When one thinks of relations between China and the island nations forming concentric rings around its Western Coast, one typically thinks of ASEAN. A decade ago, this region was the focal point of China's "charm offensive,", an attempt to sweet-talk these nations (most of which look to the US for security) into siding with China instead (Banerjee, Asia Society). That ended, of course, at the 2010 ASEAN assembly in Hanoi, when China's Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, having previously stormed out of the room in disgust as tiny nations dared to criticize his country, took the stage and shrieked into the mic for 40 minutes including a lengthy barrage of invective at Vietnam for siding with non-Communists. This tirade ended with Yang loudly declaring, with all ASEAN leaders present, "China is a big country and other countries are small countries and that is just a fact (Mosher, Bully of Asia, 258)."
Needless, to say, this rather ham-fisted declaration of a superiority complex did not endear China to any of her neighbors (Storey, China Brief). China never issued an apology for the outburst (as a civilized nation would). They never even made any attempt to backpedal on it or blame it on a translation error (as a semi-civilized nation would).
As a result, China has been on the defensive in the years since 2010, trying to woo ASEAN back, (Peh, Channel News Asia) but without much success (Parameswaran, The Diplomat). This lack of success is partly due to the fact that the superiority complex China displayed in 2010 keeps resurfacing, in academe, where Chinese academics try to paint China as benevolent but still insist "[China's] dignity as a major country, requires due consideration for its core interests, which can never be compromised," an open declaration that China's interests take precedence over the interests of 'lesser' countries (Yu, China-US Focus), and in print, such as Jin Canrong's CCP-approved China's Wisdom, wherein the author rather casually asserts that China has a special right to set rules for other countries in the region (38), claims "the world needs China's solutions (84)," and then goes on to give a still-simmering rebuke to the countries in ASEAN for daring to refuse to grovel to China (114-178).
Indeed, far from grovelling, the bloc has come to identify itself largely as a counterweight to China (Woody, Business Insider).
But there is another organization of island nations in the Pacific, a bit farther out from China, that typically does not get much attention, and they have been the target of the debt-trap diplomacy that has become China's diplomatic scheme of choice after their "Charm Offensive" lost its charm and just became offensive, and that organization just got its own dose of the arrogance that characterizes Chinese officials abroad. That is the Pacific Islands Forum.
So Who Are These Countries, and What Happened?
The Pacific Islands Forum is a group of (mostly) small island nations whose Westernmost end is Australia. If that sentence left you running for a map asking "what's east of Australia," you're not alone. Most of these countries are smaller than the average Western city, both in land area and population. To give you an idea of how small these nations are, the powerhouse among them, exercising near-dominance of the others in every category, is Australia, with New Zealand running second. Yet their location in the South Central Pacific makes them ideal for any major power seeking to control sea-lane traffic, as China has already proven their desire to do in the West Philippine Sea. As China has started throwing Belt-and-Road money around, these islands were major beneficiaries and there were reports that one of the islands, Vanuatu, was being courted as the site of a PLA Naval base (Wroe, The Sydney Morning Herald). Of course China vehemently denied any such plans existed, but then again, they're still denying that anyone (other than 9 "brave Chinese soldiers") was killed in the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre... and also claiming that the student protesters were armed (Beam, Slate). That said, excuse me if I don't take any Chinese denial very seriously, especially given the fury of China's arrogant officials when they took it upon themselves to order the Australian media not to air the story (Fernando & Chang, news.com.au). If you have noticed "arrogant, imperious Chinese officials embarrassing their country" seems to be a burgeoning trend here, keep reading.
In any case, there are plenty of reasons not to be surprised about China wanting a naval base in Vanuatu. The Japanese tried to accomplish the same thing in WW2, but the Americans beat them to it. Construction of deep-water ports that would be easily converted into naval bases (provided the host-countries could be persuaded to allow the conversion) has been a staple of the Belt-and-Road, from Pakistan's Gwadar Port (Kanwal, CSIS Brief) to Sri Lanka's Hambantota Port (Panda, The Diplomat). In fact, it is the latter, and the way Sri Lanka's debt to China for financing a project that never made any money forced the country to hand over its sovereignty over its main sea-trade artery to China in a manner eerily reminiscent of Hong Kong, that has made so many smaller nations, including the PIF, suddenly look askance at China's alleged largesse viz-a-viz Belt and Road (Cook, Asia Times).
Earlier this summer, the PIF began to discuss whether or not their charter, the 2000 Biketawa Declaration, was sufficient to face the challenges of the present age, and China was listed by name as one of those 'challenges (Shapiro, Geopolitical Futures, "The South Pacific").' It was announced by multiple parties within the PIF that the bloc would be signing a "new security agreement" aimed at "emerging threats" at their meeting in Nauru later in the summer.
