South China Sea Strategies for other nations (Not China)

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
Yvrch, you are new to SD. Read the rules and abide by them.

You are inserting yourself into a conversation that other, more seasoned member of SD are having. That is fine...but any attack dog mentality is not. And that cuts both ways.

Personal attack, demeaning, insulting, or other such behavior is not allowed on SD. Keep it respectful, cordial, and even tempered, or leave. It's that simple.

Such behavior and comments, on either side, ALWAYS invite similar behavior in return, and this then turns into a huge distraction, meaningless arguments, and material that will be moderated and deleted, and the offenders will be warned, suspended and banned in that order.

So let's simply not go there.

DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS MODERATION
 

Blackstone

Brigadier
Interesting comments from Admiral Richardson's confirmation as Chief of Naval Ops. Not surprisingly, the good admiral avoided controversial topics by skirting them, but this sentence in the article caught my attention, and if accurate, indicates US does indeed accept 12-mile territorial limit for China's reclaimed islands.

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just two weeks ago at the Aspen Security Forum stated it is US policy to afford a 12-(mile) limit around all (features) in the South China Sea… to include islands and formations.

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CAPITOL HILL:
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sailed through his Senate confirmation hearing this morning. But two ominous issues breached the surface, hinting at growing conflict between the
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and Hill Republicans over
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.

Richardson,
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nominated for Chief of Naval Operations, deftly dodged the difficult questions from Senate Armed Services Committee: Does US-China cooperation on nuclear reactors help their military? Should the US challenge China’s territorial claims in the
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? But as both Beijing and Capitol Hill step up the pressure, he may not be able to dodge for long.

“Admiral,
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?” Sen. Tom Cotton asked bluntly.

ADMIRAL_JOHN_M._RICHARDSON-300x253.jpg

Adm. John Richardson

“China is a
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,” Richardson replied. “Many of the things they’re doing have an adversarial nature to them,” he said (italics ours), notably the construction of pseudo-islands in the South China Sea.

So why are we helping them build up their nuclear navy? the senator asked.

The Nuclear Question

The US has had a “
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” on civilian nuclear cooperation with China since the Reagan administration, back when Beijing was a counterbalance to Moscow. That 30-year deal is up for renewal, but Cotton and fellow conservative Mark Rubio are opposing it. The grounds: US civilian reactor technology transferred to China for civilian purposes could end up in military hands. Specifically,
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— designed to cool Westinghouse nuclear reactors — were transferred to Westinghouse’s Chinese partners, who also just happen to make the pumps for China’s new ballistic nuclear missile submarines (SSBNs). Pumps are one of the noisiest components of a nuclear sub, so better pump technology makes subs harder to find.

“This is very troubling to me,” Cotton said this morning. “I imagine any increase in the capability and lethality of the PLA Navy would also worry you.”

“This is something I obviously watch extremely closely,” said Richardson, a career submariner. The details are highly technical and highly classified, the admiral went on, but the Navy has looked “very closely” at the civil nuclear agreement. He gave it this less than ringing endorsement: “I believe that in the aggregate, we would be better with a renewed successor agreement than without it.”

Cotton pressed him: “Even if you suspected or knew that the PLA Navy was going to divert civilian nuclear technology towards nuclear naval systems?”

“I can say with a fair degree of confidence we are better with this agreement than we are without,” Richardson said.

The admiral’s written answers to the committee’s questions in advance of the hearing go into more detail on the upsides: ” While it is impossible to state that there will be ‘no risk’ [of civilian technology being put to military use], the successor U.S.-China Atomic Energy Act Section 123 Agreement ensures continued U.S. access to China’s civilian nuclear complex, allowing for the development of a culture of best practices on nuclear security and safety, as well as the opportunity to ensure Chinese nonproliferation policies are consistent with international nonproliferation norms.” There’s also the attraction of selling US nuclear reactors to the largest and most energy-hungry country on the planet.


