South China Sea gunboat diplomacy – A divergent establishment view

We heard Bilahari and Ong Keng Yong’s view, one official and one personal, attacking China for trying to divide Asean in the South China Sea island disputes. Last Saturday, the ST published a divergent establishment view about the South China Sea, this time giving it another spin. Instead of a dispute between a few South East Asian countries, claiming islands and coral reefs in the South China Sea, the veil was dropped and the naked truth was exposed. It was an open contest for control of the South China Sea by the Americans, to reinforce its hegemony over the region in the name of Freedom of Navigation.

Leslie Fong, the former editor of the ST, an establishment men, or used to be a part of the establishment. His views must still be a reflection of what the establishment is thinking. But he put it that what he wrote was not his views but the view of a Taiwanese lady by the name Ms Oh Beigong through a letter to the Japanese Admiral in charge of the American Pacific Fleet by the name of Harry Harris. A yellow banana for sure, very like the Singaporean banana, but a very dangerous one.

In brief, Ms Oh Beigong, or in Hokien Ms Black White Said, the Americans were just pretending about Freedom of Navigation but using it to pick on China while the American allies like Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam have been doing exactly what China is doing but no Freedom of Navigation to their reclaimed and militarized islands were conducted by the Americans.

The bottom line, in Leslie’s article, through Ms Oh Beigong, is this. ‘Might is right. The US is out to stymie the rise of China and prevent it from challenging American dominance, if not hegemony. We get that. So do us a favour, please stop talking about high principles and international law. However, if you wish to regain at least a modicum of respect from clear sighted people in this region, here is something you…can do. In the name of asserting freedom of navigation and upholding international law, send your destroyer or whatever to an atoll in the Philippine Sea which the Japanese call Okinotorishima and claim as their territory….the atoll lies 1,700km south of Tokyo, …but less than 500 km from Taiwan itself.’

The American hypocrisy in the South China Sea is exposed by this dear letter to the American banana now called Harry Harris, no Hiroshima or Nagasaki. It is all about gunboat diplomacy, about control of the South China Sea, about American hegemony.

What shit is the talk about splitting Asean countries by the other side of the establishment? What is the real issue? China claiming the islands, Asean countries claiming the islands, or the American claiming the whole South China Sea?

Thank you Leslie Fong. Oops, thank you Ms Oh Beigong.