(MENAFN- Asia Times)
MANILA–All major global powers are flexing muscles in East Asian waters, with the US, China and even Russia conducting major drills across the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia in recent days. While global attention focuses on the potential for a major conflagration in the Middle East, great powers are sleepwalking toward conflict in Asia.
Last week, the US destroyer USS
Dewey
(DDG-105) and Royal Australian Navy frigate HMAS
Stuart
(FFH153) conducted bilateral operations in the Strait of Malacca, a show of joint force in a crucial maritime chokepoint. China's People's Liberation Army Navy responded by deploying its Dongdiao class surveillance ships to the East and South China Sea.
Beyond naval deployments, Washington and Beijing have also been fortifying their military presence in the area. The US will likely retain the Typhon missile system in the Philippines for the foreseeable future after its controversial deployment ahead of the Balikatan annual exercises earlier this year.
A top US general publicly hailed the move as“incredibly important” to American regional strategy, namely the Biden administration's aim to establish an arc of military alliances
and missile defense systems across the Western Pacific in anticipation of a potential direct conflict with China.
For Beijing's part, the Asian superpower is building its own network of stealth-penetrating radars
in adjacent waters to counter American air superiority in the event of a contingency.
Once completed, the new facilities will“significantly increase China's signals intercept and electronic warfare capabilities across the disputed Paracel Islands archipelago and add to a wider surveillance network
spanning much of the South China Sea ,” a report by the UK think tank Chatham House argues.
Although concentrated on Ukraine, Russia has also flexed its naval muscle and doubled down on its military diplomacy by conducting drills in Myanmar and, for the first time, Indonesia , where newly inaugurated President Prabowo Subianto is expected to adopt a more proactive and multi-aligned foreign policy.
To underscore its growing resolve, Southeast Asia's largest nation also recently drove away a Chinese coast guard vessel entering Indonesia's exclusive economic zone in the so-called North Natuna Sea.
Meanwhile, Vietnam, following a few short years of relatively calm ties with its northern neighbor, is also doubling down on its military footprint in the disputed waters.
To prepare for possible conflict with China in adjacent waters, the Southeast Asian dynamo is adding a new 1.5 kilometer to its sprawling network of military facilities across the South China Sea, where it controls up to 27 land features.
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