The South China Sea

In both this morning’s hearing and in his written testimony, Adm. Richardson made clear that
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was “destabilizing.” What he didn’t make clear was what the administration plans to do about it — even when the committee pressed him.

In fact, there are rumors of a disagreement between the White House and the military’s Pacific Command on a crucial question: whether to fly or sail within 12 nautical miles of the new Chinese bases. China claims its constructions in the South China Sea are permanent and inhabited islands, which would legally mean they are each surrounded by territorial waters and airspace for 12 miles in every direction. The US considers them to be artificial and temporary structures, which under international law means they have no legal impact on other nations’ rights of passage in the surrounding seas or airspace. The Chinese have made it clear they think that
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or sailing within 12 nautical miles of these structures would be an unmistakable challenge to their claims.

“Sailing inside 12nm is a key component to any freedom of navigation campaign that seeks to reject China’s claims to these man-made islands,” one Senate staffer told me. “
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‘s speech in Singapore was excellent, but now it’s time we back up his strong words with very visible actions.”

“There seems to be a confusion in our policy,” Sen. Dan Sullivan said at the hearing. At the recent
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, he said, “Sec. Carter stated we will continue to fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows (and that) turning an underwater rock into an airfield simply does not afford the rights of sovereignty or permit restrictions on international air and maritime transit. However,
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just two weeks ago at the Aspen Security Forum stated it is US policy to afford a 12-(mile) limit around all (features) in the South China Sea… to include islands and formations.”

“It’s absolutely important that the Navy continue to be present in that region,” Richardson said, “(but) we do have to respect the legitimately claimed territorial boundaries.”

“Does that mean respecting that?” Sullivan said, pointing scornfully to a photo of China’s airstrip atop one of the structures known as Fiery Cross Reef.

“I’d have to at look exactly which of those claims are legitimate,” Richardson demurred. “It’s a dynamic situation there. There are competing claims down there…. We need to get down there, understand the truth, and make that very clear.”

“Mr. Chairman,” Sullivan said, turning to
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(himself no fan of Obama’s foreign policy), “I’ll be submitting questions for the record to make sure the policy of the United States is clarified.”
 

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
Interesting comments from Admiral Richardson's confirmation as Chief of Naval Ops. Not surprisingly, the good admiral avoided controversial topics by skirting them, but this sentence in the article caught my attention, and if accurate, indicates US does indeed accept 12-mile territorial limit for China's reclaimed islands.



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Good article and it makes clear the vagaries.

As I have stated...I do not think, other than talk...that the US will be able to do anything to stop or limit the PRC's reclamation efforts.

At the same time, I do not believe, other than talk and communicate with vessel and aircraft in the area, that the PRC is going to stop the US Navy from FON in the SCS.

Now, there are limits to both...for example, a US Navy vessel sailing into one of the new harbors would be forcefully restricted if it did not have permission...but something like that is simply not going to happen.

As long as no one makes an overt, serious mistake, you are going to end up with China having significantly increased and bolstered its presence in the South China Sea, and the US performing more naval patrols there with its partner nations in the area.

One making its point by the establishment of new, permanent facilities in the area, the other by sailing around the area more often..
 

Zetageist

Junior Member
Small reefs, big problems
Asian coastguards are in the front line of the struggle to check China
Jul 25th 2015

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EVERY ten or so days, and rarely at weekends, the Chinese coastguard arrives at eight in the morning, in time for the Japanese foreign ministry to deliver a formal complaint to its Chinese counterpart by lunchtime. It is something of a ritual these days. Chinese vessels breach the 12-mile territorial limit of Japan’s Senkaku islands, which China claims and calls the Diaoyu islands. Japanese coastguard cutters shadow them warily until the Chinese decide that national honour has been satisfied and sail away. Call this little dance an improvement: in 2012, with anti-Japan fervour at its height, aggressive incursions into Senkaku waters highlighted the risk that China might even provoke a war with its neighbour over the uninhabited rocks.

