BETWEEN THE DRAGON AND THE DEEP BLUE : THEMATIC HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES ON A POTENTIAL ECONOMIC OF CHINA BY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

By Lachlan MacFie

A thesis in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy

School of Humanities and Social Sciences UNSW Canberra

August 2016

Thank you to:

Dr. John Reeve & RADM James Goldrick for their knowledge, insights and assistance, Imogen for being the perfect distraction, & Kerrie for her love, support and everything else.x

2 Abstract

The thesis employs a thematic approach and comparative historical analysis to assess the strategic efficacy of a potential maritime blockade of the People’s Republic of China by the United States of America and its allies, with reference to associated operational issues. It thus follows broadly the methodology of and, more recently, of such writers as Colin Gray and Geoffrey Till, in terms of using historical case studies to illuminate contemporary maritime strategic issues. After establishing the precise definition of a blockade, the thesis analyses key thematic elements in the history of economic blockade that may relate to the China case. These include issues influencing a state’s comparative vulnerability to economic blockade, such as international law, financial and economic factors, and political and moral considerations. It then discusses the role of economic blockade in wider strategy and the issue of strategic effectiveness, and these themes are subsequently applied in succession to the US-China scenario. The thesis utilizes a variety of historical and contemporary primary sources. The former include letters, personal papers, articles, memoirs, reports and diaries, some of which are available in the documentary resources published by the British Navy Records Society. The latter include statistical and analytical reports by governments and non-governmental organizations, data pertaining to international maritime transport, media articles and various other online sources. A broad cross-section of secondary sources has also been utilized, from the works of the classical maritime-strategic historians Alfred Thayer Mahan and Julian Corbett to standard texts and studies by modern naval-maritime scholars such as Paul Kennedy, Bruce Elleman, Sarah Paine, and legal scholars including Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg. More recent studies employed include those of Nicholas Lambert, Stephen Cobb, and Lance E. Davis and Stanley L. Engerman. The thesis concludes that a US economic blockade of China could be strategically effective, albeit in an indirect manner, but that legal and political considerations in particular would probably limit the scope within which this belligerent right could be exercised.

3 Table of Contents ABSTRACT ...... 3 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS & ACRONYMS ...... 5 INTRODUCTION ...... 7 DEFINING BLOCKADE ...... 12 FLEET : CLOSE, CLOSED, OPEN & DISTANT ...... 15 ECONOMIC BLOCKADE, GUERRE DE COURSE & ...... 18 EXCLUSION ZONES, SANCTIONS & OTHER NON-BLOCKADES ...... 25 ECONOMIC BLOCKADES IN HISTORY: THEMES AND VARIATIONS ...... 31 ASSESSING VULNERABILITY TO ECONOMIC BLOCKADE: ...... 31 THE ROLE OF ECONOMIC BLOCKADE IN A WIDER STRATEGY & THE QUESTION OF STRATEGIC EFFECTIVENESS ...... 58 ON INTERNATIONAL LAW & ECONOMIC BLOCKADE ...... 68 THEMATIC CONCLUSIONS ...... 77 A US ECONOMIC BLOCKADE OF CHINA? ...... 80 CHINA’S COMPARATIVE VULNERABILITY TO ECONOMIC BLOCKADE ...... 80 THE ROLE OF ECONOMIC BLOCKADE IN THE US’ WIDER STRATEGY & THE QUESTION OF STRATEGIC EFFECTIVENESS ...... 105 LEGAL IMPERATIVES FOR THE US ...... 114 APPLYING HISTORICAL THEMES TO THE US-CHINA CASE: A SUMMARY ...... 119 CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS: TO BLOCKADE OR NOT TO BLOCKADE? ...... 121 BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 126 PRIMARY SOURCES: ...... 126 SECONDARY SOURCES: ...... 134

4 List of Abbreviations & Acronyms A2/AD Anti-Access/Area Denial AIIB Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank ASB Air-Sea ASBM Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile ASM Anti-Ship Missile ASW Anti- Warfare BM Ballistic Missile C2 Command and Control CPC Communist Party of China CRS Congressional Research Service CSBA Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments DPRK Democratic People’s Republic of Korea EEZ Exclusive Economic Zone EIA Energy Information Administration (USA) EU European Union IPR International Property Rights International Security and Assistance Force ISAF (Afghanistan) Joint Concept for Access and Maneuver in the Global JAM-GC Commons JIT Just-in-time JOAC Joint Operational Access Concept NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organisation NGO Non-Governmental Organisation NSA National Security Authority NSR Northern Sea Route (Arctic Ocean) Organisation for Economic Cooperation and OECD Development PLA People's Liberation Army PLA-N People's Liberation Army- Navy PRC Peoples Republic of China

5 RAF Royal Air Force REE Rare Earth Elements RMA Revolution(s) in Military Affairs RN ROK Republic of Korea RUSI Royal United Services Institute SLOC Sea Lines of Communication SSBN Ballistic Missile Submarine (Nuclear) SSN Attack Submarine (Nuclear) UK UN United Nations UNCLOS United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea UNGA United Nations General Assembly UNSC United Nations Security Council US United States (of America) USAF United States Air Force USCG United States Coast Guard USMC United States Marine Corps USN United States Navy USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ULCC Ultra Large Crude Carrier UUV Unmanned Underwater Vehicle VLCC Very Large Crude Carrier

6 Introduction Relations between the United States of America (US) and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are perhaps the most significant strategic issue of the early twenty-first century. Due to the continuing tension between these two states, the subject of potential is never far from the lips, pens or keyboards of a variety of observers and interested parties. From the US perspective, it has been suggested that an economic blockade of China could be an efficacious strategy in the event of a conflict.1 China, the Second-come-First-World power that is set to overtake the US as the world’s largest economy, would surely be vulnerable to such economic disruption- and the US is incidentally best placed to undertake it via its extensive maritime power. This is far from a simple matter, with significant strategic implications, some arising out of the increasingly integrated global economy, while others stem from the not inconsiderable legal issues. Historically, blockade has been one of the oldest and most commonly employed naval strategies, and its close relative, the city-, has been an element of history since humans could build walls- which is what the sea equates to in a blockade. Despite the significance of blockading such an immense continental power as modern China, it has received scant attention in a historical context. This can be explained in part by much of the writing on this subject being undertaken by people and organisations that are very much ‘in the moment’. They may not have the time or inclination for depth and detail (journalists, for example) or may be focused on one or a few specific factors (think-tanks may fit into this category).2 Strategic analysts moreover perhaps have a tendency not to think historically.3 A comparative historical analysis of the potential efficacy of a US economic blockade of China is therefore wanting. This historical thesis seeks to go some way towards filling that gap by utilising the contemporary issue as a point of reference for a thematic historical investigation, which is in turn intended to shed light on that issue. Its methodological inspiration here is of long standing. The application of historical study to modern maritime-strategic issues is a well-established practice, both in early writing on the subject (Alfred Thayer Mahan, Julian Corbett) and in the work of more recent scholars such as Geoffrey Till and Colin Gray. Following the introductory section, this thesis will commence with a discussion of what constitutes a blockade and what does not, using historical examples, and of the various forms that an attack on maritime trade has taken. This will be followed by an historical analysis of key themes pertaining to economic

1 For example: Thomas X Hammes, 'Offshore Control: A Proposed Strategy for An Unlikely Conflict', Strategic Forum, National Defence University, 2012 http://purl.fdlp.gov/GPO/gpo37897; Sean Mirski, 2 For example, respectively: Anton Marsadov, ‘China Circumvents the US Naval Blockade’, MBW News, 27 March 2016, http://margotbworldnews.com/2016/Apr/Apr1/PeoplesArmy.html (accessed 27 August 2016); Van Tol et al, AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2010. 3 {Mirski 2013}

7 blockade, with a focus on those most relevant to the US-China scenario. These themes include the different ways in which a state’s vulnerability to economic blockade can be manifested: geographically, economically, politically, and in terms of operational and to an extent tactical issues, and the criticality of intelligence. The role of economic blockade in a wider strategy will then be assessed, with attention given to the issues of measuring effectiveness and escalation, which will be followed by a discussion of relevant issues in international law. These themes will subsequently each be applied to a potential US economic blockade of China as a means of gaining historical insights into the contemporary issue. The thesis will conclude that an economic blockade of China by the US could be efficacious but only in certain politico-strategic contexts. The chronological scope of the thesis is generally from the advent of commercial blockade in the seventeenth century to the present day.

Scenarios and triggers for war It is widely held that the likelihood of conflict between China and the US is low. Current trends suggest that in the short to medium-term there will be a tendency towards confrontation between China and other regional powers but, paradoxically, away from conflict. This can perhaps be expected to continue as long the protagonists feel that there is little to be gained by conflict, and even less by the sort of ‘total’ that occurred in the twentieth century. Displays of strength at sea have however been common, particularly by China- as evidenced by its recent activities in the South China Sea- but also by the US. Further, the speed with which it responded to the tsunami that struck South East Asia on 26 December 2004, although occurring in the context of a humanitarian mission, highlighted the USN’s ability to take distant control of China’s SLOCs at short notice.4 Current tensions in the South and East China indicate that acts of limited naval force are set to continue.5 The potential provocations or catalysts for the US to declare an economic blockade of China are varied: a Chinese attempt at forced reunification with Taiwan is one possibility, as is an inadvertent escalation of a territorial dispute between China and a US ally, such as Japan or the Philippines. Although several steps may lie between such a confrontation and a US declaration of an economic blockade, there is a presumption for the purposes of this thesis that the incident does escalate, for whatever reason, and that attempts to defuse the situation peacefully fail.

4 Bruce A Elleman, 'Waves of Hope: The US Navy's Response to the Tsunami in Northern Indonesia', Newport Papers, 28, (2007), passim. 5 Limited naval force was coined by James Cable as a more descriptive and nuanced term for Gunboat . James Cable, Gunboat Diplomacy: Political Applications of Limited Naval Force, 1st: Chatto and Windus for the Institute for Strategic Studies, London, 1971.

8 The nature of blockade An economic blockade is a means of attacking an enemy’s trade, and as we shall see, a form of economic warfare. It is therefore both a specific measure in itself (particularly in legal terms), while also being an indication of the kind of warfare the blockader wishes to espouse. Therefore while it will be acknowledged early in this thesis that many measures that may appear similar to blockade do not in fact constitute it, an important element of any blockade-like action or strategy is the intention of the belligerent undertaking it. The conceptual scope of this thesis thus includes, in addition to examples of economic blockade, instances of guerre de course, a belligerent activity that since the banning of privateering in 1856 has essentially been the province of legitimate naval forces.6 This step alone in some senses brings it closer to economic blockade in terms of the means of undertaking it, but some instances of guerre de course may be considered in a sense hybrids of the two forms of attack on maritime trade, or comparable for other reasons. As we shall see, guerre de course operations, such as those of US and German in Two, can take on certain blockade-like aspects; hence scholars including Clay Blair, who has written extensively on these campaigns, refers to the Third Reich’s U-Boat campaign as a blockade.7 Further, both economic blockade and guerre de course are functions of economic warfare in the maritime domain. Like economic warfare itself they are both, in J.C. Wylie’s terminology, cumulative strategies, in terms of their gradual advance towards the ultimate goal.8 This may be to force a policy change (coercion), regime change or the collapse of the enemy state in toto. The means may be economic pressure, causing hardships to civilian population (explicitly illegal in international law), military diversion or barring the passage of critical military or civilian logistics. Importantly, in Wylie’s terms, is itself essentially cumulative, as the sinking of vessels- and in the case of economic blockade the capturing of merchantmen- is an incremental process that builds towards an end result. Two opposing such cumulative strategies, as in a naval-maritime conflict, tend

6 Bruce A Elleman and S C M Paine (ed.), : Historical Case Studies, 1755-2009, vol. 40, Naval Institute Press, Newport, 2013, p. 278. Privateering became equated with piracy as a result of the 1856 Paris Declaration. ‘Declaration Respecting Maritime Law’ (1856 Paris Declaration) in: Adam Roberts and Richard Guelff, Documents on the Laws of War, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000, p. 49. 7 Clay Blair, Hitler's U-boat War: The Hunters, 1939-1942. Vol. 1, Kindle: Cassell Military, London, 2000, locn. 434; see also: Stanley L Engerman and Lance E Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War: An Economic History Since 1750, Kindle: Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2006, passim. While many early submarines, including U-Boats, were technically submersibles rather than genuine submarines, the latter (more common) term will be used throughout this thesis in the interest of clarity. 8 Lukas Milevski, 'Revisiting J.C. Wylie's Dichotomy of Strategy: The Effects of Sequential and Cumulative Patterns of Operations', Revisiting J.C. Wylie's Dichotomy of Strategy, 35: 2, (2012), 223- 242, p. 237.

9 to impact non-military areas of the enemy state, such as economic activity.9 This suggests that a war between China and the US, which would presumably be largely of a naval-maritime nature, would impact the economies of both states, irrespective of the employment of an economic blockade by the latter. The potential illegality of a quasi-blockade- although perhaps impacting its legitimacy in diplomatic terms- cannot therefore dismiss it entirely from our consideration, either as a comparable historical precedent or potential future strategy. As we shall see, as a conflict escalates, the less international law tends to play a role- and the blockade or quasi-blockade at issue will continue (as the World War ‘blockades’ suggest). This historical trend would almost certainly be repeated in general war between China and the US. This thesis must therefore strike a balance in acknowledging contradictions between international law and potential quasi- blockades, while focusing on a possible legitimate US economic blockade strategy against China.

Parameters, sources and terminology This thesis addresses the strategic dimension of blockade, both historical and contemporary. The grand strategic question of why the US should undertake a conflict with China, while not unrelated, is not directly the focus of this thesis. Operational challenges regarding how to interdict China’s immense and diverse maritime commerce highlight the need for strategic goals to be operationally (and tactically) feasible. For a comparative and thematic analysis such as this however, a focus on tactical aspects can be problematic, as era-specific issues tend to dominate. Factors at the strategic level are in contrast often more enduring and historical study can thus be illuminating. The strategic level and dimension thus remains the intellectual center of gravity of the thesis, although reference is made to higher and lower levels of military activity where relevant. Inherent in this thesis is the assumption that the US would need the support of regional allies to conduct an economic blockade of China in a limited or general war. As such the term ‘the US’, will, where appropriate, be used to refer to a US-led coalition (in the interests of brevity and clarity); the United States is, after all, the key protagonist regarding China. The scope of the US-China conflict in which an economic blockade is here discussed is of limited or general war. This does not however exclude or diminish the value of cases from contexts in terms of comparative historical analysis. As a counterpoint to economic blockade, the thesis will, where appropriate, include discussions of more assertive US action in a comparable vein to Air-Sea Battle (ASB). A variety of primary sources have been utilised, including the letters, papers and memoirs of key historical figures, archival submarine patrol reports, and

9 Ibid. p. 241.

10 collections published by the Navy Records Society. While the majority of these are from the time of the events in question, others were compiled in the immediate aftermath of major historical events, such the US’ World War Two Strategic Bombing Survey. A range of contemporary sources has also been employed to elucidate issues around China’s potential vulnerability to maritime blockade (and the US’ ability to engage in one). These include sources pertaining to maritime trade patterns and statistics, and documents pertaining to military and economic matters from Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and the Chinese, US and other governments (less from the relatively opaque CPC).10 Key secondary sources include the work of scholars such as Geoffrey Till, Bruce Elleman and Sarah Paine, and international law scholar Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg. Important recent works by Stephen Cobb, Nicholas Lambert, and Lance E. Davis and Stanley L. Engerman, among others, have also been consulted, as have recent non-historical studies of a possible US conflict with, and blockade of, China by Sean Mirski and the RAND Corporation. Recent scholarly practice often consists of using the term ‘naval blockade’ as an indicator of the means of the blockade, thus giving a more precise term than simply ‘blockade’. This is distinct from ‘fleet blockade’ as a reference to the objective of a blockade, that is, a naval fleet of the blockaded state. For the latter scenario this thesis will employ the term ‘fleet blockade’, while ‘naval blockade’ will maintain its common usage as above. ‘Military blockade’ is akin to fleet blockade but is associated with operations such as city . Economic blockade is likewise regarded as a naval-maritime measure targeting the blockadee’s economy, and is differentiated from economic warfare, of which it is a subset. The advent of economic blockade in place of commercial blockade is of historical interest for our purposes, and although commercial blockade is distinct from economic blockade in some respects, the latter term will be used when no distinction is necessary. Further, the term ‘naval-maritime’ can for our purposes be considered to include all elements or forces intended to impact the maritime domain, which today might include (EW) and land-based missile and air forces.

10 This thesis makes frequent use of ebooks such as Amazon’s Kindle. Please note that the pagination (or ‘location’ in some Kindle ebooks) change due to variables such as page/window size, orientation, font and the device being used (iPad, Laptop etc). The prefix ‘locn./locs’ for Kindle Locations is used where page numbers are not specified in the source; every effort to ensure consistency has been undertaken.

11 Defining Blockade While the right of a belligerent to prevent contraband from entering an opponent’s territory during wartime has generally been a matter of long-standing historical agreement, the concept of blockade emerged later, and has proven to be more contentious. Historical precursors to economic blockade included various forms of guerre de course and privateering, particularly by England against Dutch trade. Similarly, the earliest economic blockades and their antecedents by Holland involved the ruthless interception of neutral merchant vessels and their cargoes.11 Fleet and military blockades have been a feature of naval warfare from at least as early as the classical period, as evidenced by the siege of Syracuse (214-212 BC). Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, placing an emphasis on the interdiction of SLOCs rather than just the investment of ports, suggests that the first fleet blockade might have taken place in the sixteenth century, by the Dutch against Spanish-occupied Flemish ports.12 As such blockades were initially adjuncts of- and were later considered analogous to- city sieges, they functioned at the operational, rather than strategic, level.13 They were therefore essentially military operations, although the interdiction of food highlighted the fact that fundamental necessities of life could also be considered contraband. Edward Roscoe observed that, for such a formalised strategy as blockade to be operationally viable, needed to be of sufficient size to remain at sea for an effective period of time.14 Wade G. Dudley goes further, arguing that longer-term blockades (greater than a few months) were not possible until key advances in shipboard medicine and hygiene, and technologies such as copper-bottomed hulls appeared in the late 1700s.15 Britain’s adoption of copper ‘sheathing’ significantly increased the amount of time a vessel could operate between refits and repairs in-

11 Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', International Law Studies, 74: International law across the spectrum of conflict: 8, (2000), https://www.usnwc.edu/Research---Gaming/International- Law/New-International-Law-Studies-(Blue-Book)-Series/International-Law-Blue-Book- Articles.aspx?Volume=75. 203-230, p. 205. 12 Ibid. p. 205. 13 H W Malkin, 'Blockade in Modern Conditions', British Yearbook of International Law, 3, (1922), 87- 98, p. 96; Edward Stanley Roscoe, 'The Evolution of Commercial Blockade', The North American Review, 205: 736, (1917), http://www.jstor.org/stable/25121485. 345-355, p. 346. 14 Ibid. p. 345. Kennedy notes the English advantage of having vessels in the Anglo-Dutch Wars- the size of Dutch vessels being limited by their local geography. The increase in size of European vessels generally in the post-medieval period showed greater endurance and reliability than previously but Kennedy makes no special reference to blockade. At the height of British maritime power, her ships were often smaller than those of her main competitors. Paul M Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, Penguin Books, London, 2001, pp. 50, 14, 126. Other sources indicate that increases in the size of British warships at times happened for problematic reasons such as a lack of standardisation in ship-construction, and that the resulting vessels were often not successful. British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, pp. 251-3, 479. 15 Wade G Dudley, 'The Flawed British Blockade, 1812-15,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Kindle: Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 905.

12 dock as well as the length of time that it could spend at sea.16 The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries saw significant improvements in shipboard health, following earlier disasters. The proportion of sailors ‘sent sick’, and the subsequent ratio of these who died from their illnesses were reduced over this period.17 Even after such advances, challenges in victualing blockade fleets adequately with necessities such as fresh vegetables, livestock, and beer (the latter being particularly prone to spoiling en route or in store) persisted.18 When ‘blockade’ emerged as a word with particular meaning, rather than a loose concept, is also of interest. The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary dates the term blockade from 1680 (from French origins), and cites 1693 as a key year in its emergence as a strategic approach to interdicting in- and out-bound maritime traffic from a coast or port.19 This period is well after the generally cited references to early blockading during the Anglo-Dutch wars. British Naval Documents 1280-1960 observes however that the period from 1648 (the Peace of Westphalia) to 1714 (the end of the War of Spanish Succession) was one in which the idea of using naval power for engaging in blockades figured highly in English/British considerations.20 As an example of this approach, Britain used its naval power to press for the cessation of Genovese corn shipments to during the War of Spanish succession.21 As might be expected of a strategy with such historical depth, economic blockade has thus undergone considerable evolution in terms of theory and practice. Some of its principles have remained consistent in strategic terms. In a broadly accepted characterisation, the US manual on the law of naval warfare defines a blockade as

“a belligerent operation to prevent vessels and/or aircraft of all nations, enemy as well as neutral, from entering or exiting specified ports, airfields, or coastal areas belonging to, occupied by, or under the control of an enemy nation.”22

16 ‘The effects of copper sheathing, 1783’: The Navy Board to Philip Stephens, Secretary of the Admiralty, 5 November 1783, in: British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, pp. 500-2. 17 ‘The health of seamen, 1779-1813’: Sir Gilbert Blaine’s statistics of sickness and death, 1779-1883, in: Ibid. p. 557. 18 ‘Victualing: fresh food to support blockade, 1759: Admiralty Order to the Victualing Commissioners, 2 August 1759’, in: Ibid. p. 442; 251. ‘Victualing: difficulties supplying the fleet off Brest, 1759: Captain Robert Pett, Victualing Commissioner, to the Victualing Commissioners, Plymouth, 10 August 1759’, in: Ibid. pp. 442-3. Note, these Blockades were relatively close to home ports; subsequent operations such as Howe’s blockade during the American War of Independence did not have this luxury, particular in terms of refitting vessels. 19 C T Onions, comp. Willliam Little, H W Fowler and J Couldson, The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (on Historical Principles), vol. I, Third: The Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1969, p. 191. 20 British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, p. 194. 21 126. ‘Diplomacy and blockade of trade’, Lord Sunderland, Secretary of State, to John Chetwynd, envoy to Savoy, 29 November 1709, in: Ibid. pp. 211-2. 22 US Naval War College (International Law Dept), ‘The Commander’s handbook on the law of naval operations NWP 1-14M’, US Navy, US Marine Corps, US Coast Guard, Newport: Republished by: Department of The Navy Office of The Chief of Naval Operations, 2007,

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Critically therefore, a naval blockade is an act of war. But beyond this general definition there has historically been considerable variation, evolution and abrogation; in this sense blockade is not, and has never been, a static concept. In the post-World War Two era in particular, political sensitivities influenced the tone of discourse around international armed conflict. Much of this relates to the increasing delegitimisation of unilateral force in settling international disputes. It can also be traced to the long history of tension between “belligerent necessity [and] neutral convenience”.23 The importance of international and domestic public opinion, which are associated with the purported rights of neutral states, has varied over time, as has the latter’s ability to influence belligerents’ actions. Today, the potential public outcry over an ostensibly injudicious act on the world stage is not something to be dismissed lightly; no state is overstocked with political and economic capital. As a consequence, more benign terms such as ‘sanctions’ and ‘exclusion zones’ entered the lexicon in the latter part of the twentieth century; ‘blockade’ is today used infrequently.24 Although not affecting blockade-law, matters of terminology and the plethora of blockade-like measures historically employed by states at sea have muddied the waters on this subject. Rather than necessarily reflecting the increasing use of diplomatic language discussed above, this also relates to the ambiguous use of the term ‘blockade’ more broadly. Corbett observed that the term blockade has historically been applied to operations that varied “widely in character and strategical intention.”25 Modern Australian Maritime Doctrine states similarly:

Blockade is an act of war and the right to establish it is granted under the traditional laws of war. This war requires, inter alia, that the blockade must be effective, that it is to be declared by the belligerent so that all interested parties know of its existence and that it is confined to ports or coasts occupied by the enemy. The expression is also used more broadly to mean a combat operation carried out to prevent access to, or departure from the coast or waters of a hostile state [emphasis added].26

http://www.jag.navy.mil/documents/NWP_1-14M_Commanders_Handbook.pdf, Retrieved: January 12, 2016. para. 7.7.1. This source will hereafter be referred to as the US Manual. 23 Roscoe, 'The Evolution of Commercial Blockade’, p. 351. 24 Geoffrey Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century, Kindle: Routledge, New York, 2013, locn. 5309. 25 Julian Stafford Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, iBook: Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1911, p. 320. 26 Australian Maritime Doctrine, Royal Australian Navy, Sea Power Centre, Canberra, 2010, p. 185.

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Thus, ‘blockade’ is frequently used to describe belligerent actions that, while analogous to blockade in a limited strategic and in operational sense, are not equivalent to the legal right of blockade in war. 27 One of the most critical distinctions between blockades and other measures pertains to the right to interdict exports:

Whereas the law of contraband regulates the extent to which a belligerent can prevent an enemy from receiving goods useful in the conduct of war, the law of blockade deals with the belligerent right — and limits thereto — to prevent the vessels (and aircraft) of all states from entering and leaving either the whole or a part of an enemy's coast.28

Thus, only a blockade grants a belligerent the legal right to intercept the exports of the blockaded state.29 We will now address some of the specific forms in which blockades and (and non-blockades) have taken.

Fleet blockades: Close, Closed, Open & Distant While the term blockade has often been used to refer to non-blockade measures, various forms of blockade or non-blockade have also fallen by the wayside in terms of our strategic lexicon. Lord Nelson’s watch on the French fleet at Toulon in 1804 early in the had an effect similar to a fleet blockade (such as those concurrently underway at Brest, Rochefort and Ferrol), in that the French were unsurprisingly loathe to put to sea on inferior tactical terms. But as Nelson himself wrote in a letter to the Lord Mayor of London on August 1st, after the latter had congratulated him on the effectiveness of his ‘blockade’ of Toulon:

I beg to inform your Lordship that the Port of Toulon has never been blockaded by me: quite the reverse- every opportunity has been

27 Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, 'Blockade', The Max Planck Encyclopaedia of Public International Law,2009 http://opil.ouplaw.com/view/10.1093/law:epil/9780199231690/law-9780199231690- e252?rskey=J31Jco&result=3&prd=EPIL, p. 2, para 4. ‘Blockade’ is also occasionally not used when the action does meet the legal perquisites of a blockade, such as the US blockade of Haiphong Harbour using mines during the Vietnam War. Of course, ‘blockade’ is of course no more immune to misuse- or indeed linguistic evolution- than any other word in the English language. 28 Robert W Tucker, The and Neutrality at Sea, International Law Studies XLX US Naval War College, Newport, 1955, p. 283. 29 Malkin, 'Blockade in Modern Conditions', p. 88; Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 213.

15 offered the Enemy to put to sea, for it is there that we hope to realize the hopes and expectations of our Country.30

This misapplication of the term ‘blockade’ by an individual holding a significant public office during the classic phase of British maritime power could be an indication that misapprehensions regarding what constitutes a blockade are not a modern phenomenon.31 There were advantages to Nelson’s approach compared to a genuine blockade: bringing the enemy fleet to battle held the promise of subsequent strategic success, and was in some respects less onerous to vessels and their crews. The fleet blockades of France’s Atlantic and Channel ports in the early nineteenth century were referred to as ‘close’ blockades, as relatively close proximity to the blockaded port was essential to intercept ‘blockade-runners’. These blockades were multi-faceted:

Using the term ‘‘ blockade ” loosely, as the nearest single word to comprise any close watch over the entrance to an enemy’s port, with a view to impede egress or ingress, such blockades are of a twofold character- and defensive. The first is directed against both egress and ingress, but more especially against ingress, being meant to prevent the entrance of needed supplies, and being therefore essentially a blow at communications. The second also has a twofold aim, but its chief object is to prevent egress unmolested, because such freedom of issue to an enemy means danger, more or less great, to certain national interests... Such a blockade is, therefore, essentially defensive.32

British close offensive fleet blockades of French ports often resulted in the interdiction of inbound victuals and naval stores and thus impacted the fighting condition of French vessels. Evidence from the blockade of Brest indicates that various French vessels sighted during the latter stages of the blockade were “very ill equipped” and “not at all in good order [with] the sailors badly clothed”.33

30 Horatio Nelson, The Dispatches and Letters of Vice Lord Viscount Nelson, with Notes, vol. 6, Colburn, London, 1846, p. 125. 31 ‘Letter To Sir Alexander John Ball, Bart’, Malta, HMS Victory, off Toulon, August 12th, 1803, in: Horatio Nelson, comp. Nicholas Harris Nicolas, The Dispatches and Letters of Vice Admiral Lord Viscount Nelson, with Notes, vol. 5, Colburn, 1846, p. 162. As Nelson noted again in August 1803, “nothing ever kept the French Fleet in at Toulon or Brest, whenever they had a mind to come to sea.” Mahan, 'Blockade in Relation to ', Royal United Services Institution Journal, 39: 213, (1895), 1057-1069, pp. 1060-1. 32 Ibid. p. 1067. 33 ‘Cornwallis to Admiralty: Ville de Paris, off Ushant, 27 July 1801’; ‘Lieutenant Pilford to Pellew: Impetueux, 6 April 1801.’, in: Roger Morriss, comp. Richard C Saxby, The Channel Fleet and the

16 Despite Nelson’s disclaimer regarding his fleet’s watch on the French squadron at Toulon, scholars including Sir Julian Corbett and Stephen Roskill have characterised such activities as ‘open’ blockades. Till meanwhile equates the latter with distant blockade. Although not codified as such, distant blockades are now regarded as a necessary adaption of blockade-law, due to the increasing effectiveness of shore-based and littoral systems from the early 1900s.34 This development was manifested in World War One by the threat of submarines, torpedo boats and mines, which forced the Grand Fleet’s blockade of Germany to be undertaken in the North Sea, away from the coasts of continental Europe. Elements of the UN/US sanctions enforcement regime of Iraq from 1990-2003- a de facto economic blockade- are a rare example of close blockade in the twentieth century, due to the lack of such threats.35 Further, Elleman posits the concept of near versus far blockades, referring to the distance of the area of blockade operations from the blockaded coast, port or ports. Whether the geographic separation implied by a ‘far’ blockade would comply with international law is not clear, particularly as it might imply an invocation of the contentious doctrine of continuous voyage.36 Corbett’s differentiation between naval and commercial blockades included a crucial qualification: the latter had an “intimate relation” with open (distant) fleet blockade, in that the enemy would be compelled to attempt to break a commercial blockade or suffer the severe economic consequences. Both commercial economic and fleet blockades therefore provided the potential for the destruction of the enemy’s naval forces.37 In this way Britain’s economic blockade of Germany in World War One was enabled by the Grand Fleet’s concurrent distant blockade from Scapa Flow, which protected the vulnerable armed merchant cruisers from potential sorties by the High Seas Fleet.38 Corbett thus argued that a fleet blockade was a means of attaining , whereas commercial blockade was a means of exercising it.39 J. Widen has observed that this dichotomy has some limitations in the sense that, like the ‘chicken and egg’ paradox, command of the sea is both a precondition and a

Blockade of Brest, 1793-1801, Published by Ashgate for the Navy Records Society, Aldershot, 2001, pp. 638, 632. 34 Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century. locs. 5196-5210. 35 James Goldrick, 'Maritime Sanctions Enforcement Against Iraq: 1990-2003,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 4372. 36 Infra, p. 71; Bruce Elleman, 'A Comparative Historical Approach to Blockade Strategies: Implications for China,' in Gabriel B Collins, Andrew S Erickson, et al (ed.), China's Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing's Maritime Policies, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2008, locn. 8787; Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 214. 37 Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, pp. 214-5. This could also apply to economic blockades. 38 Paul Halpern, A Naval History of World War I, Kindle: US Naval Institute, Annapolis, 1994, p. 50. 39 Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, pp. 320-1.

17 consequence of blockade; even fleet blockades require relatively uncontested command of the sea.40 As C. J Colombos observed,

The maintenance of a blockade demands naval superiority on the seas on the seas on the part of a blockading power.41

It is important to remember here that Corbett’s Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, while a seminal theoretical work, was also a political document designed to advocate a new approach to naval warfare and strategy in the industrialised era. How applicable his theories would be in various situations- particularly outside his contemporary geostrategic context- is an open question.

Economic blockade, guerre de course & economic warfare An economic blockade involves the interdiction of a state’s maritime trade by a naval-maritime force in a manner that meets the usual legal requirements of blockade. It is differentiated from guerre de course (also known as commerce warfare) by the latter being an attack on a state’s maritime trade in a manner comparable to ashore. Further, both economic blockades and guerre de course are functions of economic warfare, which can be considered as “all the measures designed to weaken an enemy’s economy”.42 Economic warfare is an element of national or , which might include military and non-military components, but historically, economic blockade has been its most common manifestation.43 Economic blockades and fleet blockades are not necessarily mutually exclusive in operational terms; they may be undertaken concurrently, and enforced by the same warships, aircraft or other forces.44 Britain’s blockade of America in the , despite initial shortcomings, eventually confirmed the potential effectiveness of dual economic-fleet blockades. Davis and Engerman observe that in 1814

Not only had the blockade crushed domestic and international trade and imposed the costs and pain of war directly on the population, but it also gradually spelled the end of effective naval

40 Jerker Widén, Theorist of Maritime Strategy: Sir Julian Corbett and His Contribution to Military and Naval Thought, eBook: Ashgate Pub. Ltd, Burlington, 2012, p. 159. 41 C. John Colombos, International Law of the Sea, Longmans, Green & Co., London, 1967, p. 718. 42 Alan Kramer, 'Blockade and Economic Warfare,' in J M Winter, The Cambridge History of the First World War. Volume II, Volume II, 2014, http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CHO9780511675676 p. 462. 43 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War, locn 78. 44 The platforms suitable for one blockade-derivation may however not be so for the other.

