Admiral Details Challenges, Opportunities of Pacific Fleet

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON  – As America’s focus shifts to the Asia-Pacific region, the U.S. Pacific Fleet is well-placed to protect national interests and connect with regional nations, Pacific Fleet’s commander, Adm. Patrick Walsh, said.

Adm. Cecil Haney will replace Walsh as the commander of the world’s largest fleet tomorrow during a ceremony at Pearl Harbor.

President Barack Obama’s military strategy announced earlier this month says that America’s focus will shift more toward the Asia-Pacific region in keeping with the U.S. position as a leading Pacific nation.

The Navy’s Pacific Fleet is a guarantor of peace and stability in the region, and it is well-positioned to take on the added focus, Walsh said during a recent interview with American Forces Press Service.

The fleet will continue to build military-to-military relations with Pacific nations, the admiral said. It will seek to strengthen ties with rising powers such as China and India while maintaining long-established relations with Japan, South Korea, Thailand, the Philippines and Australia. It will continue to work bilaterally, trilaterally or multinationally with all in the region, he said.

The region is huge and diverse, but one thing that the nations agree on is the role America plays in security and stability there. Few national leaders anywhere in the region want America to become isolationist, Walsh said.

“In terms of our role as a Pacific power, often I hear about the Chinese coastline being 9,000 miles long; ours is 45,000,” he added.

China is the dragon in the room. The nation now has the second-largest economy in the world – growing at about 8 percent annually – and is investing in its military force.

The U.S. Pacific Fleet is engaging with Chinese counterparts in many areas. “We work with many countries in the region to take an inclusive approach to identify key exercises that would contribute to humanitarian assistance and disaster relief at sea,” Walsh said. The idea is to find common ground, and then build on them.

U.S. Pacific Fleet leaders have met with Chinese counterparts in many regional forums from Singapore to Japan to Hawaii. Walsh has met with his Chinese counterpart and said he believes there is a momentum to closing the gaps that separate the U.S. and Chinese militaries.

The South China Sea and the Spratly Islands are a potential flashpoint with China, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei and Taiwan all claiming sovereignty.

“It’s very important for us to understand how the Chinese characterize the South China Sea,” Walsh said. “We have very different interpretations of what we think they want. That leads to confusion and friction. That’s something I’ve addressed with my counterpart and something we must work toward resolving.”

The nations must talk or else local events at sea will play out in the international arena and spark tensions between countries. “Having China participate in the norms and behaviors and activities that all the other nations are participating in, I think is really important,” the admiral said.

The Chinese need to remain involved in talks “because the danger is that they could retreat into a very narrow interpretation of what is acceptable and what is not in international waters and the high seas,” Walsh said.

“There are established norms and behaviors at sea that have brought us the security, the stability, the prosperity in the Asia Pacific since the World War II era,” he added. “We can’t set that aside for an interpretation that the South China Sea falls under the category of internal Chinese law. That just won’t work.”

The United States recognizes the historical disputes in the area and believes “the most constructive role that we can play is to facilitate the peaceful resolution of disputes,” he said.

Competition for resources, including possible oil and gas deposit on the Spratly Islands, will increase tensions in the region, Walsh said.

“Moving forward, the question is how do we resolve the tension that exists now with the demand for greater resources?” he said. “Having a credible force that is sustainable forward is critically important to working with partners in the region to resolve disputes and to resolve conflict.”

India is another rising international economic power and the Pacific Fleet has a robust military-to-military relationship with the second-most populous nation in the world.

India and other Asian nations have recognized that the U.S. model for security and stability operations at sea has contributed, enhanced and underwritten prosperity in the region, Walsh said.

The Pacific Fleet works with nations to develop the ability to patrol and develop their maritime capabilities. “Our interests are inherited from our geography,” he said. “The idea that we have a Navy that looks after our interests and the interests of our friends and partners in the region is consistent and logical.”

There are countries in the region that see positive aspects to American influence and seek partnerships. “It’s an open and more inclusive approach that continues to generate interest on the part of other countries,” he said.

Walsh was commissioned out of the Naval Academy in 1977. An aviator, he served on the Blue Angels. The Navy today is far different than the one he entered as an ensign.

“We’ve come a long way, and we’ve got a lot to be proud of,” he said. “It’s best represented in the amount of interest in joining the service and staying in. The quality of personnel we have has continued to improve over time. It’s a model we need to take full stock of.”

America’s role in the Pacific is unique even according to statesmen in the region. Walsh told about a recent conversation he had with Singapore’s senior minister, Lee Kwan Yew. They were talking about translators and the senior minister asked Walsh if he brought his own interpreters when he visited Southeast Asia or if he hired them in country.

“I told him we have our own,” the admiral said. “The sons and daughters of those who immigrated to the United States are not only translators, but they are coming back now in command.”

Lee Kwan Yew’s observation about that fact was penetrating, Walsh said. “He said that America has done something that no other country in the region can do: we’ve learned how to recognize and embrace diversity,” the admiral said.

“What that means now is we have commanders who fled Vietnam in 1975 who are now back in command of Arleigh Burke destroyers going back to Vietnam, Cambodia, South Korea or India, the commander said.

Lee “said you couldn’t do that in Asia. You could not expect to immigrate to China, for example, and then expect to land on your feet, attend a military academy and then get command of a Chinese naval vessel,” he continued. “It’s only in the United States that you’ve learned to unlock the potential of all that diversity and all it means.”