That the dance is carried out by coastguard vessels, white-painted and minimally armed, also allows both sides to disengage more easily. Yet gunmetal-grey warships lurk nearby. One reason China has backed off in recent months is the solid presence of the Japanese navy just over the horizon. And were the two countries ever to come to blows over the Senkakus, America has made it clear it would come to Japan’s aid. (It claims no view over the territorial dispute, which did not stop it using the Senkakus for bombing practice during its post-war occupation of Japan.)

Facing pushback in the East China Sea, China has turned to softer targets: the islands, reefs and atolls of the South China Sea. These have long been the subject of territorial disputes among littoral states, especially involving the Philippines and Vietnam. But China has increased the tensions sharply in the past year. First, without consultation it towed an oil rig into Vietnam’s claimed Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). More troubling is confirmation of China’s massive landfill work on disputed reefs and islands a very long way from China’s shores. In contrast with Japan, China’s neighbours to the south are poorer and weaker, and they lack cast-iron American security guarantees. A vacuum has existed in the South China Sea since American forces withdrew from the Philippines in 1992.

Game of shadows

China’s neighbours are unnerved by its rapid increase in defence spending, in particular its pursuit of a blue-water navy. They note a Chinese president, Xi Jinping, who is not shy about flexing Chinese muscle. He likes to talk of China’s “peaceful rise” and of a “new type of great-power relationship”—one that appears to leave little space for small countries.

In both Beijing and Washington, strategists have long liked to grapple with whether America and China are destined to fall into a “Thucydides trap”. In the original, the Spartans’ fear of the growing might of Athens made war inevitable. The modern parallel states that an existing power (America) is bound to clash with a rising one (China). In Japan the point is made differently: at sea modern China is behaving with the paranoid aggression of imperial Japan on land before the second world war. “They are making the same mistakes that we did,” says a Japanese official.

For now, it is a game of diplomacy, legal manoeuvre, positioning and the creation of facts on the ground (or, rather, on the water). It is played mainly by non-military forces: dredgers and barges; oceanographic and other survey ships; and, above all, coastguards. China insists that its landfill work is intended to provide public goods such as lighthouses, typhoon shelters for fishermen, weather stations and search-and-rescue facilities. But American defence officials are certain the purpose is, in fact, military. At Fiery Cross reef a new airstrip 3km (1.9 miles) long could take any of China’s military aircraft, and what look like hangars for fighters are being built. Artillery has been seen at another outpost. American planners say that these positions are vulnerable—“aircraft carriers that can’t move”, as one puts it—and would quickly be put out of action in any conflict. But short of war the artificial islands would serve as useful forward bases to project Chinese power.

China claims an ill-defined U-shape, the “nine-dashed line”, that encloses much of the South China Sea (see map) and clashes with the claims of several of its neighbours. Again, America affects to take no position on who owns what. Its priority, it says, is to preserve the right of free navigation by both air and sea. It periodically sends military reconnaissance aircraft near the newly built islands to make this point.

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Zetageist

Junior Member
Continued from above due to 1000 words limitation ...

China is not the first country to build in the South China Sea, but it is now by far the most energetic. By shredding trust with South-East Asian claimants, China’s actions make a long-promised code of conduct for dealing with territorial disputes ever more elusive. Its assertiveness has pushed several South-East Asian countries closer to America, lending justification for the American “pivot” to Asia. Countries alarmed at Chinese assertiveness have rushed to buy military equipment.

In the face of strong domestic opposition, Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, is pushing new security bills through parliament that would loosen the constraints on Japan helping its American ally. He would, for instance, like Japan to join the American navy in South China Sea patrols. Japan is also financing the construction of ten new coastguard vessels for the Philippines and six for Vietnam. It is all part of a concerted “anti-coercion strategy”, says Narushige Michishita of the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo.

Meanwhile, Vietnam’s relations with America go from strength to strength (while it increases arms purchases from Russia). The Philippines has signed a new defence pact that would allow America to return to its former base in Subic Bay as well as other bases. And it plans to beef up its neglected armed forces. The shopping list includes new fighters, frigates and maritime reconnaissance aircraft. But, given the scale of the country’s corruption, some wonder how much of a punch the extra pesos will deliver.

