sea when discussing one of "the basic organizing principles for a long-term national strategy". It also suggests that "Careful strategic judgments will need to be made by the United States about when and how to confront China militarily in the South China Sea." Unlike other assessments, it suggests that China might not decisively win a military engagement.

Taken together, the think tank is proposing that the US should seriously consider a limited war with China in the South China Sea, since it wrongly presumes that the US might win. This, according to the anonymous author, would provoke unprecedented divisions within the CPC and result in an intra-Party coup. There is no way that this scheme could ever succeed.

The first is that it's political fantasy to imagine that differences of opinion within the CPC will lead to an intra-Party coup. While there exist various proposals within the party for tackling issues of national significance, this is the norm within every government across the world. All CPC members have China's best interests in mind, and it's through their collaborative brainstorming efforts that the country devises and implements policies. Simply put, it's impossible for any force to divide the CPC, let alone an external one as openly hostile as the US government. Furthermore, there is universal consensus within the CPC about the importance of protecting China's sovereignty and territorial integrity at all costs.

China has invested considerably in improving the People's Liberation Army Navy's capabilities over the past decade in order to ensure the defense of the Chinese homeland. Beijing has proven that it won't back down in the face of threats to its territorial integrity from Washington and its allies. China's sovereignty, rights and interests in the South China Sea have been formed in the course of its long history, and are in line with international law and practice. As such, China will defend its national interests in this area, including through more naval deployment and other military deployments on the islands under its control.

With this in mind, it's unrealistic for the Atlantic Council to propose that one of the US redlines should be to stop any of China's possible efforts to safeguard its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests in the South China Sea under the implied threat of war per its ninth "organizing principle for a long-term national strategy". Not only will any threats to this end fail to divide the unity of the CPC with General Secretary Xi Jinping as the core especially on what is premier issue of national security, but all aggression in pursuit of the proposed goal of waging war against China within its maritime borders will be met with a befitting response that guarantees Beijing's victory in such a scenario. China will not lose a military engagement with the US in the South China Sea.

Andrew Korybko is a Moscow-based American political analyst.