VietNamNet columnist Viet Lam spoke with Prof. James Dale Bindenagel, former US Ambassador to Germany, and now a thinker at the Boston Global Forum, and Dr. Nguyen Hong Son, Deputy Director of the Institute for the East Sea Studies of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, about China’s rise and Vietnam’s choices. Below is the second part of the talk.

Viet Lam: You described several aspects related to China’s rise. What about the US response?

Prof. Bindenagel: I think, for us, there is a fundamental misunderstanding of what the U.S. role is, from the Chinese point of view, or perhaps from some of the neighbors’. That seems to be changing after the Chinese became more aggressive. The question of the U.S. is what is the role of the U.S.

First of all, if we take the land wars, both in Vietnam and in Korea, that was in the context of the Cold War. Now the Cold War has been over for 25 years, so what is its role? Many analysts are looking at the U.S. that it is continuing the Cold War. We are not. That is finished, but there is the role of the U.S. First of all, as we are a Pacific power, we have every right to be here. This is part of the U.S. intrusion. What we are trying to do is to maintain stability.

I draw an analogy with the European experience. After the Second World War, the U.S. immediately withdrew from Europe and was challenged by the Soviet Union and came back. So we came back in the Cold War sense of confronting the Soviet Union, but we also did something that was really analogous to the debate that is happening here.

There is an opportunity to think about what is the way to approach the issue. That is the role that we essentially have in our mind of why we are here. It is to bring the parties together and try to ensure that there is no conflict.

The Europeans have perhaps overcome the underlying political concern, which was nationalism in 19th and 20th century, although Mr. Putin has brought back the concept of nationalism.

In East Asia, nationalism is a very strong force that can be good because it rallies people but it can get out of control very quickly. So nationalism is a motivating fact for us. We do not have nationalistic ambitions in East Asia and we do play a role, and then the question becomes, under what structure? How do we do that?

Viet Lam: So, let me ask you one question from our reader. As you mentioned the U.S. role in the region, do you think it is because of the U.S. soft handling towards China that emboldens the revisionist China’s power?

Prof. Bindenagel: I think that is a good question. I would immediately say no because what you have in structural terms, the U.S. bilateral security agreement with Japan and the Republic of Korea provides the structure around which the Chinese can make a judgment and know what the reactions would be.

The example I have is the Senkaku Islands. When the Chinese announced the Air Defense Identification Zone and challenged the Okinawa Prefecture borders, and the Japanese Self-Defense Forces reacted by sending airplanes to challenge the Chinese.

This was very unstable and difficult until President Obama in April came out to say that Senkaku Islands come under the structure of the agreement. The Chinese then, as I said earlier, moved.

The problem is, what is the structure in the East Sea where the conflict resolution is, where you can judge what is the border, when you call it provocative, and when your moves are not challenged. The point is that we are not challenged, how can we do that? Can that be through structure around ASEAN as ASEAN develops? Can it be in the Asia Summits?

We have some in the U.S. who have suggested that the U.S. should become a strategic partner with Vietnam against China. It is not an approach one should take. That is confrontational without any resolution. So, the question really is what structure is possible so that both sides cannot miscalculate, so that they can understand where the borders are, where the limits are.

Dr. Nguyen Hung Son: I quite agree with the question of the reader. I think the U.S has a critical role to play in keeping a stable and peaceful region. And there can be arguments both ways, either the U.S.’s perceived weaknesses which encourages China to be more assertive, or even the US assertiveness which provokes China to become more assertive. It can be argued either way.

However, I think it is ambiguity that is creating misperceptions within China that encourages China to miscalculate and take wrongly perceived actions.

I agree with you that it is the structure which is quite important but the purpose of such a structure is to help clear the ambiguity and ensure stability in the region. So I see that while creating transparency in the region, one of the things that ASEAN does for the region which helps everyone is to help clear the ambiguity.

We interpret and clarify each and everyone's intention and objectives in the region and bring everyone together in order to avoid misperceptions, which can lead to miscalculations. Miscalculation is sometimes strategically very dangerous. That is the role of the structure and that is the role of the ASEAN which it is playing in the region.

Prof. Bindenagel: I would like to emphasize the point that you have just made, that is miscalculations. Historical analogy is sometimes difficult. In the 100th anniversary of World War 1, the element is very important. It is miscalculation.