18 operations. With most of its warships bottled up in port, the navy actually suffered its greatest losses on land rather than at sea.45

As a corollary, the last sentence of this excerpt also highlights a key point: in large- scale conflicts, blockade is one of several elements of a broader strategy. The destruction of US naval forces, and thus any hope the US might have had of countering the British blockade, could probably not have been achieved without the presence of a British army in North America. The strategic functions of economic and fleet blockades are therefore the essential point of difference.46 A fleet/strategic blockade may reside at what Corbett referred to as both major and minor level of strategy, or at the operational level as a peripheral operation to support an amphibious assault or other campaign. Oppenheim’s International Law vol. II delineates the distinction between ‘strategic’ (fleet) and commercial (economic) blockades thus:

A blockade is termed strategic if it forms part of other military operations directed against the coast which is blockaded, or if it be declared in order to cut off supplies from enemy forces on shore. In contradistinction to strategic blockade, one speaks of commercial blockade when it is declared simply in order to cut off the coast from intercourse with the outside world, and no military operations take place on shore [original emphasis].47

These definitions require some qualification for the present context; as Heinegg has observed, in the modern era even purely economic blockades have a ‘strategic’ aspect to them in terms of their ulterior objective.48 Moreover, in the context of an economic blockade, even were some peripheral operations to take place, such as suppressing the blockadee’s counter-blockade forces or destroying strategic reserves of contraband, the nature of the blockade would remain essentially economic. In the interests of clarity, this thesis will equate fleet blockades with Oppenheim’s strategic blockades, while noting that there are other contexts in which this may not be appropriate. As a counterpoint to the notion that economic and fleet blockade are distinct from each other, Australian Maritime Doctrine’s description of a naval

45 Ibid. locn. 1788. 46 Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century. locn. 5971. Till does not explicitly refer to the arguments behind Heinegg’s above observation. 47 L Oppenheim, H Lauterpacht (ed.), Oppenheim’s International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, vol. 2, 7th: Longmans, London, 1952, pp. 769-70. 48 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 204; Heinegg, 'Blockade’, A. “Definition and Distinction from Other Concepts”, para. 1.

19 blockade’s primary objective focuses on economic impacts. It states that a blockade is

An operation intended to disrupt the enemy’s economy by preventing ships of all areas from entering or leaving specified coastal areas under the occupation and control of the enemy [emphasis added]. 49

Despite the nuances of the interconnectedness of economic and fleet blockades (argued by Corbett), it is hard to regard this as referring to anything other than an overt economic blockade. The distinction between commercial and economic blockades relates to historical developments in international trade and finance. During the pre-industrial mercantile era, the essence of a commercial blockade strategy was:

Money, credit, is the life of war; lessen it, and vigor flags; destroy it, and resistance dies.50

Commercial blockades were associated with mercantilism- a zero-sum approach to international trade variously prevalent in seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth century Europe. Such blockades were as much for the purposes of supporting one’s own trade as weakening that of an enemy. A defeated blockadee in this period was rarely conquered as a result, and could often regain its military and economic strength relatively quickly in historical terms. Trade wars, such as the Anglo-Dutch Wars, might impact the prosperity of the loser but not its existence. In the industrial era the commercial blockade evolved into the economic blockade, which, while similar, had a more fundamental goal. Economic blockades, most notably those of the World Wars, involved direct physical attacks on imports of raw materials and food, designed to cripple the opponent state.51 The overthrow of governments and reconstitution of their administrative apparatus was the implied- and variously gained- objective.52 As Robert W. Tucker argued, there was now an “intense desire to cut off the whole of an enemy's sea-borne trade”, which worked

49 Australian Maritime Doctrine, p. 185. Considering that the Royal Australian Navy is too small to effectively blockade any but he smallest state unilaterally- which would certainly damage a small states’ economy- and Australia’s geographic position relative to key SLOCs, it is perhaps unsurprising that economic blockade (or economic effects of blockade) are central to its maritime doctrine. 50 Captain A T Mahan, Sea Power and Its Relations to the War of 1812, Sampson Low, Marston & Co., London, 1905, p. 285. 51 In legal terms these were ‘quasi-economic blockades’, 52 Economic and commercial blockades’ continuing similarities included operational issues, diplomacy and the importance of geography.

20 in tandem with “the changes that have occurred in the means for conducting naval hostilities”.53 As functions of economic warfare that seek to weaken the enemy’s resistance through an attack on his maritime trade, economic blockades naturally retain a connection to their precursor, guerre de course. Guerre de course was initially, like the trade it preyed on, a sporadic affair. A coherent interdiction strategy implied equally coherent international trade, in addition to suitable vessels to undertake it. The advent of commercial, and later economic, blockades came after an increase of international commerce from about the seventeenth century, and the associated expansion of maritime trade.54 Highlighting the close relationship between guerre de course and commercial blockade, Mahan argued that the latter was “so distinctly commerce-destructive in essence, that those who censure one form must logically proceed to denounce the other.”55 Commercial/economic blockade and guerre de course overlapped, particularly as the former emerged during the First Anglo Dutch War, and this has continued in various other conflicts.56 Mahan did note that such blockades and guerre de course differ significantly in terms of scope, particularly as the latter primarily targeted belligerent merchant vessels, whereas commercial/economic blockade permitted the interdiction of neutral commerce. 57 As a consequence they are not analogous from an operational perspective, or in terms of international law. More recently, Steven Haines has characterised modern blockade as “a pattern of guerre de course”- a proposition refuted by Heinegg.58 Both Haines and Mahan may therefore be making too much of these similarities. A further argument against Haines’ contention could be that the strategic contexts in which economic blockade and guerre de course might each be employed (that is, in terms of the balance of naval forces) are typically diametrically opposed. That is to say that, in Corbettian terms, a state which engages in guerre de course does so because it is incapable of mounting a genuine economic blockade (or other significant maritime operation). Both guerrilla warfare and guerre de course are associated with the strategy of a numerically weaker power in their respective

53 Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, p. 286. 54 Roscoe, 'The Evolution of Commercial Blockade', pp. 347-8. 55 Mahan, Sea Power and Its Relations to the War of 1812, p. 287. 56 Elleman & Paine, Commerce Raiding, passim. 57 Mahan, Sea Power and Its Relations to the War of 1812, p. 287. See also:A T Mahan, Henry Smith Pritchett and Julian Stafford, Sir Corbett, Some Neglected Aspects of War, Sampson Low, Marston & Company, Ltd, London, 1907, p. 174, where Mahan appears to overlook the legal distinctions between blockade and guerre de course. 58 Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, 'The Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare: A Fresh Look at the San Remo Manual', Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare, 36, (2006), www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/2581da3b-2f2c-4172-9a9f-0e2a861a9624/Vol--82---The-Current- State-of-The-Law-of-Naval-Wa.aspx&usg=AFQjCNFgedWqCdEjqn8- QSz3tQ51JKPDCA&sig2=E1NULZGeF3QLzjOiXQjO_g&bvm=bv.113943665,d.cGc. p. 291 fn 40.

21 mediums (on land and sea). Guerre de course is thus commonly the strategy of continental powers with limited naval capabilities, confronted by a strong maritime power. As Mahan argued in Seapower in Relation to the War of 1812

[W]ar against commerce… is a species of hostilities easily extemporized by a great maritime nation; it therefore favors one whose policy is not to maintain a large naval establishment. It opens a field for a sea militia force, requiring little antecedent military training.59

Other historical examples of this scenario have included France in its various wars with Britain, the Confederacy during the US Civil War, and Germany in both World Wars. 60 In a comparable paradigm, Bruce Elleman and Sarah Paine argue that guerre de course will primarily be the tool of failed and pariah states in the modern era.61 Despite this traditional connection between weaker naval power and guerre de course, Elleman and Paine have also concluded that the latter has historically been most successful when undertaken by strong maritime powers- and when used in conjunction with blockade.62 So while guerre de course strategies potentially offer the wielder some economic utility of force, it is not clear that this has generally manifested in strategic success for continental powers undertaking it.63 The continuing modern relevance of guerre de course- and its connection with economic blockade- is therefore based, as Till argues, on their comparable functions as means of “strategic coercion”.64 The complex relationship between blockading and guerre de course is illustrated by the German U-Boat campaigns against Britain in both World Wars. German maritime strategy in this era involved a consistent element of guerre de course, manifesting in U-Boat, surface raider and merchant raider employment, following the discrediting of Tirpitz’s dreadnought strategy. U-Boat-guerre de course became Germany’s primary strategic at sea during World War Two, yet the increasingly structured nature of the campaign rendered it akin in some respects to a

59 Mahan, Sea Power and Its Relations to the War of 1812, pp. 286-8. 60 Guerre de course is in a sense therefore a form of in terms of the relative naval power of the belligerents. When used appropriately, economic blockade is itself a manifestation of asymmetric warfare, that is, simultaneously exploiting ones’ own strength and an enemy’s weakness. To adopt an asymmetric strategy is thus a matter of common strategic sense, rather than a modern phenomenon, as is sometimes implied in contemporary discourse (for example, regarding the rise of A2/AD). Alex Clarke, 87 - Falklands Series 7: Amphibious Panel (Interview with: CAPT Michael Clapp, MAJGEN Julian Thomson, RADM Jeremy Larken) (CIMSEC, July 27, 2015), cimsec.org. 61 Elleman & Paine, Commerce Raiding, p. 290. 62 Ibid. pp. 288-9. 63 Ibid. p. 1. 64 Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century, p. 214.

22 concerted, if flawed, economic blockade strategy. This occurred particularly at the operational level in the use of U-Boat wolf-packs.65 Moreover, the geographic focus of the Third Reich’s U-Boat campaign on the area in the mid-North Atlantic Ocean that was beyond the range of allied escorts endowed it with a further blockade-like quality.66 The hunters were not ranging along known SLOCs in search of prizes; rather they were coordinated in specific areas on the SLOCs based on intelligence and organized strategy. Similarly, the US submarine campaign against Japan in World War Two, although initially haphazard, became a targeted strategy systematically attacking Japan’s maritime transportation. The campaign’s ultimate coherence and above all its key role in the US’ broader maritime-amphibious strategy in the Pacific arguably precludes in-depth comparisons with ‘traditional’ guerre de course activities, and even with Germany’s unrestricted submarine warfare of 1917. As a corollary, neither Britain nor Germany invoked the belligerent right of blockade to justify their maritime interdiction strategies in the World Wars, albeit for different reasons. Instead, both sides relied on the more nebulous concept of reprisals.67 These, Tucker argued, were desirable to the belligerents because their vague legal basis allowed for greater freedom of action compared to blockade:

It is abundantly clear that these measures of reprisal were in- tended, in almost every instance, to achieve the purpose of blockade.68

Thus, even though blockade law was not comprehensive, it was nevertheless regarded as being too restrictive for modern total warfare. Further, the Admiralty in the lead up to World War One also considered economic blockade alone to be less efficacious than a wider economic warfare strategy in which a blockade would play an ancillary role. Economic warfare necessitates a whole of government approach, comprising of various military and non-military measures, the latter including financial pressure, embargoes and denial of credit and services (such as shipping) from state owned- or controlled companies and institutions. Adding confusion is the fact that many such measures are also a

65 This approach to guerre de course was somewhat reminiscent of that of French privateers and royal vessels in the War of the Spanish Succession, which operated in small groups able to outrun ships of the line but strong enough to overwhelm many convoy escorts. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, p. 84. ‘Royal vessels’ were owned and funded by the French crown. 66 This escort-free area was also not historically unique- see: Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, pp. 262-3. 67 L. F. E. Goldie, 'Maritime War Zones & Exclusion Zones', International Law Studies, 64 Law of Naval Operations, (1991), 156-204, p. 169. While the term ‘blockade’ was not used in official circles, at least initially, it was common “in everyday speech”. John D Grainger, The Maritime Blockade of Germany in the Great War: The Northern Patrol, 1914-1918, vol. 145, Ashgate Publishing, 2003, p. 4. 68 Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, pp. 285-6.

23 common element of modern non-belligerent sanctions regimes. But as the British Ministry of Economic Warfare stated prior to World War Two:

Economic warfare is a , comparable to the operations of the three Services in that its object is the defeat of the enemy, and complementary to them in that its function is to deprive the enemy of the material means of resistance. But, unlike the operations of the Armed Forces, its results are secured not only by direct attack upon the enemy but also by bringing pressure to bear upon those neutral countries from which the enemy draws his supplies. It must be distinguished from coercive measures appropriate for adoption in peace to settle international differences without recourse to war, e.g. sanctions, , economic reprisals, etc., since, unlike such measures, it has as its ultimate sanction the use of belligerent rights [emphasis added].69

The proposed British economic warfare measures against Imperial Germany are an example of economic warfare that has come to light relatively recently in historiographical terms. In the event, concerns regarding the response of neutral states and the (not unexpected) impacts on the British economy led to the majority of the measures being abandoned early in the war, although the economic blockade of Germany and its allies continued.70 This highlights the interdependence of economic warfare measures- including blockade- in terms of their cumulative effectiveness.71 Further, the World War One example can be differentiated from the economic warfare of the mercantilist era of Anglo-French hostilities, in which economic blockades were virtually synonymous with states’ politico-economic objectives. Historian E. F. Heckscher characterised this period as “an unbroken series of commercial blockades,” which largely continued via Napoleon’s Continental System and successive British Orders in Council.72 As mercantilism waned these ‘grand strategic economic blockades’ declined similarly. A war on trade, Tracy argued, was “no longer a technically necessary part of war strategy, required to

69 W N Medlicott, History of the Second World War: United Kingdom Civil Series. Vol. I, Economic Blockade, vol. 1, H.M.S.O. and Longmans, Green & Co., London, 1952, p. 17. 70 See: Nicholas A Lambert, Planning Armageddon: British Economic Warfare and the First World War, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2012. 71 Debate continues regarding the extent to which economic warfare was genuinely pursued by the British government. See: Ibid. and Stephen Cobb, Preparing for Blockade 1885-1914: Naval Contingency for Economic Warfare, Ashgate, Farnham, 2013, 72 Eli Filip Heckscher, The Continental System: An Economic Interpretation, Clarendon Press, London, 1922, p. 10. In this Heckscher (or Hecksher) referenced the arguments of German economic historian, Professor Schmoller.

24 ensure private investment in warships, and to stimulate recruitment.”73 The concept of grand-strategic economic warfare is probably consigned to the history of the mercantilist era. Britain’s World War One economic blockade also raises the notion of contraband, and questions how and when a blockader decides what materiel should be prohibited. What constitutes contraband is not a static concept in historical terms, and the interdiction of contraband does not itself constitute a blockade.74 Yet although the laws of contraband are not directly analogous to those of blockade, they remain relevant, particularly in terms of the rights of neutrals, and in the context of a selective or targeted blockade of key commodities or materiel. In Elleman’s terminology, a selective blockade is a form of partial blockade, which can be non-comprehensive, either through unavoidable practical issues like the amount of maritime traffic, or through selectively targeting a specific import or export.75 The enforcement of UN sanctions against Iraq was an example of a de facto selective blockade that focused on oil exports and the import of WMD materiel. Selective blockades are of interest in the context of this thesis given China’s dependence on oil and other energy imports (a debateable but critical issue as we shall see) and the sheer extent of maritime commercial traffic bound for China and its neighbours at any given time.76

Exclusion zones, sanctions & other non-blockades As we have seen, the terminology around blockades and blockade-like activities has varied as different practices come in and go out of fashion, and today, sanctions and similar terms that emphasise the non-military aspects of blockades are more common than ‘blockade’. Operations such as ‘exclusion zones’ that have supplanted blockades are distinct from them in key areas- particularly with regard to international law. W. J. Fenrick defines an exclusion zone thus:

An exclusion zone… is an area of water and superjacent air space in which a party to an armed conflict purports to exercise control and to which it denies access to ships and aircraft without permission. It thus interferes with the normal rights of passage and overflight of ships and aircraft of non-parties… Exclusion zones are different from the more traditional blockade zones because in blockade zones the primary risk is that of capture,

73 Nicholas Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 1991, p. 120. 74 Heinegg, 'Blockade’, Sect. A, para. 2. 75 Elleman, 'A comparative historical approach to blockade strategies: implications for China’, locn. 8851. 76 For an argument in favour of a selective commercial blockade of China targeting energy imports see: Ibid. For a contrasting view, see: AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, p. 76- 8.

25 while in exclusion zones it is, frequently, the risk of attack on sight.77

Importantly, in a general war there is no certainty that a blockade will primarily involve capture of vessels rather than destruction.78 Blockades and exclusion zones are both potential elements of what L.F.E. Goldie and others have referred to as “logistical strategies” that target war materiel and supplies.79 They share similarities in terms of needing to be declared, specified and effective, and issues such as their purpose, scope and duration are key to their legitimacy in international law and diplomacy.80 An exclusion zone may function as a precursor to or an adjunct of a blockade, such as a ‘defensive bubble’ for a maritime task force similar to those declared by Britain during the 1982 Falklands Conflict, and by the US in the Persian Gulf two years later.81 An exclusion zone could also be used as a counter-blockade strategy (see discussion of area-denial below). As we have seen recently, China has made frequent use of exclusion zones as part of its passive-aggressive territorial strategy in the South and East China Seas- a practice generally to be considered outside current international norms. Exclusion zones are perhaps more acceptable than blockades in politico- diplomatic terms because, whatever their ulterior object, they are operationally defensive (or passive), and focus predominantly on the sea and adjacent airspace. A blockade strategy, by comparison, is directed at the shore- as a classical maritime operation should be. It thus runs into the issue of directly affecting local inhabitants. In any case, exclusion zones are incontrovertibly not analogous to blockades in legal terms.

As a blockade is fundamentally a belligerent act, Heinegg argues that blockades undertaken in non-war contexts- so-called pacific blockades- are a something of a misnomer. Blockades are, he argues either an act of war (hence not ‘pacific’) or must be undertaken under the auspices of the UN.82 Stanley Engerman and Lance Davis note that the legal status of pacific blockades is unclear, but that they have historically been used “to deter war by weakening a potential enemy

77 W J Fenrick, 'The Exclusion Zone Device in the Law of Naval Warfare', Canadian Yearbook of International Law, 24, (1986), 91-125, p. 92. 78 This, as we shall see, depends on whether one considers the ‘blockades’ of the World Wars to be anomalous or evolutionary in terms of state practice and international law regarding blockades. Exclusion zones were employed by The US and the Third Reich as elements of these submarine guerre de course campaigns in World War Two. Ibid, pp. 100-02. 79 Goldie, 'Maritime War Zones & Exclusion Zones', p. 157. 80 Fenrick, 'The Exclusion Zone Device in the Law of Naval Warfare’, passim. 81 Ibid. pp. 20, 29. 82 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 204.

26 before an official declaration of war [and] in recent years… they have been deployed… under the newly-coined rubric of ‘’”.83 The importance of non-military measures in enforcing sanctions explains in part the diminishing use of the term ‘pacific blockades’ in modern parlance. Further, pacific blockades have historically usually been undertaken by larger powers against weaker states, and, as Davis and Engerman argue, the general effectiveness of both pacific blockades and sanctions regimes has been “at best, mixed”.84 The enforcement of UN sanctions against Iraq in 1990 is a useful recent example of what otherwise might have been referred to as a pacific blockade. The evidence of recent state practice and observations of scholars such as Davis and Engerman suggest that sanctions have replaced pacific blockade in both terminology and in custom. Despite their legal ambiguity moreover, pacific blockades are functionally and legally distinct from economic blockades, which is a belligerent right in international law. Sanctions may operate as precursors or adjuncts of an economic blockade, and as such they overlap the realms of warfare and diplomacy.85 Moreover, as they often require enforcement, sanctions and economic blockade are not mutually exclusive. When a sanctions regime requires enforcement in a maritime domain it arguably becomes a form of economic blockade by default. Further, as with economic blockades, the cooperation of the sanctioned state’s neighbours in prohibiting the import of contraband is essential to sanctions’ efficacy.86 Tracy argues that the more effective sanctions are, the more likely they are to lead to war. It is not clear that his further argument- that unenforced sanctions are more escalatory than the alternative (due to the ‘free hand’ given to the sanctioned state)- holds for all situations.87 It could be argued that the presence of a blockade fleet enforcing sanctions could be a powerful political tool to build domestic support for military retaliation.

The concept of ‘reverse blockades’, or counter-blockade strategies, which today are associated with the anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD), have more practical relation to exclusion zones than to actual blockades in strategic terms. At the grand-strategic level, Napoleon Bonaparte’s Continental System is historically the most significant example of a counter-blockade strategy. Anti-access operations could be regarded as analogous to a fleet-in-being concept similar to the Western

83 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. Locn. 111. Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, pp. 97-100. 84 Sanctions are now the primary “tools of strategic messaging, deterrence, constraint and behaviour change” for the international community in general, and economic-maritime powers like the US in particular. Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War, locs. 6031-50. 85 Center for a New American Security (CNAS), American Economic Power & The New Face of Financial Warfare, Zachary K Goldman and Elizabeth Rosenberg, June, 2015, p. 4. 86 United Nations Security Council, UN Sanctions, 2013, passim 87 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 183.

27 Approaches squadron operated by the Royal Navy.88 Recent anti-access activities have included China’s limited naval force operations in the context of territorial claims in the South and East China Seas.89 While the term ‘reverse blockade’ is perhaps an apt descriptor, it is misleading, again particularly in legal terms. Most measures that could be characterised as reverse-blockades are essentially exclusion zones in a coastal or littoral area, and anti-access therefore cannot always be differentiated from the simple defence of territory. Furthermore, as anti-access strategies are designed to prevent ingress, they are not synonymous with the belligerent right of blockade, which as discussed seeks to preclude in- and out-bound maritime traffic. The fact that anti-access can be manifested in a peacetime limited naval force context- evidenced by the activities of China’s paramilitary maritime forces in the South China Sea- is a further point of difference with a blockade, which is a belligerent measure. Anti-access is generally operationally defensive but may be strategically offensive, while its relative, sea- or area-denial, is typically synonymous with the naval defensive. Recent discussions regarding the US’ response to China’s naval expansion have however included proposals for a ‘maritime denial’ strategy (possibly in concert with a distant blockade).90 Further, Australian Maritime Doctrine observes that sea-denial can itself take the form of a blockade.91 While denial of use of the sea for trade or naval operations would be one of the outcomes of a blockade, we have seen that sea control is essential to establishing and maintaining an effective blockade, rather than merely disputing or precluding sea control by the enemy.92 For an effective blockade therefore, multidimensional sea- and air-control appears to be a prerequisite, as the two are inextricably linked in a maritime environment.

To conclude this section, we can agree on several key points in terms of the precise nature of an economic blockade and its relations. Economic blockades are long-term measures targeting some or all of the blockadee’s imports or exports. As an act of war the strategy gives a belligerent certain legal rights but also brings

88 N. A. M. Rodger, The Command of the Ocean: A Naval History of Britain 1649--1815, Kindle: Penguin, London, 2004, p. 251. 89 It is also connected to China’s apparent grand strategy of regional hegemony in terms of hard power, finance and politics. 90 ‘Maritime Denial’ seeks to create a ‘no-go-zone’ for all Chinese vessels within the first island chain. Aaron L Friedberg, Beyond Air-sea Battle: The Debate Over US in Asia, Kindle: The International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, 2014, locn. 2329. Although not directly relevant to this thesis this is interesting given Elleman and Paine’s conclusion that effective guerre de course has in recent history been manifested in the context of parallel blockade operations. Elleman & Paine, Commerce Raiding, p. 289. 91 Australian Maritime Doctrine. p. 73. 92 Heinegg and others have made a similar observation regarding the large-scale use of aircraft to enforce blockades, in that it would only be practical if the blockading power possessed air superiority. Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 278.

28 obligations. This has resulted in variations of economic blockades- that is, non- blockades- in conflicts such as the World Wars. In such wider conflicts, other means of warfare, notably land campaigns, figured heavily alongside economic blockades. Relatively few historical examples exist of genuine economic blockades being employed alone. This should perhaps not be surprising given that states are unlikely to declare war for the sole purpose of economic blockade, when comparable (albeit not synonymous) non-belligerent measures are available. The conundrum that remains is how to assess the effectiveness of an economic blockade when it is most likely to have been one of several elements of a given war. Today, economic blockades remain essentially strategic in nature and are designed to weaken the blockadee’s ability to employ his military to achieve strategic objectives, or even cripple the basis of his politico-economic existence. Commercial blockade, the predecessor of economic blockade, belongs largely to a period in economic history that is distinct from the globalised era of today, although the historical blockades themselves continue to be of interest. Fleet blockade, while distinct from economic blockade, can function as an adjunct to one. In the scenario envisaged in this thesis, any US fleet blockade would be primarily tasked with protecting the economic blockade from Chinese counter- blockade forces (although the definition of such measures could be quite broad). Further, against any but the weakest naval powers, close blockades are today a risky strategy given the proliferation of anti-access and area-denial technology. Close blockades, at least by manned platforms (as opposed to mines or Unmanned Underwater Vehicles- UUVs), will therefore continue to be a rarity in future conflicts. Nevertheless, the ability to supress an enemy’s naval-maritime forces and thus enable blockade and other operations remains critical today, as it proved to be in close blockade’s heyday. Guerre de course is distinct from economic blockade in operational and key strategic terms, and historically has been associated with the naval strategy of continental powers. It is legally distinct from blockade but historically has paradoxically found its greatest effectiveness when employed in conjunction with it by maritime powers. Guerre de course remains relevant to a study of economic blockades in history due to this relationship, and due to recent examples, including World War Two, in which guerre de course campaigns took on various blockade-like aspects. Here German fleet guerre de course failed, whereas for the US it was a spectacular success. In both cases it was the wider strategic context that was the important variable. Further, economic blockade and guerre de course are functions of economic warfare, which can be any action designed to disrupt an enemy’s economy. Economic warfare is therefore also associated with non-military means of achieving comparable objectives to an economic blockade. Belligerent economic warfare is highly escalatory in terms of the victim and potentially inconveniencing for neutral

29 states and corporations. Economic warfare was arguably not fully exercised in the industrial era due to this potential impact on neutrals, and on the blockader’s own economy, and this remains the case today. Mercantilist economic warfare from the pre-industrial era, in which Britain essentially prevailed via its maritime-economic power and the flawed policies of Napoleon Bonaparte, is less comparable today in terms of grand strategy due to its premise that there was a limited amount of trade in the world, an increase of which could only be gained at the expense of an opponent. Modern globalisation has seen the continued use of non-belligerent measures that largely prevailed after 1945. Although sanctions and the like are technically elements of economic warfare, recent state practice indicates that they are more often used- and therefore regarded- as a non-belligerent action. Like a variety of blockade-like or blockade-related measures, they are distinct from the actual definition of blockade, particularly in terms of belligerents’ legal rights under jus in bello. They may be used in conjunction with an economic blockade as a preceding step in hostilities, or they might need to be enforced by military operations; the latter can be identical to economic blockade in essentials. A necessary legal precondition in this context is UN involvement, without which the operations take on more of a policing character. The premise of this thesis and thus the need for an economic blockade is that coercive soft-power devices such as sanctions are unsuccessful in dissuading or compelling China into alternate geopolitical steps, such as retreating from a move against Taiwan. Having laid the foundations of our discussion, we can look in greater detail at some of the key historical themes of economic blockade pertinent to the US-China scenario.

30 Economic Blockades in History: Themes and variations

Assessing vulnerability to economic blockade:

Geographical Considerations Geography, one of Mahan’s key Elements of Sea Power, has traditionally been prominent in considerations of a blockade’s potential efficacy, in terms of the blockadee’s SLOCs and the relationship between continental and maritime power.93 Maritime powers are the primary exponents of blockades and blockade-like strategies (Britain being a notable historical example), and also the most vulnerable to them, particularly in the industrial era (as Britain and Japan both discovered in World War Two).94 Once protracted economic blockades became practical, a continental power with even modest levels of maritime trade and limited access to the sea was potentially vulnerable. As Mahan observed,

[T]o nations having free access to the sea, the export and import trade is a very large factor in national prosperity and comfort.

Blockades and (blockade-like operations) of even predominantly landlocked countries can turn out to be quite effective, such as the sanctions-enforcement ‘blockade’ of Iraq (1990-2003). As James Goldrick observed,

That such a largely land-locked country should be so susceptible to maritime action was not immediately obvious, but this proved to be the case. Iraq’s access to the sea, however confined, was and remained its only potential means of securing the materials required to accomplish the regime’s strategic goals.95

Holland, which had SLOCs dominated by British maritime power, and fought with Bourbon Spain and France at sea and on land, demonstrates these overlapping concerns. The preoccupation of states dependent on maritime trade and the security of their SLOCs is one of long-standing historical experience. Such concerns are

93 A T Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783, 5th: Dover Publications, New York, 1987, p. 29. 94 Indeed, before maritime trade expanded- and before armies became more reliant on external sustenance rather than pillaging the land that they occupied- blockades and their historical precursors were most commonly employed by naval/maritime powers against each other. Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 31. 95 Goldrick, 'Maritime Sanctions Enforcement against Iraq: 1990-2003’, locn. 4366.

31 inevitably amplified when the SLOCs can be dominated by a potential adversary possessing the means to interdict them, evidenced by the Confederacy’s vulnerability to economic blockade during the US Civil War. SLOCs that include narrow channels or straits can be similarly exploited, as Holland and Germany variously experienced at the hands of British sea power, and as seen more recently in the Iran-Iraq Tanker War of the 1980s.96 Long SLOCs can also be a strategic weakness, and challenging in operational terms for a blockadee trying to defend them. Britain’s North Atlantic SLOCs were frequently the targets of privateers and commerce raiders from her continental rivals. She continued to experience this in the American War of Independence and the War of 1812, and in this and other theatres in both World Wars.97 US fleet guerre de course preyed on Japan's SLOCs between the home islands and conquered territories in South East Asia and the South West Pacific. This was made possible in part by a lack of attention to questions of SLOC security and maritime transport capability. Importantly, out of all these examples, only in the cases of the American War of Independence and the Pacific theatre of World War Two were the length of SLOCs a critical factor- and even then one of many- in the eventual outcome of the respective war. The extent to which geography in general, and SLOC-dependence in particular, continues to have relevance in the globalized era is an important question to consider. The digital revolution has challenged existing industries and practices in international communications and finance. In a comparable fashion, the increasing number of military-strategic domains, including space and cyberspace, could be regarded as diminishing maritime geography’s significance in terms of the role of economic blockade in economic warfare. The improved range and accuracy of land- based precision-guided munitions (PGMs) today seem likely to challenge the value of traditional naval-maritime forces.98 A blockade could under the correct conditions one day be maintained (or countered) using land-based systems alone; China established a de facto blockade of Taiwan in 1996 using land-based missiles and associated exclusion zones.99 Then again, it may be that geography is still relevant, just in a different manner- and in any case the impact of new technology on a geostrategic or economic status quo is an on-going historical phenomenon. In the history of maritime transportation, potential ‘game changers’ such as railways and pipelines,

96 Elleman & Paine, Commerce Raiding, pp. 289-90. The vulnerability of ‘chokepoint’ or ‘bottleneck’ SLOCs to economic blockade also applies similarly to guerre de course and piracy. 97 Long SLOCs were also an operational challenge for Britain during the 1982 Falklands/Malvinas conflict. 98 See: Andrew F Krepinveich Jr, 'The Pentagon's Wasting Assets-The Eroding Foundations of American Power', Foreign Affairs, 88: 4, (2009), 99 Chris Rahman, 'Ballistic Missiles in China's Anti-Taiwan Blockade Strategy,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Kindle: Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 4390.

32 which might have diminished the significance of maritime trade, proved important but not capable of supplanting it. Railways were significant for continental trade and warfare and, as we shall see, they made limiting a blockade to enemy ports more problematic in terms of strategic effectiveness- but they did not negate maritime blockade per se.100 Maritime transportation is still by far the most efficient means of conducting large-scale international trade (and historically has been so consistently over the last several centuries).101 In the modern era, “it is generally accepted that 90% of global trade is carried by sea.”102 The recent trend towards larger merchant ships arguably renders the interdiction of individual ships more significant in financial terms, though perhaps more complex operationally. The significance of the ‘just-in-time’ maritime economy is also pertinent here. Increasing trade volumes, shipbuilding, and container throughput underscore the fundamental significance of maritime trade to the global economy, and to the prosperity of individual states.103 This to an extent echoes the increased economic activity in Europe that triggered the advent of the economic blockade over four centuries ago. The current growth in maritime trade and the whole process of globalisation can therefore be seen as a continuation of this trend, and thus of the continued potential effectiveness of a well-executed economic blockade.

