Thayer Consultancy Background Brief:

ABN # 65 648 097 123

ASEAN’s Security Strategy in
the South China Sea
November 9, 2023

We request your assessment of the following issues:

Q1. Regarding the current situation in the South China Sea: have there been any new
developments in the region? And if so how has the situation changed recently?
ANSWER: There are three major trends affecting the current situation in the South
China Sea.
First, Chinese Coast Guard and Maritime Militia vessels are remaining forward
deployed in the Exclusive Economic Zones of littoral states for longer periods of time.
Second, since mid-2021 there has been a marked increase in the number and
aggressiveness of Chinese-initiated confrontations of military aircraft and ships flying
over or sailing on the South China Sea.
Third, the Fernand Marcos Jr. government in the Philippines, elected in June 2022, has
taken a more proactive stance to assert sovereignty in the West Philippines Sea. This
includes expanding the number and scope of maritime patrols and conducting
resupply missions to the BKP Sierra Madre on Second Thomas Shoal.
Q2. What does the South China Sea issue mean to ASEAN, to China and to other
stakeholders including Japan and U.S. in terms of politics and security?
ANSWER: The South China Sea issue has confronted ASEAN for over three decades.
ASEAN issued its first statement on the South China Seas in 1992 in response to a
confrontation between China and Vietnam in the waters around Vanguard Bank.
Vietnam was not then a member of ASEAN. In 1995, ASEAN issued its second
statement on the South China Sea on the initiative of the Philippines after China
occupied Mischief Reef.
The South China Sea issue has been a divisive one for ASEAN due to the differing
national interests between littoral states who want to protect their rights to sovereign
jurisdiction over their Exclusive Economic Zones and non-littoral state who want to
protect their trade relationship with China. For ASEAN, the South China Sea is a
regional security issue that has to be managed by self-restraint by the parties directly
concerned, without resort to force and on the basis of international law, including the
United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
To China, the South China Sea has become a key element in Xi Jinping’s narrative of
the rejuvenation of the Chinese people and China’s rise as a regional power. Virtually
 2

the entire South China Sea is viewed historically as part of China’s sphere of
interference in which countries “outside the region” and interfering in order to
contain China.
For the United States and Japan, there are two main aspects of the South China Sea
dispute. First, the preservation of rights to freedom of navigation on the high seas
under customary international law and UNCLOS. Second the U.S. and Japan want to
counter China’s militarisation of the South China Sea and its attendant intimidation
and coercion of littoral states.
Q3. How do you evaluate the first ASEAN-only joint military drill held in September?
What is the main purpose of the drill and what was the message to China? And did it
work well as intended?
ANSWER: ASEAN’s first naval exercise was a tentative step towards enhancing
ASEAN’s Political Security Community. It was a demonstration of political will to
underscore ASEAN centrality with representation from all ten ASEAN members and
Timor-Leste.
ASEAN first naval exercise, however, was a modest demonstration of ASEAN naval
prowess with only four countries contributing naval vessels – Indonesia (2), Singapore,
Malaysia and Brunei. Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines did not contribute.
The ASEAN naval exercise steered clear of combat drills. The location of the exercise,
originally planned for the southern end of the South China Sea, was moved further
away into Indonesia’s territorial waters at the request of Cambodia.
Despite ASEAN’s first maritime exercise, China will continue to forward deploy its
Coast Guard and Maritime Militia in the Exclusive Economic Zones of the Philippines,
Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia and harass their oil exploration activities.
Q4. There are criticisms that the process of Code of Conduct negotiation is slow and
that is because some ASEAN members like Cambodia and Lao have different
perceptions of territorial and jurisdictional dispute in South China Sea. Even under
these circumstances, do you think that ASEAN should still work together on this issue?
Why is that?
ANSWER: When the Single Draft Code of Conduct in the South China Sea Negotiating
Text was adopted in August 2018, it was to undergo three readings and be completed
in three years. Progress has been slow. This year China and ASEAN members
completed the second reading and adopted guidelines to speed up negotiations with
an aspirational deadline of three years.
Since late 2019, there has been growing consensus that China should comply with the
2016 Arbitral Tribunal Award in the case brought by the Philippines against China.
There is no means to enforce this Award, however.
Negotiations on the Code of Conduct now have a momentum all their own. As a senior
ASEAN diplomat has told me recently, “the journey is more important than the
destination”. That is, the management of the dispute is an important objective in its
own right. Negotiations on a Code of Conduct provide a venue for ASEAN claimants to
bring their concerns directly to China in a multilateral setting. Negotiations also
 3

provide time for individual claimants to modernise their naval forces and shore up
relations with the United States and other like-minded countries.
Q5. How do you evaluate ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific?
ANSWER: I have viewed the confidential penultimate draft and the final version of the
AOIP. It is a watered down document that asserts ASEAN centrality and advises major
powers not to force ASEAN to take sides. The AOIP has little or no effect on strategic
competition between China and the United States, a regional military build-up, and
the annual action-reaction cycle of their major naval exercises.
There are concerted efforts to mainstream the AOIP and make it more relevant. As
ASEAN’s first naval exercise demonstrates, ASEAN has a long way to go to present a
credible regional defence strategy.
Q6. Since Japan and U.S. also have their own Indo-Pacific strategies, do you think
ASEAN and other stakeholders can work together? If so, specifically in what way and
how?
ANSWER: A distinction should be made between ASEAN and ASEAN members. ASEAN
has already commenced cooperative maritime activities with its major dialogue
partners to address humanitarian assistance/disaster relief and non-traditional
security issues (piracy, armed robbery at sea, smuggling, trafficking (in arms, humans
and narcotics), climate change etc.
Individual ASEAN members have forged their own bilateral defence-security
arrangements with the United States, Japan, Australia etc. This entails maritime
security capacity building, maritime domain awareness and arms procurements.
Other stakeholders have already entered the picture, most notably the United
Kingdom, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy who have individually
dispatched naval ships to the South China Sea.
These navies will train to improve interoperability to address challenges to maritime
security to ensure safe and secure sea lines of communication. Combined naval
exercises of these naval powers will also signal deterrence to China.
Q7. Recently, the Philippines and Japan agreed to take defense ties to next level. Do
you think the Japanese government’s policy of Official Security Assistance (OSA) may
increase tension in South China Sea?
ANSWER: Japan has been assisting littoral states in the South China Sea, particularly
Vietnam, for some time. Japanese self-defense forces have regularly participated in
multilateral exercises with the Philippines in the South China Sea. Japan’s Official
Security Assistance is carefully crafted to assist capacity building for self-defence
purposes.
China’s submission to the Single Draft Code of Conduct in the South China Sea
Negotiating Text calls for military exercises between China and regional states. If
countries outside the region are invited, China requires that advanced notification be
given so it can object. China’s zero-sum view of security cooperation will inevitably
increase tensions because China will resort to punitive measures to disrupt Japanese-
Philippines security cooperation.
 4

Suggested citation: Carlyle A. Thayer, “ASEAN’s Security Strategy in the South China
Sea,” Thayer Consultancy Background Brief, November 9, 2023. All background briefs
are posted on Scribd.com (search for Thayer.. To remove yourself from the mailing list
type, UNSUBSCRIBE in the Subject heading and hit the Reply key.
Thayer Consultancy provides political analysis of current regional security issues and
other research support to selected clients. Thayer Consultancy was officially
registered as a small business in Australia in 2002.