China's SCS Strategy Thread

Also small countries simply cannot go up against China mano-to-mano, too mentally draining. During Oil rig incidence, Vietnam emotion ran wild, burning factory and riot on the brink of collapse. Vietnam cannot afford society break down like that. But anytimes it goes against China, its people can't help but emotionally exploded. So, better tone down and keep the society running.
Same thing with Philippines, past few years, the tension consumes filipinoes. They were emotionally charged. The small countries have to diffuse or else they can't function normally and that's why Duerte 180 degree change. They had enough.

China is big, things like that doesn't affect the general population that much emotionally.

If south korea wants to play this game, I wonder how long they can keep this up before emotionally wasted even if US fully on its side.

China was tough on philippines, banned its main export, fruits and told its people not to go to philippines and stopped all investment there. I have yet to see that happen to Japan and South Korea. I want to see what kind of effects there are. I bet same thing happened, Abe and Park will come down.

tidalwave said:

China needs to setup one carrier strike group in Hainan and another one in Paracel.

When US ship coming to Woody island to do FON, it will surrounded by the carrier fleet and it will make it look punny and weak, like a lion walk into and surrounded by a herd of adult elephants.

It will look Funny.

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Whatever goals that the US wants to achieve with these FON operations -- I suppose the purposes are to impress and intimidate, the results are the opposite and counterproductive.

The targets to impress, primarily Philippines and Vietnam and other countries in the region, apparently are not convinced. Australia and Japan paid some lip services, but would not want to join the patrols.

The target to intimidate, obviously China, is far from being deterred. Instead, with every FON operation and passing day, China just seems to enhance her presence and tighten her grips in SCS. It used to be that if the USN did not announce it had made some FON operation in SCS, China wouldn't even know it - it didn't have the means or the need to know it. Now China has the means, and due to the US's high-profiled FON operations, it also has the need to follow and monitor the US ships as soon as they enter SCS. The latest FON operation, conducted by the USS Decatur, was closely followed and monitored by a 052B Destroyer (Guangzhou) and a 053III Frigate (Luoyang). The PLANAF have also recently deployed a regiment on the Yongxing Island in Parcel Islands.

The US can bring more ships to do FON, like a CVG occasionally, but then again, China appears to (the latter if true would likely to be put on hold now due to the recent Philippines' pivot to China policy). China has already built a carrier base in Hainan Island. So the question is how sustainable these FON operations would be for the US.

The key was Philippines. It appeared that the US was gradually getting back to have more permanent military bases in Philippines after the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) signed in 2014, which would make SCS patrols and FON operations much more regular and cost-effective.

I think the US will have to regroup and reexamine their pivot to Asia policy after the election. At a minimum, just relying on military means and shifting more and better weapons to the Asia Pacific would not likely to be very effective.

Blackstone said:

The crux of the argument isn't whatever baseline China filed with the UN, those don't matter at all when it comes to freedom of the sea lanes. As long as US or any other nations' ships stay outside of legal territorial waters, which means 12 miles for coasts and islands, 3 miles for submerged features, and 500 meters for artificial islands. Inside those limits, China has full sovereignty and outside of them China limited law enforcement jurisdiction, but no sovereignty. It's that simple.

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Technically how does the US define the 12 miles from coast and island? that is the crux of the argument. Territorial Water is technically and legally define by the baseline submitted to UNCLOS and not some so-called think tank paid for by the US government. Anyone can create an agency the make arbitrary claims with no legal basis.

So going the the original post. The US acted illegally based on China's Defense Ministry and based on international law as defined by UNCLOS, Only excuse for US is it is not a signatory to UNCLOS and can arbitrarily claims without consequences. As had already been said before, just stirring the pot and making trouble,

Dolcevita said:

So going the the original post. The US acted illegally based on China's Defense Ministry and based on international law as defined by UNCLOS, Only excuse for US is it is not a signatory to UNCLOS and can arbitrarily claims without consequences. As had already been said before, just stirring the pot and making trouble,

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Of course the US is not "stirring the pot", it simply does not recognize China's claim to these islands, and wants to make sure China understands this point. That China currently administratively controls them is irrelevant to the US's lack of recognition of these islands as belonging to China. Why is this so hard to understand? China is doing the EXACT same thing with the DYT territorial seas, i.e. failing to recognize Japan's claim to the islands, and wants to make sure Japan understands this point. This is all a part of the new Great Game being played out in the SCS, and it should be shocking to absolutely nobody.

Dolcevita said:

Technically how does the US define the 12 miles from coast and island? that is the crux of the argument. Territorial Water is technically and legally define by the baseline submitted to UNCLOS and not some so-called think tank paid for by the US government. Anyone can create an agency the make arbitrary claims with no legal basis.

So going the the original post. The US acted illegally based on China's Defense Ministry and based on international law as defined by UNCLOS, Only excuse for US is it is not a signatory to UNCLOS and can arbitrarily claims without consequences. As had already been said before, just stirring the pot and making trouble,

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Not sure how the 12mi limit is defined in all cases, but that doesn't matter with USS Decatur's recent legal FONOP in the Parcels. I say that because US claimed the single DDG in question was outside 12mi limit of land features, and China didn't contradict it. The bottom line is current international laws and norms allow FON operations by foreign military vessels in host countries EEZ; that's what Beijing doesn't like, but it's the argument between China and most of the world.