Since continental powers cannot be defeated at sea, exploiting their enslavement to terrestrial concerns has historically been a key element of strategy for maritime powers.104 Thus, the significance for Britain of Holland remaining free from Louis XIV’s France was based not only on the strategic location of Dutch ports but the importance of preventing France “acquiring ‘universal monarchy’ in Europe”.105 This in part explains why periods of largely ‘unified’ (or subjugated) Europe under Napoleon Bonaparte and Adolf Hitler were challenging to Britain, as the relevant continental power was in both instances allowed more scope to confront the maritime adversary. France was typically the historical counterpoint to Mahan’s analysis of British sea power, which addressed the fundamental link between maritime power and

100 Infra, p. 72; Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 734. Pipelines may be as vulnerable to military intervention as maritime trade- arguably more so due to their fixed locations. They are also a much less economical means of oil transportation compared to maritime trade. 101 Mahan, Pritchett and Corbett, Some Neglected Aspects of War, p. 176. 102 International Maritime Organisation (IMO), International Shipping Facts and Figures- Information Resources on Trade, Safety, Security, Environment, Maritime Knowledge Centre, March 6, 2012, p. 5. 103 Infra, p. 43; United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, United Nations Publications, 2013, p. 52 & passim. 104 Colin S Gray, The Leverage of Sea Power: The Strategic Advantage of Navies in War, Maxwell Macmillan International, New York, 1992, passim. 105 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, pp. 52-3.

33 international trade.106 For states like Britain and today the US, these factors are synonymous in terms of their impact on national economic prosperity. For France, like China today, the challenge was to be both maritime and continental; the former was crucial to support maritime trade but the latter necessarily trumped it in terms of national priorities. Its access to various seas and numerous neighbours on land offered potential benefits and challenges.107 As France’s necessary continental preoccupation prevented it from confronting British maritime power on equal terms, perpetuating war on the Continent was an important element of British strategy.108 It was felt, not without justification, that when continental distractions for Britain’s enemies were lacking, Britain’s prospects suffered accordingly. As the Duke of Newcastle wrote in a letter to the Earl of Hardwicke on 6 September 1749

My dear Lord, a naval force… unsupported with even the appearance of force upon the Continent, will be of little use. It will provoke; but not effectually prevent… It will end, in a few years, in nothing. France will undo us by sea, when they have nothing to fear by land [original emphasis].109

Lord Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty (1771-1782), made similar observations in 1782 decrying the lack of continental distractions for France.110 Britain’s defeat in the American War of Independence has been regarded in historiographical terms as evidence of this causal relationship. This approach has been challenged more recently by the consideration of other important factors, such as the shortcomings in administration and logistics that impeded Britain’s ability to protect and maintain her trans-Atlantic shipping.111 Support for the rebels from France and Spain was crucial to minimizing their expenses, while Britain’s increased dramatically due to the costs of shipping and financing an expeditionary army.112 But perhaps one of the most critical elements of Anglo-French strategic rivalry lay in the immense

106 Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, pp. 26-8 passim. 107 Mahan, Pritchett and Corbett, Some Neglected Aspects of War, pp. 179-80. 108 This applied similarly to other continental European states such as Spain and Holland. 109 ‘The Duke of Newcastle to the Earl of Hardwicke, 6 September 1749’, in British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, Scholar Press for the Navy Records Society, Aldershot, 1993, pp. 326-7. 110 ‘Sandwich’s’ defence of his administration, 1782’, in: British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, p. 337. In fact, during this second period of Sandwich’s as First lord of the Admiralty, it was Britain that had faced a ‘continental struggle’ of sorts- in the American War of Independence. 111 Britain’s inability (and to an extent unwillingness) to interdict French munitions shipments to the rebels, impacted her ability to wage her land campaigns effectively Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 40. 112 John Reeve, 'British Naval Strategy: War on a Global Scale,' in Donald Stoker, Kenneth J Hagan and Michael T McMaster (ed.), Strategy in the American War of Independence: A Global Approach, Routledge, 2009, pp. 80-1.

34 challenges in France’s ability to ‘field’ and maintain a viable fleet over the long term. In this area of French strategy, the cost of raising armies played a secondary role.113 N.A.M. Rodger observed that

Sea power cannot be improvised. In every age and every circumstance, the successful navies have been those which rested on long years of steady investment in the infrastructure essential to keep running the complex and delicate machinery of a seagoing fleet… Shipbuilding itself is relatively quick and simple compared to the slow nurturing of the manifold resources and skills on which all successful naval operations must be based.114

It is therefore important not to oversimplify the notion of ‘continental distraction’ to a cause-and-effect dichotomy. As a corollary, a continental power will generally develop naval power in a manner both in keeping with historical precedents on the one hand, and befitting its unique advantages on the other. Its peacetime behaviour in areas such as limited naval force, A2/AD development and international finance seems to be in line with the traditional proposition that a

land power, not having the naval wherewithal to challenge the sea power directly… turns to cumulative strategies of denial, either through commerce raiding or exclusive economic systems.115

The navies of continental powers therefore function quite differently in strategic terms from those of maritime states. As Till argues

A navy that is central to the concerns of a powerful country is obviously likely to be more ambitious in its aspirations than the incidental navy of a small or weak one. This leads to the conclusion that the conceptions of a maritime strategy are universal, but the extent to which individual countries can… realize them may be highly particular.116

113 Ibid. 114 N. A. M. Rodger, The Safeguard of the Sea: A Naval History of Britain, 660-1649, Kindle ebook: W.W. Norton, New York, 1998, p. 327. 115 Milevski, 'Revisiting J.C. Wylie's Dichotomy of Strategy', p. 241. 116 Ibid. locn. 1864.

35 History suggests, moreover, that continental powers’ limitations regarding such resources often result in an essentially one-track naval strategy/policy, with a specified limited function. This might be fisheries patrols, coastal defence, sea denial or, like Imperial Germany’s High Seas Fleet, the purpose may be essentially geopolitical.117 Other historical examples include France’s support for privateers during the Seven Years War, and Germany’s ultimate emphasis on U-Boats in both World Wars. Perhaps the most extreme ‘specialisation’ of a continental navy was French Admiral Hyacinthe Aube’s ultimately abortive Jeune Ecole conception of the late 1800’s, which proposed to target Britain’s dependence on imports using cruisers and torpedo boats, at the expense of the French battlefleet. Jeune Ecole was conceived as a counter to British maritime power, not to win strategic victories at sea but to cause politico-economic upheaval in Britain.118 Critically, many of these continental conceptions of naval power were based on contemporary technological advances.119 Yet while such an approach may appear to offer the potential to offset an opposing maritime power in a peacetime context, this cannot be relied on in wartime if losses are accrued and additional construction and innovation are required. This was the experience of the German kreigsmarine in World War Two, and highlights the fact that all naval warfare comes at a financial cost.120 This guerre de course campaign also illustrates the fact that an attack on (or defence of) maritime trade that relies on one operational element is problematic in a manner that can undermine the state’s wider strategy.121 Ideally, a continental power’s strategic objectives at sea should complement those ashore, as was the case with the intended Soviet submarine strategy during the . While limited, such forces can be effective for a time at least. As Colin Gray observed,

Continental powers can win wars against sea powers if they are able to deny a tolerable level of sea control to their maritime- dependent enemies; that has not been accomplished in modern

117 Although it is not clear that Tirpitz and Wilhelm I were fully aware of the inherent strategic limitations of a German surface fleet facing the advantageously-located Royal Navy 118 Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century, pp. 74-5. 119 It may be that the failure of this endeavour did some disservice to sea-denial and commerce warfare and helped cement the prevailing emphasis on capital ships. At a technical level, Aube’s plan was quashed largely by the advent of the torpedo-boat destroyer but interestingly it also resulted in France’s production of the world’s first workable submarine prototype.119 120 Marc Milner, 'The Atlantic War, 1939-1945,' in Evan Mawdsley and John Robert Ferris (ed.), The Cambridge History of the Second World War, Online: Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2015, http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CHO9781139855969 p. 484. 121 This is in keeping with Elleman and Paines’ conclusions regarding the efficacy of guerre de course discussed earlier. Supra, p. 22.

36 times, but there have been some close calls.122

This ability of a continental power to offset the advantages enjoyed by a rival maritime power, which include operational flexibility and , will arguably continue to impact key geostrategic relationships. This trend is evidenced by the increasing popularity of missile and A2/AD technology in China and Iran. Today, as historically, therefore, an economic blockade of a continental power may have to contend with resistance at sea, albeit perhaps only in the short- to medium term, as well as the need for the blockade to be paralleled on land to some degree. The issue of events on the blockadee’s land frontiers go not so much to whether it must divert resources away from the maritime domain (though clearly this can be advantageous) but whether it is able to circumvent the blockade through land transport corridors. Like continental naval power this is perhaps of limited utility in the long-term but can be critical in cases in which there is political or other pressure for the economic blockade to bear fruit quickly. Thus, in the geographical context, Napoleon’s already flawed Continental System was brought undone in part by its porousness across land-borders (particularly via ), rather than by direct British maritime commerce alone.123 While this forcing of one’s own trade on one’s enemy and his trading partners was peculiar to the mercantilist era, and may not therefore be as applicable in a modern market-based economy, it nevertheless demonstrates that the landward flow of contraband goods can undermine a commercial or economic blockade regime. Geography is also capable of setting out some of the physical parameters of an economic blockade in operational terms, and thus further conditioning its strategic viability. This pertains to the physical conformation of (and potential vulnerabilities in) SLOCs and ports, and, in the case of continental powers, land frontiers and the possible actions of neighbouring states. The notion that maritime strategies in general should be based on feasible strategic goals on land is well- established, and an economic blockade of a continental power merely illustrates it more clearly. The historical desire of continental powers to develop the means to resist hostile maritime power (perceived or genuine) continues, and has, as previously,

122 Gray, The Leverage of Sea Power: The Strategic Advantage of Navies in War, p. xi. 123 This situation was illustrated by Bacher, Napoleon’s Minister to the Confederation of the Rhine, in a report dated October 10, 1810: “The new direction which colonial goods take… is stated to have created [significant] activity on all roads leading from… Russia to Prussia on one side and through Poland and Moravia to Vienna on the other… and consequently serve to create secure routes, which will convey not only colonial goods, but also British products, as far as the states of the Confederation of the Rhine, and from there to the Rhine and even to Switzerland.” Heckscher, The Continental System, p. 231. For an untranslated reproduction of Bacher’s original report in full, see: Charles Schmidt, Le Grand-duché De Berg (1806-1813): Étude Sur La Domination Française En Allemagne Sous Napoléon 1er, F. Alcan, Saint-Germain, 1905, pp. 497-8.

37 been aided by technological developments. Yet while a continental power might develop an effective naval force-structure, the characteristics that render that state a continental power cannot be shed. There was and is, little that Germany, Russia, France and China could have done- or can do- to relieve themselves of their geographic locations, often involving large land masses and long borders, all requiring administration, and defence in various ways. It needs to be remembered that the impact of terrestrial concerns on continental powers’ responses to economic blockade is a question of case-by-case nuance, not causality.

Impacts of economic blockade on finance, trade & economies The fundamental relationship between economic strength and maritime power that was a feature of European history for some centuries was given wider public voice by Mahan in the late nineteenth century. This nexus, on which the history of economic blockade rests, is integral to understanding the naval-maritime elements of economic warfare. Decreasing maritime freight costs and technical developments that appeared at the turn of the twentieth century seemed to accentuate the link between maritime trade and economic prosperity. In Retrospect and Prospect (1902), Mahan observed the increasing pre-eminence of commerce in international affairs in his time, and this evolved in the financial and economic integration of in the industrial era, a process that is arguably amplified today many times over.124 In the eyes of some observers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, economic interconnectedness negated the prospects for a drawn-out conflict, while others saw it as a basis for an enhanced efficacy of economic warfare.125 Given the increasing complexities and interdependencies in global finance and trade today, similar arguments are understandable, however the intricacy of this nexus has perhaps led to the advantages of an attack on maritime trade being overstated. Eli Hecksher argued that Mahan was

[T]oo much concerned with sea-power in itself to devote sufficient attention to its connexion with economic policy and economic activity, which after all have also a non-naval side.

In a similar vein, Nicholas Tracy has pointed to the “impression” created by the during the US Civil War, that the increasing complexity of markets

124 Alfred Thayer Mahan, Retrospect & Prospect: Studies in International Relations, Naval and Political, Little, Brown, and Company, Boston, 1902, p. 246. Still, it should be remembered that Mahan’s writing was based on an era in which commercial blockade was commonly the instrument of economic warfare, which proved to be of less relevance in the twentieth century. 125 Lambert, Planning Armageddon, pp. 2, 104-5.

38 and commodities trading had rendered a blockade more effective than ever.126 We can look also to the Continental System, which was based, among other things, on fundamental misconceptions regarding the nature of Britain’s wealth and how her dependence on maritime trade could best be exploited.127 The assessments of the Admiralty leading up to World War One likewise appeared to highlight the potential of economic warfare measures that included- but were not limited to- economic blockade. They also revealed their inherent challenges.128 But at the very least it was clear by the mid-twentieth century that was largely economic in character, and that some rules and norms might need to be obviated as a result.129

The direct causal relationship between economic power and maritime power articulated by Mahan may have been somewhat overstated, but a state that relies on maritime trade for its economic growth and stability is nevertheless theoretically vulnerable to economic blockade. Continental powers may be less vulnerable of course, depending on factors such as the size of their economies, the volume of their maritime trade and the resources and policies of neighbours. A state with options in terms of alternative trade routes and stockpiles of key commodities might be able to resist an economic blockade, at least for a time. The ability of the state’s administrative apparatus to govern effectively in a time of crisis would also be at issue. This would invoke other elements such as the relationship between economic and political power in the blockaded state. The closer this connection, arguably the more effective an economic blockade (or economic warfare) might be. In seventeenth century Holland, the political power of Dutch merchants rendered the interdiction of Dutch trade a potentially effective strategy for its enemies, particularly Britain.130 Connections like this were ripe for exploitation in the mercantilist era, in which the purpose of weakening an opponent’s economy was to advance one’s own and the power of one’s own state. Proponents of classical mercantilism held that there was a finite amount of trade available, and therefore that one state could gain only at the expense of another. Economic, political and military power were thus generally regarded as zero-sum games. In the Anglo-French wars of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, commerce was central:

To inflict military injury on the enemy, either directly or indirectly, was not — at least not to any notable extent — the object of the interference with his trade. On the contrary, the primary object

126 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 95. 127 Heckscher, The Continental System, pp. 70-1, 60-1. 128 See: Lambert, Planning Armageddon; Cobb, Preparing for Blockade. 129 Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 796. 130 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 47.

39 was that of waging commercial war against him, i.e., of depriving him of a source of gain, or, in other words, beating him off the field.131

Napoleon Bonaparte’s Continental System was, as elucidated by Eli Heckscher, an attempt to cripple Britain via its trade while simultaneously improving that of France and its allies.132 Britain’s retaliatory commercial blockades were largely a continuation of her existing strategy and policies. 133 Trading with the enemy was fundamental to Britain’s mercantile strategy in its wars with France in this period. As evidenced above, the Continental System collapsed in part due to its porousness in geographic and administrative terms, as British goods poured into the continental European economy. The Dutch trade war with Spain during the Eighty Years War is also a classic example of trading between belligerents, and the employment of economic warfare measures that were detrimental to both sides.134 By the end of the Crimean War the practice of trading with the enemy, while not strictly mercantilist, was nevertheless considered to have gone too far. The restriction of imports had been anathema to Britain’s Orders in Council in the Napoleonic Wars and had even played a relatively minor role in the US Civil War blockade.135 In the post-mercantilist industrial era, trading with the enemy ceased to be a strategic objective, as enabling an enemy to import any goods was counter to the goal of destroying the foundations of their state. Trading with the enemy in this sense was a particular problem for Britain in World War One, despite an investigation into the issue in 1912 led by Lord Desart.136 An indirect trade in animal fats (used in the manufacture of explosives) and other materiel between Britain and Germany via Scandinavia and Holland persisted for much of the war. Generally

131 Heckscher, The Continental System, p. 35. 132 Nicholas Tracy argues conversely that its purpose was to foster the expansion of the French economy at the expense of all other states in Europe, and that characterisations of the Continental System as an essentially anti-British measure are therefore erroneous. Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 74. It was instead pro-France; this was in keeping with the mercantilist system. 133 In contrast to this prevailing view, Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, argued that, “A nation that would enrich itself by foreign trade, is certainly most likely to do so, when its neighbours are all rich, industrious and commercial nations.” Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations [1776], Electronic Classics Series: The Pennsylvania State University, 2005, p. 397-8. 134 See: Jonathan I Israel, The Dutch Republic and the Hispanic World, 1606-1661, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982, 135 Heckscher, The Continental System, p. 121; Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locs. 2791-2801. 136 Cobb, Preparing for Blockade, p. 71.

40 speaking, increased British exports to these countries allowed them to similarly increase the export of their own produce to Germany.137 An agreement limiting Sweden’s exports to Germany was only signed between its government and Britain in May 1918.138 Even so, Scandinavian exports to Germany in 1918 (from all individual states) “exceeded the pre-war average.”139 The need to prohibit trading with the enemy ultimately became a key element in enforcing embargos and other economic warfare measures at the domestic level in Britain during the final years of the war.140 These inconsistencies highlight not only the complexities in that particular case but also the challenges facing all belligerents in a globalized economy, in terms of precluding indirect trade between belligerents to the benefit of their enemies. This period was also, as Stephen Cobb notes, that in which the political and diplomatic elements of Britain’s economic warfare strategy gained prominence over the cruisers’ economic blockade.141 In addition to the allocation of additional ships, British diplomatic efforts, the control of bunker coals and the Navicert system supplemented actual blockade operations.142 The onset of German blockade-like measures in 1917, US entry into the War and Britain’s concurrent transition away from simple economic blockade both contributed to the former’s defeat. Montague Consett argued that military matters were in a sense secondary throughout the war:

[I]n 1914-1918 the clash of arms, the destruction of cities and even the passing subjugation of smaller nations were not the sole determining factors of an issue in which one half of the more highly organised nations of the earth sought to impose its will upon the other half… The real struggle itself was unaccompanied by any single act of violence; yet it was more deadly in its passive relentlessness than the military forces and engines of war, on which the whole attention of the world was exclusively riveted.143

137 M W W P Consett, The Triumph of Unarmed Forces (1914-1918), Williams and Norgate, London, 1923, p. 274. & passim. As a 1940 newspaper article observed- almost in passing- regarding Britain’s definition of contraband in World War One, “neutrals were supplied with coal to two or three times their needs- and the surplus went to Germany”. 'Naval Prize Courts', The West Australian, 20 July 1940, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article46727766. 138 The US’ entry into the war and the possible threat posed by Russia were also considerations for the Swedes. Consett, The Triumph of Unarmed Forces (1914-1918), p. 273. 139 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 3585. 140 Archibald Colquhoun Bell, A History of the Blockade of Germany and of the Countries Associated with Her in the Great War, -Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, 1914-1918, Digitised (Scriptorium): H.M. Stationery Office, London, 1937, http://www.wintersonnenwende.com/scriptorium/english/archives/blockade/bgy00.html Part III, Ch. 33, sect vii. 141 Cobb, Preparing for Blockade, pp. 251-2. 142 The Maritime Blockade of Germany, p. 503. 143 Consett, The Triumph Of Unarmed Forces (1914-1918), p. viii.

41

This opinion supports the contentions of Nicholas Lambert and others, who argue that a whole of government approach to economic warfare- with naval power playing a subsidiary (albeit crucial) role- was the basis of the Admiralty’s pre-war planning.144 It also echoes Mahan’s assessment of the impact of British sea power on Napoleon Bonaparte’s grand strategy from 1805:

[A]mid all the tramping to and fro over Europe of the French armies and their auxiliary legions, there went on unceasingly that noiseless pressure upon the vitals of France, that compulsion, whose silence, when once noted, becomes to the observer the most striking and awful mark of the working of Sea Power.145

Unfortunately for Britain, the industrial era brought dramatic changes to the efficacy of its sea power. Britain itself became vulnerable to blockade due to its increasing import demands and reliance on its role as a global financial nexus. At the same time, states like Germany and the US improved their overall economic positions and military power through their own processes of industrialisation, while Britain’s faltered. Continental powers were able to develop counter-blockade technologies such as submarines, dealing a further blow to the basis of British maritime power and potentially to the efficacy of a contemporary war on commerce in general terms.146 Further, in contrast to commercial blockades of the pre-industrial era, the economic blockades in the age of industry were the antithesis of ‘noiseless’. The goal of industrialised economic blockades was not to ‘beat the enemy from the field of commerce’ or deprive it of a means to finance military campaigns.147 They instead involved attacks on an enemy state’s ability to function in toto, by precluding its access to fundamental goods such as food, fuels and raw materials.148 Many elements of commercial blockade, which was essentially an attack on finances and communications, could from this period be undertaken by soft-power economic warfare measures, as was attempted by Britain in 1914.149 This was enabled in part by the expansion of global finance and the associated

144 Lambert, Planning Armageddon. passim. 145 A T Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon the French Revolution and Empire, 1793-1812, Little, Brown, and Co., Boston, 1892, p. 184. 146 Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, p. 200. 147 Heckscher, The Continental System, p. 35. 148 The historical politico-ideological context in which, in broad terms, capitalist democracy vied with fascism and socialism for supremacy, also played a role in this. These manifestations of the nation- state were mutually incompatible; the situation was therefore conducive to total war and industrial- era economic blockade. 149 Mahan, Sea Power and Its Relations to the War of 1812, p. 285.

42 interconnectedness between national economies. The global decline of the states’ role as the source of national economic activity and the associated rise of market- based economies have accompanied this transformation, which has been manifested more recently by globalisation and interdependent markets. This shift has purportedly given rise to the ambiguities around the proper definition of an economic blockade in the modern context.150 Critically, economic blockade on a scale of a general war has not been undertaken in the current globalised era and as such its ramifications are difficult to predict. The ‘just-in-time’ (JIT) approach to international trade has taken advantage of the increasing interconnectedness of the globalised economy and is heavily reliant on maritime transport. JIT improves profit margins by manufacturing and delivering specified (minimal) amounts of product or resources at the time needed, as opposed to relying on stockpiles of goods. This is achieved by the increase in the velocity of international maritime trade.151 Such “fragmentation of international production processes” has, along with the process of globalisation and other factors, driven the recent supercycle, with China as a “key driver”.152 JIT is essentially untested in terms of its robustness and flexibility in a wartime context. Its inherent reliance on rapid and predictable maritime trade and by extension on unimpeded SLOCs perhaps suggests a new potential for economic blockade. Moreover the constricted time frames of JIT economies could theoretically translate into an amplification or acceleration of the effects of an economic blockade.153 But it is worth remembering at this point that, while globalisation may have given renewed relevance to attacks on maritime trade, comparable assessments historically have at times proved wanting, as Tracy’s observations highlight.154

Selective/targeted economic blockades Globalisation might present other advantages for economic warfare in general, and economic blockade in particular. As the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) have noted

Globalization is motivated by the recognition that resources and goods are not always collocated with the populations that desire

150 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 276. 151 International Transport Forum, The Impacts of Globalisation on International Maritime Transport Activity: Past Trends and Future Perspectives , James J Corbett and James Winebrake, OECD, 2008, p. 7. 152 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2015, United Nations Publications, 2015, p. 4. 153 This might also apply to a broader economic warfare strategy or guerre de course. 154 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 95.

43 them, and so global transportation services are needed (and economically justified if consumer demand is great enough).155

In such an environment, the strategic effectiveness an economic blockade that targets a small number of specific critical imports or exports may be amplified compared to previous eras.156 This derivation of economic blockade seeks to exploit an element of maritime trade that the blockadee state requires to maintain its political and/or economic power, discretion or survival. Such strategies have a long history: maritime powers in the sail era, which relied on their navies to both protect and prosecute their interests at sea, were theoretically vulnerable to the interdiction of materiel required for their shipbuilding programs.157 British imports of a favoured mast-building timber from the Baltic were vulnerable to interdiction by several states (and their privateers).158 In the US Civil War, the Union interdiction of Confederate exports (needed to finance the purchase of war materiel) could be considered a form of targeted economic blockade. Selective blockades in the twentieth century included Britain’s semi- effective Beira Patrol and the US’ ‘Cuban razor’, which prohibited the transfer of Soviet missiles to the island state.159 While this goal was achieved, and the aforementioned sanctions enforcement again Iraq (targeting WMD imports and oil exports) was also largely effective, translating these approaches to a targeted economic blockade of a large economic and military power like China may be a rather different proposition. Identifying appropriate targets for interdiction is a critical intelligence requirement for a selective blockade; once this is accomplished it should use fewer resources at the operational level than a wholesale blockade. Strategically, a selective economic blockade might be advantageous in terms of having limited collateral financial and economic impacts, and thus fewer political consequences arising from neutral objections. The law of naval warfare currently does not explicitly

155 International Transport Forum, The Impacts of Globalisation on International Maritime Transport Activity: Past Trends and Future Perspectives , p. 6. 156 The notion of a ‘selective’ blockade implies numerous options in terms of the contraband that might be interdicted; ‘targeted’ blockade is therefore in some cases more appropriate, while ‘porous’ emphasises what materiel is being allowed through the blockade. 157 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, pp. 31, 35. 158 ‘The quality of mast timber, 1803’: Chatham Dockyard officers to the Navy Board, 12 September 1803, in: British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, p. 505. 159 Richard A Mobley, ‘The Beira Patrol: Britain’s Broken Blockade against ,’ in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 3691; George W Baer, One Hundred Years of Sea Power: The US Navy, 1890-1990, Stanford University Press, Stanford, 1996, p. 382.

44 prohibit selective blockades; their legality would presumably stand so long as there was a reasonable chance that inbound vessels would be intercepted.160 Alternatively, allowing most imports while targeting profitable exports might damage the blockadee’s terms of trade by creating a trade deficit.161 The blockadee could in theory be bankrupted by such a strategy as goods were imported without the exports to pay for them. While an interesting concept, this perhaps bears more resemblance to the historical principles of commercial blockade rather than modern economic blockade. It would also be a long-term prospect and not effective in all cases.

We have seen how, in the pre-industrial mercantilist era, states’ economies were both means and ends of strategy, and that this was superseded- as evidenced by the economic warfare and blockades of World War One. It has been argued by Nicholas Tracy that the mercantilist era, which relied heavily on naval power and economic blockade, is a poor historical prism though which to analyse the efficacy of the latter per se, in the context of ‘negative objectives’ of economic warfare in terms of denying an enemy’s access to trade through blockade.162 Further, Steven Haines suggests that the relevance of the two classical hard-power means of economic warfare- economic blockade and guerre de course- is open for question, given the length of time since either was employed to a significant degree. This is based on the premise that great power confrontations are an anachronism- (thus contradicting the premise of this thesis) but given current tensions between the US and Russia and China respectively, it is a proposition that is dangerous to overstate.163 The difficulties for a contemporary economic blockade remain relatively consistent with those of its predecessors. The impact of the blockade on neutrals, which might choose to undermine the blockade in response, is an on-going concern, as is its effects on the blockader’s own economy.164 This applies also to its effects on the global and regional economies, and is therefore an important consideration for a blockader in terms of keeping other states on side. As we have seen, a blockadee’s particular vulnerability to economic blockade could be manifested in terms of weaknesses in its economy, financial position and by extension the threat to its political structures. A general war between great powers

160 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 213. The declaration of the blockade must include its “extent”, which could be interpreted as including its selective nature, while prohibitions on discrimination apply to nationality of vessels, not the type of cargo being transported. International Institute of Humanitarian Law, San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, International Committee of the Red Cross, 1994, https://www.icrc.org/applic/ihl/ihl.nsf/52d68d14de6160e0c12563da005fdb1b/7694fe2016f347e1c12 5641f002d49ce?openDocument Section II: Methods of Warfare- Blockade, paras. 94, 100. 161 Malkin, 'Blockade in Modern Conditions', p. 88. 162 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 106. 163 Steven Haines, 'The United Kingdom's Manual of the Law of Armed Conflict and the San Remo Manual: Maritime Rules Compared', Israel Yearbook of Human Rights, 37: 2006, (2006), pp. 112-16. 164 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 6727.

45 would be without precedent in the era of globalisation, and the implications of economic blockade for the JIT maritime economy are a critical ‘unknown’. Implicit in this consideration is the further question of the form that economic blockade will take in the future.

Political and moral issues As with any military conflict, an economic blockade presents certain political and moral challenges. These relate primarily to the impacts on neutrals on the one hand, and the civilian population of the blockadee on the other (this also goes to the reaction of the government). There is of course some overlap with legal considerations here, but what is legal and what is moral are not necessarily synonymous, particularly as the latter is subjective. Morality and international law do however share one dubious distinction: it is reasonable to suppose that morality- like law- will be viewed by belligerents as being ultimately expendable as the intensity of a conflict increases. In the most extensive modern conflict involving great powers (World War Two), civilian suffering was so significant as to render it beyond description in a thesis such as this. It is not clear that advances in terms of the moral choices of political and military leaders have accompanied the technical revolutions in military affairs since that war.165

Historically, economic blockades, such as that of Germany in World War One and the military-economic blockade of Japan in 1945, have at times had significant impacts on civilian populations. While blockades for the explicit purpose of inflicting such suffering are prohibited under current international law, there is always the potential for them to occur as an indirect consequence. Blockades that prohibit ‘dual-use’ contraband (that is, potentially for either civilian or military purposes) are open to accusations of immorality- if not illegality- which might become a powerful political tool for the blockadee state. An economic blockade regime that does not include dual-use items is conversely open to abuse. Civilian hardship and suffering in any context is a moral calamity. In a or ‘hot peace’ such as the sanctions-blockade of Iraq from 1990-2003, humanitarian issues can also be politically damaging for the blockader. In the event, this blockade survived due to its legal legitimacy and widespread support in the international community, as we shall see. A blockade’s humanitarian impacts are often as difficult to differentiate from other consequences of war. In World War One, Britain’s economic blockade impacted the supply of food to German civilians and there were some consequences

165 Williamson Murray, 'Thinking About Revolutions in Military Affairs', Joint Force Quarterly, Summer, (1997), http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA354177.

46 for their health.166 This impact was generally of an indirect nature, and poor internal administration and distribution- including of German-grown produce- were critical factors in the food shortages experienced by civilians and soldiers alike.167 Changes in normative behaviour during the twentieth century regarding the definition of contraband in an economic blockade are also evident. A 1940 article in the West Australian newspaper noted that, in previous conflicts (including World War One), civilian well-being was a higher priority, and that as a result the concept of contraband involved a measure of discretion.168 As with the development of international law regarding blockades during the World Wars, the question may be asked whether the massive level of suffering of civilians is an anomaly or an evolution in the acceptable standards for international practice.169 We have seen how economic blockade became a much more fundamental method of offense in the industrialised era, which can be seen as fitting a general pattern in the consequences of modern warfare:

To put economic pressure upon the enemy has always been legitimate; but whereas previously it only played a secondary part, in modern warfare it has become of primary importance.170

Also of interest for our purposes is the further observation that totalitarian states, “in which the life and property of the individual are entirely dominated by the State” tend to pass on economic impacts to civilians both directly and indirectly.171 In the case of the UN sanctions-blockade of Iraq (1990-2003), while it met its modest objectives of denying Iraq oil revenue and undermining its alleged WMD- program, it also impacted the civilian population. Although proponents of the blockade question the degree of impact caused by the sanctions/blockade regime, there was significant deprivation in Iraq during this period.172 Again we are faced with multiple potential variables in analysing a blockade’s impact. As the CRS observed:

166 Kramer, 'Blockade and economic warfare', p. 489; Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn 3601. 167 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 138. The continuation of the blockade after the Armistice (until the signing of the ) did however have an impact, and its moral legitimacy and strategic efficacy have both been called into question. Ibid. pp. 146-7. 168 "Naval Prize Courts", The West Australian. 169 Infra, pp. 72. 170 Oppenheim, Oppenheim’s International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, p. 208. 171 Ibid. p. 172. 172 David Reiff, 'Were Sanctions Right?', The New York Times, 27 July 2003, http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/27/magazine/27SANCTIONS.html?pagewanted=all (accessed May 17, 2016).

47 Imposition of U.N. sanctions in 1991 followed a nearly decade- long war between Iraq and Iran, during which spending on the social welfare system declined. Decades of conflict, including the Iran-Iraq war and the bombing during Desert Storm, damaged or destroyed much of the Iraqi public infrastructure such as water and sewage plants and many public buildings… Since 1996, the OFFP [Oil for Food Program] has alleviated some of the worst effects of the sanctions, but the humanitarian crisis (defined as an urgent need for food, shelter and basic health care) remains serious. While some improvements have been seen in nutrition, health services, water supply and sanitation, there is greater dependence on government services. Observers of the Iraq situation have identified disturbing health and nutrition problems affecting the civilian population. These have been tied to the consequences of war, sanctions, shortcomings of assistance, and the deliberate policies of the Iraqi regime.173

Thus, identifying singular catalysts of a humanitarian crisis is problematic; these are complex issues for governments, civilians and militaries alike that rarely befit simple explanations. Blockadee states including Imperial Germany and Ba’athist Iraq have attempted to minimise such intricacies for political gain. This can potentially be effective; the quest for belligerents in modern circumstances to have a “lower media profile”174 means that

Skilfully deployed, sympathy waters down the most draconian of sanctions and hampers the maintenance of an effective blockade.175

This is not a new phenomenon. In 1812 when the US was at war with Britain over the latter’s treatment of neutral shipping, an article in the Independent Chronicle newspaper in Boston declared that

173 Congressional Research Service, Potential Humanitarian Issues in Post-War Iraq: An Overview for Congress, Rhoda Margesson and Johanna Bockman, Library of Congress, 2003, p. 2. http://burgess.house.gov/uploadedfiles/iraq%20-%20humanitarian%20issues%20in%20post- war%20iraq%20an%20overview%20for%20congress.pdf 174 David Brown, 'Blockade and the Royal Navy,' in N. A. M. Rodger, Naval Power in the Twentieth Century, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1996, p. 175. 175 Ibid.