Mullen: Partnerships Vital to Pacific Security Strategy

By Karen Parrish

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, July 25, 2011 – America’s national security strategy priorities for the Asia-Pacific region encompass both a burgeoning relationship with China and enduring security commitments to other countries there, the nation’s senior military officer said today.

Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Foreign Press Center here that his recent visit to China and the trip his Chinese counterpart, Gen. Chen Bingde, made here in May form “a basis for ongoing dialogue and some very tangible, common challenges we can continue to work on together -- things like piracy and terrorism and disaster relief operations.”

President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao have agreed to advance military relations between the two countries, Mullen said, while acknowledging that “very real, very substantive issues” inhibit close cooperation and partnership between the two nations.

The Chinese object to U.S. arms sales to Taiwan and U.S. reconnaissance flights in international airspace, Mullen said, while the United States objects to the use of coercion in settling disputes in the South China Sea, or any attempt to inhibit freedom of navigation and access to the global commons -- international waters and airspace -- as well as cyberspace.

Disagreement is a healthy part of any relationship, the chairman said, expressing the hope that a better relationship between the U.S. and Chinese militaries would help to improve the level of trust between the two nations.

“We have a long way to go in our relationship with China,” Mullen said, “and no recent history of strategic trust upon which to build it.”

But building a better military relationship with China cannot dominate U.S. planning and force posture decisions in the Asian-Pacific region, the admiral said, citing the U.S. relationships with South Korea and Japan as vital.

South Korea has steadfastly supported U.S. security efforts around the world, including in Afghanistan, and “our commitment to their defense and to security on the peninsula remains unwavering,” the chairman said.

Mullen added that he believes the North Korean regime will again attempt to provoke hostilities.

“Thus far, [South Korean] leaders have shown commendable restraint, but I think it would be a grave mistake for the North to perceive this restraint as a lack of resolve or, in fact, of the capability of our alliance to defend itself,” he said.

Mullen said the United States will continue to work with Japanese Self-Defense Forces to improve their operational capabilities.

“This was my first visit back to Japan after the devastating earthquake and tsunami last March, and I was struck by just how fast and how well the hardest-hit areas were recovering,” he said. “I was also glad to hear from Japanese leaders that U.S. military contributions to the relief effort were of the size and scale they most needed.”

Mullen said the United States-Australia alliance is another model for “interoperability, transparency, and meaningful combined full-spectrum capabilities.”

“We will make it better with more joint operations, exercises and exchanges,” he added.

U.S. strategy also includes seeking expanded military cooperation with India on nonproliferation, safeguarding the global commons and countering terrorism, the chairman said.

“And we will expand our military security cooperation and exercises with the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Pakistan, Indonesia, Singapore and other states in the region,” he said, “working with them to address common threats to their sovereignty and security.”

The United States also encourages other nations to strengthen partnerships with their neighbors, he said.

“Relationships matter -- not just bilateral relationships, but collective ones, whether they include the United States or not,” Mullen said. Multilateral relationships improve understanding, sharpen interoperability, strengthen regional norms and encourage responsibility in addressing shared security challenges, he added.

The U.S. military will increase its emphasis on work with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and other multilateral forums, he said.

“We are and will remain a Pacific power,” Mullen said. “Our military is and will remain the long arm of that power. We will not shrink from old or new responsibilities. And we most certainly will not shrink from every opportunity to enhance peace and stability in this vital part of the world.”

U.S. Urges Negotiation in South China Sea Disputes

By Donna Miles

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, June 21, 2011 – The United States, like the rest of the world, has a deep interest in ensuring freedom of navigation in the South China Sea and in helping defuse tensions over territorial disputes there, a senior defense official said yesterday.

Speaking on background at a Center for Strategic and International Studies conference on maritime security in the South China Sea, the official reiterated Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates’ and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for peaceful resolution regarding territorial disputes in the strategically critical region.

The South China Sea is a vital shipping lane that possesses vast oil and gas deposits. China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines all lay claim to overlapping parts of it, causing regional friction and several recent confrontations.

“The United States, like every nation, has an interest in the freedom of navigation and open access to Asia’s maritime commons and with respect for international law in the South China Sea,” the official said at theforum.

He cited Gates’ comments earlier this month at the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit in Singapore, where the secretary emphasized U.S. support for “freedom of navigation and unimpeded economic development and commerce and respect for international law.”

Gates warned at the summit that lack of a strong multilateral mechanism for nations to settle their disputes peacefully could cause problems to escalate. “I fear that without rules of the road, without agreed approaches to deal with these problems, that there will be clashes,” he told attendees. “I think that serves nobody’s interests.”

The secretary urged the countries involved to establish a code of conduct based on an agreement between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and China to promote peaceful resolution of their territorial disputes.

“Given recent events, we would hope that all parties will be able to make tangible progress” toward creating this code of conduct, the defense official said.

Until that can be achieved, the United States recognizes customary international law, as reflected in the U.N. Convention of the Laws of the Sea, as providing “clear guidance” regarding the maritime domain, he said.

The United States does not take positions on territorial disputes in the South China Sea, he said. It does, however, urge nations to pursue their territorial claims and accompanying rights to maritime space in accordance with international law and through diplomatic means.

Although encouraged by nations’ stated interest in peaceful resolution, “we remain concerned” that actions haven’t always been in line with that goal and could lead to further incidents, the official said.

This, he said, “could threaten the safety, security and stability of the region.”