When the new agreement, known as the Boe Declaration, was signed, many found it a bit underwhelming. It was noted by some that it seemed less aimed at China and more like a scattershot aimed at major powers from China to the US, from Japan to the UK, and all points in between. However, the vital distinction was that the Boe Declaration includes a tiny section wherein the countries pledge to increase security cooperation, and “recognize that national security impacts on regional security.” In short, what was previously nothing more than a loose economic bloc (if even that) has now become a security alliance (Shapiro, GPF, "A Sea Change"), led by Australia (who, don't forget, is a member of the Quad Alliance (Reminisci, Steemit)) and New Zealand. Of course, some of these nations (such as Tonga), having gotten themselves in hoc to China for huge swaths of their entire GDP, have more reason to fear China's debt trap diplomacy than others (Shapiro, GPF, "Tonga a New Ally"), but the entire bloc has begun to put up fences to keep from being strangled with China's Belt and left in the Road.
Perhaps that's why China's representative at the Forum threw a classic Zhonghua tantrum last week.
Who Cares if I'm a Minister or Not?! I'm Chinese, so I Should Speak First! Don't You Grovelling Laowai Tributaries Know Anything?!
At this point, it is almost redundant to reiterate China's long history of putting their arrogance on display abroad when anyone dares to challenge or question them (Burney & Hampson, The Globe and Mail). What is unusual is for a Chinese official to launch into such a derogatory tirade without waiting to be questioned.
China is not a member of the Pacific Islands Forum (for reasons which should be obvious to anyone owning a map), but it is one of several nations who hold a status that enables them to participate in dialogue, even without having a vote. China's representative at the Forum, Du Qiwen, is not a ministry-level official. He's not even an undersecretary to a minister. His loftiest credential is being China's former ambassador to Greece. His official title is "Special Envoy," which is a euphemism for "we need a suit there with our flag on its lapel, and unfortunately we haven't trained suits to walk around without someone wearing them yet." In the diplomatic world, he's on the bottom rung of the ladder and his feet are slipping. Well, like most international assemblies, the Pacific Island Forum has protocols for the order of speakers, mostly based on rank. Heads-of-State speak first, Ministry-level officials speak next, deputy ministers next, and so forth. Within each category, Forum Members speak before non-members. So when Du Qiwen, special envoy from the "Celestial Empire, ruling all within the Four Seas," stood up at the Forum in Nauru and spent "a good number of minutes" demanding to speak first, Nauru's presidet, Baron Waqa, refused to yield the floor and insisted China comply with the Forum's rules (South China Morning Post, "Chinese Diplomats"). Video catches President Waqa calling on Du to "show some respect." In response, Du did not just walk out, but walked all over the room griping like a spoiled child and then, once he was finally satisfied that he had made enough of a scene, left with his entire delegation. I doubt Nauru, the host nation for the summit and one of Taiwan's last remaining diplomatic allies, missed him that much.
But here's the part that is going to shock China, because Baron Waqa, president of the tiny island nation of Nauru, just did something that this swaggering, overbearing ex-empire with delusions of current hegemony is completely unaccustomed to from "lowly foreign barbarians." He has demanded an apology from Beijing (Doherty, Europe Solidaire).
...I mean, wow!
Hey Duterte, are you watching? Taking notes maybe?
And President Waqa is not just talking about a case of "issue a demand and let it go." He has made it clear he plans to repeat his demand at EVERY UN session. This is coming from the leader of a nation of 21 square km and a population of 11,000, who has gone on record referring to China's envoy as "a nobody." "Like a Boss" doesn't even come close. That's "Like a President." I mean, this makes me wish Nauru would join the US so this man could run for president once Trump's term finishes (eh, depending on whether the definition of 'natural born citizen' includes someone born on US soil before it was US soil).
Now, I'm not holding my breath waiting for Beijing to give that apology. I have searched high and low for some instance, any instance of the PRC government giving an apology to any foreign government for anything, and I have never found one. Rather, their M.O. is to insist that their actions were flawless and that any party in dispute with them is in error and sanctimoniously declare that the "offending party" should engage in some bastardization of the Confucian "Rectification of Names" and a Maoist "self-criticism session" and debase themselves before China in humble contrition.
But frankly, from what I've seen of President Baron Waqa, I don't see that happening.
Works Cited
Books
Mosher, Stephen. Bully of Asia. Washington, 2017. Regnery Publishing Group.
ISBN 978-1-62157-696-9
Jin Canrong. Trans. Wen Jianxin. China's Wisdom. Beijing, 2017. China Renmin University Press.
ISBN 978-7-300-24622-2
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