48 When the embargo, the precursor of war, was laid, [the British] employed it as an engine to disaffect the people, and thereby destroy the popularity of the President.176

This was something of an exaggeration, as Eli Heckscher’s analysis of these events indicates.177 Nevertheless, it is probable that any blockaded state will seek to arouse the sympathies of the international community. The perception of an ulterior motive might also critically undermine the legitimacy of a blockade- and thus any multilateral support necessary to maintain it. Mercantilism and the predominance of economic warfare cast a pall over attempts to undermine contraband trade in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as Tracy shows.178 During the Revolutionary Wars that preceded Napoleon’s rise to power, Britain declared somewhat disingenuously that its blockade of foodstuffs bound for France was “purely… an important means of forcing the enemy to make peace.” In fact the former was actually based on Britain’s need to supplement its own food supplies; the contraband food was acquired by the government from both the Royal Navy and privateers.179 Historically, the alienation of allies and neutrals, such as resulted from Britain’s attack on Copenhagen during the Napoleonic Wars, and its economic warfare policy in 1914, has shown significant potential to undermine diplomatic and naval-maritime strategies alike.180 The indirect impacts of economic blockade on neutral states are, like that on civilians, difficult to separate in real time, and are equally difficult to distinguish from other consequences of war. As Oppenheim argued

The fact is that the detrimental consequences of blockade on neutrals stand in the same category as the many other detrimental consequences of war to neutrals.181

Blockades are subject to the laws and principles governing armed conflict and humanitarian concerns, and although blockades are not integral to the law of neutrality, they are related to that body of law via the potential impacts on neutral

176 ‘For the Chronicle: Massachusetts-No. 2.’ Independent Chronicle , 22 October 1812, Vol XLIV. 177 Heckscher, The Continental System, pp. 139-46. 178 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, pp. 40-1. 179 Heckscher, The Continental System, pp. 43-4. 180 Rodger, Command of the Ocean, p. 552. The attack on Copenhagen did achieve its objective in terms of ending the threat to Baltic grain convoys bound for Britain. Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 73. 181 Oppenheim, Oppenheim’s International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, p. 774.

49 trade.182 A violation of either may be detrimental to international determinations regarding the blockade’s legitimacy in political terms. Neutral trade is further complicated by the fact that merchant vessels often simultaneously carrying goods to multiple destinations. These might include landlocked countries that (paradoxically) may be particularly sensitive to interruptions to maritime trade with transit countries.183 Goods might even be traded even while in transit; Sean Mirski argues “the idea of ‘enemy commerce’ on the high seas no longer holds”.184 Further, the lessons of the two most recent examples of guerre de course- the Iran-Iraq Tanker War (1980s) and the continued activities of pirates around the horn of Africa- could be applied to a prospective economic blockade, in that in both instances the international community reacted strongly to the disruption of maritime trade.185

While the ‘blockades’ of the world wars are important episodes in the history of blockading, they perhaps present questionable precedents for future blockades in operational and political terms. Perhaps most significantly, the practice of sinking enemy commerce on sight is relatively anomalous in the history of maritime warfare. Julian Corbett alluded to this in Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, when he argued that

The current term "Commerce destruction" is not in fact a logical expression of the strategical idea. To make the position clear we should say "Commerce prevention.”186

Thus, it was only a century ago that the practice of sinking rather than capturing vessels deemed to be carrying contraband became the fashion. Moreover this occurred during a state of total war, at a time when the blockading tool of the day was generally the submarine and to a lesser extent aircraft, which were not conducive to capturing ships as prizes. If a blockade is to be based on capture rather than destruction of blockade-runners, the point of historical comparison arguably shifts to the pre-U-Boat (commercial blockade) era. Capturing enemy ships, rather than destroying them, was based on factors such as the value of sea-worthy sailing ships and their cargo, as well as their relative indestructability compared with modern vessels due to contemporary ship construction and armaments. The

182 Heinegg, 'Blockade', p. 1; 183 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, pp. 88, 139. 184 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China', p. 397; 185 Elleman & Paine, Commerce Raiding, p. 2. 186 Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, p. 141.

50 increasing size of merchant ships today could be an interesting point of historical comparison here, as there is discrepancy between this and the limited capacity of many naval weapons systems and platforms.187 The distinction between commerce destruction and prevention is important in moral-political terms for several reasons. Although in either case the population of the blockadee might suffer, there is a loss of life among merchant ships’ crews implied by the destructive paradigm. Moreover, the environmental destruction resulting from sinking large bulk carriers, Very- and Ultra- Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs and ULCCs), would likely prove to be catastrophic. SLOCs through littoral chokepoints that provide opportunities for interdiction also pose risks of environmental devastation.188 In some respects there is limited historical precedent for environmental considerations in war due to the scale of the potential damage resulting from the size of modern merchant vessels, and the increasing global attention given to such issues.189 To sink a modern tanker vessel would result in tens of thousands of tons of crude oil or petroleum products being spilled into the ocean. In a narrow SLOC bottleneck such those in South East Asia, the environmental devastation could be disastrous; entire ecological systems might be damaged or destroyed. The subsequent ruination of local economies and cultural activities that are reliant on fishing for trade and sustenance would be disastrous, potentially creating poverty and subsequent socio-political unrest in littoral states. This has clear international political implications too for the legitimacy of a blockade, as well as in terms of internal public opinion in the blockading state.

Several general observations may therefore be made regarding the politico- moral implications of adopting an economic blockade. How the argument for such a strategy is to be framed diplomatically is a key strategic question that goes to the political viability of the blockade in terms of neutral, global and indeed domestic opinion for the blockader. The moral justification of the strategy, including its effects on civilians and neutrals, is closely linked to the legal basis of any blockade. While most forms of modern warfare impact heavily on civilians, an economic blockade is to some degree a fundamental attack on a state’s survival, which almost inevitably flows on to affect civilians. This should itself be a consideration for a potential

187 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, p. 77; Today the largest merchant ships typically cost in excess of US$100 million to build. International Maritime Organisation (IMO), International Shipping Facts and Figures- Information Resources on Trade, Safety, Security, Environment, p. 7. 188 World Oil Transit Chokepoints, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), August 22, 2012, http://www.eia.gov/countries/regions-topics.cfm?fips=WOTC passim. 189 Thus, modern tankers such as VLCCs are many times the size of even the biggest converted Japanese whale factory ship-tankers sunk by US submarines in World War Two. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Impact of Oil Spillage from World War II Tanker Sinkings, Campbell, Brad, Ed, Kern and Horn, Dean, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1977,

51 blockader. A further challenge that arises goes to the blockade’s legitimacy, and the fact that the arguments for a blockader are complex, unlike the probable objections of the blockadee. While ‘hunger blockades’ are probably consigned to history absent a total war, the muted response of the international community to the sieges and other humanitarian calamities currently happening in parts of Syria indicate that civilian suffering is not necessarily in itself a catalyst for political or military intervention. What might be is a broad and long-term detrimental impact on the economies and polities of regional neighbours and other neutral parties. It can be surmised therefore that the impacts of an economic blockade on neutrals in the contemporary world are to an extent more politically significant than those on the population of the blockadee. This applies particularly if, as is often the case, the cooperation of neutral states is required at some level for the blockade to be strategically effective. The moral and political issues in terms of neutral trade, while largely addressed by the law of neutrality, must be considered, particularly as an escalating naval-maritime conflict in an area of high population and busy maritime traffic would undoubtedly have consequences for neutrals and belligerents alike. The smaller ‘footprint’ of maritime forces may be advantageous in terms of perceptions of excessive force, notwithstanding that this perception might be somewhat illusory in terms of its impact on civilians (as was arguably the case in Iraq during the 1990s).190 Like international legal considerations, politico-moral issues do not pose insurmountable obstacles to states’ adopting the most advantageous strategies- as we have seen consistently in history. Unlike legal considerations, there are potentially direct consequences for the viability of an economic blockade strategy, due to the link between global economic disruption and political pressure for the blockader. Further, although, as we shall see, inadequate legal justification can impact the legitimacy of an economic blockade, the sinking of a ULCC in a manner that directly impacts a key regional ally or neutral is likely to have more immediate- and less nebulous- consequences for its viability.

Economic blockades at the operational level; technology & intelligence Although an economic blockade is a strategic measure, operational feasibility is a crucial element to consider. Notable aspects of such sub-strategic considerations have historically included the role of technology, logistics and the criticality of intelligence. The latter also has a role of course at the strategic level in either influencing or informing strategic goals, the Allies’ exploitation of Ultra and other signals intelligence in World War Two being important examples; these advances were themselves game-changing.

190 Goldrick, 'Maritime Sanctions Enforcement against Iraq: 1990-2003’, locn. 4376.

52 Technological developments can therefore be fundamental to evolutions in the conduct of naval operations such as blockades. The demise of the close blockade in World War One- manifested in the clearing of the Grand Fleet from the North Sea- through the advent of submarines and mines (among other things), with all the legal and strategic ramifications it implied, is a key historical example.191 This was not entirely unforeseen, as the pre-war writings of observers such as Colonel Charles a Court Repington indicate, and as Admiral Fisher argued in a letter to the Prime Minister on May 14 1914,

And what is it that the coming of the submarine really means? It means that the whole foundation of our traditional naval strategy, which served us so well in the past, has been broken down. The foundation of that strategy was blockade… The ultimate purpose of the Fleet was to make blockade possible for us and impossible for our enemy... But with the advent of the long-range ocean-going submarine that has all gone. Surface ships can no longer either maintain or prevent blockade, and with the conception of blockade are broken up all the consequences, direct and indirect, that used to flow from it.192

Submarines proved to be effective at both undermining and enforcing blockades; their activities rapidly forced blockades to be slackened in both Northern and Southern European waters.193 Critically, submarines, like aircraft, could not easily capture ships as prizes, as we have seen. Their primary advantage- stealth- was antithetical to traditional conduct of a war on commerce. On the surface they were vulnerable to attack and in both World Wars Germany lacked sufficient numbers of U-Boats to escort prize vessels to port and maintain the ‘blockade’ of Britain. Thus emerged the destructive economic blockade. A key element of such blockade and blockade-like operations is the criticality of intelligence in terms of ship movements and the enemy’s strategic vulnerabilities, and how they can be exploited in an operational context. As Allied and German successes in World War Two highlight, intelligence can both help circumvent and enforce economic blockade (or blockade-like) operations. In the Pacific theatre

191 The Maritime Blockade of Germany, p. 3. 192 Charles Å Court Repington, 'New Wars for Old', Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 1910; Baron John Arbuthnot Fisher, Records by Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Fisher, Hodder & Staunton, New York, 1919, p. 182-3. 193 Henry John Newbolt and Julian Stafford Corbett, History of the Great War: Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence, vol. I-V, Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1920, http://www.naval-history.net/WW1Book-RN3b.htm p. 385. Submarine activities were, as Paul Halpern observed, the only challenge to Entente maritime power in the Mediterranean theatre. Paul Halpern, 'The War at Sea,' in Hew Strachan, The Oxford Illustrated History of the First World War, Kindle ebook: Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2014, locn. 2271.

53 however, Japan’s vulnerability in terms of tankers and fuel stocks was not appreciated until relatively late in the campaign, despite the Allies’ signals intelligence successes. In fact the US was unaware of Japan’s overall shortage of merchant shipping for the entire course of the war.194 Had Japan’s tanker shortage in particular been comprehended earlier, it could have had a significant impact on the US submarine campaign, which ultimately climaxed in 1944.195 US submarines- and thus the intelligence they utilised- were often used “tactically and reactively”, rather than strategically.196 Political and economic intelligence, much of which might be ‘unclassified’, is therefore as vital for the formation of strategy, while intelligence on ship movements and the like can inform commanders about how the strategy can be pursued in operational terms. The latter can help prosecute the chosen blockade strategy; the former can tell us whether it is a practical consideration in the first place, and how quickly and to what extent it is working. Without reliable intelligence and the means to exploit it, an economic blockade can become essentially passive, comparable to that of the Union Navy against Confederate blockade-runners, which at times involved blockade vessels “drifting”, with no apparent purpose beyond keeping post.197 This was some time after the Union had received intelligence that cleverly designed blockade-runners were being constructed in European shipyards.198 The Civil War blockade was thus far from watertight. It was a matter of coincidence that most often led to a blockade-runner being captured as, in the absence of any systematic intelligence, coordination and communication, blockade-runners were only sighted if they were unfortunate enough to sail or steam into visual range of a blockade ship. Rear Admiral Du Pont observed sourly that

A navy of thirty-five available modern vessels… counted for almost nothing as an effectual barrier to commerce along 3,000 miles of coast.199

Although strategic goals must be operationally feasible, it does not necessarily follow that a blockade must be operationally flawless to perform its function at a strategic level. Thus, the blockade was ‘effective’ because it was not challenged to an extent

194 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 191. 195 United States Strategic Bombing Survey, The War against Japanese transportation 1941-1945, 1947, p. 7. 196 Clay Blair, Silent Victory: The US Submarine War Against Japan, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2001, p. 182. 197 Craig L Symonds, Edited with Commentary, Charleston Blockade: The Journals of John B. Marchand, US Navy, 1861-1862, Naval War College Press, Newport, 1976, p. 247. 198 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 2245. 199 James Russell Soley, Daniel Ammen and Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Navy in the Civil War: The Blockade and the Cruisers, vol. 1, C. Scribner's Sons, New York, 1895, p. 44.

54 that could undermine it, and it was able to have an impact on the Confederate economy. The US Civil War blockade also illustrates the historical challenges of maintaining and re-supplying blockade vessels. As highlighted earlier in this thesis, naval blockades have proven detrimental to the survivability of ships, and this was a key factor limiting the scope of early naval blockades.200 Even steam-powered vessels that were able to hold a position in adverse weather were not immune to damage from the elements, as experienced by the Union Navy during the US Civil War.201 It may even be that the flexibility of steam power gave false sense of security in terms of vessels’ capabilities, particularly with regard to the use of side-wheel steamers (rather than single or twin screw-propelled vessels) in the open ocean.202 The armed merchant cruisers of Britain’s World War One economic blockade are also a useful historical illustration of this need for appropriate vessels to maintain a blockade. Their size and configuration allowed them to stay at sea longer and endure more arduous conditions than the old cruisers they replaced.203 Thus, warships that are designed with combat in mind may not be suitable for a blockade in which capturing blockade-runners, rather than sinking them, is the objective.

Developments at the operational and tactical levels of naval warfare are clearly able to influence the development of strategy, often via the impacts of new technologies. New weapons, vessel types and means of communications have proven significant to the employment of blockades, as have indirect elements such as logistics. The kinds of weapons and platforms that essentially ended the viability of close blockades (small, fast, heavily armed surface and sub-surface vessels) are today as popular and inexpensive as ever, relative to broader maritime power. Under the rubric of A2/AD they continue to be a key element of counter-maritime strategies in particular. Signals intelligence similarly revolutionised the conduct of blockade and blockade-like operations, evidenced by the US submarine campaign. The vast amounts of data available in the globalized era, and various cyber, space and other

200 Supra, pp. 12-13. 201 ‘Inclosure 2 in No. 43: Commander Hickley to Rear-Admiral Sir A. Milne’, in: North America No. 8: Papers Relating to the Blockade of the Ports of the Confederate States, Online (2011): Foreign Office- Great Britain, London, 1862, https://archive.org/details/papersrelatingtogrea p. 39; Symonds, Charleston Blockade, p. 126; James M McPherson, War on the Waters: The Union and Confederate Navies, 1861-1865, University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2012, p. 47. 202 Symonds, Charleston Blockade, p. 220; ‘Victualling: difficulties supplying the fleet off Brest, 1759: Captain Robert Pett, Victualing Commissioner, to the Victualing Commissioners, Plymouth, 10 August 1759’, in: British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, pp. 442-3. Replenishment at sea by auxiliary ships and aircraft has alleviated this somewhat today, and advances as simple as improved communications between the crews of deployed vessels and their loved ones are also beneficial in terms of morale. 203 The Maritime Blockade of Germany, p. 1. See, for example, ‘Note by W. H. Whiting, Superintendent of Contract Work’, 24 February 1915, in Ibid. pp. 115-5.

55 EW mediums capable of processing and exploiting it, suggests that signals intelligence too will be a critical element of any future great power conflicts.

56 A state’s relative vulnerabilities to economic blockade should be assessed with an eye to both their individual relevance and combined significance. Geography and associated elements set the physical context of a blockade. Long or bottlenecked SLOCs can inform considerations at the operational level. Whether the blockadee is a continental or maritime power can affect the strategic function of an economic blockade. A relatively landlocked state might still be vulnerable, although each state’s boundaries and composition of neighbours is unique. The same state may not be as vulnerable to blockade a second time if its relations with terrestrial neighbours have improved. The significance of a large regional or global power sharing a land border with a blockadee is also clearly not to be underestimated. The configuration of a county’s economy, trade volumes and finances are natural considerations in the context of an economic blockade. This goes to the internal economic conditions, relations with land-border trading partners (as above) and global economic complexities. Also of critical concern is the relationship in a blockadee between economic and political power. While mercantilism has declined, trading with the enemy- albeit indirectly- took some time to control in World War One; in today’s more complex environment this might take even longer. Other issues such as the decline of trade regulation and states’ influence over financial markets would today be in play. It is difficult to say how these issues might influence an economic blockade strategy but certainly they would be complicating variables. This might render economic warfare an essential support to the strategic goals of an economic blockade. Economic blockade absent other draconian economic warfare measures has been shown historically to be more acceptable to neutrals and in domestic politics during war, but also less effective- the economic blockade of Imperial Germany being a classic case. To have a significant immediate impact they arguably have to be particularly restrictive, hence unpopular with virtually all other parties, internal and external to the conflict itself. The alternative is for them to be a long-term measure as in the blockade of Iraq 1990-2003, which may not be appropriate or efficacious in all circumstances. This operation also raised issues of the effect of such a measure on civilians, which despite the distinct benefits of UN sponsorship, was a controversial issue in international opinion. Questions of the extent to which global or domestic opinion might tolerate either civilian suffering or neutral disenfranchisement are necessarily hypothetical, and the matter of how the conflict started could be critical to this. Nevertheless they must be considered in both moral-political and- as we shall see- legal terms.

57 The role of economic blockade in a wider strategy & the question of strategic effectiveness The strategic context in which a blockade is employed is an important thematic element in the history of blockading, influencing both how a given blockade functions and how it should be considered. The question of how a given economic blockade’s effectiveness can be measured in strategic terms is a corollary of this dimension, as well as being related to- though not synonymous with- the legal the principle of effectiveness.204 This is a key challenge to analysing the efficacy of an economic blockade that is undertaken, as is often the case, as part of a broader strategy, containing multiple theatres and operational elements. In such cases, quantifying the impact of a single component in terms of overall success or failure may not always be possible. The strategic goals of an economic blockade itself are also an important historical variable to consider. Britain’s victory in its war against the US (1812-1815), which involved an effective fleet-commercial blockade, still left the US in a functioning position. In a manner not uncommon in the era of wars on commerce, Britain’s strategic goals were relatively limited, and this allowed the US to build upon its strengths in resources, geography and population through the nineteenth century and industrial revolution.205 Crushing military defeat- in part by fleet-economic blockade- was not a bar to long-term prosperity. The Iraq sanctions-blockade (1990-2003) indicates that longer-term economic-maritime pressure may be effective (absent land-power) if the strategic objectives are limited. Given that like all blockades it was not 100% effective and that action ashore was politically unviable, it can be viewed as being effective within the realities of its own historical context. The sanctions had specific functions in terms of responding to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and subsequently the preclusion of WMD proliferation, and the scope of the naval-blockade element was therefore clearly delineated by UN decrees. Whether a blockade can be both legal and strategically effective is a key question for potential blockading powers to consider. Of particular importance in the World War contexts is the fact that the belligerents relied on reprisals rather than the right of blockade, due to the latter’s legal limitations. In both contexts determinations of what is ‘effective’ must be made on a case by case basis, as there is no arbitrary or default definition thereof.206 Cobb notes in Preparing for Blockade 1885-1914,

204 See International Law section Infra, p. 67. 205 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn 1850. 206 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 277; Infra, p. 71.

58 In British practice, the effectiveness of a blockade was a matter of empirical judgment [and] was judged on results.207

Here we see the conundrum of a blockade's strategic effectiveness being ascertainable only retrospectively. The limitations of maritime power were an on-going preoccupation of Britain in its relations with continental Europe.208 Tracy underscored this chink in British grand strategy:

It was unfortunate for Britain, and for the advocates of sea power, that naval force and the economic strength it produced could rarely be translated into political influence without the agency of an army.209

The efficacy of naval action alone in impacting events on land has been a long- standing challenge for maritime powers. The Anglo-Dutch Wars provide one of the few examples of a maritime conflict in which warfare ashore played limited, in any role.210 But even with an army engaged in a concurrent land campaign, an effective economic blockade is naturally not a guarantee of ultimate strategic success. The Union’s fleet-economic blockade of the Confederacy during the US Civil War was part of a strategy centred on a land campaign, although it was originally conceived as a dual strategy ‘by land and sea’:

The decision to impose a fleet blockade on the Southern Confederacy was among the first strategic decisions made by the North in the Civil War. It was originally proposed by Gen. … who saw it as one part of a grand scheme for ending the rebellion. Blockade their ports, he said, maintain a steady military pressure on their armies... The rebellious states would thus be weakened economically and Southern leaders might even come to recognize the extent of their dependence on the North and rejoin

207 Cobb, Preparing for Blockade, p. 68. 208 ‘Letter from Sir Charles Middleton to Philip Patton’, 27 June 1794, in: The Channel Fleet and the Blockade of Brest, 1793-1801, pp. 45-6. 209 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 62. 210 In these trade-wars, the issues of mercantilism and national prestige were both contributing factors. For our purposes the mercantilist aspects are of less interest than matters of Holland’s geographical and economic dependence on maritime trade, as well as how political competition between the two states manifested in a maritime environment. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, pp. 48-9.

59 the Union. [This] scheme remained the foundation around which Union plans were made.211

Undertaking a blockade in isolation, without any form of land campaign, was the antithesis of what General Scott proposed, although some still considered land war as being incompatible with the goal of re-uniting all states. In a sense this embryonic plan called for a broad strategic of the Confederacy: a coercive siege by land and sea of almost continental proportions.212 The significance of continental warfare in supplementing the impacts of an economic blockade by ensuring that land communications are as paralysed as those at sea, can therefore be critical. Years of static on the Western Front in World War One, which negated the prospect of Britain’s economic blockade being circumvented by continental trade, are perhaps the most striking example of this in high-intensity industrialised warfare.213 Conversely, cross-border trade with Canada during the War of 1812 allowed Britain’s land forces to be resupplied, even as the latter’s blockade suffocated America’s maritime trade.214 For the Civil War blockade, the concept of applying of attritional pressure on the South at a societal level stood in contrast to the blockade’s ultimate strategic value in denying the Confederacy finances and war materiel. Simultaneously, the blockade’s suppression of the Confederate navy (such as it was) gave the Union access to littoral areas, and enabled joint riverine and littoral operations that led to the capture of key strategic locations.215 The blockade largely succeeded in the complete constriction of the South’s commerce, particularly its cotton exports, causing the devaluation of the currency and some shortages of imported goods.216 As James M. McPherson observed,

As an agricultural society with little industry, the Confederacy was heavily dependent on imports of war materiel and export of

211 Ibid. p. x. 212 Scott, a patriot who wished to preserve as many American lives as possible, had at best developed a strategic framework- that is, a general idea of how the South could be defeated- rather than a comprehensive plan of war. 213 Ibid. p. 254. 214 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn 1815. 215 McPherson, War on the Waters. passim. 216 Soley, Ammen and Mahan, The Navy in the Civil War, p. 45; Thomas C DeLeon, Four Years in Rebel Capitals: An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy, From Birth to Death, Gossip Print Co., Mobile, 1890, p. 298; John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia, 2010, http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31087 p. 22, 76.

60 cotton to pay for it. An effective blockade would do serious damage to this process.217

The Confederate economy was therefore not a goal in itself of the blockade, as had typically been the case in preceding Anglo-French wars, nor did it act as a coercive measure of limited naval force prior to actual hostilities. The blockade, including its commercial goal of interdicting the Confederacy’s means of war-finance, is rather an example of a classic ‘maritime strategy’ in support of the primary theatre on land.218 Questions regarding the role of blockades and naval power more broadly intensified in the twentieth century. In 1945 questions arose among US military leaders regarding whether the blockade of Japan was sufficient to force Japan’s surrender. This blockade involved the interdiction of inbound raw materials- particularly oil- and the interception of many of Japan’s remaining capital ships.219 After the US capture of Okinawa (completed by July 1945), many senior USN officers believed the naval and air blockade should be continued to force Japan’s surrender.220 In contrast, MacArthur and others argued stridently against relying on blockade alone:

Blockade and bombing are powerful weapons indeed… but decisive results in modern war can be achieved only through the combined efforts of all three forces- ground, naval, and air. No one or no two of them can obtain victory. The strongest military element of Japan is the army, which must be defeated. This can be done only by the use of large ground forces. It is useless and misleading to talk of short cuts. They do not exist.221

Further, scholars such as Elleman have questioned the significance of the blockade in terms of Japan’s decision to surrender when compared with Russia’s declaration of

217 McPherson, War on the Waters, p. 25. Moreover, the Union the blockade served the further purpose of vitiating the South’s political legitimacy. 218 Mahan, 'Blockade in Relation to Naval Strategy', p. 1059. 219 Additionally, the US’ interdiction of outbound Japanese troops, equipment and supplies provided valuable support to US forces attempting to retake conquered territories in South East Asia and the Western Pacific. United States Strategic Bombing Survey, The War against Japanese transportation 1941-1945, p. 2. A distinction must be drawn here between the blockade of Japan and the US submarine campaign that preceded it. The latter was, as has been well documented, a highly effective example of fleet-guerre de course strategy, although Davis and Engerman characterize it as a blockade. 220 Baer, One Hundred Years of Sea Power, p. 268. 221 Frank Dexter, 'Jap Army Must Be Defeated, Says MacArthur', Jap Army Must Be Defeated, 17 February 1944, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article26010698. MacArthur’s bias towards his own service should not be overlooked here, however.

61 war against Japan, and of course the US’ use of atomic weapons.222 Moreover there were other disincentives in the US polity to the sort of ‘Versailles-like’ settlement that is ultimately implied by a victory by protracted blockade.223

We have seen that, historically, economic blockades have rarely been used in isolation, partially for strategic reasons, and, as discussed, because there are various non-belligerent options for blockade-like measures.224 We can argue that, in purely military terms, the concomitant use of direct action ashore is typically more conducive to the speedy conclusion of any conflict than economic blockade alone.

Measuring the unmeasurable? The above conclusion has ramifications for measuring an economic blockade’s effectiveness, as singling out individual elements such as an economic blockade from a broader strategy may often be problematic in terms of determining their ultimate impacts. The afore-mentioned food shortages in Germany subsequent to the British economic blockade in World War One are a case in point. Davis and Engerman have referenced the blockade’s relatively high impact on German civilian food rations and mortality rates compared to Britain.225 This at least suggests a measurable impact, but as Geoffrey Till argued, it may be difficult to argue that Germany’s food shortages were a direct result of the blockade alone, or that food was necessarily the resource most significantly lacking in Germany at the time.226 Alan Kramer argues that the blockade’s greatest impact was on materiel required to sustain the German War effort.227 But the general strains of war on the German economy were perhaps the most fundamental issue, for which the blockade was at best only an amplifying factor; the German military’s consumption of food, materiel and manpower were critical factors exacerbated by the blockade.228 Importantly, shortages, particularly of food, were amplified by German maladministration.229 Some elements are inseparable: the blockade of nitrates (used for making ammunition but also fertiliser) impacted food production in Germany, and was arguably as significant as the blockade of food itself. Food shortages impacted

222 Elleman, 'A comparative historical approach to blockade strategies: implications for China’, locn. 8936. 223 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 192. Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 5329. See also: Blair, Silent Victory. passim. 224 Supra, p. 29. 225 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn 3601. 226 Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century. locn. 5969. 227 Kramer, 'Blockade and economic warfare’, 228 Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, p. 254. 229 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, pp. 144-5.

62 civilian and, via new recruits, military morale.230 The latter is difficult to measure but not impossible, as Davis and Engerman’s work indicates.231 Like most blockades in history, the economic blockade of Germany in World War One was one of several important elements that contributed to the Allies’ victory; few historians argue that it was either solely responsible or entirely inconsequential. Hence John D. Grainger characterises the blockade as both “a war-winning weapon [but] not, however, the decisive weapon, as its vaunters imply.”232 A comparable situation emerges in assessments of the US Civil War blockade. As Nicholas Tracy has observed, fundamental issues of maladministration and poor coordination between the Confederate states were amplified by the blockade, rather than being triggered by it; in fact the blockade was often used as an excuse for inaction by the Confederate leadership. Many of the issues cited by Tracy, such as states’ independence from each other and the primarily agrarian Southern economy, were also the basis of the Confederacy’s attempted secession.233 Such shortcomings could also occur below the level of state governance, and again, enemy action often had more of an amplifying than a catalytic effect. Thus, although British shipbuilding in the early eighteenth century at times suffered a want of good timber, which at times had to be sourced from overseas, deficient practices in its storage and distribution had far greater detrimental consequences than the import challenges from North America and the Baltic.234 Comparable logistical and management issues were also extant in World War Two Britain, and were exacerbated by the U-Boat attacks on her North Atlantic SLOCs.235

Some blockade-like strategies have been relatively easy to quantify in terms of pure tonnage interdicted and sunk. The British blockade of America in the war of 1812 was proven initially ineffective by the mass exodus of American privateers from the ‘blockaded’ ports.236 Over the course of the war Britain was able to direct more resources towards it. American trade statistics from the time illustrate the ultimate effect of the blockade:

230 Paul Halpern, 'World War I: The Blockade,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, 231 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locs. 3836, 3546. 232 The Maritime Blockade of Germany, pp. 18-19. Measuring effectiveness through the number of ships intercepted by the blockade was theoretically possible but could not have been conclusive in terms of its ultimate effect. Ibid. 233 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 93. Nevertheless ,Tracy describes the US Civil War as “a turning point in the history of maritime strategy”, through the perhaps overestimated impacts of the Union blockade. Ibid. p. 95. 234 ‘The faults of British Ships, 1745’: Commodore Charles Knowles to Lord Winchelsea, First Lord of the Admiralty, Superbe, Antigua, 6 January 1745; & ‘The search for shipbuilding timber, 1788’: Captain Henry Duncan, Commissioner of Halifax Dockyard, Rear Admiral Sir Charles Middleton, Controller of the Navy, 30 September 1788, in: British Naval Documents, 1204-1960, pp. 489, 503. 235 Milner, 'The Atlantic war, 1939-1945', p. 484. 236 Dudley, 'The Flawed British Blockade, 1812-15’, locn. 898.

63

In 1811, the value of real exports stood at $47.7 million, by 1814 the value had fallen to $5.4 million, a decline of 88 percent…The data for the real value of imports also underscores the effectiveness of the blockade. The real value of those imports declined by 91 percent- from $59.8 million in 1812 to $5.6 million in 1814.237

These statistics indicate that the blockade was ultimately effective, despite the initial challenges. Similarly, the US submarine campaign against Japan in World War Two proved devastating, as post-war records indicate.238 There were however challenges in analysing reports accurately. Submarine commanders would submit their patrol reports, including estimates of tonnage sunk, for endorsement. An excerpt from Read Admiral Thomas Kinkaid’s endorsement of USS Bowfin’s second war patrol report to the Commander in Chief, US Pacific Fleet reads:

This outstanding patrol resulting in the destruction of 70, 948 tons of enemy shipping, including a large tanker, is a brilliant page to be added to our annals of submarine warfare.239

Such high official estimates of tonnage sunk on a given patrol were typically lowered on subsequent analysis, and post-war assessments often revealed even these relatively conservative estimates to be too generous. The discrepancies could not always be attributed to the flawed leadership and faulty torpedoes that dogged the US submarine campaign for much of the war.240 This perhaps calls into question the usefulness of human estimations of a given blockade-like measure’s impact at the tactical level. The US did have the advantage of an excellent source of intelligence at this time through the ability to read essentially “every bit of traffic” in Japanese radio communications by the latter stages of the war.241 Cryptographers were able to find

237 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 1874. 238 See: United States Strategic Bombing Survey, The War against Japanese transportation 1941-1945; Japanese Naval and Merchant Shipping Losses During World War II by All Causes, U.S. Govt. Print. Off, Washington, 1947, 239 US Submarine War Patrol Report (WWII): SS-287 USS Bowfin (Pt 1) 1943-4, Historical Naval Ships Association (HNSA), Washington: 1951; Republished by: ISSUU, 16 July 1974; Retrieved: October 1, 2014. http://issuu.com/hnsa/docs/ss-287_bowfin_part1 240 Blair, Silent Victory, p. 386. & passim. 241 National Security Agency, Oral History Interview with DR. SOLOMON KULLBACK, H.F. Schorreck and R.D. Farley, 1982, p. 36.