Many are now closely watching the proceedings of a UN-sponsored arbitration panel at The Hague, where the Philippines is seeking a ruling on whether China’s building on submerged reefs confers the right to territorial waters and EEZs under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The panel cannot settle the question of ownership, but the Philippines is hoping for a moral victory that will undermine China’s vague but sweeping claims. China has refused to take part in the process, but is being drawn willy-nilly into the legal argument.

One China, one claim

At the junction of the East China Sea and the South China Sea lies Taiwan, which China claims. Tensions across the Taiwan Strait have greatly eased in recent years, as the Taiwanese president, Ma Ying-jeou, and his Kuomintang (KMT) have sought reconciliation with the mainland Communists. But a test of relations is on the horizon with a presidential election that is likely to see Mr Ma replaced by Tsai Ing-wen of the more independence-minded Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). She has tried to assuage American worries of cross-strait crisis by speaking of her desire to maintain stable, predictable relations with the mainland. But China does not trust her party.

Besides, the South China Sea disputes have the potential to become a new bone of contention between Taiwan and China. Taiwan shares identical claims to China’s in the East China Sea and the South China Sea. Indeed the nine-dashed line was first drawn up by the KMT in 1946 (it had 11 dashes then) when it still ruled China and set out to retake islands following Japan’s surrender. Identical claims actually suit China, since they reinforce the pretence that there is just “one China” (with China and Taiwan disagreeing over precisely what it is). But America recently pressured Mr Ma to clarify Taiwan’s claim as a means of undermining the absurdly sweeping nature of China’s.

Mr Ma, a Harvard-trained lawyer who is keen that his country is seen to be upholding international law, said that under UNCLOS Taiwan claims only the 12-mile limit around its islands, not all the seas within the nine-dashed line. A DPP government might adopt a still narrower position. Ms Tsai insists that Taiwan will defend Taiping or Itu Aba, the largest island in the Spratlys, which it holds, but is vaguer about other features.

Diplomatic nuance will not change the inexorable shift that is taking place in Asia’s balance of power. Military experts offer the following rough reckoning: Taiwan lost the ability to halt a Chinese invasion on its own several years ago; Japan may be able to keep protecting its farthest-flung islands only for another 10-15 years. So the longer-term questions are: can either country inflict enough damage on China to deter it from attacking and, more importantly, how far is America still willing or able to tip the scales? Two decades after a cross-strait crisis in which China fired missiles close to Taiwan, would America again deploy aircraft-carriers nearby as a warning? Few offer an unqualified “yes”.

Military thinking is changing markedly. America is seeking new weapons to try to break through China’s growing “anti-access/area denial” (A2/AD) capability. This involves, for example, anti-ship missiles designed to hold back the Americans, perhaps at the “first island chain” (which runs from Japan to Taiwan, the Philippines and Indonesia). Such is the mismatch that neighbours are now planning their own A2/AD strategies to fend off China.

Toshi Yoshihara of the US Naval War College thinks that Japan should focus on things like shore-based anti-ship missiles, submarines, “guerrilla warfare at sea” with fast missile boats and mine warfare. America is quietly pushing Taiwan to adopt similar tactics. And Japanese officials privately admit that Taiwan’s security is essential to Japan’s. Andrew Krepinevich of the Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a think-tank in Washington, DC, suggests that America should help extend what he calls “archipelagic defence” to the Philippines.

If you can’t beat them, contain them

Such advice may be a counsel of despair, an admission that the East China Sea and South China Sea are bound to become Chinese lakes, and that the best that can be done is to contain China within them. Nobody wants to test such notions, not least because of the risk tensions pose to global prosperity. The aim in the coming years must be to draw a rising China into co-operative relationships with its neighbours, while deterring bad behaviour.

China is hardly without internal problems, or indifferent to external pressure. Some experts in Beijing think their country has been too assertive at sea of late. China has said its land reclamation in the South China Sea is coming to an end. Mr Xi will want to avoid too many controversies ahead of his visit to America in September.

