Author: China has a "remarkable willingness to compromise", USA to blame for maritime disputes with Philippines, Japan, etc.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Not as long as US 7th fleet is the primary power in the South China Sea.

That won't be the case for much longer.

Edited April 25, 2013 by The Patriot

[GandD 5,966]

That won't be the case for much longer.

Assuming carriers and heavy cruisers are displaced as the flag ships for a naval force by submarines and land to ship missiles. Other than that I don't see china shoring up that difference for some time.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Assuming carriers and heavy cruisers are displaced as the flag ships for a naval force by submarines and land to ship missiles. Other than that I don't see china shoring up that difference for some time.

2020 at the latest. The Chinese are patient.

[GandD 5,966]

2020 at the latest. The Chinese are patient.

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33153.pdf

Here's a good read on the subject. I don't know who it supports as I'm still reading but I thought I'd share

[lostinblue 1,989]

It is all about fishing rights. The Chinese and the Japanese will eventually go to war over fishing rights.

It's All About Oil and the large natural gas fields surrounding the islands.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

It's All About Oil and the large natural gas fields surrounding the islands.

If you were actually following the news stories, you would notice that the fishermen are the ones doing all the initial skirmishing. I haven't read one story where the US was involved, except when a US minesweeper ran into a protected reef in the Philippines, because they didn't want to hire a local pilot to navigate the ship for them.

Smith said the Scarborough issue is not about oil and gas but sovereignty over the area.

“I was talking to our energy analyst before I came to this trip and they were telling me there’s no oil and gas in Scarborough Shoal. According to our analyst, it’s not fighting over oil and gas. It is a sovereignty issue,” Smith said.

“It is not economically viable to extract, too deep, we don’t think there is anything significant out there anymore,” he added.

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2013/04/11/929525/china-likely-increase-panatag-shoal-presence-expert

[Love's JAA 100]

If you were actually following the news stories, you would notice that the fishermen are the ones doing all the initial skirmishing. I haven't read one story where the US was involved, except when a US minesweeper ran into a protected reef in the Philippines, because they didn't want to hire a local pilot to navigate the ship for them.

I just read about a Chinese "fishing" boat caught in a protected site in the Philippines that held a cargo of illegal animal carcus destined for the Chinese medicinal consumption market.

[lostinblue 1,989]

If you were actually following the news stories, you would notice that the fishermen are the ones doing all the initial skirmishing. I haven't read one story where the US was involved, except when a US minesweeper ran into a protected reef in the Philippines, because they didn't want to hire a local pilot to navigate the ship for them.

apanese – China Conflict “All About Oil”

Sep19

Andy Rowell

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It was planned to be the year of friendship between China and Japan, but instead we have a brewing conflict over oil.

The headlines of the burgeoning diplomatic spat between China and Japan may be about “disputed islands” but make no mistake, this is a conflict over oil.

It was all meant to be so different: this year is the 40th Anniversary of normalised relations between the two nations, but instead of peace, people are now even talking of war.

Yesterday, tensions rose even further as eleven Chinese warships raced to the disputed Senkaku archipelago, over which both countries claim sovereignty.

A flotilla of around 1,000 Chinese fishing boats is also said to be heading for the islands.

In fact to the Chinese the islands are called not the Senkaku, but the Diaoyu. The islands were handed to the Japanese after the Second World War, but China argues that it has a prior sovereignty claim. Taiwan also claims sovereignty too.

The latest protests have been sparked by the fact that Japan recently purchased several of the islands back from a private Japanese owner. The Chinese are outraged by the de facto nationalisation.

The last week has also seen violent anti-Japanese demonstrations in over 100 cities across China.

Most analysts argue this is a conflict over oil. “It all comes down to black gold”, argued the New Scientist yesterday. “There is potential oil and gas,” Pui-Kwan Tse of the US Geological Survey told the magazine.

Writing in the Financial Times this morning, Tim Taylor of international law firm SJ Berwin, agrees: “At stake in the East China Sea (and in a separate row in the South China Sea) are not the barren rocks themselves but the oil and gas that might be found under surrounding waters.”

This region is said to hold as much as 213 billion barrels of oil and 900 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, but no one knows precisely how much oil or gas there is. Back in the late sixties a United Nations report suggested that “Sediments beneath the continental shelf… are believed to have great potential as oil and gas reservoirs.”

One analyst for Resource Investor argues that the increasingly hostile situation could get ugly and “can and will affect the United States.”

Firstly, “if it succeeds in grabbing and holding the China Sea region and all its treasures, China will preclude any chance the US might’ve had at accessing those resources” and second “a China-controlled China Sea could impact the navigation paths of both commercial shipping, and the US Navy.”

One thing is certain, where there’s oil, there is always trouble …

http://priceofoil.org/2012/09/19/japanese-china-conflict-all-about-oil/

[Darnell 8,478]

I just read about a Chinese "fishing" boat caught in a protected site in the Philippines that held a cargo of illegal animal carcus destined for the Chinese medicinal consumption market.

ya, that's about 3 weeks old, on that news.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

http://priceofoil.org/2012/09/19/japanese-china-conflict-all-about-oil/