China says it is ‘rock solid’ over its ‘great wall of sand’ in the South China Sea, warning the US of an ‘price to pay’ for its stance that it remains an international waterway.

Beijing has already rejected whatever verdict the International Court of Arbitration in The Hague finds. To reinforce its position, last weekend it announced it would seal-off an large swath of the contested sea for military exercises in the seven days leading up to the announcement.

With many analysts anticipating a rejection of China’s claims, speculation is mounting as to how Beijing will react.

Could such an international verdict bring on some kind of showdown in the South China Sea?

China’s military power has grown considerably in recent decades. It now has a significant force of modern ships and aircraft projecting its power over the East and South China Seas.Source:Supplied

BRINKMANSHIP

Beijing appears to have left itself little option when it comes to a response. All involve varying degrees of escalation:

Ignore it altogether? The whole issue exploded after China simply went ahead with the enormous engineering project to turn reefs into artificial islands with ‘carrier-killer’ fortresses on top. It could quietly continue to do so. But China’s official media mouthpieces have ramped up their own rhetoric as international outrage grows. Beijing’s expressions of insult at opposition to its territorial claims have put its own population on edge. Any sign of backdown or weakness would come with a political price.

Declare an Air Defence Identification Zone: In November 2013 Beijing declared its sovereignty over another contested waterway, the East China Sea. It did this by imposing an ‘Air Defence Identification Zone’ over a reach of water including islands which Japan, Taiwan and South Korea also claim. A similar assertive move to control the airspace over the South China Sea would be further controversial step towards imposing full sovereignty. It would also send a signal to Beijing’s own people that it would not be cowed by international pressue.

Flex its military muscle: China has repeatedly expressed its outrage at the ‘Freedom of Navigation’ missions that the United States and others have been conducting in the South China Sea. Washington says it is merely exercising its right to sail in international waters. It’s a scenario ripe for confrontation. And then there are the small outposts on islands such as Scarborough Shoal established by the Vietnamese and Philippines as counterclaims. China could move to evict these nations from their coral outcrops to further assert its claim.

Once bitter Pacific rivals, the US and Japan are now sending a unified message to China that its territorial grab must not impede on the ‘freedom to navigate’ the East and South China Seas.Source:Supplied

LOOMING SHOWDOWN

Whatever Beijing’s reaction, Asia seems destined for even greater tensions as China applies its new-found economic and industrial might to jostle for the fishing, mineral and fuel resources of the South China Sea.

These mounting territorial tensions are increasingly being played out in the skies and on the waters of the East and South China Seas.

Earlier this week Beijing expressed outrage at how its fighters - enforcing its own arbitrarily declared Air Defence Identification Zone - were themselves intercepted by Japanese jets which engaged their targeting radars.

Admid it all comes yet more rhetoric.

China’s People’s Daily newspaper, Beijing’s official mouthpiece, has overnight threatened the US of an ‘price’ to pay for its ‘interference’ in the South China Sea.

“There is a bottom line with every issue, and a price will be paid if that line is crossed,” an editorial printed in the paper asserts.

“If the United States, regardless of the cost, chooses the path of ‘brinkmanship’ that pressures and intimidates others, there will be only one result, that is, that the US bears all the responsibility for possibly further heightening tensions in the South China Sea.

“China has a solid-rock position over safeguarding China’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity. It will not want anything that does not belong to it, but it will ensure that every inch of land it owns is safe and sound.”