For now, whether competition in Asia can be prevented from turning into conflict may come down to whether the crews on lightly armed coastguard ships in the waters around China can keep their heads.

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advill

Junior Member
I recently attended a talk given by a senior Philippines' diplomat at one of our University Institutes. It was on the South China Sea disputes, focusing on the updated Philippines' position. There were discussions on the developments including the pending Philippines' case before the International Tribunal. My personal belief, which I made known to the distinguished gathering was that some compromise, if possible, should be examined through serious negotiations. There will be no winners but losers IF there are flare-ups in the South China Sea that will eventually effect the whole region. Hopefully, the high level government officials of the effected parties will give it another serious try to resolve the problem/s ASAP.
 

shen

Senior Member
I recently attended a talk given by a senior Philippines' diplomat at one of our University Institutes. It was on the South China Sea disputes, focusing on the updated Philippines' position. There were discussions on the developments including the pending Philippines' case before the International Tribunal. My personal belief, which I made known to the distinguished gathering was that some compromise, if possible, should be examined through serious negotiations. There will be no winners but losers IF there are flare-ups in the South China Sea that will eventually effect the whole region. Hopefully, the high level government officials of the effected parties will give it another serious try to resolve the problem/s ASAP.

Again as previously posted in the thread, I remind people the 2005 Joint Seismic Survey Agreement between Philippines, China and Vietnam. Not perfect, but a good start to a peaceful solution. Torpedoed by the diplomacy of Secretary Hillary Clinton. She is most likely going to be the next president of the US.
 

Brumby

Major
I recently attended a talk given by a senior Philippines' diplomat at one of our University Institutes. It was on the South China Sea disputes, focusing on the updated Philippines' position. There were discussions on the developments including the pending Philippines' case before the International Tribunal. My personal belief, which I made known to the distinguished gathering was that some compromise, if possible, should be examined through serious negotiations. There will be no winners but losers IF there are flare-ups in the South China Sea that will eventually effect the whole region. Hopefully, the high level government officials of the effected parties will give it another serious try to resolve the problem/s ASAP.

A lot of discussions in this forum had centred around the notion of a rule based order and that China would somehow follow the rules. The actions by China especially in the SCS, the nine dash line and the massive land reclamation suggest to me another track that had not been overtly discussed but in my view offers another perspective in explaining China's actions, its international behaviour and the strategic game plan that possibly be guiding its decision process. In primarily all our discussions the assumption rest on China behaving within what is essentially a western centric rule based order. There are suggestions in some writings of China's non acceptance of the status quo because it has neither shaped nor influenced their development. This means inherently, China instead of abiding by them will progressively set to make its own rules outside the established system. This explains China's emphasis on the nine dash line based on historic rights as a primary argument. The question therefore is what international relations policies are underpinning the Chinese leaders as it engages the rest of the world in the 21st century but with a stronger military and economic posture. I will posit the following :

During the 1980's as China came out of its economic stagnation probably under the guidance of Chairman Deng, the stone was cast that China will bide its time until it is in a position to complete its plan. The immediate IR policy initially is what some has described as the "Guanxi" IR policy. In western terms, that is establishing and developing relationship primarily trade and essentially adopting a cooperative posture. During this time, China cooperated with the rest of the world and operated within the rules. I believe what we are seeing today is a new phase and has migrated to a more assertive posture loosely term as the "Tianxia" policy. "Tianxia" means all-under heaven. This concept has its roots in early Chinese history and through the various dynasties. Coinciding with that concept is the belief of "mandate under heaven" and that simply is the right to rule because it is mandated by heaven. China, I view is seeing her rise as her rightful place in the 21st century, and for too long this right has been exploited and denied by western powers. It is also synonymous with the term "Zhongguo" and that is China being the centre of the universe. Such view means, rules should emanate from it rather than be bound by rules not of its making. The implications of such a world view is collectively what the western school coined historically as the "tributary system". Essentially, in exchange for recognition of China's pre-eminent status, vassal states will be accorded protection and economic benefits through trade. This policy, I believe is the genesis for projects such as AIIB and silk road.

