US, China defence chiefs maintain uncommon talks on Taiwan, South China Sea | South China Sea Information

Singapore assembly between Lloyd Austin, Dong Jun marks first substantive face-to-face talks between the 2 nations in 18 months.

The defence chiefs of america and China have held uncommon direct talks in Singapore, providing hope that additional army dialogue might assist stop disputes over Taiwan and the South China Sea from spinning uncontrolled.

Lloyd Austin and Dong Jun met early on Friday on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue to carry their first substantive face-to-face dialogue in 18 months.

They started the talks on the luxurious lodge internet hosting the safety discussion board, in accordance with officers. The assembly adopted a video convention name in April.

Defence chiefs and officers from all over the world are attending the annual discussion board that has in recent times change into a barometer of US-China relations.

This yr’s version comes per week after China held army drills round Taiwan and warned of battle over the US-backed island following the inauguration of President William Lai Ching-te, who Beijing has described as a “harmful separatist”.

The dispute over democratic Taiwan, which Beijing considers a part of its territory, tops the listing of disagreements between the rivals.

Beijing is livid over Washington’s deepening defence ties within the Asia Pacific, notably with the Philippines, and its common deployment of warships and fighter jets within the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea.

In current weeks, the Philippines hosted the biggest ever joint army train with the US. On Thursday, China’s defence ministry strongly condemned the deployment of a US intermediate-range missile system within the northern Philippines throughout army drills in April, saying it “introduced enormous dangers of battle into the area”.

China views the actions as a part of a decades-long US effort to comprise it.

Easing friction

President Joe Biden’s administration and China have been stepping up communication to ease friction between the nuclear-armed rivals, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken visiting Beijing and Shanghai final month.

A key focus has been the resumption of military-to-military dialogue.

China scrapped army communications with america in 2022 in response to then-US Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s go to to Taiwan.

Tensions between Washington and Beijing have been stoked additional throughout 2023 by points together with an alleged Chinese language spy balloon that was shot down over US airspace, a gathering between Taiwan’s then-president Tsai Ing-wen and Pelosi’s successor Kevin McCarthy, and American army assist for Taipei.

The 2 sides agreed after a summit between Chinese language chief Xi Jinping and Biden in November final yr to restart high-level army talks.

That features a communications channel between the US Asia Pacific command chief and Chinese language commanders chargeable for army operations close to Taiwan, Japan and within the South China Sea.

Chinese language and US forces have had a sequence of shut encounters within the disputed waterway that China claims virtually totally.

Austin warned previous to Biden and Xi agreeing to renew military-to-military dialogue that accidents have the potential to spiral uncontrolled, particularly within the absence of open traces of communication between American and Chinese language forces.

In a put up on X early on Friday saying his arrival in Singapore, Austin mentioned he would meet with regional counterparts and proceed his division’s work with “like-minded Indo-Pacific companions to advertise our shared imaginative and prescient for a free and open area”.