Vietnam and the South China Sea Disputes

Greetings from the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University where Thanh Hai Do is speaking on "Vietnam and the South China Sea Disputes". The first question he asked was why so little progress has been made on this territorial dispute compared to others. He pointed to Vietnam's ambivalent strategic posture, wanting to assert their claims, but not upset China. Vietnam is hedging by normalizing relations with the USA, joining ASEAN and working with oil companies. Interestingly one company Veitnam is working with is Russia's Gazprom. Thanh Hai Do's 2009 paper "Vietnam’s evolving claims in the South China Sea" is also available.

It seems to me that if Vietnam can agree a common position with other countries in the region there is the possibility of negotiating with China. Countries around the South China Sea probably do not want to have to be seen to be aligned with China or the USA in a great power dispute.

Last night in the presentation "A Small Navy in a Great War: Australians at sea, 1914-18" Dr David Stevens pointed out how the Royal Australian Navy (RAN)  played a key role in South East Asia during WW1. He argued that the RAN was seen as separate from the Royal Navy and so was seen separate, to some extent, from the great powers involved in the European conflict. Australia was able to play this role as in the years before WW1 it developed a small but powerful navy. This is detailed in his book "All Respects Ready: Australia’s Navy in World War One".

The RAN is now developing a significant surface force of Amphibious Assault Ships, upgraded ANZAC class frigates, and Hobart class destroyers. These might be called on to play a role in the South China Sea, being more acceptable to all the parties involved than the presence of the US 7th Fleet. One way to make this more credible would be for Australia to modify its order for F-35A aircraft and take early delivery of a small number of F-35B aircraft to operate from HMAS Canberra.

ABSTRACT
Over the last few years, academic and public inquiry into the South China Sea disputes has increased significantly as tensions in this region have flared up without any signs of abating. However, much of the attention has naturally focused on a rising China, which is the most powerful claimant in the dispute and the potential disrupter of the regional order. Other smaller claimants have been largely overlooked, or have been studied within the context of China’s policy. This imbalance in the literature has the potential to distort the cycle of the actions and reactions which have shaped the dynamics of the disputes.
This research, which offers the view from a smaller claimant but a key rival to China, seeks to address this gap in the current discourse on South China Sea politics. Specifically, it will draw on a wide range of primary and secondary sources to trace and account for continuity and changes in Vietnam’s approach to its disputes in the South China Sea with an emphasis on the period between 1991 and 2011. It is argued that in this period, Vietnam oscillated between bandwagoning and hedging strategies to respond to China’s rising power and assertiveness in the maritime domain.
The study, which presents the case of Vietnam in the South China Sea, examines the way in which Vietnam has managed its relations with China. It offers a critical evaluation of the realist school in international relations about how a medium-sized state responds to a power transition in the region. Though the case of Vietnam is unique, it is indicative of how regional countries react to shifts in power relations and to changes in China’s foreign and security posture.
Thanh Hai Do is a PhD Candidate in the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University. He is a recipient of the Prime Minister’s Australia Asia Award, and has commenced his doctoral studies in Australia in July 2011. Prior to this academic endeavour, Thanh Hai worked as a research fellow at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam.

Boats With Wheels for Australian Navy

In "Ship-to-shore utility key link in ADF amphibious vision" (Asia-Pacific Defence Reporter, Jun 2014), Ian Bostock wrote that the Australian Defence Force (ADF) would have a problem getting people and supplies from their new amphibious ships to shore. The ADF has only a few old amphibious cargo vehicles (LARC). Other vehicles will need to be transported in a few landing barges. Even the rigid hull inflatable boats (RHIB) will need trailers for launching from the well decks of the ships. 

One option would be to make the inflatable boats amphibious, by adding three retractable wheels, as with  New Zealand’s Sealegs amphibious rigid inflatable boat. These can self launch and recover through the well deck of an amphibious ship (and also drive over sand bars and up the beach). A lower cost option would be un-powered wheels, with the crew pushing the boat.

The Australian Light Armoured Vehicle has limited amphibious capability, which could be supplemented with additional flotation using RHIB technology and propulsion for beach landings. New Zealand company Lancer manufacture inflatable tubes up to 20m long and 1 m diameter and these have been used for military purposes. The bow of the vessel could be simply deflated to allow loading and unloading the vehicle. The boat could be fixed to the vehicle, with the wheels protracting through the bottom, so it could be driven on land. The Bushmaster Protected Mobility Vehicle could be similarly adapted; while is is not designed to be amphibious, it can ford to a depth of 1.2 m without any preparation. The French EFA floating bridge, with a 50 tonne capacity, shows that military vehicle using inflatable flotation is feasable.

Climax at Gallipoli

Greetings from the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, where Commodore Richard Powell OBE RN, Defence Attaché, British High Commission is speaking at the launch of the book "Climax at Gallipoli" by Dr Rhys Crawley. Commodore Powell has a distinguished career in amphibious operations, making it relieve to the book being launched and to current concerns in the Australian Defence Force. Most recently media reports indicate that the Australian Government is investigating the already ordered Landing Helicopter Dock ships to carry aircraft ("Tony Abbott aims for aircraft carriers", by BRENDAN NICHOLSON, The Australian, May 23, 2014 12:00AM). It should be noted that Gallipoli was one of the earliest amphibious military operations where aircraft were used.