Former Trump security adviser seeks united military deterrence vs China

By Kenneth Christiane L. Basilio, Reporter

THE US and its allies should limit China’s access to technology and data to curb its expansionist ambitions in the South China Sea through coordinated military deterrence, a former US security official said on Monday.

“It would be better to constrain and temper Xi Jinping’s ambitions now through robust coordinated military deterrence and through strict limits on China’s access to technology, capital and data controlled by our countries,” said Matthew Forbes Pottinger, a former deputy National Security adviser to US President Donald J. Trump.

“That is better than waiting until Xi Jinping has taken fateful and irrevocable steps, such as attacking Taiwan that would lead to a war between superpowers,” he said in a video message at a parliamentary intelligence-security forum in Manila.

The Chinese Embassy in Manila did not immediately reply to a Viber message seeking comment.

China claims almost the entire South China Sea, including parts claimed by the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam. It asserts its sovereignty claim through an armada of coast guard ships, despite a United Nations-backed court ruling in 2016 that voided its claim for being illegal.

Mr. Pottinger said countries should speak out against Beijing’s actions that undermine the sovereignty of its neighbors. “It’s important to speak openly and loudly if we are to prevent Xi Jinping from making grave miscalculations.”

The Philippines has contested China’s sweeping claim in the waterway through diplomatic channels by filing more than 190 diplomatic protests since President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. took office in 2022.

“Gratuitous efforts to flatter and reassure Beijing are likely to be taken as signs of weakness,” Mr. Pottinger said.

Countries should also consider banning Chinese-made apps such as TikTok and WeChat to prevent Beijing from conducting what he described as “information warfare” and weaken its “discourse power.”

“All we need to do is prevent Beijing’s platforms from manipulating our discourse at home, while making it easier for Chinese citizens to communicate safely with one another and with the outside world,” he added.

Washington is in a “cold war” with Beijing amid its increasing assertiveness in the contested South China Sea, said Carl Timothy Delfeld, chairman at the Hay Seward Economic Security Council.

‘SILK CURTAIN’
“Are we in a second Cold War with China?” he told the forum. “In short, we are. But it’s a very different Cold War than the one with the Soviet Union. We don’t have an ‘iron curtain’ in the Western Pacific. We have what I refer to as a ‘silk curtain.’”

The iron curtain was a political, military and ideological boundary that separated the Soviet Union from the West after World War II.

Mr. Delfeld described China’s encroachment of the waterway as a silk curtain due to the risk of conflict in contested areas. “A silk curtain is flammable, meaning there are flash points from the East China Sea to Taiwan and to the Philippines in the South China Sea.”

“It’s flexible, so it moves to and fro depending on the winds of change, events and alliances, which are constantly shifting,” he added.

He said the flow of trade in the South China Sea makes controlling it more difficult. About $3 trillion worth of ship-borne trade passes through the waterway annually.

“You have trade, you have capital, you have tourism,” he said. “So it’s much more difficult. The challenge is who’s going to control the flow through the silk curtain.”

Manila has used a so-called transparency initiative to raise public awareness and highlight its rights in the disputed waterway while also exposing “unlawful Chinese actions” including aggressive behavior and bullying, Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil L. Gavan told the same forum.

“By exposing unlawful and coercive behavior, we prevent intimidation tactics from operating in the shadows,” he said. “We made its reputational cost higher.”

The Philippine Coast Guard on Sunday said it had deployed an aircraft to check the “illegal presence” of two Chinese vessels 63 kilometers from the coast of Pangasinan province facing the South China Sea in the country’s north.

In a statement, the PCG said its Islander aircraft confirmed the presence of the China Coast Guard (CCG) vessels with bow numbers 3301 and 3104 at 9:30 am on Sunday. “Notably, the CCG vessels did not respond to the radio challenge issued by the PCG,” it added.

It said two 44-meter PCG vessels — BRP Cabra and BRP Bagacay — were dispatched to Bolinao, Pangasinan “to address the illegal presence of the China Coast Guard.”

The vessels reinforce the Philippine government’s position against the “normalization of illegal patrols” by China within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea.

The Philippines has accused China of intimidating Filipino fishermen near Scarborough Shoal and normalizing its “illegal presence” after Beijing sent the monster ship into its exclusive economic zone (EEZ) on Jan. 4.

China has repeatedly accused Philippine vessels of encroachment on its territory. Bilateral ties are at their worst in years after repeated confrontations and heated diplomatic rows.

A United Nations-backed court in the Hague voided China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea in 2016, as it ruled the shoal is a traditional fishing ground for Filipino, Chinese and Vietnamese fishermen.