Beijing bests Manila in a naval standoff, worrying its neighbors.

Contributing to the Center for New American Security's Flashpoints: Security in the East and South China Seas, Michael Auslin writes on increasing tensions in the East China Sea and offers policy considerations.

There are five broad trends leading to greater instability in the South China Sea in the coming years. These are the failure of UNCLOS--or the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea--a weakening of ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations), China's evolving South China Sea policy, Southeast Asian military modernization, and a hollowing out of the U.S. military.

Tensions in the South China Sea have been on the rise following a number of incidents at sea and tough rhetoric among the claimants to the sea's waters and islands.

American policy makers need to recognize they're playing a different game from the Chinese and adjust their strategy. While shifting to billiards is too provocative for Washington, if trends continue, it may soon find itself behind the eight ball with few options for maintaining its stabilizing role in the region.

China has recently begun building oil rigs and conducting military exercises in disputed territorial waters. This has threatened its neighbors and raises questions about Chinese intentions.

Ever since its founding in 1948, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has maintained an aggressive and bellicose international security posture. Today, fully two decades after the end of the Cold War, North Korea's external defense and security policies look arguably more extreme and anomalous than ever.