64 out directly or indirectly that their work was producing results in terms of Japanese ships intercepted.242 To that extent the real-time effectiveness of the US submarine campaign was recognised. Moreover its effectiveness in major-strategic terms is not disputed.243 Then again, as we have seen, another lesson from the US submarine campaign is that any amount of intelligence and statistics is of little value if it is not properly assessed and the lessons comprehended.

The idea that a blockade’s effectiveness, or lack thereof, is impossible to measure is clearly a fallacy. Statistics have in some instances been available, if not in real time then soon enough to ascertain that the blockade was a good use of resources. Nevertheless, it is also evident that a blockade’s effectiveness in terms of its contribution to the result of a war overall can be difficult to measure, because blockades are typically indirect in strategic terms during a general war. Tonnages can be quantified, whereas the mindsets of statesmen and the experiences of individuals in the blockaded state are often more elusive. Moreover, the often long duration of economic blockades adds to such difficulties, as their impacts are cumulative. Retrospective analysis is often the most revealing. Goldrick’s observation that “blockades are easier to assess in retrospect than in execution” is well founded, and underscores the difficulties facing any state planning for or attempting a blockade strategy.244

Time and escalation An economic blockade is a manifestation of economic warfare in the most literal sense in that it uses military power against an enemy state via its economy. Such a fundamental attack on the state’s prosperity and perhaps its survival is potentially escalatory, although James Cable has observed that actions at sea, such as stopping a merchant ship, are often regarded more benignly than equivalent ones on land.245 Yet because economic blockades have been relatively uncommon in recent history- particularly absent an associated - there is more conjecture than firm evidence that they pose more of a risk of escalation than a clash between military or paramilitary forces at sea. Today, any incident can be reported, manipulated or amplified to a political end. Perhaps the most critical aspect of economic blockade in terms of escalation is that they condition the scope of the conflict (to include the politico-economic fundaments of the blockadee), and, as we shall see, its duration.

242 Ibid. p. 81. 243 United States Strategic Bombing Survey, The War against Japanese transportation 1941-1945, pp. 80-1. 244 Goldrick, 'Maritime Sanctions Enforcement against Iraq: 1990-2003’, locn. 4364. 245 Cable, Gunboat Diplomacy, p. 92.

65 As Corbett argued, an economic blockade is very much a long-term strategy; historically it has not shown short-term results. This is also a matter of practicalities in terms of implementing the given blockade and overcoming the challenges unique to each situation. Britain’s blockade of the US in the War of 1812 and economic blockade of Germany in World War One took time and adjustment to be effective.246 If a state can act quickly before an economic blockade ‘bites’, it might be rendered superfluous. It could be argued contrariwise that the more complex economic relationships are, the earlier the impact of an economic blockade may be felt, particularly if it is part of a wider economic warfare strategy. The Admiralty’s plan for “fast-acting” economic warfare measures against Germany in the lead up to World War One arguably supports this case.247 Yet if a blockadee is willing and able to withstand these impacts for a time, it may be able to bring other resources to bear in other theatres to offset any vulnerability to economic warfare. Likewise, the blockading power will be at an advantage if it can itself withstand the economic and political consequences of engaging in economic warfare (including economic blockade). Britain’s economic warfare plans before World War One were, as we have seen, based on this very premise.248 In cases in which the blockadee is perceived to be to some extent resistant to economic blockade in the short term, the temptation will exist for the blockading power to increase the scope or severity of its measures, thus increasing the risk of escalation. Economic blockade alone arguably has a similar potential for escalation today to broader economic warfare, noting that the latter might have more rapid impacts. The danger of an economic warfare/economic blockade strategy triggering a response from the blockadee that might lead to general war is therefore not to be taken lightly. It has been argued that there is a “potential for escalation intrinsic to an attack on maritime trade”, and similarly that a failed economic blockade invites aggression on the part of the blockadee.249 An effective economic blockade could also trigger an escalatory response by the blockaded state. This conundrum could explain in part the relative unpopularity of economic blockade in recent history cited by Heinegg.250

Economic blockades have proven to be useful adjuncts of a broader strategy, rather than of particular merit in themselves. Their greatest impact has been on the inner workings of blockaded states- a long-term process- and combining with issues

246 Similarly, the impacts on the fighting capability of blockaded ships from the close fleet blockades of the sail era naturally took time. 247 Lambert, Planning Armageddon, pp. 3-4. 248 Ibid. & passim. 249 Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 121; Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 6739. 250 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 204.

66 already present, such as maladministration. It is due to their amplifying impacts on the consequences of broader war that they require both time and parallel campaigns, as in World War One. To the extent that they are attacks on the survivability of the blockadee, economic blockades can be seen as potentially escalatory. Yet the fact that they require parallel land campaigns to be effective- and have rarely been used without them- perhaps negates this potential, as land warfare is more escalatory than economic blockade alone. This suggests a distinction in terms of escalation between the intensity of the conflict, which economic blockade can minimise, and its scope and duration, which it typically increases.

67 On International law & economic blockade The history of international blockade-law has been characterised by slow evolution, largely due to disparate interests among states who would either wield or be susceptible to blockades. The fact that states with differing degrees of economic and naval power often disagreed in terms of what was justifiable- over hundreds of years- on this subject should perhaps not be surprising. In war, neutral states’ interests were often antithetical to those of belligerents in general, and potential blockading powers in particular. Here we will examine the progression of key elements of international law pertaining to blockades, and the historical contexts in which they arose, in order to understand the current legal circumstances and potential future developments. We have seen how the first economic blockades appeared around five centuries ago in Europe, although measures analogous to blockade occurred even earlier.251 While the actions of states can over time alter or even abrogate customary international law, any regulation- including legal regimes- cannot occur in a vacuum and must naturally be preceded by the actions that they seek to control. Once common trends and norms emerge, predictive guidelines can be set until new norms appear, whether through technological innovation, economic trends or political and socio-economic changes. The law to this extent can be seen as reactive, and the broader theme of regulatory regimes seeking to adequately respond to technological developments is one that continues today. A further point of consideration is that the scope of discourse on international law was understandably limited in the early days of blockading, as the very concept of such law was still in its infancy.252 The concept of blockade was also, as Colombos argued, predicated on the existence of guaranteed freedoms for neutral commerce.253 In a similar fashion to economic and technological developments, international blockade law can also be seen as variously shaping belligerents’ behaviour- or being shaped by it- as a result of wartime experiences. In terms of belligerent practice during the World Wars, Heinegg observes that considerable disagreement persists regarding the extent to which ‘the tail wagged the dog’ in relation to international blockade law (that is, did law shape belligerents’ actions or vice versa?).254 Stone argued that the operational necessity of Britain’s resort to distant blockade in World War One rendered it a precedential change to “the traditional law of blockade”, as opposed to being an aberration.255 As another scholar has pointed out, the degree to which international law is observed in a given conflict can be traced directly to the belligerents’ level of military power and the intensity of the conflict; the higher the stakes, the less international law is adhered

251 Roscoe, 'The Evolution of Commercial Blockade', p. 347. 252 Ibid. p. 348. 253 Colombos, International Law of the Sea, pp. 768-9. 254 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 209. 255 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 292, ff. 50.

68 to.256 Further, while the principles underlying the standard definitions of blockade are largely uncontroversial, numerous key areas of blockade-law remain unresolved and have consistently been so historically. Thus, the degree to which civilian aircraft would be subject to a blockade (naval or economic), and how the blockade could be enforced in their case vis-a-vis prize law, has been a matter of contention since 1945.257

Blockade-law has several key criteria that are delineated in most of the accepted general definitions of blockade, such as the requirement of defining the temporal and physical parameters of a blockade. This element is closely linked with the requirement of a belligerent to ‘declare’ any blockade to the international community or relevant society of states (depending on the historical context). The San Remo Manual states that

A blockade shall be declared and notified to all belligerents and neutral States [and that]

The declaration shall specify the commencement, duration, location, and extent of the blockade and the period within which vessels of neutral States may leave the blockaded coastline.258

While declaring a blockade is clearly beneficial for neutral states that may have vessels in the blockaded area, it is also in the blockader’s interest; the latter wishes to end all relevant maritime traffic, and having other states do this voluntarily is clearly a better use of resources than engaging in a blockade surreptitiously. This also applies to the advantages of a blockade having clear parameters to minimise unintentional breaches and similar misunderstandings.259 Yet the age-old desire of belligerents to expend their resources efficiently has historically resulted in ‘perversions’ of the concept of blockading at both the

256 D. P. O'Connell, The Influence of Law on Sea Power, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 1975, cited in: Fenrick, 'The Exclusion Zone Device in the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 91. 257 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 291, ff. 42; While the legal principle of the inclusion of aircraft in blockade-law is not doubted, the potential practical difficulties with such a measure are considerable. Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, p. 283, ff. 1. As an example of this principle, Article 53(i), Chapter VII of the 1923 Hague Rules of states that “A neutral private aircraft is liable to capture if it… is engaged in breach of a blockade.” Roberts and Guelff, Documents on the Laws of War, p. 151. See also: Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 292, ff. 53. 258 International Institute of Humanitarian Law, San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, Section II: Methods of Warfare- Blockade, para. 93. The San Remo Manual represents as much as is possible the current agreed state of the laws of naval warfare. 259 According to some states declaration did not necessarily imply a formal diplomatic notification; this could in theory have been come from naval commanders at the tactical or operational level. Oppenheim, Oppenheim’s International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, p. 775.

69 operational and strategic level. Rather than being accidental, such examples typically involved the cynical declaration of a blockade that the blockader had no capacity or intention to enforce, and which were designed to disrupt the enemy’s economy in favour of their own. These were the so-called ‘paper’ or ‘fictitious’ blockades. They were in many respects synonymous with economic blockades of the sail era and the associated mercantilist approach to international trade, which saw a great deal of overt interference by states in each others’ economic affairs. Such measures in turn had significant negative side-effects regarding the development of international law. The extensive use of fictitious blockades by states including Holland, England/Britain and France created significant disquiet among neutral states, leading to calls for and ultimately the adoption of one of the more significant changes in blockade law: the principle of effectiveness. This was first called for in 1780 by Katherine II of Russia, although it would take almost another century to be accepted by maritime states, during which Napoleon declared his continental blockade of Britain- one of the most fictitious blockades in history.260 Silvia Marzagalli has observed that the decree of the Continental System was shorter than its own preamble- a brevity that was not synonymous with clarity.261 Britain’s practices at the time were similarly dubious- its Orders in Council were, Hecksher observed, “marvels of obscurity and rambling.”262 The period is generally considered to be regressive in terms of the evolution of international law relating to blockades.263 Even the Paris Declaration of 1856, which took place in the shadow of the Crimean War, was not definitive on the principle effectiveness, although it was the first time that major powers including Britain acknowledged its validity. The Declaration states that

Blockades, in order to be binding, must be effective, that is to say, maintained by a force sufficient really to prevent access to the coast by the enemy.264

260 As a member of the British House of Lords proclaimed- earning a laugh from his colleagues, “What was the use of [Napoleon] talking of blockading [Great] Britain, when he had scarcely a ship on the ocean to enforce his Orders? He might as well have talked of blockading the moon”. Lord Erskine addressing the House of Lords: Cobbet's Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), Covent Garden: Republished by: R. Bagshaw, 15 February 1808; Retrieved: April 20, 2016. 261 Silvia Marzagalli, 'Napoleon's Continental Blockade: An Effective Substitute to Naval Weakness?,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah Crosby Mallory Paine (ed.), Naval Power and Expeditionary Wars: Peripheral Campaigns and New Theatres of Naval Warfare, Routledge, 2010, locn. 732. 262 Heckscher, The Continental System, p. 114. 263 Heintschel von Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade and International Law,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Kindle: Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 443. 264 ‘Declaration Respecting Maritime Law’ (1856 Paris Declaration) in: Roberts and Guelff, Documents on the Laws of War, pp. 48-9.

70

Clarifications, including specifying what constitutes ‘effective’, were lacking in the Declaration; the result was not wide scale regulation through accepted international law but rather a retrospective case-by-case approach.265 It has been argued that this was merely the ratification of “a law universally recognised”- including by states not party to the Declaration.266 Thus, the legal effectiveness of the Union blockade of the Confederacy during the US Civil War was questioned at the time by both sides; the New York Times insisted that the Union’s “paper blockade” was “not such as international law demands” and that it must be made “impenetrable”.267 This was an impossible demand given the state of the Union Navy. Rather being a ‘paper blockade’ therefore, it was simply a reflection of the intent of the blockade power, combined with its naval-maritime capabilities at the operational level.268 The 1909 London Conference, although not ratified, clarified the matter of effectiveness, among others, and is broadly considered a reflection of customary international law, modified slightly by the necessary trend away from close blockade discussed earlier.269 At its essence was that there be sufficient “risk of capture”, rather than a certainty thereof.270 Yet, in a sense the twentieth century had its own equivalent of paper blockades (that is, in terms of resource-efficiency) in the use of blanket reprisal measures by belligerents in the World Wars.271 These, as Tucker argues, were aimed at “nothing less than the complete stoppage of enemy trade with the least possible commitment of surface naval forces”.272 The point is illustrated in a letter from the Admiralty secretary, W. Graham Greene, to the Commander-in-Chief, Grand Fleet, addressing the issue of the blockade’s alleged porousness:

[F]or geographical and other reasons, no blockade of Germany in the strict technical sense of the word has been declared… The measures which have been adopted aim at achieving a result similar to that intended by a regular blockade by restricting as far as possible the importation of commodities into Germany… [I]t would be impossible and undesirable under the existing procedures to detain every vessel bound for a neutral port which

265 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', pp. 206-7. 266 Soley, Ammen and Mahan, The Navy in the Civil War, p. 26. 267 ‘Privateering and Pickens’, New York Times, 15 July 1861, in: Blockade of the Confederate States, pp. 21-22. 268 Soley, Ammen and Mahan, The Navy in the Civil War, p. 26. The Confederacy attempted to characterise the blockade as fictitious, without success. Ibid. p. 88. 269 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 209. 270 Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 718. 271 As discussed in ‘Defining Blockade’, Supra, p. 23. 272 Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, p. 286, fn. 6.

71 is encountered by HM Ships, as though a blockade were in force.273

The ‘blockade’ was tightened after the anti-climax of Jutland, in part by forcing neutrals to choose which side they would trade with.274 Such measures enabled the blockade to be effective with limited resources. This is one of numerous examples that highlight the distinction that a blockade might be effective strategically but not so in legal terms.275 Legality is in such cases not necessarily of primary concern from the ‘blockading’-power’s perspective; it is perhaps more important that neutral states regard the measure as a de facto blockade, as they did in World War One.276 The legal principle of effectiveness continues to be fundamental to blockade law today. Section II, para. 95 of the San Remo Manual states, “A blockade must be effective. The question of whether a blockade is effective is a question of fact.”277 This is based on the prevailing circumstances surrounding the employment of a given blockade, as Heinegg argues:

While it is clear that “effectiveness” can no longer be judged in the light of technology of the 19th Century and, while the view is widely held that effectiveness continues to be a constitutive element of a legal blockade, it must be recognised that there are no criteria that would make possible an abstract determination of the effectiveness of all blockades.278

Consequently belligerents have applied “a large measure of discretion” when interpreting the principle of effectiveness.279 The London Conference also dealt with a further consistent point of historical controversy associated with the principle of effectiveness: the so-called doctrine of continuous voyage.280 This element of traditional blockade practices had been a hardship to the maritime commerce of neutral states since the era of Anglo-Dutch rivalries in which commercial blockade emerged. The doctrine allowed for the interdiction and confiscation of merchant vessels at any point in their journey (even

273 ‘W. Graham Greene to Commander-in-Chief Home Fleet’, Admiralty, 29 June 1916, in: The Maritime Blockade of Germany, pp. 471-2. 274 The Maritime Blockade of Germany, p. 447. 275 Or a blockade might meet the legal requirements of effectiveness while not having a significant strategic effect. 276 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 3602. 277 International Institute of Humanitarian Law, San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, 278 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 277. 279 Roberts and Guelff, Documents on the Laws of War, p. 48. 280 Originally the “droit de prevention” and “droit de suite”. Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', pp. 205-6.

72 en route to a neutral port), on the supposition that the ultimate destination of their cargo was a blockaded port or territory. The crime was thus the intention to breach a blockade, rather than the physical act of doing so.281 Such an ambiguous proposition was open to abuse or misinterpretation, or more often intended as an economic measure in support of the blockader’s own trade and/or a ruthlessly efficient means of crippling an enemy state. The doctrine was established formally by the Union to justify the interception of Confederate blockade runners during the US Civil War, and was further adapted to include transportation over land from a neutral port to an ultimate (belligerent) destination.282 Davis and Engerman have pointed out that this was the only deviation by the American state in terms of international maritime law prior to 1917- highlighting perhaps that principles are always expendable when necessary.283 Britain and France applied the doctrine of continuous voyage to “all contraband” in 1914, and the fact that the doctrine was not accepted by neutral states in World War One reflected the reliance of Britain and its allies on reprisals rather than blockade.284 Also highlighted by experiences surrounding the quasi-blockades of World War One was the question of distance. The most accepted alteration of the 1909 Declaration was the change to the requirement that a blockade had to be ‘close’ to be effective and therefore legal.285 In any case, close blockade, Tucker argues, is not mandated in traditional blockade law, and opposition to Britain’s distant blockade of Germany in World War One on the basis of its distant nature was “scarcely decisive”.286 Arguably a close blockade simply precluded any interference with vessels travelling to neutral ports; Tucker argues that this becomes more likely the further a blockade is from the blockaded state.287 Yet as Colombos pointed out, the advances granted by railways in overland transport (from neutrals to the blockadee) made a distant blockade more strategic effective than one restricted to enemy ports alone.288 Therefore a distant (or ‘far blockade’, in Elleman’s terminology) would not in itself signal a deviation from traditional blockade law.289 Although Heinegg observes

281 Cobb, Preparing for Blockade, p. 68. 282 Soley, Ammen and Mahan, The Navy in the Civil War, p. 40; McPherson, War on the Waters, p. 127. 283 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn 3782. 284 Cobb, Preparing for Blockade, p. 252; ‘Summary of the views of the French Foreign Office (17 June 1916): Effect of 14 months’ Blockade on Enemy Trade’, in: The Maritime Blockade of Germany, p. 458. para. 242. 285 Due to the advent of weapons like the submarine that rendered close blockade suicidal in that era, as we have seen. Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 734. 286 Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, p. 290. 287 Ibid. p. 290. 288 Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 734. 289 Elleman, 'A comparative historical approach to blockade strategies: implications for China’, locn. 8787; Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 211.

73 that a blockade “may not be established outside the general area of naval warfare”, this perhaps pertains more to interdictions that take place outside the range of blockade forces. Such ad hoc measures, rather than a ‘far blockade’, would arguably render the principle of effectiveness “meaningless.”290 As an indication of current legal norms, the San Remo Manual states that “The force maintaining [a] blockade maybe stationed at a distance determined by military requirements.”291 For an example of how a self-consciously legitimate international approach can benefit a blockade strategy, we can look to the US-led, UN-sanctioned blockade of Iraq (1990-2003). The UN’s authorisation gave moral and legal legitimacy to the operation, which in turn had strategic value in enabling regional powers to provide logistical and other support for the blockade forces.292 Controversy at a domestic or regional level in these states, regarding the “international delinquency” of violations of the law of neutrality, might otherwise have proved an obstacle to such support.293 Heinegg argues,

Probably, the law of neutrality is one of the most disputed aspects of public international law. The diversity of views on the subject makes it almost impossible to establish the continuing validity of that body of law, the scope of its applicability, and its content.294

Also at issue in terms of the rights of neutral maritime trade is the law pertaining to international straits. Despite the fact that SLOC chokepoints may present advantageous strategic opportunities for potential blockading states, many such waterways are protected to an extent by international law through the right of transit passage. This area of law, which remains contested, is controversial because the right of transit passage is seen as being analogous to the prohibition of a blockade of neutral ports or coasts.295 The San Remo Manual states that

290 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade and International Law’, locs. 613-23. 291 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 214; International Institute of Humanitarian Law, San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, Section II: Methods of Warfare- Blockade, para. 96. 292 Goldrick, 'Maritime Sanctions Enforcement against Iraq: 1990-2003’, locn. 4376. 293 Oppenheim, Oppenheim's International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, p. 753. 294 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 282. 295 Tucker, The Law of War and Neutrality at Sea, p. 289, fn. 14; Oppenheim, Oppenheim’s International Law. Vol. II, Disputes, War & Neutrality, p. 773.

74 The right of non-suspendable innocent passage ascribed to certain international straits by international law may not be suspended in time of armed conflict.296

Therefore, while it would not obviate the belligerent right of blockade, the wholesale closure of an entire strait to all shipping does not have a sound legal basis. The US itself objected to such a measure by Iran at the start of the First .297 Similarly, Article 44 of UNCLOS states that “There shall be no suspension of transit passage” by states bordering straits, while archipelagic sea-lanes may be closed only if necessary for the protection of the encompassing state’s security.298 Consequently the temptation for economic blockade to again be supplanted by a less restrictive measure is understandable. Similarly, such complicating factors may in part explain attempts by various states to interpret international law regarding blockades in a manner that removes some of its restrictiveness, thus potentially increasing its effectiveness in strategic terms. The US is unique in arguing that

All vessels operating under an enemy flag, and all aircraft bearing enemy markings, possess enemy character. However the fact that a merchant ship flies a neutral flag, or that an aircraft bears neutral markings, does not necessarily establish neutral character…

[E]nemy merchant vessels may be attacked and destroyed by surface warships, either with or without prior warning… If integrated into the enemy’s war-fighting/war-sustaining effort.

Significantly, the US Manual cites the changes in belligerent behaviour in World War Two around the destruction of enemy and neutral merchant vessels as a context for this policy.299 From the our outside observers’ perspectives, the parallels between the US policy and the lessons of World War Two might appear overstated. Instead one may see similarities between naval powers attempting to throw off the shackles of blockade-law.

296 International Institute of Humanitarian Law, San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, Section Ii: International Straits And Archipelagic Sea Lanes, paras. 32, 33. 297 Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, 'The Law of Naval Warfare and International Straits', International Law Studies, 71, (1998), 263-292, p. 265. 298 The Law of the Sea: United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, with Index and Final Act of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea, Croom Helm, London, 1983, p. 14-17. 299 'The Commander’s handbook on the law of naval operations NWP 1-14M’, paras. 7.5, 8.6.2.2.

75 International law can be a powerful tool to unite states with disparate interests and give vital political legitimacy to a given strategy or campaign. Importantly, the legality of most modern blockades has been established only in retrospect and in some respects this is a continuation of the situation that followed the 1856 Declaration of Paris. The close connection between legality and international political legitimacy suggests that such retrospectivity might not be sufficient in the court of public opinion today.300 Thus, the legal or other validation of any significant interference in international trade is arguably essential prior to action. International law is however only one of many elements that could garner legitimacy and support for blockade measures at a diplomatic level, or in domestic political terms in the blockading state. Moreover there is limited scope in international organisations for penalties to be applied for breaches of international law. History also suggests that international law can only influence the behaviour of states up to a point, and then only in conflicts of limited scope. Thus in World War Two, blockades were not used in the legal sense of the term, as the definition and its requirements were deemed too restrictive by both Britain and Germany for the type of warfare they wished to wage at sea. Yet this may have triggered an evolution in our understanding of what constitutes a blockade- possibly a point in the US’ favour today. It has been argued that the San Remo Manual is lacking relevance in terms of modern maritime operations including blockade; as a reflection of current international law this suggests the need for an update to allow for “operable and viable provisions for the conduct of modern maritime operations”.301 A fundamental question will be whether internationally acceptable adaptions of the law- in order that it should to remain relevant- are possible without broadening the definition of blockade to the point that it becomes meaningless. Blockade will presumably evolve further in the future, depending on developments in technology and state practice, and any new legal regimes put in place by the international community in response. One scholar has even argued that blockade is an outmoded concept.302 It may be that if alterations to blockade law- customary or otherwise- are not forthcoming, states like the US and China will likely continue to find other means of pursuing their interests at sea.

300 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 212. 301 Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 274. 302 Haines, 'The United Kingdom's Manual of the Law of Armed Conflict and the San Remo Manual: Maritime Rules Compared’, 112-16, passim.

76 Thematic Conclusions As we have seen form our thematic historical investigation, the elements of a state’s relative vulnerability to blockade are cumulative in nature and can be seen as enablers to blockade. Aspects of geography such as SLOC configuration or lack of continental alternatives to maritime trade would fit into this category, as would economic and/or political dependence on one or multiple goods for which maritime trade is essential. The same would apply to the political circumstances within the prospective blockadee, which might be ripe for the socio-economic disruption that an economic blockade can create or (more often) exacerbate. Vulnerability to blockade is therefore, like the legal legitimacy and strategic effectiveness of a blockade itself, to be assessed on a case-by-case basis; the themes are consistent but individual outcomes are not. Many of the obstacles to the application of an effective blockade- ‘disablers’- have also been consistent over time, and while their implications vary from case to case, their relevance is arguably relatively predictable. Thus, an economic blockade of one great power by another in a general war will adversely impact the prevailing global and regional economic circumstances. A destructive blockade in the industrial or post-industrial era will have some environmental impact. Civilians will suffer, either directly or indirectly as result of the blockade and of the war more broadly. The impact of economic blockade on civilians is one area in which, as we have seen, the consequences of an economic blockade are largely indistinguishable from the consequences of the war generally.303 This kind of ambiguity also exists in terms of a blockade’s strategic effectiveness, and has proven a challenge to historical analysis. Thus, we can often tell whether a blockade impacted this or that import or export or even a whole economy, but the critical question goes to the bearing that this had on the state more broadly, and wider strategic situation. We have also seen that assessing this at the time of events is a particular challenge. The impacts of war on societies and economies tend to aggregate over time; an economic blockade is one element, the effect of which can combine with others to cripple an enemy state. Therefore, although economic blockade is a unique belligerent right in terms of the interdiction of vessels, it is highly unlikely that such a strategy could be effective on its own. And there is no prospect and arguably no need for this to be contradicted. Put simply, the interdiction or disruption of international trade is not worth the declaration of war implied by a genuine economic blockade, when an exclusion zone or similar can have a comparable effect, albeit not identical. A declaration of war tends to paint both blockadee and blockader into a corner in political and strategic terms. Economic blockade can to this extent be seen as escalatory in both premise and potential consequences. As they are almost always used in the context of either land war or broader economic warfare however,

303 This depends naturally on the relative significance of actions other than the blockade in a given conflict.

77 economic blockades, as most often employed in history, are not the most escalatory element of strategy in terms of the intensity of the conflict. They are instead conditioning factors in terms of its scope and duration. A further theme that emerges from our historical inquiry is that although both fleet and economic blockades have at times had significant impacts, they have typically amplified administrative, logistical and other non-operational shortcomings that either pre-dated the blockade, or were a result of multiple complex factors. We have seen how this related to British naval operations in the sail era and in the twentieth century. Comparable shortcomings of maladministration at a more fundamental level led largely to the rebel victory in the American War of Independence. Add to this the pre-existing internal challenges of the Confederacy during the US Civil War, and those extant in Imperial Germany in World War One, and a picture emerges of a deeply complex- and largely non-military- basis for operational set-backs and strategic defeats for the blockadee, in which economic blockade played a supporting role only.304 The more problematic these essential functions are to begin with therefore, the greater the potential effectiveness of an economic blockade- particularly if it is one element in a suite of economic warfare measures. This supports the contention that blockade in general- and economic blockade in particular- is more of an enabling contributory variable than a catalyst in terms of its role in a wider strategy. It may appear paradoxical that while economic blockades are an attack on an enemy state’s essential functions, they have been proven to have more indirect than direct benefits. Yet this paradox can be explained by the observation that maritime operations are almost always supportive in relation to the major strategy of the blockader. Davis and Engerman conclude that economic blockades have dubious track records in terms of their ultimate effectiveness.305 This perhaps explains why the belligerent right of blockade has frequently been obviated in favour of other measures, both military and non-military, in recent history. International law may influence economic blockades undertaken in future wars to some degree, most likely when political legitimacy, such as from the UN, is lacking. If the international community, manifested in the UN, is unable to legitimise an economic blockade for some reason, it to an extent implies the involvement of one or more of its permanent members in the situation at issue. Given that the latter are great powers, the contention that international law will continue to be vitiated or abrogated in higher intensity conflicts seems set to be realised in the event of a general war

304 The fundamental administrative flaws in Napoleon’s Continental System and Japan’s lack of pre- war preparation in terms of its maritime logistics in World War Two can also be considered in this light. 305 Engerman and Davis, Naval Blockades in Peace and War. locn. 6727.

78 between China and the US, once the latter’s need for political legitimacy is superseded by operational priorities. In any potential blockade scenario therefore, there are what we might term ‘external factors’ involved in a state’s comparative vulnerability to economic blockade, which include elements such as regional geography, international diplomacy (including the concerns of neutrals and other third parties), global economic and trade considerations and the ramifications of international law. Contrariwise, ‘internal factors’ go to the specific state’s intrinsic vulnerability to economic blockade, although they may not necessarily be quantifiable. In this category we can put elements such as domestic socio-political matters, the relationship between economic and political power, and the extent to which the state ultimately relies on the international maritime trade being considered for interdiction, both in the short and longer term. Most important is the conceivable impacts of the blockade on the internal functions of the state, broadly speaking, and the flow-on effects to its capacity to sustain belligerent operations. If the latter are not in some way already problematic in a real sense, an economic blockade is unlikely to be efficacious- at least not in a manner conducive to strategic victory for the blockader. ‘External factors’ such as advantageous legal and geographical environments, though important, might thus be subsidiary concerns. Examples in which such internal factors played a critical role, such as British economic warfare and economic blockade in World War One, the US Civil War and the Continental System, also highlight the challenges in predicting outcomes of such strategies in a highly complex global economic environment. This is a common descriptor of the times that we live in today, and thus illustrates the importance of analysing the prospects for economic blockade today, in an environment that is characterised by the kinds of variables we have discussed.

79 A US economic blockade of China?

China’s comparative vulnerability to economic blockade

Geographical challenges for China & the US As we have seen from this historical investigation, there are geographical issues that condition the prospects for an economic blockade that can be applied to China. These include the conformation of SLOCs and land-frontiers, the attitude and actions of neighbouring states, and the nature of continental power. Like Holland before it, China is reliant on long and variously bottlenecked SLOCs for its prosperity and perhaps therefore for its survival in its current form. It shares land borders with a relatively large number of states, although few perhaps pose a strategic threat in themselves. As a continental power, these issues also determine China’s ability to turn towards the sea, as France and Germany experienced consistently. Determined to avoid dependence on- and thus vulnerability to- an opposing maritime power for their maritime security, such states invariably use innovative means to attempt to level the playing field, while maintaining land forces to ward against possible terrestrial threats. Whether China sees itself and its naval power in this light is unclear. Despite Chinese interest in Mahan’s work, China has in many respects diverged from his view of sea power as a conditional and organically evolving phenomenon by seeking to foster it ‘artificially’. By deliberately gearing its economy to unprecedented rates of growth and thus engendering increased reliance on maritime trade, China has provided both the financial means for and some justification of its naval expansion.306 China might perhaps also argue, with some justification, that China is merely reacquiring an ancient tradition of sea power. In their work on China’s ‘turn to Mahan’ in its development of a naval strategy, Professors James R. Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara highlighted the efforts of former prominent Chinese naval strategist Liu Huaqing to redirect the military and political leadership’s thinking away from the Maoist doctrine of “active defence”, which subordinated the PLA-N’s role to that of the PLA.307 By embracing an approach that is essentially continentally-based offshore maritime , China has been able to co-opt a nominally terrestrially-based strategy into an embryonic and potentially effective maritime one. China’s island reclamation activities in the South China Sea, its associated territorial approach to its near seas and its apparent search for “a maritime theorist

306 James R Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara, Chinese Naval Strategy in the 21st Century: The Turn to Mahan, Routledge, New York, 2008, p. 4-5. 307 Ibid. p. 30.

80 a land power can love” are however belied by statements contained within its recent defence white paper:308

The traditional mentality that land outweighs sea must be abandoned, and great importance has to be attached to managing the seas and oceans and protecting maritime rights and interests. It is necessary for China to develop a modern maritime military force structure commensurate with its national security and development interests, safeguard its national sovereignty and maritime rights and interests, protect the security of strategic SLOCs and overseas interests, and participate in international maritime cooperation, so as to provide strategic support for building itself into a maritime power [emphasis added].309

China may indeed regard its control of various islands as a part of a maritime rather than a continental grand strategy. But for China to attempt to build itself into a maritime power- to turn away from the land- would be to deny its own continental nature; the land in such a case most certainly does outweigh the sea. The issue is, as we shall see, that China cannot shed its continental characteristics: a traditional continental- but not necessarily terrestrial (that is, land-centric)- approach to sea power is precisely what is called for.