The structure is helpful to make that happen. It is critical that the leadership of the country not make miscalculations, misassumptions against what is going on. What we are doing here in this conversation is to find out what is the way that you can understand what is actually happening. Is that the oil rig and initiative of an interest group or is it driven by the leadership of Beijing?

These are the two hugely different outcomes and two different ways that you can deal with issues. You can protest it or you can protest China, I mean, the incident, or the whole country. But remember that in 1914 it ended up in a disaster for Europe because you lost the Tsar Empire, Hungarian Empire, and Turkish Empire ended. So empires can end with miscalculations.

Viet Lam: So maybe the risk is that Chinese leaders, and various interest groups as Mr. Son mentioned, overestimate their power and strength and underestimate the responses from the international community?

Prof. Bindenagel: I think it is absolutely right when you think about the role of the U.S. here and the perception of the basis that we have or in the case of sending a few more soldiers to Australia and having reactions that are perceived as provocative issues. For us, it was not a provocative issue at all.

We are simply being there and being available to have freedom of the sea or international regime in there to enforce and protect the prosperity that we have through trade.

There are a whole range of issues that we were not being provocative but we were accused of being provocative. So that is the misperception from the other side.

Viet Lam: Let us move to the alliance formation as the response toward China’s rise. Here is a question from our readers. China and Russia have signed a massive gas pipeline deal, that will make China a Russia’s major ally. So do you agree that the final Russia alliance would be resurrected, and how stable could this alliance be and what are its implications for the regional balance of power?

Dr. Nguyen Hung Son: Well, I am a little bit reluctant to use the word alliance because whereas we are in the globalized world, there is certainly increasing cooperation, but the nature of the cooperation is very different from the Cold War era.

Whereas one forms an alliance, you agree on and cooperate on everything. This are just issue-based cooperation and whereas countries can enhance their cooperation in one area, they can disagree or compete in other areas. This is the nature of international relations today, which is very different from that of the Cold War era.

We should escape from the notion of ideologically based alliances like during the Cold War. That said, I think, those are important geostrategic developments because that increases mutual dependency between China and Russia on the one hand, and that gives the perception that these two countries are aligning or enhancing their ties against the formation of another alliance, and that gives a Cold War impression in international relations.

That might give the message to other countries that might force them to choose between sides, which might force them to align, to have an opinion that they do not necessarily have. So I think we should be more careful and not over-interpret such development.

Prof. Bindenagel: I would certainly agree with that. I would argue that Putin and Xi Jinping’s agreement on gas supply was a business deal and if I analyze it as a business deal, I would say that the Chinese did it very well.

That is because of the needs from Russia to have alternative places for their major commodity to maintain their economy. I think the deal is very good for China and I do not think that it is a strategic deal at all. It is a gas strategy and a win for China because they have a larger need for energy and lesser need for Russian energy so the relationship was skewed to the Chinese.

Mr. Putin of course needed a political statement that he needed an alternative to the Europeans that he was facing sanctions for his invasion and annexation of Crimea. So there was a trade-off on balance and again, I agree with you that, do not miscalculate, try to understand what is really happening. The Cold War is long over. Some have suggested that Mr. Putin has reengaged in the Cold War. He may have stalled the tendency of the rise of Russia. That is not a Cold War. That is an ideologically based conflict that we have.

We have actually had different changes in the last 25 years after the Cold War ended. We now have a challenge that we have no future in the post Cold War period. That period is built on in Europe in particular, with rules on keeping a healthy process. One of the key rules was you do not change borders by force. That is the challenge that Mr. Putin has put on table. That is a very bad signal for East Asia, both Southeast and Northeast Asia, because if that becomes the international rule, they can change borders by force and you will have a whole different world.

It is not a Cold War, not the alliances between the Russians and the Chinese, it is an underpinning of our structure right now that is eroding or being challenged. If it is challenged and successfully challenged, then you have the question that you raised: Is that the new rule? And I think our challenge is not ideologically the question.

In Vietnam, you have a system of government, we have a system of government. We have some basic confirmation that we need to have the rule that borders will not change by violence. And in the East Sea, that should be the number one rule. There is no place for change by violence. You can negotiate, you can have a stronger or weaker position and all the pain that goes with that, but at least from my point of view, and also from my Government’s point of view, is that violence is not a way to go and Mr. Putin changed it.

Just tell them that there is a principle. That is the danger that we have with China and Russia’s gas deal. If it is a business deal, the Chinese did it very well.

To be continued…

VietNamNet