Why China’s Flash Points in Asia Persist Despite a Network of Crisis Hotlines

TAIPEI - A growing network of crisis-defusing telephone hotlines between China and other Asian countries shows Beijing’s intent to strengthen those relations but does not resolve the wider disputes that could spark conflict, analysts believe. 

Officials in Beijing expect these phone connections to show “we are cooperating” but without policy changes that would calm its neighbors, said Alexander Vuving, professor at the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii. Most acts that anger other countries in disputed waterways are planned rather than sudden, he believes.  “In actuality it doesn’t really reduce tension, because tension is most of the time deliberate,” Vuving said of Sino-Vietnamese relations. “China and Vietnam also take care to keep the tension below the threshold of an open conflict.”    The navy hotline will ensure Sino-Vietnamese goodwill until the next planned upset, analysts believe. Each side has angered the other over the past seven years by exploring for oil under or near disputed tracts of the South China Sea. Last year Vietnam protested to China over the sinking of a Vietnamese fishing boat.