Nine years ago, during an interview with BBC journalist about the situation in the South China Sea, I expressed my opinion about it, which soon was published in Vietnamese under the following title: “China’s long-range strategy?". The question mark at the end of the title was added by the BBC, because my opinion, “This is only a small step in China’s long-term strategy. That strategy is very clear: to establish control over East Asia, initially indirectly and then directly”, seemed too radical to them at that time. Nowadays, China’s strategy in East Asia is relatively clear to most political analysts, but the strategy of Asian countries vis-à-vis this challenge is still under question. In order to understand the main trends of the security situation, we should consider the South China Sea conflict in the context of the developing geopolitical situation in Eurasia.