If I were to apply this worldview and IR policy with regards to the Philippines and China negotiations, then China's position and what is the subject of negotiations become more apparent and why the Philippines has resorted to arbitration. I believe China's nine dash line and associated maritime territories are not subject to negotiations. What I believe on offer is the Philippines acceptance of China's claims and in return the Philippines will enjoy all the benefits of a vassal state with the rights to joint economic development in the disputed territories. In other words, the Philippines economic right is subject to Chinese pleasure.
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
I recently attended a talk given by a senior Philippines' diplomat at one of our University Institutes. It was on the South China Sea disputes, focusing on the updated Philippines' position. There were discussions on the developments including the pending Philippines' case before the International Tribunal. My personal belief, which I made known to the distinguished gathering was that some compromise, if possible, should be examined through serious negotiations. There will be no winners but losers IF there are flare-ups in the South China Sea that will eventually effect the whole region. Hopefully, the high level government officials of the effected parties will give it another serious try to resolve the problem/s ASAP.

Out of interest, which university is this?
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
Except you are cleverly merging two different situations as if they are comparable. The former as you described had gone through escalation steps with the nature of serious conflict as a possibility involving nuclear weapons. In a nuclear standoff, first strike as a doctrine is a serious consideration because of the nature of the issue.

In the SCS, adding over 2000 acres of real estate in disputed territory because someone has filed for arbitration and to argue as proportional is a less plausible explanation as compared to it being pursuant of a long held strategic program being executed.

Actually the two are both quite similar because in either case, the response that one chooses to make is very much a result of their doctrine regarding the issue and the scale of the level of perceived escalation.

In the nuclear stand off, there is little good will between each side and the fear of a decapitating strike means that the parties involved will have heightened vigilance to intrusions.

In the SCS, the combined action of various island grabs by other countries such as Vietnam over the years, as well as the potential of roping the US into the dispute as a position against Chinese claims, and the further filing of the lawsuit by the Philippines means China must fortify its presence in its territorial claims as the other sides are bringing forward their own means



I said China's actions is duplicitous because it accused the Philippines while in negotiation had gone to arbitration and therefore has acted disingenuously (per position paper to the Tribunal). In return, I am simply casting China by the standard that China has herself used by China's massive reclamation while in negotiations. This is notwithstanding officially China had on many occasions stated that the territories are indisputable. If they are indeed indisputable as claimed, what good faith is there to expect the Philippines to continue to negotiate over indisputable territories. That itself is an oxy moron position.

I think we need to clarify which negotiations we're talking about...

In my view, China's reclamation was in response to the cumulative build up of various actions by the Philippines, Vietnam, and the US over the past few years culminating in the Philippines and their lawsuit.

I'm not sure which negotiations you refer to while China is undergoing its reclamation, but even if there were/are negotiations which were occurring or ongoing, that does not mean China is obliged to stop its reclamation anymore than a nation is obliged to stop fighting a war when both sides may be negotiating a ceasefire. Both sides are only obliged to stop once a ceasefire is finished.

In the same way, even if negotiations are current ongoing regarding the territorial disputes, that does not mean either side has to stop their actions until terms are fully agreed by all sides for a common cause of action and result


You are right. Each parties are not bound to play nice or be proportional.

Cool, agreement!

The context of proportional response was with regards to whether it was more plausible when connected to reactive vs. a pre planned program given the scale of the reclamation

There is no reason why a reactive response cannot have extensive contingency planning prior to the reaction.


The scope of the conversation was more narrow as it was not my intention to broaden it to a degree (like you have) that it became unmanageable as a conversational topic.

The way I see it, the original conversation was about proportionality and duplicity... I am simply reapplying a different lens to the same situation and saying that it may be better viewed through the scope of what caused each side to act how they are acting and what the chronological sequence of events were.
 
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