As geography is a critical factor pertaining to sea power and blockades in general terms, it is of specific interest to a potential economic blockade of China. Mahan’s reference to “the weakness of a country depending wholly upon [maritime] sources external to itself for the part it is playing in the world” (noting that China is not wholly but rather largely dependent on maritime trade) is clearly applicable.310 In Mahan’s terms China’s role as an economic nexus and potential geopolitical heavyweight is certainly dependent to a significant extent on its external trading relationships. The significance of maritime trade to the global economy and to individual states, including China, is as fundamental as it has ever been. Importantly, continental powers continue to be as reliant on maritime trade as other states, and China is no exception. Critically, this applies equally to China’s landlocked neighbours.

308 James R Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara, 'China's Navy: A Turn to Corbett?', Proceedings- United States Naval Institute, 136: 12, (2010), www.usni.org/print/6935. p. 2. 309 China's Military Strategy, The State Council Information Office of the People's Republic of China, May 26, 2015, p. 4. 310 Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783, p. 38. Mahan is referring here to the Dutch position of strategic weakness vis-à-vis Britain.

81 In the event of a US blockade of China, the exploitation of various bottlenecks in the latter’s SLOCs has been mooted as an advantageous strategy- most commonly of the Malacca Straits (China’s ‘Malacca Dilemma’).311 Malacca has been described as “the key chokepoint in Asia” for oil shipments.312 Further, 85% of oil traffic passing through the Strait of Hormuz (and thence Malacca) ultimately went to Asian markets- including China, Japan and South Korea.313 Between these two chokepoints the seas are dominated by the Indian and US maritime presences in the Indian Ocean. In the event of war, these could present genuine challenges for China’s economic security, and for their significance to Chinese prosperity we can look to the historical examples discussed earlier, including Germany and Holland, whose SLOCs were exposed to English/British naval power. No two historical situations are completely analogous however, and it is not clear that geography is the foundation of strategy today to the extent that Mahan argued, due to technological developments discussed earlier. China’s land-based manifestation of maritime power projection has clearly progressed during the last two decades, potentially giving it limited scope both to conduct and counter blockades using its land based missile capabilities.314 China’s land-based missile and other A2/AD forces are already a cause for concern for US maritime power- and hence for influence- in the region. While their capabilities are unproven, the PLA appears to be continuing to increase their physical scope, particularly through Anti- ship ballistic missiles (ASBMs), while its EW elements- perhaps the most important and yet least understood in the West- are less bound by traditional geographical restraints.315 By employing such revolutionary developments, China, with its expanding economy and vast standing army, is ostensibly well suited to traditional continentally orientated naval power. In historical cases of such a challenge to maritime power, continental powers have utilised technological advances as a means of gaining some leverage- a pattern that China is repeating. In this, China’s A2/AD capabilities are reminiscent of the guerre de course and anti-access strategies of France’s Jeune Ecole, the Confederacy, and Imperial and . While these strategies

311 Marc Lanteigne, 'China's Maritime Security and the “Malacca Dilemma”', Asian Security, 4: 2, (2008), 143-161, 312 World Oil Transit Chokepoints, p. 5. 313 Ibid. p. 2. Hormuz is the chokepoint between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman (and thence into the Arabian Sea). 314 Recent legal considerations of a blockade maintained solely by aircraft are perhaps analogous to such development, particularly the suggestion that a surface vessel might still be required to administer the blockade in some instances. By extension it could be argued that a blockade by land- based missiles would require the presence of at least one surface vessel, in order to communicate with the vessels and aircraft of other states in close proximity to the blockaded area. Heinegg, 'Current State of the Law of Naval Warfare', p. 277. 315 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, Michael Green et al, Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2016, pp. 15-16. http://csis.org/files/publication/160119_Green_AsiaPacificRebalance2025_Web_0. pdf

82 were ultimately unsuccessful, the contemporary manifestation of continental naval- maritime power by China could have grave ramifications for the operational viability of a US economic blockade. This historical investigation has indicated how, among other factors, the naval ambitions of continental powers like China must be based on key continental factors, particularly the stability of land-borders, as well as the financial implications of investing in naval-maritime power in the long term. Thus, the naval power France and Germany has historically been predicated on stable- or at least readily defensible- land borders, as well as a strong economy. China is in the same mould, and therefore significant upheaval on its frontiers might force a readjustment in China’s assertive maritime strategy in its near seas. Its maritime power was possible in the post-Cold War environment for this very reason, as the collapse of the (and thus of the Red Army threat to its Northern frontiers) essentially freed China from large-scale continental considerations.316 The question of how China’s terrestrial neighbours could hamper or exacerbate a US economic blockade is therefore critical. We saw earlier how Russia was instrumental in the collapse of the Continental System; it was also the source of one of Napoleon’s most devastating defeats during his army’s retreat from Moscow in 1812. With feet in several major regions- Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East (indirectly), East Asia and the Arctic, Russia is equally well-positioned in terms of a blockade of China.317 Naval Historian Bruce Elleman argues

Any blockader of a country bordering on Russia should be prepared for Russian intervention. Historically, Russia has chosen sides in conflicts to open up or close down alternate supply routes and sources of supplies. In six of… seven Asian blockades [referred to within Elleman’s essay], Russian actions helped tip the balance in the blockade.318

With Russia becoming increasingly hostile towards the US and Western interests generally over events in the Ukraine and Syria, the US is presumably not counting on Russian support for a potential blockade of China. Russia has agreed to supply China with resources from Siberia including oil and gas, and their cooperation on issues of strategic significance has recently included an agreement to jointly build what will be

316 Holmes and Yoshihara, Chinese Naval Strategy, p. 2. 317 Russia was of course regarded as the quintessential continental power and was the political entity around which Mackinder’s Eurasian Land Power centred. Halford John Mackinder, Democratic Ideals and Reality: A Study in the Politics of Reconstruction, Faber & Faber, London, 2014, loc 131. 318 Elleman, 'A comparative historical approach to blockade strategies: implications for China', locn. 8809. The examples cited by Elleman include Russian opposition to the US blockades of Korea and Vietnam, and its continued sale of missiles to China during the 1995-6 Taiwan Strait missile crisis.

83 one of the East Asian region’s largest seaports.319 Further, in a continuation of recent activities, China and Russia will also hold joint naval exercises in the South China Sea in September 2016.320 There are some areas of tension between China and its continental neighbours, however, and Russia is wary of being regarded as China’s subordinate in the Asia-Pacific. The CSIS have observed that

Whether the Kremlin ultimately bandwagons with China or seeks to balance against its more powerful neighbour will have far- reaching implications.321

China and Russia are also competitors in the ‘New Great Game’ in vying for investment opportunities and influence in Central Asian states, some of which provide China with access to oil and natural gas.322 Thus, just as Russia has historically been pivotal to the effectiveness of blockades such as the continental system and Britain’s World War Two economic blockade, the character of the China-Russia relationship would be a critical factor impacting the strategic effectiveness of a US economic blockade, and potentially the outcome of a general war. Despite the fact that maritime transport is generally much more efficient than any terrestrial alternative, such support as Russia could provide, were it to ignore a US blockade or sanctions regime against China, could be strategically significant. It would also give Russia a renewed political and economic relevance that, as Robert Haddick notes, would itself not be in the US’ interest.323 This relevance might come in the form of overland trade between China and Europe, highlighting the importance of some multilateral agreement on general sanctions to support the blockade.324 A future peripheral crisis triggered or perpetuated by Russia (along comparable lines to those in Ukraine) would also be a distraction for the US, were it

319 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, p. 25; U.S. Energy Information Administration, China- Full Report, February 4, 2014, p. 13. www.eia.gov; 'China, Russia to build seaport: report', AFP - Yahoo News, Retrieved: 12 September 2014, http://news.yahoo.com/china-russia-build-seaport-report-034903989--finance.html 320 Shannon Tiezzi, ‘Confirmed: China and Russia to Hold Naval Drills in South China Sea’, The Diplomat, 29 July 2016, http://thediplomat.com/2016/07/confirmed-china-and-russia-to-hold-naval- drills-in-south-china-sea/ (accessed 22 August 2016). 321 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, pp. 24-5. 322 Klevemen Lutz, The New Great Game: Blood and Oil in Central Asia, Atlantic Monthly Press, New York, 2003; International Crisis Group, China's Central Asia problem, 2013, p. 12. http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/asia/north-east-asia/244-chinas-central-asia-problem. pdf 323 Robert Haddick, Fire on the Water: China, America, and the Future of the Pacific, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2014, p. 117. 324 Brian G. Carlson has argued recently that, despite some dissenting views in China, the prospects of a formal alliance between Russia and China are minimal. Brian G. Carlson, 'China–Russia Relations and the Inertia of History', Survival, 58: 3, (2016), 213-222,

84 to undertake such a large operation as an economic blockade of China.325 Russia has displayed a willingness to use military and non-military means of pursing its strategic objectives. Yet such ‘strategic deterrence’ has generally been based on Russia’s own perceived security interests, as well as its view of global stability, rather than a particular desire to challenge the US.326 It is also worth noting that China would probably seek to by-pass its reliance on trade via the Malacca Straits via bilateral agreements with key South- and South- East Asian neighbours in the event of a US blockade adjacent to that waterway. China’s agreement with Myanmar to build an oil pipeline to that end (now operational) would seem to support this hypothesis. China also receives other energy imports from its landward neighbours, notably natural gas, while oil pipelines through Central Asia are projected to impact tanker demand and patterns in general terms.327 China’s (autocratic) government would also presumably have considerable discretion and incentive to divert resources from the domestic economy to the PLA as required.328 While there is a prevailing view among Chinese leaders “that continental Eurasian sources cannot substitute ultimately for imports by sea”, China’s trade and geopolitical relations with continental neighbours would still be critical to enforcing an effective economic blockade.329 A naval economic blockade of a continental power, as we saw from the World War One and the US Civil War cases, tackles only one physical domain in which enemy logistics need to be addressed; the issue of how to negate or limit land transport must also be considered.330 Russia and Kazakstan, which both share land frontiers with China, are among the world’s largest grain exporters, and could offer China alternative land transit corridors.331 This reinforces the need for the blockade to have broader multilateral support.332 But given that some of China’s landlocked neighbours themselves rely on

325 David C Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, RAND Corporation, 2016, p. 56. 326 Kristin Ven Bruusgaard, 'Russian Strategic Deterrence', Survival, 58: 4, (2016), 7-26, p. 19. & passim. 327 U.S. Energy Information Administration, China- Full Report, passim; United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, p. 15. 328 Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 118. 329 John Reeve, 'U.S. Naval Operations and Contemporary Geopolitics: The War on Terror and the New Great Game in the Early Twenty-first Century,' in Bruce A Elleman and S C M Paine (ed.), Naval Power and Expeditionary Warfare: Peripheral Campaigns and New Theatres of Naval Warfare, Routledge, New York, 2011, p. 191. 330 This could perhaps be an area in which economic warfare measures would be useful. 331 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, p. 21. 332 Russia’s role in a US-China economic blockade might therefore be comparable to that of Sweden or the Netherlands in Britain’s economic blockade of Germany in World War One. Today such support would depend on the basis on which a US economic blockade was declared; if it was in response to a Chinese move against Taiwan, there is no guarantee that even nominal US allies will feel compelled to support the blockade, let alone neutrals. Chas W Freeman Jr, 'Energy As China's Achilles' Heel?,' in Gabriel B Collins, Andrew S Erickson, et al (ed.), China's Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing's Maritime Policies, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2008, locn. 617.

85 land transit corridors through China, a US economic blockade would not be without controversy in this context also. A further consideration for both China and the US is that if China were blockaded, its continental neighbours would be well placed to exploit the increased demand. The latter might higher prices for direct exports, or for the use of their overland transit corridors; market forces alone could have a similar effect. As Germany experienced during Britain’s World War One economic blockade, this would increase the price and availability of related items within China. The recent expansion of the Panama Canal to accept the larger merchant ships that are becoming more common in international maritime trade perhaps signals a renewed superiority over land transport.333 This trend has obvious implications for China and the security of its SLOCs, and may indicate that the above ‘continental complications’ for a US blockade of China would not last beyond the medium-term. Yet historical examples, like the Third Reich’s ability to negate Britain’s economic blockade in the period 1939-1941 by importing goods from Russia, may suggest otherwise.334 This conundrum is elucidated by the argument that current global economic circumstances, particularly the rise of the ‘just-in-time’ maritime economy, are unique to an extent that challenges the lessons of history in this geographical context.335

China’s geographic characteristics, like those of other continental powers in history, cannot be shed. This is a critical consideration for China, which must always be mindful of its landward neighbours, particularly Russia, yet it is also an issue for the US. Closer ties between China and Russia, and a general excess of stability for China on the continental front could undermine an economic blockade of the latter. Historically, Russia has often played the role of ‘maker or breaker’ in blockades of states in Europe and Asia, as in wars generally in both regions, and would likely do so again. In the event that Russian and Chinese interests came to overlap, the vulnerability of the latter’s economy and SLOCs to economic blockade might be substantially reduced.

China’s economic vulnerabilities As we have seen, the means by which economic blockades have historically impacted a state’s ability to prosper, function or survive have been relatively consistent. There is no reason to suppose that these patterns will not also apply to

333 'Expanded Panama Canal opens to supersized ships', ABC News: PM, (June 27, 2016), Retrieved: 28 June 2016, http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2016/s4490016.htm 334 Geoffrey Till, 'Naval Blockade and Economic Warfare in the European War, 1939-45,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah CM Paine (ed.), Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and Counter-strategies, 1805-2005, vol. 34, Kindle: Taylor & Francis, New York, 2006, locn. 2692. 335 Supra, p. 43.

86 China. States such as Holland and indeed Britain that, like China today, were reliant on maritime trade for imports in terms of high volume or specific commodities have naturally proven most vulnerable to their interdiction, particularly when external factors such as geography were also conducive. Yet economic blockade, like wider economic warfare, has had its greatest impact in contexts where global or regional economic interconnectedness was highest, and, critically, where structural politico- economic weaknesses were already present within the blockadee. China, as a developing economy in a globalised economic framework, could therefore be at risk. There are challenges too for the US in terms of trading with the enemy, and the impacts on its own economy and those of neutrals as a by-product of economic blockade. This is another key historical trend of economic blockade demonstrated by Britain’s comparable issues in World War One. In modern warfare, the economic vitals of the blockaded state are targeted more than ever and may be seriously damaged as a result. This can be seen as a continuation of the increasing role of commerce in contemporary warfare identified by Mahan, and the subsequent emergence of economic blockade as an instrument of such warfare. The process of globalisation and how it would be impacted by the continuation of this trend in a future conflict between China and the US is a significant issue that might, as in World War One, cause economic warfare measures- including blockade- to impact blockadee, blockader and neutrals alike. The extent of China’s trading relationships - as a reflection of its importance to the global economy- underscores the challenges and risks associated with an attack on its trade. China’s import demand for oil and dry bulks (such as ores and grain) have been the source of significant global growth in these areas, which in itself suggests that the self-interest of neutral states could- as in World War One- pose challenges for the US in terms of their acquiescence to its blockade regime. Four out of the five leading ports in terms of productivity are in China, which also controls the world’s third-largest merchant fleet.336 Some scholars have suggested that this expansion of the Chinese-owned fleet might provide some legal basis for their protection by the PLA-N in the event of an economic blockade.337 While some key dry bulks come from Australia and (a fact overlooked by the CBSA in its distant blockade proposal), other commodities such as oil must come via the Strait of Hormuz SLOC.338 Furthermore, like other countries in East and South East Asia, China

336 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2015, p. 3, 71, 36. The size of China’s merchant fleet incidentally rules out what was one of the most effective economic warfare weapons for Britain against Germany in World War One: British domination of the global merchant fleets. Lambert, Planning Armageddon, p. 4. 337 Gabriel B Collins and Andrew S Erickson, 'Chinese Efforts to Create a National Tanker Fleet,' in Gabriel B Collins, Andrew S Erickson, et al (ed.), China's Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing's Maritime Policies, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2008, locn. 1889. 338 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, pp. 76-8; International Maritime Organisation (IMO), International Shipping Facts and Figures- Information Resources on Trade, Safety, Security, Environment, p. 7; World Oil Transit Chokepoints, passim.

87 has experienced significant growth in its exports of consumer goods to the Western World over the last decade.339 This is part of a growing trend in China’s economy “away from an infrastructure-based investment growth pattern” that will decrease its reliance on some dry-bulks.340 Not only is the prodigious size of Chinese trade significant to the global economy; the latter’s complexity is itself an issue, both in undertaking an economic blockade and its likely impacts. Merchant ships bound for China often carry goods destined for multiple ports; globally China has the greatest amount of containerized throughput (nine of its ports are among the top-20 for this figure).341 Cargo “can be sold and re-sold many times in the course of a voyage”, which may at certain times render the ownership of goods dubious.342 China is also essentially the only producer of shipping containers in the world, and in 2012 it was responsible for over 40% of the world’s new merchant shipping tonnage.343 The close economic linkages between China and the US are generally seen as further precluding a conflict between them, or making it unlikely.344 As the International Maritime Organisation argues, “international trade has evolved to the point where almost no nation can be fully self-sufficient.”345 The recent advent of just-in-time approach to manufacturing and maritime trade, which is, as we have seen a critical element of the globalised economy, could perhaps be seen as a further step in this process. A war between the world’s two largest economies in this context would have uncertain long-term consequences. A US Department of Transportation report states “China and Japan are the top two sources for [US] imports by vessel and the top two destinations for exports by vessel.”346 The US is one of China’s biggest export markets (theoretically rendering a US embargo of Chinese goods more damaging to China than the US).347 As has been posited regarding previous conflicts, the implied scope of a war

339 International Maritime Organisation (IMO), International Shipping Facts and Figures- Information Resources on Trade, Safety, Security, Environment, p. 5. 340 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, p. 19. 341 Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 118. 342 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China', p. 397. 343 Review of Maritime Transport 2013, pp. 58, 42. 344 Congressional Research Service, China Naval Modernization: Implications for US Navy Capabilities: Background and Issues for Congress, Ronald O'Rourke, Library of Congress, 2016, p. 3. 345 International Maritime Organisation (IMO), International Shipping Facts and Figures- Information Resources on Trade, Safety, Security, Environment, p. 5. 346 US Department of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, Matthew Chambers and Wendy Liu, 2012, p. 4. http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/sites/rita.dot.gov.bts/files/publications/by_the_numbers/maritime_trad e_and_transportation/index.html 347 Congressional Research Service, China's economic rise history, trends, challenges, and implications for the United States, Wayne M Morrison, Library of Congress, 2014, p. 20. However it would be fallacious to suggest that the US would not be significantly impacted, particularly as China would respond similarly.

88 between the US and China implies a level of global political and economic damage that arguably renders analysis beyond war planning essential.348 The extensive and detailed work of the Admiralty in this area before World War One is perhaps the best example of what would be required on the US’ part today, and as we have seen, much of the work in that instance in terms of economic warfare came to naught due to political obstacles. The intricacies of global trade, supply chains and financing suggest therefore that a wholesale cessation of inter-belligerent trade (particularly given the premise of the US action being multilateral to some extent) is a problematic task. As China and US are the two largest economies in the world, the sheer volume of their trade would presumably be extremely difficult to stop, particularly in the short term.349 Therefore, in the event of a conflict between them, US-China economic interconnectivity would raise the age-old issue of trading with the enemy, and the pitfalls of ceasing to do so.350 It may be that, beyond the US prohibiting contraband such as high-end technologies going to China, the immense effort required to prevent wholesale indirect trade may not be an efficient use of resources.351 Further, some commentators have highlighted the risk to the US in economic and political terms of sudden draconian measures prohibiting all US-China trade.352 History abounds however with examples where self-interest was regarded as something at once both more profound and more nebulous than economic prosperity. As T.X. Hammes argues,

Any major conflict between the United States and China would result in massive damage to the global economy. The United States would cut Chinese trade simply because the American population would not accept continued trade with China while U.S. forces are suffering significant casualties. China would respond with military, fiscal, and economic actions.353

By this argument, the dicta of mercantilism would be essentially reversed in a US- China conflict; rather than trading with the enemy being a primary strategic means (and end), it would be anathema to both states’ political narratives, and therefore would be eschewed no matter what the cost to their economies. This would of course have follow-on implications for neutral, regional and global economies. There

348 Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, p. iii. 349 Congressional Research Service, China-US Trade Issues, Wayne M Morrison, Library of Congress, 2014, ‘Summary’, 350 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, p. 58. 351 Given US investment in China by US technology firms, even such an embargo as this might be problematic. 352 Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, p. 71. 353 Hammes, 'Offshore control', p. 4.

89 is also the prospect of an international political backlash against the perceived attack on the global economy implied by a US economic blockade- particularly if it was a response to China’s ‘salami-slicing’ tactics of incremental advance (creating the perception that the US was the aggressor).354 This would be a severe blow to the blockade’s legitimacy in the eyes of global opinion. The reactive nature of financial markets suggests that a US economic blockade would create some instability in a number of exchanges around the world. But the domestic Chinese economy is relatively unexposed to such ructions on China’s Shanghai Composite Index and Shenzen Composite Index. As the CRS maintains,

It is estimated that only about 5-10% of the Chinese population is directly exposed to the market (compared to 54% in the United States). This suggests that even in the wake of a large and sustained downturn, there may only be a limited impact on household wealth and the domestic economy.355

This perhaps calls into question the significance of such short-term disruptions to China’s economy as a result of economic blockade, and therefore their viability as a means of pressuring the CPC. The potential adverse consequences of a US economic blockade in this context are probably greater for the US domestic economy than for China’s. As stock market volatility is only one consequence of such a blockade, it can perhaps serve as an indicator that the Chinese economy is more vulnerable to direct impacts, such as actual shortages due to the interdiction of imports, than to indirect influences. There are also many other aspects of global finance and trade in which China is tightly enmeshed- some of which have the potential to impact the US at a strategic level. China controls 97% of the world’s supply of Rare Earth Elements (REEs), which are crucial to high technology manufacturing.356 In 2013, the US was 100% reliant on imports for its REE needs and they are crucial to many industries:357

354 Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 116. 355 Congressional Research Service, China's Recent Stock Market Volatility: What Are the Implications?, Wayne N. Morrison and Gabriel M Nelson, Library of Congress, https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/IN10325. pdf 356 China's Rare Earth Elements Industry: What Can the West Learn?, Cindy Hurst, Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (IAGS), March, 2010, p. 3. 357 Congressional Research Service, China's rare earth industry and export regime: economic and trade implications for the United States, Wayne M Morrison and Rachel Tang, Library of Congress, 2012, p. 7.

90 Without rare earth elements, much of the world's modern technology would be vastly different and many applications would not be possible. For one thing, we would not have the advantage of smaller sized technology, such as the cell phone and laptop computer, without the use of rare earth elements. Rare earth elements are also essential for the defense industry and are found in cruise missiles, precision guided munitions, radar systems and reactive armor [sic].358

China has recently been accused of withholding or delaying exports of rare earth elements to Japan following a diplomatic dispute, an allegation denied by China though given credence by reports in the New York Times.359 China is also one of the largest holders of US Securities, upon which the US relies “heavily… to meet its domestic investment needs and to fund the federal budget deficit.”360 This has implications for both the US and China; the latter requires a stable US economy in order that the securities do not decrease in value, and as an export market. Consideration of the issue is further complicated by the fact that published US statistics do not differentiate between Chinese state investment in treasury bonds and that of other parties, such as China’s state-owned banks. The latter might not necessarily adhere to guidelines set out by the Chinese government; the bonds might also have been traded on to China’s commercial banks without affecting the statistics.361 In the current circumstances, China’s holding of US securities is mutually beneficial. If this situation continued while the two countries were at war, it would be a curious modern example of trading with the enemy. From the US perspective, China may thus have a ‘bargaining chip’ in high- stakes confrontation with the US, as a sudden Chinese divestment of US securities could theoretically have a major impact on the US economy. This is a highly complex (and speculative) area of analysis, with various commentators playing down or emphasising the risks involved.362 In any case it is a possible element of Chinese economic warfare that the US would need to consider as a potential counter to its own economic blockade. The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) recently founded by China as a rival to the US-dominated World Bank is in part an attempt to supplant US

358 China's Rare Earth Elements Industry: What Can the West Learn?, p. 3. 359 Congressional Research Service, Rare Earth Elements: The Global Supply Chain, Marc Humphries, Library of Congress, 2013, p. 16. KEITH BRADSHER, 'China Said to Widen Its Embargo of Minerals', The New York Times, 19 October 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/20/business/global/20rare.html?_r=0. 360 Congressional Research Service, China’s Holdings of U.S. Securities: Implications for the U.S. Economy, Wayne M Morrison and Marc Labonte, Library of Congress, 2013, p. 1. 361 'China’s Shaky Trade Figures and Their Ramifications', Strategic Comments, 22: 3, (2016), iv-v, 362 Congressional Research Service, China’s Holdings of U.S. Securities: Implications for the U.S. Economy, passim.

91 economic power in the region- a sort of financial anti-access strategy. In tandem with this objective is the importance for China of establishing a regional economic framework with China at its nexus; both goals underscore the connection between political and economic power in the CPC’s estimation.363 Despite the utility of Britain’s pre-World War One economic warfare plans as a basis of comparative historical analysis, these issues also illustrate the historical distinction between modern China and Imperial Germany in terms of their relative importance to their respective global economies.364 Regional support could be critical to a broader suite of economic warfare measures into which the US might wish to incorporate an economic blockade. James Mulvennon argues that an economic blockade might be “’virtual’ in implementation and would rely on the full force of U.S. diplomatic and trade relationships.”365 Indeed some observers have called for a renewed US focus on economic warfare measures in general terms, and specifically that they should be included in a “portfolio of coercion” for potential use against China.366 This again echoes the Admiralty’s avocation of economic warfare rather than blockade against Germany before World War One. A further consideration should be the resilience or otherwise of China’s economy. The minor crisis in China’s stock market in mid-2015, while not particularly damaging in itself, dispelled notions that the CPC is in full control of its economy, or that it possesses the experience and resolution necessary to take effective and decisive action. Moreover, China’s questionable trade figures suggest that the CPC feels the need to “massage” data to improve the apparent health of its economy, including that of its banks and the size of its GDP. Other statistical discrepancies indicate an inability of the state to effectively monitor its own cross-border trade.367 Such issues highlight the possible economic- hence political- structural weaknesses in China, comparable manifestations of which have proven vulnerable to economic blockade historically. Imperial Germany and the Confederacy were both vulnerable to economic blockade because of its cumulative indirect impacts that required awareness, capability and competence to address. In both these cases, as

363 Sue-Lin Wong, 'China Launches New AIIB Development Bank As Power Balance Shifts', Reuters, 17 January 2016, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-asia-aiib-investment-idUSKCN0UU03Y (accessed July 2, 2016). 364 The AIIB can be seen as an example of Wylie’s concept of “exclusive economic systems” adopted by a land-power as part of a cumulative denial strategy. Supra, p. 35. 365 James Mulvennon, 'Dilemmas and Imperatives If Beijing's Strategic Energy Dependence: The PLA Perspective,' in Gabriel B Collins, Andrew S Erickson, et al (ed.), China's Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing's Maritime Policies, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2008, locn. 451. 366 Center for a New American Security (CNAS), American Economic Power & The New Face of Financial Warfare, passim; Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 137. 367 'China’s shaky trade figures and their ramifications'; Congressional Research Service, China's Recent Stock Market Volatility: What Are the Implications?, It is also worth noting that usefulness of GDP as a measure of a state’s economic health has also been called into question. 'The Trouble with GDP', The Economist,

92 we have seen, the respective economic blockade was blamed, and the structural were not addressed. In China, the political power of state-owned enterprises is such that, in peacetime at least, they may not necessarily abide by the will of the CPC.368 The significant power of China’s provincial governments could be an issue too- again more so in peacetime.369 In the longer term, China’s demographic challenges of an aging (and male- dominated) population are a burden for the Chinese state.370 China’s growing middle-class places demands on the state for a sustained or improved standard of living. This in itself is a more resource-intensive phenomenon, and has flow on effects in terms of access to agricultural imports.371 China’s economic and non- economic structural issues are therefore closely interrelated. China’s internal economic, or politic-economic, vulnerabilities might render economic blockade an effective strategy. Alternatively, soft-power economic warfare measures could have coercive benefits in terms of fostering disunity in China domestically. Yet such measures may, as we have seen, be problematic without military operations to enforce or complement them. In order to emphasise the non- military nature of such a strategy, the US could advertise an economic blockade as a means of ensuring an embargo of US trade with China is observed by US-owned corporations.372 This would impact China’s exports to the US, perhaps to the detriment of the former’s terms of trade. The prospects of such inter-related measures by the US, in a potentially hostile international political environment, highlight the need for any action to be detailed and well planned so as to have minimal diplomatic footprint.

Chinese demand for oil & the case for selective blockade While historical cases of selective blockade such as the Beira Patrol and the US blockade of are not of the scale implied by a US-China conflict, the case for a more extensive strategy is grounded in the increasing criticality of maritime trade that arose, as we have seen, in the context of the industrial era, manifested today in the rise of globalisation and the just-in-time maritime economy. In China’s case, the sheer volume of its maritime trade renders some sort of porous or selective

368 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, p. 12. Perhaps making ‘non- belligerent’ economic warfare measures more advantageous for the US. 369 Congressional Research Service, Understanding China's political system, Susan Lawrence and Michael F Martin, Library of Congress, 2013, p. 8. http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R41007. Pdf A similar situation persisted in China’s paramilitary maritime security agencies- the so-called Nine Dragons- each with its own sub-national objectives and command structures. International Crisis Group, Stirring up the South China Sea (I), April 23, 2012, http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/asia/north-east-asia/223-stirring-up-the-south-china-sea- i.pdf passim. 370 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, p. 11. 371 'The Commodities Supercycle's End and Political Risk', Strategic Comments, 22: 2, (2016), 372 This is arguably a deviation from the general definition of a blockade, as we discussed earlier in this thesis.

93 blockade desirable from the perspective of operational practicalities for the US blockade forces. In more general terms, the targeting of critical commodities or processes by military forces, sanctions and economic warfare is of long-standing, and has been evidenced by measures as diverse as the US’ blockade of Confederate cotton exports and the sanctions-enforcement of Iraq targeting oil exports and imports of WMD materiel. Targeting key weaknesses in the Chinese economy will therefore be a critical element in the formulation of an economic blockade strategy. China’s reliance on maritime imports for the majority of its energy needs, particularly in terms of oil and natural gas, is well documented.373 The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) have observed,

China is the world's second-largest oil consumer behind the United States and became the largest global energy consumer in 2010… China's oil consumption growth accounted for one-third of the world's oil consumption growth in 2013… China is the world's most populous country and has a rapidly growing economy, which has driven the country's high overall energy demand and the quest for securing energy resources.374

Although there have been some structural changes in China’s refining apparatus and general economy, they pertain more to the ultimate use to which the refined oil is put, not to import demand. Thus, China is importing more crude oil than refined oils because of its increased capacity to refine crude oil domestically. In fact it is also now a net exporter of diesel, due in part to decreasing domestic demand based on the shift away from an infrastructure investment-based economy.375 These surpluses, which are also driven by increasing production, could of course be retained to bolster existing reserves that would be needed for military operations. China faces a Catch-22 regarding the anticipated growth of its naval-maritime forces, in that the more the PLA-N expands- particularly its ‘blue water’ fleet that could potentially safeguard China’s SLOCs- the more oil imports and other products will be required. Therefore, China’s vulnerability to maritime SLOC interdiction will in a sense paradoxically increase rather than decrease, at least initially, as a result of its maritime expansion. Naturally the employment of larger fleet units in operations increases the strain on petroleum reserves and other materiel, particularly as the

373 Due to lower demand and the extent of its own reserves, China only began importing natural gas in 2007. Since then, imports have risen dramatically and will play an increasing role in China’s energy mix. U.S. Energy Information Administration, China- Full Report, p. 17. 374 Ibid. p. 1. 375 'China’s diesel exports grow, driven by changes in its economy and refining industry', Today in Energy- May 2016, Retrieved: 21 June 2016, https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=26452

94 PLA-N’s fleet of underway replenishment and other support vessels is limited.376 As Japan discovered in World War Two, “fleet-on-fleet warfare… is one of the most resource-intensive forms of war.”377 In contrast, Hammes contends that the reduction in trade associated with a potential conflict between China and the US would result in reduced energy demand within the former.378 The CSBA has argued similarly that the “considerable attention [given] to Chinese dependence on seaborne energy flows… is generally considerably overstated”, and instead advocates general commercial blockade.379 But an update of an EIA source cited by the CSBA to support this contention has highlighted China’s dependence on oil imports as a cause for concern for the Chinese leadership.380 The RAND Corporation has argued recently that a general economic blockade of China would be “provocative, hazardous, and largely unnecessary,” whereas a selective blockade would obviate the need to be able to effectively interdict China’s “huge volume of commerce and shipping.”381 Haddick suggests that if a blockade of its oil imports was declared, China might simply annex the maritime territory it claims in the South- and East China Seas, which are thought to contain significant stocks of oil and natural gas.382 The EIA however has reported recently that the contested areas of the South China Sea contain limited energy resources, as opposed to littoral states’ territorial waters.383 Further, this implies the complications and delays involved in accessing and processing these fuels, and, in any case, such unilateral action by China would likely push the disenfranchised states into the arms of the US. For a blockade of China’s oil imports to be effective it would also need to take into account the key issues of China’s multiple strategic reserves of fuel- including rationing and diversion from civilian uses- and alternate supply lines overland (or perhaps also by sea) from Russia and other neighbours. This requires an

376 Congressional Research Service, China Naval Modernization: Implications for US Navy Capabilities- Background and Issues for Congress, Ronald O'Rourke, Library of Congress, 2016, p. 78. 377 Sarah Crosby Mallory Paine, 'Pearl Harbor and Beyond: Japan's Peripheral Strategy to Defeat China,' in Bruce A Elleman and Sarah Crosby Mallory Paine (ed.), Naval Power and Expeditionary Wars: Peripheral Campaigns and New Theatres of Naval Warfare, Routledge, 2010, p. 80. This may suggest that China will seek to consolidate its anti-access capabilities before embarking on a strategy of maritime power-projection, although this could change if the CPC comes to regard US maritime power as an actual (that is, not merely a potential) threat to its SLOCs. Bernard D Cole, The Great Wall at Sea: China's Navy in the Twenty-first Century, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2010, p. 184. 378 Hammes, 'Offshore control', p. 5. Hammes appears to equivocate regarding whether China’s imports- notably of energy resources- are an efficacious target or not. Ibid, pp. 3, 5. 379 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, p. 76. 380 U.S. Energy Information Administration, China, Full Report, Washington DC, February 4, 2014. www.eia.gov, p. 5. 381 David C Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, RAND Corporation, 2016, p. 45; Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 116. 382 Ibid. p. 117. 383 Today in Energy, Contested areas of South China Sea likely have few conventional oil and gas resources, U.S. Energy Information Administration, April, 2013, http://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=10651

95 assessment of China’s long-term strategic thinking, which will be discussed further.384

This historical investigation has illustrated some of the key characteristics of economic blockade in terms of its multiple direct and indirect economic and financial impacts. It is probable that trading with the enemy will be one of the most significant administrative and financial challenges for both China and the US. China’s investment in US securities and the interconnectedness of globalized trade are such that even Britain’s experience in World War One is not fully comparable. Key issues, particularly the rise of the just-in-time maritime economy, seem set to amplify any disruption to the globalized economy, perhaps with consequences for all states integrated into it. For the US, there might therefore be politico-economic challenges arising from the collateral impacts of its economic blockade in international (diplomatic) and domestic terms. A partial blockade that primarily targets China’s heavy reliance on maritime oil imports could do great damage to its economy, and cripple the activities of the PLA-N. The direct military outcomes of economic blockade have not been their most important feature however in historical terms. Rather, it is the indirect consequences of economic blockade that have proved most consistent. The effect of Britain’s economic blockade in World War One, despite the prohibition of German imports of nitrates and animal fats, was felt in Germany initially on the homefront, rather than directly on the Western Front. Thus, the most significant economic ramifications of a US economic blockade of China would ultimately be felt in China itself rather than specifically by the PLA-N, and would in a sense therefore be political, as the CPC’s political power is based largely on China’s economic might, and military power. Specific commodities can often be sourced from other locations, particularly by continental powers that are less reliant on maritime trade (or at least have some alternatives to it), as evidenced by Imperial Germany’s continued trade with neutral states for most of World War One, and Nazi Germany’s trade with the Soviet Union until the launching of Operation Barbarossa. In contrast, structural and governance weaknesses within the blockaded state, again evidenced by Imperial Germany and the Confederacy, cannot be so easily dealt with. This is not to diminish the importance of alternative overland trade as a counter to US blockade but merely an observation that in historical terms, an economic blockade’s indirect effects will be harder for the CPC to counter, or indeed predict.