Thing is, China will probably adopt the world's view on FONOPS as its navy increasingly play in the world's waterways.

Iron Man said:

Of course the US is not "stirring the pot", it simply does not recognize China's claim to these islands, and wants to make sure China understands this point. That China currently administratively controls them is irrelevant to the US's lack of recognition of these islands as belonging to China. Why is this so hard to understand? China is doing the EXACT same thing with the DYT territorial seas, i.e. failing to recognize Japan's claim to the islands, and wants to make sure Japan understands this point. This is all a part of the new Great Game being played out in the SCS, and it should be shocking to absolutely nobody.

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China claims DYT islands as its own. Therefore, when it enters the area, it is asserting a sovereignty claim.

What claim is the US asserting when conducting its FONOP? That these islands belong to no state?

That is a far more troublesome claim than simply claiming sovereignty, as it is effectively saying that the US has the right to determine what is or is not the territory of other nations, even when it has no horse in the race.

Blackstone said:

Not sure how the 12mi limit is defined in all cases, but that doesn't matter with USS Decatur's recent legal FONOP in the Parcels. I say that because US claimed the single DDG in question was outside 12mi limit of land features, and China didn't contradict it. The bottom line is current international laws and norms allow FON operations by foreign military vessels in host countries EEZ; that's what Beijing doesn't like, but it's the argument between China and most of the world.

Thing is, China will probably adopt the world's view on FONOPS as its navy increasingly play in the world's waterways.

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Some thoughts on the matter.

- Even though this time it was outside 12 NM of Triton, did the Decatur simply sail through or did it conduct any surveillance activity?

- For the Paracels, there is additional conflict of interpretation of those waters because China drew up baselines around the islands and regards waters within those baselines as archipelagic waters. This would be a whole another can of worms.

- The term FON gets used a lot but does international law explicitly spell out allowing one state to conduct military intelligence in another State's EEZ? UNCLOS is vague on this notion and it's articles sometimes contradict with one another as it tries to establish coastal states' rights vs freedom of navigation.

Perhaps the US FON operations would receive less attention if either FON operations against Chinese claims get less press or FON operations against other nations including allies get more press. Otherwise, it simply appears to be a "poke you in the eye" maneuver.

Supposedly the July tribunal ruling made Itu Aba and anything less not qualify for an EEZ. If Chinese fishing fleets started to fish within 200 NM of Okinotori or Howland Island, would either of these nations respect "international law"?

Blackstone said:

That's the view of China, India, and a sizable minority of nations, and there are some merits to it. However, most of the world currently align with US view on FONs, including Russia.
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Blackstone said:

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The bottom line is current international laws and norms allow FON operations by foreign military vessels in host countries EEZ; that's what Beijing doesn't like, but it's the argument between China and most of the world.

Thing is, China will probably adopt the world's view on FONOPS as its navy increasingly play in the world's waterways.

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Those are false assertions of majority and consensus interpretation regarding allowing military FON or in general unquestioned foreign military activity within EEZs. At best that is a minority interpretation by interventionist countries which is difficult to challenge short of conflict as it is an "activist" position.

joshuatree said:

Some thoughts on the matter.

- Even though this time it was outside 12 NM of Triton, did the Decatur simply sail through or did it conduct any surveillance activity?
I
- For the Paracels, there is additional conflict of interpretation of those waters because China drew up baselines around the islands and regards waters within those baselines as archipelagic waters. This would be a whole another can of worms.

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don't know if the USS Decatur simply sailed through or conducted surveillance activities, and it doesn't matter, because both are legal, as long as the ship stays outside 12 mile limit for islands, 3 miles limit for submerged features, and 500 meters for artificial islands. That's the bottom line.

- The term FON gets used a lot but does international law explicitly spell out allowing one state to conduct military intelligence in another State's EEZ? UNCLOS is vague on this notion and it's articles sometimes contradict with one another as it tries to establish coastal states' rights vs freedom of navigation.

Perhaps the US FON operations would receive less attention if either FON operations against Chinese claims get less press or FON operations against other nations including allies get more press. Otherwise, it simply appears to be a "poke you in the eye" maneuver.

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International law doesn't expressly prohibit surveillance activities in another country's EEZ, nor does it authorize it. But, current global norm is intelligence gathering in the EEZ is OK. Of course, China is free to take US to the International Permanent Arbitration Court, if it feels the rules are not clear.

Supposedly the July tribunal ruling made Itu Aba and anything less not qualify for an EEZ. If Chinese fishing fleets started to fish within 200 NM of Okinotori or Howland Island, would either of these nations respect "international law"?

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Not sure what would happen should China do what you said, but it would be an interesting day.

PanAsian said:

Those are false assertions of majority and consensus interpretation regarding allowing military FON or in general unquestioned foreign military activity within EEZs. At best that is a minority interpretation by interventionist countries which is difficult to challenge short of conflict as it is an "activist" position.

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It is current international norm, and reason say status quo rules until it is successfully challenged and a new status quo established. All the shouting we hear from Beijing are attempts to change the rules for itself. Time will tell which camp wins the argument.