A show of fighter jet diplomacy

China’s deployment of a J-16 strike fighter to buzz an RAAF P-8 maritime surveillance aircraft operating in international airspace over the South China Sea provides further evidence of Beijing’s increasingly assertive posture in our region. Like its expected launch in coming days of a huge aircraft carrier, the “dangerous incident” targeting the RAAF aircraft on May 26 fits an ominous pattern of what The Times last week warned was “China’s concerted military and political campaign to dominate the Pacific”.

According to Canberra officials, the Australian aircraft was doing no more than what was involved in similar routine surveillance missions over past decades – operating in the region strictly in accordance with international law and exercising the right to freedom of navigation and overflight in international waters and airspace. Yet the Chinese attack aircraft launched what Defence Minister Richard Marles said was a “very dangerous” incident involving not only “cutting across the nose of the P-8 (and) settling in front of the P-8 at very close distance” but also releasing “a bundle of chaff”, including aluminium pieces, that infiltrated the P-8’s engines. The incident followed another on May 6 when a Chinese surveillance ship, the Haiwangxing, was detected within Australia’s Exclusive Economic Zone off our west coast. Two days later, it was tracked travelling away from the joint Australia-US Harold E. Holt naval communication station north of Exmouth. That followed a February incident when a Chinese ship in the Arafura Sea shone a military-grade laser at an Australian surveillance aircraft between the Northern Territory and Papua.

Ahead of China’s launch of its aircraft carrier, these incidents underline the threat posed by Beijing’s increasing aggression. The new carrier is a crucial step towards realising President Xi Jinping’s ambition to build a world-class “blue sea” navy. A combination of modernised naval vessels and recruitment of traditionally US-friendly island nations such as Solomon Islands has more than defensive intent. It is about the ability to interrupt the resupply of besieged Taiwan and inhibiting any Australian response. As he concluded his Pacific tour in PNG and East Timor, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi blamed “difficulties” in Sino-Australia relations on “some political forces in Australia (that) insist on treating China as an adversary rather than a partner”. He is kidding no one but himself if he really believes “partners” behave in the aggressive way China is doing in the region.