Political and moral challenges for the US As we have seen in this historical investigation, the political challenges of economic blockade, while not necessarily insurmountable, have tended to set

384 Infra, p. 109.

96 conditions on its employment. Historically, this was primarily due to the competing interests of belligerents and neutrals, and as we discussed in relation to economic blockade and international, the demands of neutrals and non-maritime powers have historically had some influence on the development of legal measures designed, in theory at least, to curtail excesses in the employment of economic blockade. China, as a continental power suspicious of the maritime US, is particularly sensitive in terms of its interests at sea, and can be expected to object loudly to maritime power being wielded against it. Perhaps of more concern to the US should be the historical trend of neutral resistance to the use of economic blockade in a manner that is contrary to neutral economic interests, including those of China’s landlocked neighbours and major trading partners. Oil producing states, some of which as we have seen are vulnerable to economic disruption, would be heavily impacted by a blockade that targeted China’s oil imports.385 After all, economic blockade is itself predicated on the existence of guaranteed rights of neutral parties. The US has itself, as we have seen the Civil War and World Wars, both championed and vitiated the rights of neutrals, always with its own interests at the center of such policy shifts. Further, in cases of economic blockade and economic warfare, the blockadee economy is not the only one impacted, evidenced by the results of Britain’s economic warfare measures in 1914, and the effect of the resulting blockade on neutral states during World War One. Other more recent developments in international society elucidated by our discussion are the development of humanitarian and environmental concerns. These are of obvious merit in themselves but- without playing down their inherent importance- their ability to impact cumulatively on the legitimacy of a US blockade in terms of global public opinion perhaps better fits the established pattern of controversy and response seen since the rise of economic blockade itself. The deaths of merchant crews at the hands of a US blockade would however be an exception to this pattern, and would echo the outcries heard at the onset of Germany’s declaration and execution of unrestricted submarine warfare in 1915. Further, while environmental issues have not had a major impact on the course of a global or regional conflict to date, it is arguable that they could well be influential in a war between China and the US via their impact on neutral states if large merchant vessels were sunk. Since the abortive invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003, the US has arguably been on the back foot in terms of the legitimacy of the use of force in international relations. The potential impacts of a US economic blockade on China’s civilian population, neutral states and other third parties are critical to the strategy’s political viability. These challenges would arguably be amplified by the continuing- and perhaps increasing- trend of modern warfare impacting heavily on economic

385 'The commodities supercycle's end and political risk’, Strategic Comments, 2016.

97 activity and by extension on civilians, which, as we have seen, emerged as an inherent element of warfare in the industrial era. As discussed earlier in this thesis, commerce destruction- as opposed to commerce prevention- is an anomaly in historical attacks on maritime trade peculiar to the World Wars.386 Much of this was based on the advent of submarines- a valuable platform that is paradoxically perhaps too versatile and yet too inflexible to be used for economic blockade in a modern or general war. As the experiences of World War One illustrated, submarines’ only reliable function in an economic blockade (in terms of preventing the blockade being broken) is their ability- and credible potential- to sink merchantmen. This, it has been argued variously, is a key point of difference between the World War Two guerre de course paradigm and a potential US economic blockade of China, despite some similarities with the submarine war against Japan.387 The lack of fundamental applicability of the commerce destruction model arises largely out of the political and moral practicality of the US (and its allies) engaging in a lethal or destructive economic blockade strategy of China. As we have seen, the environmental and subsequent socio-economic impacts of a major fuel or chemical spill in littoral waters would be devastating in the straits of South East Asian SLOCs or other littoral areas. Even a sinking in the Indian Ocean might have disastrous environmental and political consequences due to tidal patterns that would probably deposit oil on the coasts of India, Africa or South East Asia.388 The socio-economic impact of such sinkings could well be severe in terms of impacting subsistence-fishing communities in coastal areas affected by oil spills and other damage. Such outcomes would clearly be antithetical to US strategy and necessary emphasis on cooperation with allies. It is difficult to imagine potential allies such as India and Singapore being willing, let alone active, participants in the despoiling of their own waters. Further, there is the issue of public opinion, domestic and international, which would hold the US accountable for environmental disasters as well as international economic repercussions. The blithe suggestion that the US should “conspicuously [sink] several large merchant vessels” as a signal of intent (which could still be environmentally damaging, even if they were not tankers), therefore appears problematic.389 While these considerations would in a sense be a new paradigm in the conduct of modern warfare, they remain consistent with the

386 Supra, p. 53. 387 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, p. 76. The latter include the issue of forward basing (for both belligerents) and the Asian power’s reliance on external sources of oil. 388 Matthias Tomczak and J Stuart Godfrey, Regional Oceanography: An Introduction, 2nd Edn, Daya Books, Delhi, 2003, p. 180. 389 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China', p. 400.

98 overarching conditional nature of the use of force in international affairs, which is tempered by the general claims of neutrals against belligerents. Further impacting the interests of neutrals (as well as China), global shipping rates and insurance premiums would presumably spike as a result of any sinkings, as has occurred historically in times of naval conflict. Indeed such spikes would arguably occur to a lesser degree in the event of any blockade, even absent an actual sinking. Although these would be deleterious for China, they would also be significant negative consequences for the US and global economies, and for the blockade’s legitimacy.390 Such a destructive strategy therefore seems a highly unlikely proposition without significant Chinese provocation. The potential impact of an economic blockade on China’s civilian population is also a consideration for the US and its allies, both in humanitarian terms and the political capital that the CPC will likely seek to make from allegations of hardship. The latter would presumably attempt to walk a fine propaganda line that condemns an attack on the Chinese people- thus demanding a response- while simultaneously claiming (domestically at least) that there will be no ill effects. The controversy surrounding the sanctions-enforcement blockade of Iraq (1990-2003) illustrates that even measures with strong political legitimacy have had difficulty overcoming perceptions of severity in terms of impacts on civilians. As the US will not have UNSC support for a blockade of China, maintaining a unified political front in the face of alleged moral calamities would be challenging. A blockade that targets civilians is prohibited under international law. But the Chinese population’s standard of living (as opposed to its actual subsistence) might be an effective medium through which a US economic blockade might exploit the close connection in China between political, economic and military power.391 Social unrest has been a feature of Chinese politics, particularly at the lower levels, over issues such as pollution and land-grabs.392 The pattern of what are “daily” protests in China shows sensitivities among the citizenry to economic stresses rather than purely political grievances.393 This could indicate a vulnerability to economic blockade, as social unrest would presumably worsen as the Chinese economy was impacted.

390 Freeman Jr, 'Energy as China's Achilles' Heel?’, locn. 611; Frederick Martin, The History of Lloyd's and of Marine Insurance in Great Britain: With An Appendix Containing Statistics Relating to Marine Insurance, Macmillan and Company, London, 1876, p. 161. As such this would be a dim echo of Britain’s abandonment of wholesale economic warfare in 1914. Lambert, Planning Armageddon, p. 499. 391 Yan Xuetong et al, Ancient Chinese Thought, Modern Chinese Power, Kindle: Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2011, p. 215. 392 Congressional Research Service, Social unrest in China, Thomas Lum, Library of Congress, 2006, passim. 393 Congressional Research Service, Human Rights in China and US Policy: Issues for the 113th Congress, Thomas Lum, Library of Congress, 2015, p. 7.

99 A shortage- and thus demand for- ‘luxury items’, which today would include many consumer goods, has been a feature of previous blockades, including the US Civil War blockade and the British economic blockade of World War One, and might be a source of discontent in China.394 Evidence from the US Civil War blockade seems to confirm the supposition however that such impacts are unlikely to be war- winning in themselves. Undermining the CPC’s credibility might be a long-term goal, longer perhaps than the crippling economic impact that an economic blockade could perhaps apply, and therefore may constitute a subsidiary objective of a US economic blockade. Therefore, the US would need to walk a fine line between its legal obligations and any strategic goals regarding internal Chinese politics. Thus, a blockade that impacted food imports even indirectly or inadvertently, would be politically risky. As a major importer of grain and other food products, China is vulnerable to potential shocks to the global food trade. Review of Maritime Transport 2013 noted that “[a]fter achieving self-sufficiency for many years, China is increasingly emerging as an important source of grain import demand.”395 Increased demand in China for imports affected by a blockade and associated price rises might be an effective means of coercing the Chinese state, however the political and humanitarian risks are substantial.

The evidence of this historical investigation indicates that the economic interest of neutrals, and perhaps the political self-interest of the US government of the time, would be more likely to impact an economic blockade of China, perhaps by limiting its scope and therefore its effectiveness, than was the case regarding British strategy in World War One. The likely political issues that the US would face therefore in undertaking an economic blockade of China are a continuation of this historical trend, although the specific grievances may vary. Environmental damage itself has humanitarian consequences, and as the sanctions-enforcement against Iraq indicates, even overtly-legitimate measures will not be without their detractors and adverse consequences on the basis of the impact on civilians. Perplexingly, even this measure had some ‘collateral’ consequences and it is a problematic task to fully separate their direct causes. For the US, establishing and maintaining political legitimacy for a measure that will inevitably impact civilians to some degree would be a challenge, given the nature of modern warfare and economic blockade. While the historical evidence indicates that such moral considerations are not necessarily a barrier to the execution of an economic blockade, the attitude of neutrals in term of their perceptions and political and

394 DeLeon, Four Years in Rebel Capitals, pp. 280-1; Consett, The Triumph of Unarmed Forces (1914- 1918), pp. 210-11. Attacking this nexus is not necessarily analogous to seeking the collapse of the Chinese state; it could, for example, be part of a strategy for coercion, in which a policy change by China was the ultimate US objective. 395 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Transport 2013, p. 21.

100 economic self-interest is essential to their remaining neutral, and thus not undermining the effectiveness of the blockade.

Operational considerations for an economic blockade of China This historical investigation has highlighted important considerations for the execution of economic blockades at the sub-strategic levels, which can illuminate the likely challenges for the US in a potential blockade of China. These include the exploitation of new technology as a counter to maritime power by continental states, which, as we have seen, has been a common thread influencing the conduct of blockades at the operational level. Technology can also benefit a blockade power, as we have also seen, and this includes systems pertaining to communications and the gathering and exploitation of signals intelligence. Likewise, the suitability of existing vessels for blockade duty has been a repeated element in various historical contexts, including as we saw in cases from the sail, early steam and industrial eras. China’s naval modernization regime has prioritized anti-access and area- denial (A2/AD) platforms, largely as a counter to US maritime power projection in its near seas following the latter’s deployment of two aircraft carrier battle groups during the 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis.396 The US Navy’s ability to acquire and maintain sea control- on which the operational viability of an economic blockade would rest- might therefore be disputed within the first and second island chains. This challenge to US power in the region has spawned much debate regarding the US Navy and US Air Force’s force structures and capability gaps.397 This conversation is comparable to the one that emerged before World War One regarding the Royal Navy’s force structure in the face of new threats including submarines. Today, the proliferation of relatively inexpensive A2/AD technologies is a threat to both maritime power projection and transportation in various regions around the world. A2/AD are not exclusive to China, and can be seen as a continuation of historical trends in continental navies. While such weapons systems are broadly attractive to other states due to their low cost and considerable strategic benefits, they perhaps hold the greatest potential in the hands of a state with an advanced economy such as China. Despite China’s recent articulation of a departure from its hitherto ‘land-based’ approach to maritime strategy, in terms of actual force structure it possesses a reasonably traditional continental navy, albeit with some significant technological advances. If China could secure its objective ashore quickly (forced reunification with Taiwan, for example), the mere disruption of an opponent’s maritime power projection might be sufficient. This arguably promotes pre-emptive action by the US

396 Rahman, 'Ballistic Missiles in China's Anti-Taiwan Blockade Strategy’, locn. 4576. 397 Congressional Research Service, China Naval Modernization: Implications for US Navy Capabilities: Background and Issues for Congress, pp. 55-6; Krepinveich Jr, 'The Pentagon's Wasting Assets-The Eroding Foundations of American Power’,

101 as a preferable strategy, particularly as China’s salami-slicing operations- which in the future could potentially threaten Taiwan- involve incremental advances, each of which might have a relatively short time-frame. This also depends on the robustness of the continental naval power in war, which in many historical cases, such as German U-Boat guerre de course, have ultimately proved wanting. This uncertainty suggests that China’s strategy of incremental steps (thus limiting the potential for it to suffer a significant strategic defeat or setback) will continue. While few observers have addressed the issue in detail, there have been some attempts to articulate how an economic blockade of China might function in operational terms, such as T.X. Hammes’ “offshore control”, a proposed strategy conceived in part as a response to ASB.398 Others have argued that a US economic blockade (of all imports) should be peripheral to any conflict with China, including the proponents of ASB- a more expensive (due to the requirement for new technology and platforms) and certainly more escalatory counterpoint to a ‘pure’ economic blockade strategy. Created as a direct response to China’s growing A2/AD threat to US maritime power projection in the Western Pacific and East Asia, the ASB concept might best be described as ‘aspirational’. It set out a series of operational challenges and how they might overcome, and what changes to US forces structures were, and still are, necessary to realise them.399 It remains as Hammes observes, “the antithesis of strategy”, being neither connected to or articulating a more fundamental body of thought with practical outcomes.400 ASB was subsequently developed into the subsequent Joint Operational Access Concept (JOAC).401 In 2015, the term ASB and the office within the US Department of Defence responsible for its development were replaced by the ‘Joint Concept for Access and Maneuver in the Global Commons’ (JAM-GC).402 Translating these proposed US responses to China’s A2/AD into viable strategies remains a key challenge. Proponents of ASB have argued that the US Navy in particular is ill-equipped for the operational requirements that they envisage, particularly in terms of investment in new ships and weapons systems.403 Attempts

398 Hammes, 'Offshore control', p. 1. For a critique of Hammes’ proposal see: Haddick, Fire on the Water, pp. 115-16. 399 Air-Sea Battle Office, Air-Sea Battle: Service Collaboration to Address Anti-Access & Area Denial Challenges, May, 2013, http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ASB-ConceptImplementation-Summary-May- 2013.pdf passim. As applied to China, ASB included direct strikes against military targets on the Chinese mainland. AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, p. xv. 400 Hammes, 'Offshore control', p. 2. 401 Joint operational access concept (JOAC), Web (Dept. of Defense, [Washington, D.C.], 2012), http://purl.fdlp.gov/GPO/gpo18049. 402 This change occurred as a result of the politicisation of ASB in the US and internationally, and some operational considerations. Sam LeGrone, 'Pentagon Drops Air Sea Battle Name, Concept Lives on', USNI News (Online), January 20, 2015 https://news.usni.org/2015/01/20/pentagon-drops-air-sea- battle-name-concept-lives (accessed July 23, 2016). ASB is used in this thesis due to being more recognisable and for its recent historical context. 403 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, pp. 121-22.

102 to rectify this have been made and are continuing, and the US Navy and Air Force in particular recognise the significance of the A2/AD challenges they face. Hammes’ proposal for general blockade of imports and exports has similar shortcomings in terms of current US force structure and capacity, particularly given the significant trade volumes in the SLOCs to be interdicted. Haddick is one of several scholars who have questioned the efficacy of offshore control both in operational terms and the strategic assumptions underpinning it.404 Conversely, Friedberg suggests that the US Navy and Coast Guard are essentially well-equipped to engage in a distant economic blockade of China. Importantly, Freidberg argues for a selective economic blockade of China’s oil imports- a much less demanding (and therefore less problematic) task in operational terms than the proposals of Hammes and the CBSA.405 The issue of the suitability of vessels for blockade duty was, as we have seen, a particular challenge for the economic blockade of Germany in World War One. Further, as we have seen, the sometimes trying conditions associated with blockade operations and their deleterious effect on crews and vessels alike, have been an on-going historical trend since the advent of naval blockade itself. The high operational demands of the CBSA’s envisaged economic blockade would also be felt in terms of intelligence required to track merchant ship movements reliably. A passive US Civil War-style approach to economic blockade that essentially functioned as a maritime picket would struggle to be practical operationally. Active US diplomacy in states with export or throughput ports, perhaps, as Mirski suggests, aided by a modern version of Britain’s World War Navicert system, would be the most efficient means of undertaking an economic blockade against China.406 This underscores the major-strategic approach to attacking China’s maritime trade- an economic warfare strategy- in which economic blockade operations are supported by US soft-power in neutral states, and potentially by limited attacks on China itself. The criticality of intelligence to the functioning of a blockade at the operational and tactical levels which we have observed in historical contexts would be amplified many times over in the case of an economic blockade of China.407 Even were the more practical option of a partial blockade of key imports or exports the chosen US strategy, information on ship movements and similar information such as cargoes would arguably be essential, given the volume of China’s maritime trade. The size of China’s economy means that any commodity worth interdicting, such as oil, will be of high volume also. The significant increases in the sizes of tanker and

404 Haddick, Fire on the Water, pp. 117-18. passim. 405 AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept, pp. 77-8; Friedberg, Beyond Air-sea Battle. locn. 2197. 406 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China', p. 405. 407 As we shall see in in terms of measuring the effectiveness of a blockade of China, intelligence can also inform the strategic level of economic blockade.

103 merchant vessels, which we have already identified, would be a related operational/tactical challenge for US blockade forces, which is in turn related to the issue of suitable force structures and vessels for economic blockade discussed earlier. It is arguably most pertinent however that, as in World War One, a revolution in the capacity of continental naval power to offset naval-maritime power will again pose critical operational challenges to the conduct of blockades as they have hitherto been known.

104 The role of economic blockade in the US’ wider strategy & the question of strategic effectiveness As we have seen from our historical investigation, there are inherent characteristics of economic blockade that have conditioned the functions that it can have within an overarching strategy. Despite being a fundamental attack on the blockadee in the industrial and post-industrial eras, economic blockade is a cumulative, amplifying and thus to a significant extent indirect strategy. Critically, it requires a coherent strategic envelope in which it can be effective, implying the need for an expressly non-maritime parent strategic objective; the evidence adduced in this study confirms that economic blockade cannot be effective on its own. This presents a critical problem for the US in terms of a military strategy vis-a-vis China. Further, economic blockade is, as we have seen, part of a specific kind of warfare in terms of duration and scope, with a consistent pattern of effectiveness. It was for this reason that General Scott’s ‘’ in the US Civil War was so limited in its potential, as he misread both the nature of the war ahead and the role that an economic blockade could play in it. The US’ initial considerations must include not only its definition of strategic success but also the kind of post-war environment it wishes to see. This does not necessarily preclude a declaration of war on China, if required; it is the conduct of the war itself that is rather at issue. In contemporary discussions of a potential US-China conflict, questions of exactly how a US strategy based on or inclusive of an economic blockade would function in terms of US objectives, and the geostrategic situation it attempts to create, are often unanswered. A return to the status quo would be a highly unrealistic US objective, as violence between states tends to create a new paradigm, with unintended consequences that cannot be reversed. History suggests that this would rather be at best a stalemate that would only delay the conflict’s ultimate conclusion. Successive decisive French defeats on land and at sea were necessary to bring decades of conflict with Britain to an end in 1815, while in post-World War One Germany the Treaty of Versailles laid the political foundations for the rise of Adolf Hitler. President Obama’s announcement of the US ‘rebalance’ to the Asia-Pacific (largely in response to China’s ‘assertiveness’) has to date seemingly had little tangible impact and perhaps reflects the US’ lack of an articulated grand strategy regarding the Asia-Pacific.408 The latter would arguably provide valuable context for the development of appropriate military strategies in the event of regional conflict,

408 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, pp. 116, VI. As the Economist noted with irony, “China is the only country that really believes the pivot is happening.” 'Essay: China's Future', The Economist, August 2014. http://www.economist.com/news/essays/21609649- china-becomes-again-worlds-largest-economy-it-wants-respect-it-enjoyed-centuries-past-it-does-not (accessed August 31, 2014). p. 10. A key additional hindrance is the partisan challenges that have dominated the US federal politics for most of the last decade, and the associated severe cuts to the US defence budget.

105 particularly for its prospective allies. The continued lack of such coherent peacetime planning for US engagement in the region (both for before and after a potential conflict with China) may therefore hamper the formulation- and analysis- of a military strategy in which an economic blockade might be employed. Like ASB, offshore control offers little suggestion regarding how the post-war environment should be managed, particularly in China’s case (noting only that relative to the US it will be vanquished).409 While this is a broad geostrategic topic that is somewhat beyond the scope of this thesis, it is pertinent to recognise the importance of delineating the wider strategic objectives of an economic blockade. In fact, while criticisms of ASB’s limitations are well-founded- in that it does not have the historical and of blockade, conceptually speaking- the relevance of economic blockade is largely based on history rather than current reality. That is to say that, although economic blockade has in many previous instances been a powerful strategy, a detailed (and public) case has not been made for its effective employment against China in a grand-strategic context, despite the work of Mirski, Friedberg, Hammes and others. In that respect economic blockade and ASB are arguably similarly placed in terms of potential viability. The options for the US and its allies in terms of peripheral activities on China’s land borders are somewhat limited. While it was not a simple matter of cause and effect, even Britain, which is geographically and culturally part of Europe, had limited success influencing geostrategic events on the continent without funding the army of a continental ally.410 The US’ Asian allies and neutrals are yet to be convinced of the former’s commitment to its rebalance; the re-emergence of possible US isolationism (or, paradoxically, bellicosity) in the 2016 US Presidential election campaign has presumably not helped matters.411 It is therefore understandable that Asian states impugned by China might nevertheless be wary of throwing in their lot with a geographically distant power, which may in the future choose to disengage from the region and leave them to fend for themselves against a riled regional hegemon. This applies most in the case of states sharing a land-border with China, as its massive standing army precludes traditional intervention- a lesson learned in the Korean War. As the former Soviet satellite states have experienced, being a neighbour to great continental power has some realities regarding regional influence and power imbalances that are dangerous to ignore. Only India and Russia have the ability to cause significant concern to China’s continental interests, Russia, as we saw earlier, might seek to balance with China against the PRC, while the involvement of

409 Hammes, 'Offshore control', p. 12. 410 Supra, p. 58. 411 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, p. 4; Simon Cameron-Moore, 'Trump Rhetoric Scaring Asian Nations ', Reuters Business Insider (Online),May 20, 2016 http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-rhetoric-scaring-asian-nations-2016-5?IR=T (accessed July 23, 2016).

106 major continental US ally like India could be self-defeating for the US, in that it implies an escalation to semi-global war.412 Thus, the historical requirement for the cooperation of landward neighbours in an economic blockade of a continental power may not be borne out by the strategic realities for the states in question. Yet as we have seen in the cases of the continental system and Britain’s economic blockade of Nazi Germany until 1941, an economic blockade that is not sealed in continental terms – at least to some degree- is already at a disadvantage. While the discussion of this issue is speculative, it is reasonable to assume two potential US strategic objectives: the US major strategy will seek either to coerce China into action (or inaction), or to cripple it in a limited war (assuming some degree of escalation). Given the scope of China’s imports and exports, we can assume that the blockade will not be total: it will be deliberately ‘loose’ or porous. Further, this thesis has revealed that efficacious economic blockades have historically functioned as one of several elements of a major strategy, ideally peripheral to some action ashore. The economic blockades of the War of 1812 and the US Civil War illustrated this clearly. Moreover in each of these wars, the blockader’s strategic objectives were unequivocal. This is how the longer-term strategic vacuum of ASB/JOAC, and to an extent also that of some proposals for distant economic blockade, are called into question. Due to their shallowness, offshore control and ASB cannot expect a resolution beyond a limited ‘Versailles-like’ agreement following some operational successes, which arguably could do little more than humiliate China and delay an ultimate strategic decision.413 Limited goals suggest achievability, but the prospect of a viable peace when the loser retains both a desire and a capability to subsequently redress the other’s limited victory may be problematic. Limited US strategic objectives in a conflict with China, comparable to Britain’s objectives in the War of 1812, for example, are not undesirable in themselves, however. Rather, a conflict between great powers that is inconclusive due to a lack of strategic depth on the part of either party would be a waste of lives and resources, and merely a stay of execution for a future conflict. Yet if such an inconclusive resolution to the conflict is undesirable, it is arguably probable nevertheless, considering that neither China nor the US will likely be defeated outright in a manner comparable to World War Two. That said, the US’ ultimate strategic goal (and that of China) would determine nature of the post-war geostrategic environment. Total war and/or the collapse of the Chinese state would be detrimental to the global order, particularly given China’s possession of nuclear weapons and the regional or global destabilization that they

412 Supra, pp. 82-3. 413 This was exactly what the US wished to avoid when it resorted to atomic warfare in 1945, although there were other reasons for the use of atomic weapons. Tracy, Attack on Maritime Trade, p. 192; Ronald H Spector, Eagle Against the Sun: The American War with Japan, New York, Vintage Books, 1985, p. 558-9. The reference to the Treaty of Versailles goes to its consequences for post-war Europe, rather than the conduct of World War One.

107 might entail. Yet an economic blockade must be strategically effective, which might necessitate supporting attacks on China’s fuel reserves, land transit corridors and counter-blockade forces. This being highly escalatory, if attacks are to be made on the mainland, they should be measured but emphatic in terms of China’s C2 networks and defences. Yet while the alternatives between direct strikes similar to those proposed in ASB and distant blockade appear distinct, there is a commonly held view that the latter requires some degree of strike on the Chinese mainland to support the objectives of an economic blockade. Aaron L. Friedberg has argued,

In reality, the toughest choices facing [US] military planners concern not whether, but how, and how aggressively, to threaten to take the offensive against China.414

It is most likely therefore that, within political restraints, the US would give itself the best opportunity to defeat China militarily; this implies the need for a combination of far economic blockade, wider economic warfare and more direct measures. The possibility that the economic blockade might not be supported by the participation of China’s continental neighbours- of the kind that helped render Britain’s World War One economic blockade effective- adds weight to this imperative.

Measuring the effectiveness of a US economic blockade As indicated by our historical investigation, measuring the effectiveness of economic blockade has been a consistent conundrum for blockading powers due to on-going factors in terms of the nature of warfare generally, and of economic blockade. The fact that economic blockade is, at its most efficacious, only one component in a wider strategy means that identifying specific impacts at the strategic level is often problematic, particularly at the time of events. For examples of this trend we can look to the collapse of the Continental System and Germany’s defeat in World War One. There is also an important distinction to be made between quantifying impacts, such as tonnages interdicted, goods denied and inflationary pressures, and the ultimate effect that they have on the wider strategic situation. Ascertaining the latter during a conflict is largely a role for intelligence gathering, evidenced by US signals intelligence successes in World War Two, comprising information from various sources that might today be classified or freely available. The challenge of such activities mean that, as we have seen, the ultimate effectiveness of a blockade can only be discerned from information obtained after

414 Friedberg, Beyond Air-sea Battle. locn. 2785.

108 the cessation of hostilities. These historical patterns in economic blockade would again be critical considerations for a US economic blockade of China. Measuring the effectiveness of an economic blockade of China in real time would therefore be hugely challenging for the US, although not impossible. The opacity of Chinese trade statistics and other governmental data- deliberate and inadvertent- is one important obstacle, and it may be that China’s military planners cannot ascertain what its wartime shipping requirements will be. Britain was forced to deal with similar challenges in the face of the threat of German guerre de course strategy in World War Two.415 Another challenge for the US is the short-term volatility of financial markets that might not be indicative of genuine impacts. Likewise, other consequences such as currency devaluations in both the US and China are to be expected, and might reflect market sensitivities to disruption due to conflict, rather than the effect of an economic blockade per se. For the general public (in international terms), an economic blockade is an unfamiliar concept, as are its ramifications for them and their communities. War conversely, while most of us have limited or no direct experience of it, is more readily comprehended. It could be argued therefore that, as with the economic blockade of Germany in World War One, reactions to the outbreak of war between China and the US (as implied by an economic blockade) will be foremost in the minds of individuals, rather than any subsidiary economic blockade. The catalysts of any economic and subsequent political disruption therefore, which are largely governed by the actions of individuals, may be difficult to identify. It is for this reason perhaps that the specific impact of Britain’s World War One economic blockade has been continuously reassessed in subsequent historiography, and why the Admiralty had preferred a more direct economic warfare approach than blockade and land warfare. These circumstances mean that the collection and analysis of information from within China would be essential to gauging an economic blockade’s effectiveness. Despite the opacity of the Chinese state, it cannot fully cut itself off from the outside world. Useful information might include news of rationing, domestic price fluctuations and black-marketeering, critiquing of domestic propaganda, and financial intelligence such as the health of China’s banks, inflationary pressures and the activities of CPC-members’ private accounts. International gauges would include calculations based on increases in shipping costs and maritime insurance. Similar assessments would also be necessary to gauge the blockade’s impact on the US. An advantage of modern globalised interconnectedness in the employment of economic blockade/economic warfare strategy is the fact that the US would not need to rely on its own resources to gain such information. Whereas in previous examples of economic blockade the matter of strategic effectiveness could largely

415 Milner, 'The Atlantic war, 1939-1945', p. 457.

109 only be established by state-sponsored means (such as diplomacy and intelligence gathering), today, third party NGOs and even media organisations could be useful sources of information. No doubt China would seek to prevent this, but this could be a challenge in terms of its increasingly active online communities, despite China’s immense security apparatus. In this sense, as with other elements of globalisation and the digital revolution, a war between China and the US would be historically unique. China’s actions will in some cases be indicative; the degree or manner in which it seeks to circumvent the blockade might indicate where the strategy is having an effect. Patterns in the deployment of the PLA Navy and Air Force might give clues as to China’s sensitivities to its reserves of oil and petroleum products. Yet even if the blockade were seen to be empirically effective, it would not necessarily follow that the blockade was therefore decisive, significant or an efficient use of US resources. As we have seen, the work of Davis and Engerman has illustrated this very conundrum in the case of Britain’s World War One economic blockade. It may be that the phrase ‘measuring effectiveness’ is misleading in the sense that not all salient aspects of blockade will be able to be quantified in terms of the measure’s ultimate political impacts. Instead, as we have seen, one of the most enduring aspects of economic blockades in historical terms has been their impact on pre-existing shortcomings in administrative, political and economic structures. The indirect nature of such impacts has been shown to be non-conducive to contemporary analysis, requiring some time before cumulative effects can be seen and understood. This could then facilitate further actions (such as strikes against land targets or increased economic warfare measures) on the part of the US to exacerbate these issues, as was the case when Japan’s oil shortages were eventually comprehended by the US in World War Two. These issues are indicative of the longer-term nature of economic blockade in both effect and assessment thereof, and suggest that some persistence and indeed patience is essential when employing an economic blockade, which is, as we have also seen, at times anathema to political pressures of warfare and diplomacy. Again we can look to Britain’s abortive economic warfare plans of World War One due to the complaints of the Foreign Office and the neutral US as an example of this pattern.

