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The Solomon Islands-China Agreement
As the world looks to the bloodstained plains of Eastern Europe, on the other side of the planisphere The agreement between the small Solomon Islands archipelago and China reveals what the battlefield will be to decide who will be the ruler of the Pacific.
Again, as in Ukraine, the strategic value of the dispute is evoked by the specters of World War II, when the archipelago had been the scene of the fierce battle on land and sea of Guadalcanal, the main island, between the Imperial Japanese Army and American forces for control of this focal point of the eastern theater.
The Japanese considered control of this strategic area of the ocean crucial because it guarded the shipping routes between Asia, Australia and the United States, and the clash between the two fleets in the waters near the island determined the outcome of the war.
The 2017 agreement and diplomatic recognition
In July 2017, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare and Chinese Ambassador Hu Shan signed an agreement in the capital city of Honiara as part of the ambitious One Belt-One Road, a kind of Plan. Marshall in a bittersweet sauce that would aim to stimulate global development through Chinese financing of massive infrastructure investment.
The agreement between Solomon Islands and China, was sealed by the triumphant visit of President Xi Jinping, with a grand traditional welcoming ceremony, marching bands, costumed dancers, ampull speeches on the historical relations between the two countries and commitment to development, streets packed with government supporters.
Prime Minister Sogavare thanked China for the loan and promised the Solomon Islands' support for the One Belt-One Road project.
The agreement included a loan of 500 million of dollars to finance the construction of a large pier in the capital's port to allow large ships to dock, the lengthening of the airport runway and a bridge connecting these projects. In addition, a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in maritime technology was signed.
The reaction of the population and oppositions
The Australian and Western security apparatuses saw this move as a Possible covert attempt to restructure the island's infrastructure main so as to be able to accommodate Chinese fighter jets and strategic bombers in the airport in the future, on the one hand, and especially naval ships in Honiara Harbor, on the other.
La reaction of the population Local to the agreement between the Solomon Islands and China. has been discordant. On the one hand, supporters agree on the potential economic benefits the project will bring, while detractors have raised concerns about Chinese influence in the region.
Some prominent opposition figures, including Matthew Wale, Job Tausinga and Alfred Sasako, have publicly denounced the agreement for lacking transparency and threatening the country''s sovereignty.
They complained that, the terms of the agreement granted Chinese companies control of one million acres of land, a vast area that concealed natural resource exploitation projects.
The fear is of falling back into what Western analyses accuse of being the "debt trap" Chinese, implemented in developing countries, whereby China provides loans that are impossible to repay in exchange for geopolitical presence and concessions on natural resources.
The Australian response
In response to the agreement between Solomon Islands and China, The Australian government in 2019 committed to a series of measures that collectively allocate a budget of $2.5 billion to Solomon Islands in the form of subsidized grants over a six-year period, offering a package of economic assistance in areas such as health, education and sustainable economic growth.
However, there was no shortage of a military component: support for the Royal Solomon Islands Police Force and joint improvement of maritime border surveillance is also planned.
Nevertheless, In 2020, the Solomon Islands, which was part of the handful of countries still linked to the Republic of China, cut ties with Taiwan and Have established diplomatic relations with the People's Republic, an indicator of the degree of success of Beijing's economic-diplomatic initiative.
As a result of the tensions that followed this diplomatic move, on November 24, 2021, a group called "Malaita for Democracy" started some protests that quickly escalated into looting, going so far as to burn down buildings near Parliament.
Australian security forces, in compliance with an existing bilateral treaty, intervened to disperse the protesters.
The 2022 security agreement
Despite Western pressures to the contrary, crowning this work, in 2022, the People's Republic announced that it had entered into a security pact with the Solomon Islands.
China's navy may use Solomon Islands ports, and Chinese security forces may patrol its streets, realistically to support the government backing Chinese operations on the island.
The agreement between Solomon Islands and China does not sanction the immediate construction of a military base but offers the option of housing military and police forces to protect Chinese interests.
Beijing said the pact does not target third parties and proceeds in parallel with the Solomon Islands' existing bilateral and multilateral security cooperation.
The U.S. administration and its regional allies responded with the visit of secretary of state Blinken February 2022.
Blinken was accompanied by a delegation of U.S. officials headed by the Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs and the coordinator of the National Indo-Pacific Security Council, to Fiji, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
The mission can be considered a corollary of the Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan as part of a strategic web aimed at countering Chinese attempts.
The geopolitical implications of the China-Solomon Islands agreement.
Direct U.S. intervention is a quantum leap unheard of in the last three decades, because with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States had effectively outsourced regional policy to Australia, responsible for keeping potential adversaries out of the South Pacific quadrant. As evidence of this, the U.S. embassy in the Solomon Islands was closed in 1993.
La Chinese presence on the island ramifies into relationships with the political and business elite of the country, while a section of the population protested violently, destroying much of the Chinatown in the capital city of Honiara, because growing Chinese economic influence, while bringing new resources, has destabilized small-scale trade, agriculture and traditional activities in the hands of the island's natives.
As in other Chinese projects included in the One-Belt One-Road, on the one hand the Chinese have positioned themselves as the important partner in the area And have become more influential offering necessary infrastructure, financial resources and jobs in a neglected economy.
On the other hand, in these arrangements often exclusive use of resources such as mineral deposits and farmland is planned that transfer wealth without redistributing it (certainly not a peculiarity of Chinese investments alone though). These lands, once ceded, can be used for economic projects but also for military purposes.
The Great Pacific Chessboard
The 2017 Chinese investment and the 2022 Solomon Islands-China agreement are part of a larger geostrategic design aimed at countering U.S. dominance in the Pacific and disentangling itself from the "island chains" strategy, limiting the range of China's military fleet.
The Solomon Islands were the subject of contention during World War II because of their location: they are placed astride two strategic terminals, 1700 km from naval bases on the Australian coast and about 3000 km from Guam, pivot of the "second island chain" against the Chinese fleet.
By gaining access to the port of Honiara, the Chinese could use the island nation as a refueling and logistical support point for air-sea operations in the area, allowing them to Monitor the activity of the Seventh Fleet American in the entire South Pacific.
Effectively, the presence of a military base in the Solomons could monitor the passage of all U.S. and Australian shipping in the strategic triangle between New Guinea, Guam and the Philippines, which would be crucial in an intervention in Taiwan.
The repercussions on Taiwan
The presence allows China to counterbalance the almost exclusive Austro-American control of the region, as the Solomon Islands provide access to deepwater ports, expanded with the previous 2017 investment that is expected to be completed during 2023.
In the context of a contest over Taiwan, control of Solomon Islands could give the People's Liberation Army access to strategic and tactical information on Taiwan through electronic surveillance tools.
Taiwanese officials themselves, have called for increased security measures and strengthened relations with other Pacific nations. Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen urged the international community to take a greater interest in the South Pacific to avoid Chinese hegemony over the region and Open another front in the Taiwan crisis.
In response to Chinese maneuvers, the Americans and regional allies, Primarily the ancient Japanese enemy that is heavily rearming itself, are making their moves: in January 2023, the U.S. Marines announced the reopening of a base for amphibious operations in Guam.
Curiously, these are the same wards that had landed on Guadalcanal almost a century ago now....
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