When Singapore's Terrexes were detained in Hong Kong, many jumped at the opportunity to chastise Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong for apparently pissing the Chinese off (this development is important and we'll come back to it later).

He spoke about the need to uphold the rule of international law on several occasions (including during National Day Rally 2016 and his visit to Japan) prior to the Terrex incident.

The timing of his comments - on the back of the South China Sea Arbitration ruling in favour of The Philippines - was seen by some as directed squarely at China.

Coffeeshop talk was that the detaining of the Terrexes was China's response.

Why did PM Lee poke the panda multiple times?

Due to the timing of arbitration results and PM Lee's comments about upholding the rule of international law, many people naturally drew connections between the two matters.

It was hard to imagine anything else particularly after the drama at the 17th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in September 2016 where Singapore along with the other ASEAN countries had wanted to update the NAM Final Outcome Document's portion on ASEAN's position on the South China Sea - again it would seem that it was on the back of South China Sea Arbitration ruling.

China's Global Times falsely accused Singapore of being the sole instigator of wanting the update. This was refuted by Singapore. Unfortunately, the false report cemented the narrative for many regular folk (in China and Singapore) that Singapore was out to make things difficult for China.

As a consequence, it was hard for the regular Singaporean to understand why there was a constant mentioning of the need to uphold the rule of international law, only if it was meant to stick it to China.

The question then is why would Singapore repeatedly bang the drums of international law seemingly in China's face?

Because Pedra Branca and other stuff

International law is what ensured that Singapore retained control of Pedra Branca, a small island that is part of Singapore. Malaysia decided that it had sovereign rights over it based on its claim that it was territory claimed by the Johor-Riau Sultanate in the 1500s. In 1979, it published a map including the island as part of the country.

The matter was brought to court in 2003 and in 2008 the island was ruled in favour of Singapore.

The fallout would have been bad if Singapore had to assert its sovereign right over Pedra Branca using military means instead of going to court.

Beyond Pedra Branca, there are other things in the neighbourhood that Singapore can fall back on international law for.

Two things come to mind immediately - Singapore's water agreement with Malaysia, and Singapore's administration of airspace near Indonesia's Riau.

Again, international laws and the adherence to rules is preferred when handling differences of interpreting agreements with our neighbours.

Malaysia's latest claim on Pedra Branca

Malaysia's latest claim comes at an interesting time. On the surface, it is based on British documents which were only declassified last year.

Interestingly, Malaysia is due for elections this year. The cynical rhetoric on social media was that this issue was being used to drum up votes via nationalistic fervour.

If one were to be even more cynical, it could be speculated that the re-opening of the Pedra Branca case is one of Malaysia trying to reciprocate China's help by making things difficult for Singapore.

We can look to news in late-2016 of Malaysia turning to China for help in bailing it out from debt obligations resulting from 1MDB.

Chinese state-owned China General Nuclear Power Corp bought 1MDB's Edra Global Energy Bhd in Nov for US$2.3 billion. In Dec, China Railway Construction Corp bought 60 per cent stake in 1MDB’s property project known as Bandar Malaysia for US$1.7 billion.

Malaysia Prime Minister Najib Razak who went to China on a state visit in Nov, brought back with him US$34 billion worth of economic deals.

Coffeeshop talk in Malaysia and here in Singapore can only get more colourful after this latest development.

Singaporeans fared poorly in the 'closing ranks' test

Throughout the Terrex incident, anecdotal encounters with higher-ranked civil servants and observations of social media posts of establishment intelligentsia show that they were closing ranks and backing the establishment.

However that could not be said of the general populace.

If people were to believe that the Terrexes were indeed held in Hong Kong because China was pulling strings, they should have been extremely indignant, or be feeling rather nationalistic.

Except most of them chose to chastise the Singapore establishment instead of 'closing ranks' behind it.

Also, Singaporean businessmen in China who faced increasing pressure from the Chinese in turn put the pressure on the leaders in Singapore - this was said as much during PM Lee's NDR speech in 2016. It seems that company bottom lines trumped a country's interest.

The lack of a strong core Singaporean identity could be the reason for such a weak response from Singaporeans - on top of not understanding why Singapore continues to champion the rule of international law.

Singapore's leaders were probably caught between a rock and a hard place. If they had made comments to galvanise Singaporeans into a stronger response, the Terrex issue would have escalated beyond what Singaporean and Chinese leaders could possibly control - yes, even in China rising nationalism can be problematic.

However, without a show of strong leadership, or at least quotable quotes by Singapore's leaders throughout the Terrex issue, it was a missed chance to build resilience among Singaporeans. Diplomacy was favoured over the morale of Singaporeans. Getting Singaporeans to close ranks need not necessarily mean having to make an enemy out of China.

One can only wonder how Singaporeans would react the next time they are required to close ranks again.

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