On Tuesday, the United States Navy sent a guided missile destroyer into the South China Sea in response to the Chinese building of an airstrip on a disputed island. The Navy destroyer got to within 12 miles of the island when it was met by Chinese warships and fighter aircraft. The artificial islands, the Pentagon believes, are just part of a military expansionist program by the Chinese and it wants the Chinese to know that the United States will continue to dispute the Chinese claims.
The Chinese sent three warships of their own along with the three fighter planes sent to monitor the American destroyer. The Americans made their presence felt and then retreated quietly from the area. The United States Navy continued to assert that it’s navy will sail anywhere in the world that it wants to and will defend itself if necessary.
The US Navy destroyer got within the 12 miles of the Fiery Cross Reef that happens to also be claimed as territory by Vietnam, Taiwan, and the Philippines. Just several months past, the reef was little more than a small rocky island. Since, the Chinese have built up the island into a formidable fortress with an airstrip and a port which is part of a small chain of six artificial islands that the Chinese have been developing.
The American ship was challenged because the Chinese proclaimed that the vessel entered into Chinese territorial waters without permission. A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry declared that, “The American naval vessel threatened China’s sovereignty, security and interests, and it harmed the safety and the interests of the people and the facilities in the island damaging regional stability.”
The Chinese claim that they are fortifying the islands in the South China Sea as a defensive measure and that it is American arrogance that is causing the instability in the area. President Obama plans a trip next month to Vietnam and the situation is sure to come up. The Navy postures that the area is disputed territory that is claimed by several nations and that the free navigation of international waters must be defended and maintained.
PHOTO CREDIT: The Washington Post