If Beijing can claim South China Sea, US can call Pacific ‘American Sea’, says Clinton in leaked speech
US presidential candidate says in WikiLeaks excerpts that Chinese have a right to assert themselves but Washington needs to push back
US presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton has said the US could claim the Pacific Ocean as an “American Sea” if China claims all of the South China Sea, according to excerpts of her speech contained in hacked emails revealed by WikiLeaks.
In a speech the Democratic candidate gave to bankers from Goldman Sachs in October 2013, she said the Chinese “have a right to assert themselves” in the South China Sea but the US needed to “push back” to keep Beijing from getting a “chokehold over world trade”.
“You can’t hold that against them. They have the right to assert themselves,” Clinton said in the speech.
“But if nobody’s there to push back to create a balance, then they’re going to have a chokehold on the sea lanes and also on the countries that border the South China Sea.”
In the speech given eight months after her resignation as US secretary of state, Clinton reportedly told the audience that China “basically wants to control” all of the South China Sea, which includes the world’s busiest trade routes.