Long-term strategy & escalation This thesis has established that a pattern in the employment of economic blockades exists in terms of their long-term strategic potential, largely in keeping with Corbett’s theory of their inherent long-term role in strategy. There is a link moreover between this and the potentially smaller potential of economic blockades for escalation in that, in addition to having relatively modest initial impacts on the

110 blockadee, they operate in the maritime environment. This has historically been seen as an advantage for maritime power, as we have seen from blockade and blockade-like measures of the post-World War Two era, including the sanctions enforcement against Iraq (1990-2003). Yet we have also seen that this nominally de-escalatory character is contradicted in the case of economic blockades by the fact that they are a fundamental attack on the blockadee’s prosperity at the very least, and potentially on its survival. As this pattern emerged in the industrial era, it can be reasonably applied to the current era of globalization, in which elements of the former period persist. China moreover is not only potentially vulnerable to economic warfare in general terms (including blockade); it is also, as we have seen, suspicious of what it perceives as unfriendly maritime power. While the small footprint of maritime actions may have a benefit in terms of global opinion therefore, it seems unlikely to have any such advantage with its intended victim in this sense. Further, as a relatively slow-acting belligerent act, economic blockade conditions (or reflects) the scope of any war in which it is employed. This explains in part why it has been most commonly employed in great power conflicts lasting several years. In this context economic blockade may be an appropriate strategy for the US against China. China’s continued construction of strategic fuel reserves in recent years is indicative perhaps of the tendency towards long-term thinking in its grand strategic planning.416 Similarly, Chinese activities in the Indian Ocean suggest a long-term approach to the development of maritime power projection and SLOC defence.417 Well-considered long-term planning has also been a feature of China’s energy strategy in more general terms.418 Its economic and naval expansion arguably shows a degree of considered planning and patient incremental advances, of which its ‘salami-slicing’ strategy in territorial disputes could be regarded as a microcosm.419

416 Mulvennon, 'Dilemmas and Imperatives if Beijing's Strategic Energy Dependence: The PLA Perspective’, locs. 408-26; Congressional Research Service, Understanding China's political system, p. 12. A long-term approach also decreases by natural attrition the proportion of members of the US military with experience in maritime conflict. 417 James R Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara, 'China's Naval Ambitions in the Indian Ocean', Journal of Strategic Studies, 31: 3, (2008), 367-394, passim. 418 For example: Vitaly Kozyrev, 'China's Continental Energy Strategy: Russia and Central Asia,' & Saad Rahim, 'China's Energy Strategy Toward the Middle East: ,' in Gabriel B Collins, Andrew S Erickson, et al (ed.), China's Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing's Maritime Policies, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2008, passim. Saudi Arabia is an example of the many resource-dependent states that have been heavily impacted by the end of the commodity supercycle, with potential domestic political consequences. Such states, which also include Russia, are more reliant than ever on the diminishing demand from rising economies like China. 'The commodities supercycle's end and political risk’, Strategic Comments, 2016. 419 The CPC’s attempts to dilute local ethnic groups in Tibet and Xingjiang by promoting or facilitating the internal migration of Han Chinese (the predominant ethnic group in China), ostensibly to negate ethnic nationalism, could also be seen as indicative of long-term thinking. Congressional Research Service, Current Politics and Economics of South, South-eastern, and Central Asia, Susan V Lawrence, Library of Congress, 2014, p. 27; Congressional Research Service, Human Rights in China and US Policy: Issues for the 113th Congress, p. 14.

111 On the one hand this might suggest that an essentially long-term undertaking as an economic blockade (or variants thereof) is an appropriate strategy.420 Yet the Chinese government’s grand strategy is based on highly important five-year plans. In such circumstances it is difficult to envisage a US economic blockade being sufficiently enduring while also remaining politically viable (domestically and in international terms) without escalating to general war.421 A overly-porous (hence less effective) economic blockade would moreover give China time to adapt by finding alternate sources of trade through Russian territorial waters, including the Northern Sea Route (NSR), and other potential future Arctic SLOCs and Central Asian pipelines.422 Further, while a long-term economic blockade could conceivably do great damage to China, in the time it took for it to have significant impacts, China could do considerable damage to US and allied interests using its considerable international economic power (in addition to its military capabilities). In a comparable fashion, Britain’s initial fleet-economic blockade in the War of 1812 was so ineffective that it did little other than invite American privateers to wreak havoc on Britain’s regional maritime trade. For the China-US case, this suggests the need for a more intense and speedily decisive conflict than is envisaged by offshore control, but more coherent and strategic than ASB.423 In terms of the potential for fomenting escalation by China, strikes on Chinese territory along the lines of those proposed by ASB are clearly escalatory. Economic blockade perhaps has its own potential for escalation, as it would be a fundamental attack on the Chinese state’s ability to function.424 An economic blockade without concomitant strikes on Chinese military targets might also be taken as a sign of US ambivalence by China, to which the former would cede some of the operational initiative. This is in a sense analogous to Tracy’s observation that unenforced sanctions are ultimately escalatory, in that they leave a vacuum for retaliation by the recipient state.425 China might also act pre-emptively in response to a perceived threat of either economic blockade or direct assault. As economic blockades are belligerent acts however, the notion that they are in themselves escalatory is perhaps extraneous to the fact that the declaration of such a blockade necessarily involves a limited or general war, in which- as in previous cases including the War of 1812, the US Civil War and World War One- other strategies and campaigns are likely to figure heavily. In many conflicts, such as the

420 Hammes, 'Offshore control', pp. 6, 11. 421 Congressional Research Service, Understanding China's political system, p. 13; Haddick, Fire on the Water, p. 116. 422 Asia-Pacific rebalance 2025: capabilities, presence, and partnerships, pp. 178-9. 423 ‘Maritime Denial’ could therefore play a role in this context. Friedberg, Beyond Air-sea Battle. locn. 2329. 424 Ibid. locn. 2220-29. 425 Supra, p. 27.

112 World Wars and US Civil War, the decision to employ blockade or blockade-like measures was subsequent to the declaration of war, if a natural step for belligerent maritime powers. If open war was considered too much of an escalation, at least initially, some other means could be found to disrupt China’s economy, albeit perhaps less effectively. A direct assault is therefore escalatory in terms of the intensity of a US-China conflict; an economic blockade, and the war it implies, is escalatory in terms of the scope and duration of the conflict, and could be seen in the international community as translating a local conflict into a regional war. Historically, maritime powers, particularly Britain and the US, have consistently found economic blockades and related strategies to be valuable complementary strategies, notably in the World Wars. A US economic blockade of China could play a useful role in a wider US strategy- even a critical one- but it would not be an isolated operation, which would render measuring its effectiveness a particular challenge, yet it could be viable to an extent that makes economic blockade a credible element of US strategy. Economic blockades in World War One and the US Civil War moreover illustrate how strategies originally envisaged as a rapid and critical war-winning measure can come to have other, more subtle and yet still crucial impacts on the ability of the blockadee to function in fundamental terms, such as economics and governance. This conclusion might appear rather anti-climactic if we had considered a US economic blockade of China a war-winning panacea; this historical investigation has shown that that has not been the function of an economic blockade.

113 Legal Imperatives for the US As we have seen, there are consistent elements of international law that arise in the context of economic blockades, many of which are unsettled but will likely emerge again in the case of a US economic blockade of China. These include questions of distance and the abrogation of law based on military exigencies and the status of international straits. International law has been able to set conditions on the employment of economic blockades, but has also been conditioned by state practice. It has been shown to be reactive in some respects, and this is reflected in the retrospective case-by-case means by which blockades have been condoned or declared invalid by the international community. Today, this may be too slow to be of use to the US if it were to seek political legitimacy for an economic blockade of China. Yet the frequent historical divergences from international law by maritime powers, such as in the World Wars, illustrate that the options for recourse for a blockadee if impugned are few. The importance of international law, and the political legitimacy it can endow, in a war between China and the US will therefore be predicated on the intensity of the conflict, which has historically dictated this correlation. The legal issues facing the US if it were to engage in an economic blockade of China can therefore be seen as part of the historical continuum, which we have observed, of evolving thought and practice by states intent on pursuing their interests while maintaining legitimacy for their actions. In the current context, some legal obstacles might be abrogated while others could necessitate a degree of pragmatism on the part of the US. It is worth considering moreover that, from the CPC’s perspective, the US, as the status quo power, has the most to gain from upholding the current rules-based international order. As a means to political validation, legal legitimacy not an end in itself, and as the UNSC- the perceived apex of international political consensus and law- will play essentially no substantial role in validating a US economic blockade of China due to the latter’s veto, both legal and political validation appear a challenging prospect. It is of course possible that circumstances might arise in which Article 51 of the UN Charter (pertaining to collective self-defence) could be invoked, such as the US coming to the aid of Japan or the Philippines.426 It would also be politically expedient for the US to exhaust all legal options, including the UNSC, to help validate its subsequent actions. Any support it can garner, such as a majority of votes in the UNSC and even the support of the UN Secretary General, could be beneficial in this context. Still, in terms of the jus ad bellum, the absence of UN support would an important point of difference from UN-backed measures like the 1990-2003 sanctions-enforcement against Iraq. The fact that the US, unlike China, has not

426 ‘Charter of the United Nations, 1945’ Chapter VI, Art. 51, reprinted in: Michael Byers, War Law: Understanding International Law and Armed Conflict, Grove Press, 2007, locn. 1700.

114 ratified UNCLOS might to an extent further weaken its moral authority.427 The International Court of Arbitration however has recently declared China’s legal claims in the South China Sea groundless; China is thus not in a position of strength in terms of international law, at least if that were the casus belli.428 If, as expected, China ignores the ruling and continues its unilateralist policies, it would be a significant challenge to UNCLOS and related elements of international law. This might render international law a powerful legitimising tool for a US economic blockade or other measures, although China’s continued abrogation of international law suggests that it would not in itself force a change of behaviour on China’s part. Further, despite the US’ non-ratification of UNCLOS, it generally adheres to UNCLOS’ principles- a similar situation to that which developed regarding the 1856 Paris Declaration. UNCLOS therefore remains relevant, along with the Laws of Naval Warfare. The law regarding international straits would seem to indicate that, at best, only a state whose territorial waters include an international strait could prohibit the transit of enemy vessels. The US could therefore not legally undertake such an act of its own accord. Moreover there appears to be little to no consensus on the legality of closing a strait to neutral shipping.429 Geographic bottlenecks in China’s maritime SLOCs, such as the Straits of Hormuz or Malacca, could perhaps still be exploited by economic blockade without closing the strait itself, by operating adjacent to where maritime traffic is channelized. In light of geographic considerations and the threat posed by China’s A2/AD capabilities, a distant or ‘far’ economic blockade would appear to be expedient for the US. Some innovation would therefore be required in legal (as well as politico- strategic and operational) terms, in order to deal with the challenges pertaining to global commerce and maritime trade discussed earlier. The fact that the United States in some respects pioneered the doctrine of continuous voyage during its civil war is significant, as this permissive approach continues today (although the US is relatively unique in this respect).430 As the US’ Commander’s Handbook on the Law of Naval Operations (2007) states,

It is immaterial that the vessel or aircraft is at the time of interception bound for neutral territory, if its ultimate destination is the blockaded area. There is a presumption of attempted

427 Congressional Research Service, Maritime territorial and exclusive economic zone (EEZ) disputes involving China: Issues for Congress, Ronald O'Rourke, Library of Congress, 2016, pp. 61-2; Congressional Research Service, China's air defense identification zone (ADIZ), Ian E Rinehart and Bartholomew Elias, Library of Congress, 2015, pp. 9, 28. www.cq.com/file/crsreports- 4624963/Chinas%20Air%20Defense%20Identification%20Zone%20ADIZ.pdf 428 'China Has No Legal Basis to Claim Historic Rights in South China Sea, International Court Finds', July 13, 2016, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-12/china-no-legal-basis-south-china-sea- tribunal-finds/7622738July 13, 2016 429 Heinegg, 'The Law of Naval Warfare and International Straits', pp. 265-6. 430 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 215.

115 breach of blockade where vessels or aircraft are bound for a neutral port or airfield serving as a point of transit to the blockaded area.

And similarly:

Enemy merchant vessels and civil aircraft may be captured wherever located beyond neutral territory.431

Historically it has been uncommon for neutral states to accept the interdiction of their vessels in areas “distant from blockaded coasts or ports”, which would seem to apply to a blockade of China adjacent to the Strait of Hormuz.432 Moreover, the US could find itself being accused of hypocrisy in abrogating the freedoms of navigation that it has prosecuted so stridently against China in the South China Sea, if it interdicted China-bound vessels so far from China itself. A critical point in a US economic blockade may therefore be the ability to properly identify blockade- runners to legitimise their interdiction at such distances.433 It could also be reasonably argued that interdicting China’s SLOCs at such a distance is a military necessity, because the latter’s long range A2/AD weapons such as anti-ship ballistic missiles (ASBMs) render a ‘traditional’ distant economic blockade (that is, similar to Britain’s of Germany in World War One) nearer Malacca a dangerous anachronism. As Colombos argued regarding the Allies’ blockades of the two World Wars,

Blockades conducted under the old rules [of close blockade] are of little strategic value… Legal doctrines must not be divorced from the circumstances under which they originated and under which they are developed.434

Therefore, the advent of distant blockade from this period might be a powerful historical legal precedent. Specifically, this claim could be supported by the afore- mentioned arguments of Tucker and other legal scholars that the British distant

431 'The Commander’s handbook on the law of naval operations NWP 1-14M’, 7-10, 8-10, paras. 7.7.4 & 8.6.2.1} 432 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 216. 433 Center for Naval Warfare Studies, International Law Department, Maritime operational zones, US Naval War College, 2013, http://purl.fdlp.gov/GPO/gpo67998, pp. 4-19-20. The US is not alone however in considering that outward-bound vessels (carrying Chinese exports, in the case of an economic blockade), can be captured at whatever point in their journey; Unlike inbound vessels, their association with the blockadee and breaking the blockade are not in doubt. Colombos, International Law of the Sea, p. 728. 434 Ibid. p. 736.

116 blockade- necessitated by comparable anti-access technologies- should be seen as legitimate and permanent alteration of customary international law relating to blockades. An alteration of customary international law to allow for a US blockade off Hormuz would arguably be a natural extension of the World War One precedent. The London Declaration, from which current customary law largely derives, has been for the most part adhered to in terms of the law regarding blockades. But its articles regarding a blockade’s legitimate area of operations were in essence a compromise between the interests of continental and maritime powers; their strict application would perhaps be operationally unviable today given current and projected A2/AD challenges.435 If distant blockade could be so redefined, it might be considered a significant shift in the legal definition of blockade, or a necessary evolution of blockade-law. As we have seen, the legitimacy of the Allied measures in the world wars in terms of their scope continues to be debated. There is evidently a tension between continuing the natural evolution of international law relating to blockades, and the hesitation to validate the scope of modern warfare that has such inherent direct consequences for civilians via economic impacts. A US economic blockade of China and its outcomes might progress this discussion. If attacks on an enemy’s critical economic activities become further legitimised, so too will be the discretion of the dominant maritime power to take whatever action it feels necessary to achieve its strategic objectives, such is the nature of modern warfare. Yet such conclusions would perhaps come to late too allow the US to freely undertake a measure as controversial as closing an international strait. As the US would need the acquiescence or cooperation of key regional powers such as India, Malaysia and Singapore, some degree of supportable legal foundation would be desirable. As with previous developments of such a nature, the legality of a far US blockade of China would probably be determined only in retrospect, thus necessitating the US’ diplomatic power to convince the international community of the measure’s legitimacy. Future controversy on this point therefore seems likely in the event of a ‘far’ economic blockade being undertaken by the US. The legitimacy or otherwise of a US economic blockade will feature heavily in neutral states’ considerations of whether to acquiesce in its implementation, in addition to their individual self-interest. The RAND Corporation has argued that, as ultimately transpired during Britain’s economic blockade in World War One, neutrals (including shipping companies and other corporations) need only respond to any US blockade-like measures against China as if it were legitimate, based on their economic self-interests. The RAND Corporation’s arguments are however based on the threat of a destructive selective

435 Heinegg, 'Naval Blockade', p. 209.

117 economic blockade paradigm, which as discussed brings a host of political and strategic consequences.436

International law can influence the employment of a potential US economic blockade to the extent that it can impose unenforceable restraints on how the belligerent right can be exercised. As the historical evidence adduced in this thesis indicates, such constraints are rarely enough of an incentive (or disincentive) in themselves to have such an effect in high-intensity conflicts. Instead, legal considerations are likely to affect a US economic blockade in terms of political legitimacy or lack thereof, perhaps manifested in neutral states refusing to fully cooperate with the measure, or even undermining its objectives. Thus, officials in European states conquered by Napoleon Bonaparte were willing participants in undermining of the legally dubious continental system, which promoted France’s interests over their own. A further indirect consequence of legal ambiguity could be adverse international and US domestic opinion, which might create political pressure for the blockade to be curtailed in either time or scope. In light of these considerations, any support that the US could obtain from the UN, even if it were non-binding or implied by a vetoed UNSC vote, might be hugely beneficial. International law might also impact at the operational level of a US economic blockade, if arguments in favour of applying the measure outside the Asia-Pacific region fail to receive approval. This would theoretically necessitate the blockade being carried out closer to China’s expanding A2/AD capabilities, thus putting the blockade vessels at greater risk; US adherence to such an unenforceable ‘requirement’ seems highly unlikely. It is more probable that the US would seek to abrogate the question of distance and perhaps others in international law, and, if necessary, like the World War Allies, achieve the goals of economic blockade by any means at their disposal. The US has, in these wars and its own Civil War, displayed a consistent willingness to adapt its policies towards rights of neutrals to suit the circumstances of the time, and elements of its own manual on the law of naval operations highlight the potential for similar patterns of behaviour in future conflicts. Some degree of international acquiescence to such an abrogation of international law, would arguably be necessary in a conflict of limited scope. Yet as we have seen, economic blockade may be unsuited to some limited conflicts in strategic terms.

436 Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, p. 44.

118 Applying historical themes to the US-China case: a summary This thematic historical investigation has sought to use historical examples of economic blockade as a lens through which to assess the viability of such a US measure against China. The findings of this inquiry are that, in terms of each theme, there are relevant historical issues that can be applied to and can elucidate the US- China case. In considering vulnerability to economic blockade, these issues include the nature of continental power, Chinese governmental and economic fragility, global economic interdependence, political consequences for the US and the actions of neutrals, and the ability of operational issues to force a shift in extant practice in the execution of an economic blockade. A key recurring theme has also been the nature of economic blockade itself, which although it has evolved over time from commercial blockade, has retained characteristics that condition its role in an overarching strategy, the complexity of its impacts and, in the industrial era, the paradox of a critical attack by essentially indirect means. Economic blockade is thus a challenge for historians and strategic planners alike in its nuanced yet devastating potential for the societies it is directed against. In terms of international law, strategic effectiveness and moral-political appraisals of economic blockades, we are forced to look back in order to properly ascertain what transpired, and whether it was appropriate use of force. In the application of the thematic framework highlighted in this investigation to the US-China scenario, there is ample scope for complexity but not of course for retrospectivity. What we can say is that the process of analysing the issues has raised consequent considerations for a US economic blockade. China has perhaps replaced France as the quintessential continental power with maritime interests, and like France and other continental powers, there are serious questions for the prospects of conducting an economic blockade of a state that may possess the means to circumvent it, at least to a degree. Economic blockade, absent an economic warfare assault akin to that envisaged by the Admiralty before World War One, would likely take time to implement and take effect. The context of the war and how it was triggered would determine how US citizens and those of other states perceive the war, and the extent of their patience for a grinding strategy like economic blockade. Then again, our analysis of the role of blockade in US wider strategy has underscored the point that the US is unlikely to resort to blockade without other hard power strategic components. An economic blockade implies an extended conflict; its employment alongside other operations could be a powerful signal of US intent, but this also implies a bluff. The twin thematic issues of operational viability and compliance with international law also emerge as a consideration in the US-China scenario. The PLA and PLA-N’s continuing expansion of their A2/AD capabilities replicates in the contemporary context the strategy of continental navies since the coming of the mine and the submarine. China’s expanding A2/AD envelope would seem to pose

119 grave risks for a US task force operating adjacent to the Western end of the Malacca strait, where in 2004 the USS Abraham Lincoln’s training activities may have caused China some consternation in terms of the security of this SLOC. But to move the blockade to a further chokepoint- that is, Hormuz- invites legal challenges comparable those surrounding the doctrine of continuous voyage, which the US has been alone in implicitly invoking in current policy, and at times historically. Some abrogation of international law may be necessary to ensure that an economic blockade is politically and strategically feasible, but this implies the US spending significant political capital in its attempts to persuade neutrals to cooperate with or at least accept the implications of its strategy. The nature of modern warfare and its implicit focus on attacking societies at a fundamental level via their economies is perhaps the most basic characteristic of economic blockade since its emergence following the decline of mercantilism. This instrument was particularly suited to the politico-strategic environment of the early and mid-twentieth century and its great power conflicts, and may be so again in the current context. Economic blockade, like economic warfare generally, flourishes in a complex politico-economic environment in which the wielder also possesses crucial advantages in terms of his own economic power. Therefore, although they are as yet untested in a war between great powers, globalisation and the just-in-time maritime economy appear, on the basis of our historical investigation, to be particularly vulnerable to disruption. In summary, for a US economic blockade of China therefore, there would be significant challenges, particularly in terms of the actions of neutrals- especially China’s continental neighbours, legal-political legitimacy, operational issues and the impacts on the US domestic economy, especially in a political sense. On the basis of this historical investigation therefore, we can conclude that China would probably be vulnerable to a selective economic blockade, but only in specific circumstances in which the above challenges were obviated or minimised.

120 Concluding reflections: to blockade or not to blockade? This thesis is necessarily a combination of historical investigation and informed speculation, across a variety of themes. Through one thematic ‘prism’, for example, China’s reliance on energy imports, an economic blockade can appear an efficient means to coerce or subdue China (which explains why it has gained so much traction in public debate). Through another prism such as unanswered questions of the US’ broader strategy and the likelihood of escalation by China, a blockade appears to be a poor choice. Obviously, one needs to look through multiple prisms and thus balance the relative measures of such variables, in order to assess the full spectrum of challenges and opportunities implied by an economic blockade of China by the US. Yet the more prisms that one employs, the more complex the options are. Perhaps the most important inference is the recognition that this is no simple matter; that there are few certainties on which to predicate a US strategy. From an historical perspective, this thesis has established that the ways in which economic blockade remains relevant are varied and deeply nuanced. The continuing relevance of long and/or bottlenecked SLOCs is more significant in operational than strategic terms; geography gains strategic relevance rather in regards to elements of continental power such as alternate overland transit corridors of blockaded goods and the actions of third parties to the conflict- particularly in this case Russia. Of on-going importance is the fact that continental powers cannot be defeated at sea to an extent of fundamental strategic significance. Economic interconnectedness is a further issue of on-going historical relevance; trading with the enemy remains as undesirable in this century as it was in the last, and the globalised economy presents new and complex ways in which this can be manifested. Such interdependence has been put forward as an argument both for and against economic blockades in the past, and the nature of globalisation suggests that both arguments have merit to varying degrees today. Political considerations abound in questions of economics, as they do regarding questions of international law. How neutral states and other third parties perceive and respond to an economic blockade is, as always, fundamental to its efficacy, either through their economic self-interest or conclusions as to its moral or legal validity. Today, such concerns are combined with heightened humanitarian considerations (overlapped by environmental ones), which all have the potential to impose external limits on the US’ ability to exercise maritime power effectively, via politico-legal restriction or blockade circumvention. Perhaps most significantly, this thesis has revealed that economic blockades of continental powers have tended not so much to impact the blockadee’s ability to wage war, or create internal socio-political rifts, but rather to exacerbate pre-existing governance weaknesses at multiple levels of administration, in combination with land warfare. In terms of applying these lessons to a US economic blockade of China in a limited or general war, several patterns emerge. Were this thesis to argue that the

121 geographic bottlenecks in China’s SLOCs in themselves render blockade an attractive strategy, it would not be the first to do so. But China’s ‘Malacca ‘dilemma’ is as narrow conceptually as the Straits themselves are geographically. Hormuz, separated from South East Asia by the Indian Ocean- a region dominated by the US and India, despite Chinese advances- appears to be a far more advantageous choice. The advances of China’s A2/AD capacity to operate potentially beyond the Indonesian archipelago seem to confirm this. All this assumes that an ostensive US blockade of an international strait would receive the acquiescence of global opinion, which is another uncertainty. China’s status as a continental power with naval capabilities is another theme of significance. If China circumvented a blockade through alternative overland transit corridors (or via Arctic SLOCs), it might at best complicate or extend the time required for the economic blockade to become effective. The role of Russia is perhaps the biggest uncertainty of all for the US in this context. It may be that China can buck the trend identified by Colin Gray of continental powers being ultimately unable to resist belligerent maritime power. From the CPC’s perspective, at risk from a US economic blockade is the state’s prosperity and by extension the party’s future, or at least that of its current leadership. This would perhaps apply irrespective of whether regime change was an explicit ancillary objective of the blockade, although this is a question beyond the scope of this thesis. There is no reason to suppose therefore that China will not react aggressively to economic blockade, even if it delays its response until it is fully capable of doing so effectively. China is vulnerable to economic blockade in economic and potentially political terms; there is merely uncertainty as regards the extent of that vulnerability. The interdiction of crude oil imports might affect the economy in the short term, and the PLA’s ability to respond in the long term, once civilian sources and reserves are exhausted, and pipelines and other means are at full capacity. The more limited China’s objectives are, the more problematic an economic blockade response from the US becomes. Time is thus the issue for the US: an economic blockade must be effective enough to achieve its objectives- which may require a short timeframe to impact China’s activities- but not so long as to be politically unviable. Moving further into the realm of economic warfare, a blockade targeting Chinese exports- particularly those to the US via an embargo- could perhaps be extremely damaging to China’s apparently fragile economy via its terms of trade. There is a case in this context for non-belligerent embargos or sanctions by the US to attempt to drive a wedge between state and private interests in China- a wedge that would likely evaporate in the event of war. Non-military enforcement of a US embargo on imports from China might be effective, using the US Coast Guard, taking a leaf out of China’s limited naval force playbook.

122 As various observers agree however, considerable damage would almost certainly be done to both the US and Chinese domestic economies, and the global economy. This moreover does not take into account possible Chinese economic retaliation. Whether global opinion blames China or the US (or both) for the damage to the global economy is a key unknown that would have consequences for the political legitimacy, and therefore international tolerance, of a blockade. As national self-interest is both a tangible concern and in some respects a nebulous ideal, it is not possible to determine in advance whether US citizens would consider their jobs- and those of their family members- a rescinded priority in favour of the US’ continued presence and influence in Asia. The tone of the current US Presidential election campaign is indicative of the likely challenges of explaining to concerned and distracted voters the important relationship between the US’ maritime power in, and its trade with, the East and South-East Asian region.437 The context of how a blockade is undertaken- and why war is declared- would be of fundamental importance. Economic blockades are, after all, medium- to long-term strategies. To employ one, a belligerent must have considerable domestic and international political capital. This can be achieved through a number of complementary means, including moral authority, legal legitimacy and arguably force majeure. The duration of the blockade means however that these cannot be counted on to persist, particularly after the end of any ‘honeymoon period’ of public enthusiasm in relation to the event that triggered the blockade. It is this pressure that Chinese continental naval power may be able to exploit against US maritime strategy in the region. Pressure might also come from the moral implications of the impact of an economic blockade on China’s civilian population. A draconian economic blockade in a general war might affect people severely (including inadvertently in neutral and allied states). Conversely, the consequences of an economic blockade on the Chinese middle-class’ standard of living could be a political catalyst that could be to the CPC’s detriment (or perhaps favour). International public opinion, which today is louder and more diverse than ever thanks to social media, would need to be carefully courted by the US, as would impacted neutral states. Some degree of multilateralism would be essential, and outrages such as dispossessed civilians, drowned Chinese or neutral merchant sailors or environmental (and subsequent socio-economic) destruction resulting from sunken ships would be anathema to it. It is also worth noting that, from China’s perspective, a US unwillingness to sink tankers would be an important exploitable weakness in an economic blockade regime targeting oil imports. Some observers such as the RAND Corporation and Sean Mirski do not

437 From which the US benefits.

123 discuss environmental impacts or their consequences in their recent assessments of a prospective US blockade of China.438 It is of course difficult to speculate on US strategic contingency plans vis-à-vis China. On the basis of inference from the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis and natural disaster responses in the 2006 and 2012, it seems most likely that the US would respond to increased Chinese provocation with a fleet deployment to the Eastern Indian Ocean. The forces conducting this operation would presumably be protected by exclusion zones, and could through their simple presence disrupt regional trade (directly and through jittery stock markets) and signal to China the US’ ability to escalate if it so chose (a declaration by the US and its allies that this was not a blockade would be essential). If escalation to a blockade were necessary, it would perhaps be better undertaken by a completely separate force nearer the strait of Hormuz (although the blockade force would need a defensive exclusion zone of its own). The separation of these operations would be advantageous politically and in terms of force structures, as the operational requirements would be different, and aircraft based in Diego Garcia and Qatar could support the blockade. This thesis is however primarily an analysis of what to do- and to an extent when- rather than of how to do it. In terms of when an economic blockade might be efficacious, it is evident that limited catalysts such as China forcing unification with Taiwan are not fertile grounds for US-led multilateralism- certainly on the scale necessary to legitimise the shocks to the global economy implied by a US economic blockade. As a corollary of this argument, for an indication of whether the international community would take Taiwan’s part (and thus the US’) in a conflict with China, it is constructive to consider Taiwan’s ambiguous political position. The fact that most states do not recognise Taiwan as a separate political entity from China suggests that there would not be a rush to Taiwan’s aid. The US would nevertheless seek to adhere to international law in a limited war defending Taiwan- perhaps more so than in a general war with China, which would be something of a paradox given Taiwan’s general status as a non-state. This limited war might yet involve some attempt to disrupt China’s trade or other economic activity- but probably not a blockade, for the aforesaid reasons. The same politico-legal rationales would seem to apply in any instance in which the US took the military initiative, whatever China’s provocation. Indeed, the latter’s ‘salami-slicing’ strategy is effective in part because of its inherent legal and political ambiguities, which are not conducive to a consistent international response. Potential US abrogation of current international law in terms of the agreed definition of distant blockade, the legality of blockades adjacent to international straits and perhaps also the legal principle of effectiveness given regional trade

438 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China’, The RAN Corporation also underplays the significance of international pressure generally. Gompert et al, War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable, passim.

124 volumes all imply similarly the need for a significant measure of diplomatic support. None of these aspects of international law are in themselves preclusive of a US economic blockade of China, and the measures of recourse for disaffected states are limited. The US would want to keep as many states on-side as possible however. Therefore, as Mirski suggests, an economic blockade is best suited to a general war scenario, where both the political climate (within and outside the US) and protracted conflict render economic blockade more efficacious.439 The fact that such an intense, high-stakes conflict (as against a limited war) typically diminishes the role of international law means that the US might be paradoxically more likely to employ an economic blockade in the kind of war in which adherence to international law has historically been less geopolitically significant. Further, if an economic blockade can only be used in general war, it is possible that the political environment within the US will demand some attacks on the Chinese mainland in response to Chinese attacks on US military targets. US domestic politics could well play a pivotal role in strategy, just as demands (as well as realistic requirements) for an aggressive strategy caused the US to abandon General Scott’s passive encirclement of the Confederacy. A complementary maritime denial strategy against China- adding guerre de course to economic blockade- might therefore on its own not be effective enough strategically, or sufficiently pro-active in domestic political terms, though it might perhaps be a useful peacetime deterrent. Yet concepts like ASB are not as distinct from distant or far economic blockade as they might appear. While the latter might be partially effective on its own, history suggests that this would be a poor choice for the US in both strategic and political terms. Economic blockades have functioned best as minor-strategies complementary to the primary theatre, although this could in theory be reversed. This is Heinegg’s ‘strategic’ (military) manifestation of economic blockade, which undermines the state’s ability to finance and maintain operations. This is only useful however if there are significant Chinese military operations to be resourced. Perhaps most significant is the dimension of economic blockade that sees it place stress upon already problematic structural economic and governance issues within the blockaded state. China appears to share some of these weaknesses, which renders it analogous to the Continental System, the Confederacy and Imperial Germany, and in force structure terms it suffers certain key limitations, as did Imperial Japan between 1941 and 1945. If the US were indeed able to address a complex political and legal context, it is perhaps this aspect of a potential US strategy of economic blockade- the ability to play upon existing structural vulnerabilities- that should most give China pause.

439 Mirski, 'Stranglehold: The Context, Conduct and Consequences of an American Naval Blockade of China', p. 320.

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