 said: 'The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single dash line'. Recent Chinese activities in the South China Sea and Beijing's claims of 'indisputable sovereignty' inside the nine-dash line of China's unilateral making show every sign of them taking this mantra seriously. The latest Chinese stunt was to place a buoyed net around the Scarborough shoal to prevent Filipino fishing there. Almost immediately the Philippine coast guard dismantled it but the minute their fishing boats returned they were aggressively intercepted by the Chinese Coast Guard. In terms of violating internationally recognised laws this is the equivalent of the Danes coming across to the Dogger Bank in the North Sea, throwing a net barrier around it and claiming we, the Dutch and the Germans were no longer allowed to fish there. It would be absurd if it wasn't so serious. If it's not the Scarborough Shoal today then it's the Second Thomas Shoal tomorrow where Beijing repeatedly and aggressively intervenes in Manila's attempts to shore up and resupply the BRP Sierra Madre , the ageing ship deliberately grounded there for use as a base allowing the Phillipines to enforce their rights within their own Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). China claims its activities there are defensive in nature although it is hard to remember the last time a high-powered laser was used to blind someone defensively. Also, objecting to a rusting ship's presence seems cheeky given that China has built dozens of runways in the middle of the sea, each with military infrastructure and advanced anti-ship and anti-aircraft missile systems installed. Taiwan continues to see a huge increase in military activity . This month alone has seen over 100 aircraft incursions across the median line in the Taiwanese Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ). The UK scrambles Typhoon fighter jets to intercept the Russians when they do this with one aircraft. October sees the seasonally calmes){kind=link}
One day we’ll wake up, the maps will be different and there’ll be nothing we can do
The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu once (nearly) said: “The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single dash line”.
Recent Chinese activities in the South China Sea and Beijing’s claims of “indisputable sovereignty” inside the nine-dash line of China’s unilateral making show every sign of them taking this mantra seriously.
The latest Chinese stunt was to place a buoyed net around the Scarborough shoal to prevent Filipino fishing there. Almost immediately the Philippine coast guard dismantled it but the minute their fishing boats returned they were aggressively intercepted by the Chinese Coast Guard.
In terms of violating internationally recognised laws this is the equivalent of the Danes coming across to the Dogger Bank in the North Sea, throwing a net barrier around it and claiming we, the Dutch and the Germans were no longer allowed to fish there. It would be absurd if it wasn’t so serious.