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Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

theguardian.com

41–50 of 50 posts

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#41
post #2

This resolution really only has teeth so far as the US Navy is ready and able to enforce it.

That's a problem. We don't usually intervene directly against other nuclear armed nations. It's all done through proxies. Who is going to be our proxy navy?

The armed fleet of Philippian "fishermen".

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#42
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why downvoting this guy? He is somewhat right. And it is "just" strategic military positioning - to protect the new silk road naval routes. The bases are going to be there so China's naval trade routes cannot be potentially blocked by a hostile naval power.

Exactly. To exaggerate things a bit: This is proxy conflict with USA. The South China sea today is under US Navy dominance. Within a decade or so that will no longer be the case. Simply because USA cannot afford an arms race with China.

The U.S. is so far ahead of China in the arms race already that that will not be an issue for decades, if ever. The issue is political will, because ultimately arms only change minds if they are willing to be used.

China's government would have a much easier time justifying violence in the South China Sea to the Chinese population, than the U.S. government would have with U.S. citizens.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#43

The multimedia article shared by stefap2 is a good one. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12078612 What's concerning about this is on the end of the slide, there is a text which says: "The Tribunal in the Hague ruled on Tuesday, July 12, that China's claim was illegal. But it has no power to enforce the decision." Some questions: 1. If that's the case, then what good would the Hague ruling be if it is not going to…

No one enforces international law except the individual nations themselves. This is different from a national or (in the U.S.) state government, which is typically embued with police and military powers to enforce the national laws. The state of Virginia has state police and a state court system that will arrest and put people into state prison if they violate a state law. The U.S. has federal police and a federal co…

Most of the world or the few countries which have outsized influences on Hague? The US (Philippines' close ally) and the EU basically control Hague.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#44

Well, there is a precedent Nicaragua v. United States where the United States just blatantly ignores the international court's ruling against it, and vetoes any attempt of enforcement by the Security Council. China is also a permanent member, so they will do just the same.

Yep, the one council in the UN that really matters and China can veto any resolution regarding this issue anytime they want. Possession is as they say 9/10 of the law and I doubt any country can wrestle away the islands that China has already developed.

Filipino here - I still applaud our government's efforts in pushing this issue through. This was raised by my country in the ASEAN summits and China through various political and diplomatic channels were able to stop those resolutions.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one enforces international law except the individual nations themselves. This is different from a national or (in the U.S.) state government, which is typically embued with police and military powers to enforce the national laws. The state of Virginia has state police and a state court system that will arrest and put people into state prison if they violate a state law. The U.S. has federal police and a federal co…

Most of the world or the few countries which have outsized influences on Hague? The US (Philippines' close ally) and the EU basically control Hague.

Well that's a good point. It's the difference between the ideal of the UN, vs. the reality of the UN. It's supposed to a fair global venue, but because it lacks any self-sufficient authority, it's dominated by the most powerful nations. That said, China is one of those most powerful nations, so I'd argue that this ruling still has significance.

Maybe someday there will be an actual global government, but right now I don't think that anyone believes we (i.e. human beings) know how to create a well-functioning government that large.

The EU suffers from many of the same problems of the UN, like crazy bureaucracy and dominance by the largest/richest member nations. The U.S. federal government was carefully designed to balance small states and big states, and seems to do a good job of that--but maybe not a lot of other things. And big U.S. states still dominate other areas of national governance, like environmental regs by California, or school textbook standards by Texas.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#46
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China's economy isn't expanding faster than the West's. It was. China's economy is hardly growing at all, and is no longer growing organically. They require extremely vast amounts of new debt to continue growing at just a few percent per year. That's a scenario they can't maintain going forward. The US economy by itself is expanding as much as China in dollar GDP terms, and is doing so without taking on the kind of d…

"China's economy is growing at 2% to 3% currently" Where is that number from? The latest I can find is a real growth rate around 7% pa.

That's the thing. No one who knows what they're talking about trusts the "real growth" numbers. They're all massively inflated by the CCP in order to maintain their growth driven political narrative.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#47
post #2

This resolution really only has teeth so far as the US Navy is ready and able to enforce it.

But how does US has standing?

This isn't civil court. All international law is a theatre masking anarchy between nation states. The distribution of justice it provides is roughly proportional to the relative strength and willingness of its participants.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#48
post #3

I am no geopolitical expert, but the Chinese seemed to be playing with fire. At which point a war will erupt in the South China Sea, especially when those nations won't take it anymore?

Well it's someone else playing fire seeing from the side of a Chinese.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#49

It will not change anything. China is already a superpower and what do all the superpowers do? They make rules.

Not just make rules, but bend rules that are already in place to lean in towards their favor.

...and away from US's favor.

Re: Philippines Wins South China Sea Case Against China

#50
post #25

This was a long anticipated but still powerful ruling. The only surprise was maybe Itu Aba (太平島) being ruled to not be an island. The court was particularly clear on rejecting the nine-dash line and China's claims of historic waters. As much as China will say it ignores this ruling, it absolutely puts pressure on China and constricts the language it will be able to use when discussing disputes in the South China Sea.…

The ruling isn't that powerful at all. On the latest development.

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy-defence/article/198...

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