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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsChina raises the stakes in their South China Sea territory theft :
January 22, 2021:
"China enacted a new law authorizing their navy and coast guard to use lethal force to protect Chinese coastal waters, including those that are disputed by nations. In other words, Chinese coast guard and navy vessel commanders have the authority to open fire on trespassers, even when international courts have declared it is the Chinese who are trespassing. That was the case with the Philippines, which brought the issue to an international court with jurisdiction. In 2016 that United Nation recognized Permanent Court of Arbitration ruled against China and stated that occupying uninhabitable rocks and building artificial islands did not confer an EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zone). Ownership of rocks gets you, at best 22 kilometers of territorial waters from the edge of each rock rather than 360 kilometers for EEZ rights. At first the U.S. merely called for China to comply with the court ruling, something China said it would not do even before the court completed its deliberations. The Americans did continue to carry out aerial and naval FONOPs with warships to assert the right of innocent passage. This annoyed the Chinese, who claimed most of the South China Sea was under Chinese control and no foreign ship or aircraft could enter without permission. China has been claiming areas long recognized as belonging to Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and the Philippines. That has caused all these nations, plus the United States, Japan and South Korea to form an alliance to halt Chinese aggression. Until the new permission to open fire law, Chinese armed coast guard and navy vessels had only been used to intimidate trespassers and have never opened fire. There has been violence in the form of bumping or even ramming trespassers. This has led to the countries being threatened to send their own warships to defend their territory. Until now this would usually cause the Chinese warships to back off. But the new low allows Chinese captains to order crews to prepare for combat and use the fire control radars to concentrate on possible targets. In the Chinese playbook this means the Chinese want to goad someone else to open fire first, which would make China the designated victim (according to Chinese media) and justified in unleashing violent and probably overwhelming retaliation."
https://strategypage.com/qnd/phillip/articles/20210208.aspx
Been reading chatter for a few months now on the increase of China's sabre rattling.
It's an increasingly tense situation & not sure how far China is willing to push their might.
A battle in the S China Sea is the last thing we need right now.
Or ever.
EndlessWire
(6,570 posts)that China has a ridiculous notion that they own the sea right up to the shoreline of other countries. They said that because it is called the "South China Sea" they own it.
China is pushing this too far.
EX500rider
(10,872 posts)Wounded Bear
(58,721 posts)bluecollar2
(3,622 posts)As a "7th fleet cold war veteran" I understand the dynamics.
In the past we'd have a bipartisan united understanding of how to respond...
Since the tea party took over the GQP we're on our own